III. Health and Physical Development

The value of good health and strength in the making of a career and in the enjoyment of life is incalculable. That is pretty obvious. As a matter of education one may take it to be of greater value than “book-learning” and almost as valuable as “character.” Yet in our present system of education in Great Britain it comes a very long way after “book-learning,” while “character” is left out altogether.

Our system is exactly upside down.

Education authorities and school teachers generally recognise this and are doing their best, under the circumstances, until the right system comes round for them, as it will do—some day. Meantime, we in the Scout Movement can do a great deal to help the school authorities by giving to the boys some of the training in health and personal hygiene which is so essential to their efficiency as citizens. Our great aim is to show the lad the best way of developing his strength and health, and what errors he should avoid, and to teach him to be Personally Responsible to Himself for His Health.

In Chapter IV. of Scouting for Boys I have dealt with this subject, and I would especially commend the introductory remarks of that chapter to close study by the Scoutmasters, as showing the very urgent national need for such education. They are unfortunately as true to-day as they were when first written ten years ago. The hygenic questions of food, clothing, sobriety, cleanliness, and chastity are touched upon, and also the minor but important details of development, and care of body, eyes, ears, nose, teeth, nails, etc. But I will in these notes give a few more ideas for consideration on these points.

I feel that, thanks to their innate love of sport, a great deal of the physical training is not difficult to get into practice among the boys. And I know that young men of the present day are inclined to treat their bodies to a good deal of physicking, so that it should not be a hopeless task to get them also to listen to idea on that subject.

I would further commend again to the attention of Scoutmasters the book of lectures entitled The Scoutmasters’ Training Course (London), of which four bear on the subject of this paper, viz. :

“Continence,” by Dr. Schofield. “Physical Exercises,” by Dr. Wallis. “Health and Food,” by Eustace Miles. “Swimming,” by H. R. Austin.

And The Scoutmasters’ Training Course (2nd series).

Training the Boy’s Character, by Alex. Devine. Also that excellent book by Dr. Schofield and Dr. Vaughan-Jackson, What a Boy Should Know (Cassell, 2s.).

And those who can get the Annual Report (price 2s. 6d.), by Sir George Newman, Chief Medical Officer of the Board of Education, will find it interesting and suggestive.

Now, in continuation of my previous method of tabulating the points of the subjects to show how they can be got through Scouting, I submit the following:

Health and Strength

C3 Men and an Ai Empire

Physical education is not the same as physical training, but is badly needed to remedy the above weakness in our nation.

In recruiting our great modern army, recruiting returns have shown what has consistently been pointed out in Scouting for Boys—namely, that there is an immense percentage of unfit men among our citizens who, with reasonable care and understanding, could have been healthy efficient beings.

Sir George Newman, in his most valuable report on the health of our school children, shows that one in every five suffer from defects that will prevent them from being efficient in after-life—defects, mind you, which might have been prevented.

These returns are immensely suggestive, and point at once to the need and the remedy ; if we took the boys in time tens of thousands could be saved every year to become strong and capable citizens instead of dragging out a miserable semi-efficient existence.

It is a matter of national as well as individual importance.

There is consequently much talk of developing the physical training of the rising generation on a much more general basis, and in this direction lies a tremendous opening for our work.

But I want to warn Scoutmasters against being led by this cry on to the wrong tack.

You know from our diagram on page 18 how and why Character and Physical Health are our two main aims in Scouting, and also the steps by which we endeavour to gain them.

But bear in mind physical health is not necessarily the result of a physical drill.

With a number of our men coming back from the Army where they have gone through the excellent scheme of Swedish drill and other forms of physical training, and have seen its practical effects upon themselves and on weedy fellow recruits, they will necessarily feel that this is the very thing that is wanted in Scout training, and that by their experience they are the very men to apply it.

I would say hang on for a minute and think. They would be quite right up to a point.

The physical training given in the Army has been carefully thought out, and is excellent for those who have never had proper physical development as boys. It is suited to the more formed muscular system of the man, and soldiers improve tremendously under this intensive form of training.

But it is entirely artificial, designed to make up for what has not been naturally acquired.

