THE INFLUENCE OF TOBACCO UPON BREATHING.
A FEW weeks ago, while conversing with one of the trainers connected with an athletic club, a stalwart young man, observing that the gentleman smoked, remarked that he thought smoking was hardly consistent with the highest degree of physical development. Said the athlete: “You are certainly right. I am aware of this fact, and I do not believe in smoking. I gave up smoking three years ago, having noticed its injurious effects, and I have only recently returned to the habit. I am going to relinquish it.” Wishing to obtain information from a practical observer respecting the influence of tobacco upon physical endurance, he asked, “What evidence have you that tobacco injures you?” The prompt reply was:— “Tobacco at once impairs the wind.” “Do you find that after smoking a single cigar your breathing capacity is diminished?” “Certainly. After having smoked a cigar I can not run or engage in violent exercise without getting out of breath. I learned long ago that I must never smoke before engaging in a boxing or fencing bout or any other vigorous exercise.” “Have you noticed the same effect in others?” “O, yes, it is universally the case. I have always noticed that men who smoke before they go on the running track in the gymnasium are out of breath after they have made two or three laps, while the same men, if they abstain from smoking before exercising, have good wind.” The fact that tobacco weakens a man's wind and lessens his endurance, affords the best positive proof that it must shorten his life; for the power to live long means simply the power to endure long the physical strains and emergencies to which the body must be continually subjected during life. No man who cares to live long and well, can afford to smoke or use tobacco in any form.—Good Health.