God didn’t invent physical “jerks,” The Zulu warrior, splendid specimen though he is, never went through Swedish drill. Even the ordinary boy, who has played football and has kept himself fit by training exercises between whiles, seldom needs physical drill to develop him afterwards.

It is good open-air games, hiking and camping, and healthy feeding coupled with adequate rest which bring to the boy health and strength in a natural and not an artificial way.

Nobody will disagree with this. It is quite simple in theory, but in its practice we find some few difficulties to overcome.

Your city boy or the factory hand who is at work all day cannot get out to play games in the open. The outdoor worker and country boy should by right have a better chance since he lives more in the open air, but it is seldom that even a country boy knows how to play a game, or even how to run!

When inspecting Scouts, Comissioners make a point of seeing them run in single file, when time and space allow, in addition to merely walking down the line themselves to look at the boys’ faces and their dress.

They do this in order to judge to what extent the lads have been physically trained by their Scoutmaster. The running tells its own tale.

It is perfectly astonishing to see how few boys are able to run.

The natural, easy light step comes only with the practice of running. Without it the poor boy develops either the slow heavy plod of the clod-hopper or the shuffling paddle of the city man (and what a lot of character is conveyed in the gait of a man!).

Organised Games.—The practice of running is best inculcated through games and sport.

A usual objection raised is that the poorer boys don’t care about games—can’t play them.

This is mainly because they have never been taught or encouraged. They very soon get keen when shown how, and through good team games you can not only train them physically but morally as well.

The foreigner’s criticism of Englishmen is that they make games their fetish.

With the public schoolboy this is to a certain extent true, and if you look at it from the purely physical point of view, the result is not so bad.

But with his poorer brother the fetish takes the form of looking on and betting on games.

This is where we in the Scouts can come in. We can show him how to be a player of games, and so to enjoy life and at the same time to strengthen his physical as well as his moral fibre.

Football, baseball, basketball, paper-chases, swimming and Scout games are to my mind the best form of physical education, because most of them bring in moral education as well, and most of them are inexpensive and do not require well-kept grounds, apparatus, etc.

Physical Jerks—Physical exercises or “jerks” are an intensive form of development where you cannot get good or frequent opportunity of games, and may well be used in addition to games, provided that:

1. They are not made entirely a drill, but something that each boy can really understand and want to practise for himself because of the good that he knows it does him.
2. The instructor has some knowledge of anatomy and the possible harm of many physical drill movements on the young unformed body.

Games having physical as well as moral values are being more and more taught in our Army gymnasia, and our returning soldiers can give valuable help in bringing these into play in our Scout clubrooms so long as they do not overtax immature boys.

To the same end I am telling the boys in the Scout how to get up amateur clown stunts.

Anything to get the boy to interest himself in steadily exercising his body and limbs, and in practising difficult feats with pluck and patience until he masters them.

Then a team uniform of sorts is an attraction to the boys, promotes esprit de corps in his athletic work, and incidentally involves changing his clothes before and after playing, encourages a rub down - a wash - cleanliness.

“How to keep fit,” soon becomes a subject in which the athletic boy takes a close personal interest, and can be formed the basis of valuable instruction in self-care, food values, hygiene, continence, temperance, etc., etc. All this means physical education.

Oxygen for Ox’s Strength.—I saw some very smart physical drill by a Scout Troop quite recently in their dub headquarters.

It was very fresh and good, but, my wig, the air was not! It was, to say the least, “niffy.” There was no ventilation. The boys were working like engines, but actually undoing their work all the time by sucking in poison instead of strengthening their blood.

Fresh air is half the battle towards producing results in physical exercises and it may advantageously be taken through the skin as well as through the nose when possible.

Yes—that open air is the secret of success. It is what Scouting is for—viz., to develop the out-of-doors habit as much as possible.

I asked a Scoutmaster not long ago, in a great city, how he managed his Saturday hikes, whether in the park or in the country?

He did not have them at all. Why not? Because his boys did not care about them. They preferred to come into the clubroom on Saturday afternoons!

Of course they preferred it, poor little beggars; they are accustomed to being indoors. But that is what we are out to prevent in the Scouts-our object is to wean them from indoors and to make the outdoors attractive to them.

“If I were King.“—Alexandre Dumas fils has written: “If I were King of France I wouldn’t allow any child of under twelve years to come into a town. Till then the youngsters would have to live in the open-out in the sun, in the fields, in the woods, in company with dogs and horses, face to face with nature, which strengthens the bodies, lends intelligence to the understanding, gives poetry to the soul, and rouses in them a curiosity which is more valuable to education than all the grammar books in the world.

“They would understand the noises as well as the silences of the night; they would have the best of religions—that which God himself reveals in the glorious sight of His daily wonders.

“And at twelve years of age, strong, high-minded, and full of understanding, they would be capable of receiving the methodical instruction which it would then be right to give them, and whose inculcation would then be easily accomplished in four or five years.

“Unfortunately for the youngsters, though happily for France, I don’t happen to be King.

“All that I can do is to give the advice and to suggest the way. The way is—make physical education of the child a first step in its life.”

Camp Grounds.—It would be difficult not to agree with Alexandre Dumas, especially in the light of the reports of the recruiting officers and of Sir George Newman (which everybody ought to read).

In the Scouts especially, if we adhere to our proper métier, we ought to make a big step in this direction.

To you who are Scout Presidents and Patrons, as well as to Local Associations, here is a special opportunity.

We want open-air space, grounds of our own, preferably permanent camp grounds easily accessible for the use of Scouts. As the Movement grows these should form regular institutions at all centres of Scouting.

As Army huts become available funds should, in the meantime, have been saved up for buying them to be re-erected as permanent camps. Can you not do this?

Besides serving this great purpose such camps would have a double value. They could form centres of instruction for officers, where they could receive training in camp craft and Nature lore, and above all could imbibe the spirit of the out-of-doors-the Brotherhood of the Backwoods.

This is the real objective of Scouting, and the key to its success.

With too much town life we are apt to underlook our aims and revert to type.

We are not a brigade—nor a Sunday School—but a school of the woods. We must get more into the open for the health, whether of the body or the soul, of Scout and of Scoutwaster.

Temperance.—Temperate eating is almost as necessary with the boy as temperate drinking with the man. It is a good lesson in self-restraint for him to curb his appetite, both as regards the quantity and the nature of his food-few have fathomed the extent of a boy’s capacity when it comes to tucking away food of whatever variety. The aim to be held out to him is fitness for athletics.

Temperance thus becomes a moral as well as physical detail of training.

Continence.—Of all the points in the education of a boy the most difficult and one of the most important is that of sex hygiene. Body, mind, and soul, health, morality, and character, all are involved in the question. It is a matter which has to be approached with tact on the part of the Scoutmaster, according to the individual character of each case. It is not as yet dealt with adequately by the Education authorities. But it is one that cannot be ignored in the education of a boy, still less in that of the girl.

There is a great barrier of prejudice and false prudery on the part of parents and public still to be overcome, and this has to be recognised and handled tactfully. It is, of course, primarily the duty of parents to see that their children receive proper instruction, but a very large number of them shirk their duty and then build up excuses for doing so. Such neglect is little short of criminal.

As Dr. Allen Warner writes:—

“Fear has often been expressed in the past that such teaching will lead to vicious habits, but there is no evidence that this is true, whilst experience proves that ignorance on this subject has led to the moral and physical wreckage of many lives.”

This is only too true, and I can testify from a fairly wide experience among soldiers and others. The amount of secret immorality that is now prevalent is very serious indeed.

The very fact that the subject is taboo between the boy and grown-ups is provocative, and the usual result is that he gets his knowledge, in a most perverted form, from another boy.

In What a Boy Should Know, Drs. Schofield and Jackson write:—

“The sexual development of boys is gradual, and it is an unfortunate fact that habits of abuse are begun and constantly practised at a much younger age. If safety lies in the adage that ‘to be forewarned is to be forearmed,’ then boys must be told what is coming to them, for the critical period of puberty lies ahead of them, and no boy should be allowed to reach it in ignorance.”

A Scoutmaster has here a tremendous field for good. He must in the first instance ascertain whether the father of the boy has any objection to his talking to him on the subject.

Then he will best enter into it in a matter-of-fact way among other subjects on which he may be advising him, placing himself on the footing of an elder brother in doing so. To some Scoutmasters who have never done it the question seems a very difficult one to approach. It is in reality as easy as shelling peas. And the value of it cannot be exaggerated.

Personally, apart from explaining as a preliminary how plants, and fishes, and animals reproduce their species, I have found it appeal to boys, as it did to me when I first heard it, to tell them how in every boy is growing the germ of another child to come from him. That germ has been handed down to him from father to son from generations back. He has it in trust from God; it is his duty to keep it until he is married and passes it to his wife for reproduction. He cannot honourably forget his charge and throw it away in the meantime. Temptation will come to him in many forms to do so, but he has got to be strong and to guard it.

The actual details can be dealt with as in the books suggested in Chapter VI., Scouting for Boys.

But every different boy at each age may need a different way of treatment in the matter. The main thing is for the Scoutmaster to have the lad’s full confidence as a first step, and to be to him in the relation of an elder brother—where both can speak quite openly.

I know how greatly the boys need it. I know how grateful they are afterwards for the help. Even my very vague allusion to the subject in Scouting for Boys is continually bringing me letters of thanks from lads to whom it has appealed in time.

Non-Smoking.—Somebody once wrote an improved edition of Scouting for Boys, and in it he ordered that “Scouts are on no account to smoke.” It is generally a risky thing to order boys not to do a thing; it immediately opens to them the adventure of doing it contrary to orders.

Advise them against a thing, or talk of it as despicable or silly, and they will avoid it. I am sure this is very much the case in the matter of unclean talk, of gambling, of smoking, and other youthful faults.

It is well to establish a good tone and a public opinion among your boys on a plane which puts these things down as “what kids do, in order to look smart before others.”

Walking the Tight Rope.—This may strike some readers as a curious means of teaching self-discipline or health. But it has been found by experience to do so.

You may see it being practised in Army gymnasia in the form of men walking a plank fixed up sideways it a height of some feet above the floor. It is found that by getting them to concentrate their whole attention on this ticklish test, they gain a close hold over themselves and their nerves. The experiment has been carried further to the extent that it has been found that if a soldier is making bad practice on the rifle-range a few practices in “walking the plank” readily bring back for him the necessary self-control and power of concentration.

It is an exercise that appeals to boys. They can bind several Scout staves together as a balancing pole, which will give them additional power of balance in their first efforts.

Rifle Practice

So, too, marksmanship is an excellent means of physical and mental training for a boy. It interests him, strengthens his eyesight, and induces quiet, insistent concentration of mind, together with control of the nerves and thoughts.

Dr. Kerr, the Medical Officer to the Education Branch of the London County Council, wrote:—

“The powers of spontaneous action, self-respect, and moral esteem must be called into action in the boy. This is done in the secondary schools chiefly by games. The recently introduced ‘Boy Scouts’ have had an extraordinarily good effect in this direction.

“Also light rifle-shooting appears to be almost as powerful a factor in developing self-respect . . . it gives the boy something to strive for in attaining perfection.”

Physical Development Drill

One hears a great many people advocating drill as the way to bring about better physical development among boys. I have had a good deal to do with drilling in my time, and if people think they are going to develop a boy’s physical strength and set-up by drilling him for an hour a week, they will meet with disappointing results.

Drill as given to soldiers, day by day, for month after month, undoubtedly does bring about great physical development. But the instructors—these are well-trained experts—have their pupils continually under their charge and under strict discipline, and even they occasionally make mistakes, and heart-strain and other troubles are not infrequently produced even in the grown and formed man.

Furthermore, drill is all a matter of instruction, of hammering it into the boys, and is in no way an education where they learn it for themselves.

Colonel Petersen, the Director of Physical Training in Australia, had a talk with me on that subject, and told how much is being done in Australia and in foreign countries in that line, while we in England are very much behind-hand. But in no case does the Government rely upon compulsory cadet or soldiering to supply the physical training, although such service is prevalent in those countries; it is done entirely in the schools. And the teachers have to be trained experts with a proper knowledge of anatomy, otherwise the danger of overstrain for the children is very great.

As regards drill for Scouts, I have frequently had to remind Scoutmasters that it is to be avoided—that is, in excess. Apart from militarist objections on the part of some parents, one is averse to it because a second-rate Scoutmaster cannot see the higher aim of Scouting (namely, drawing out of the individual), and not having the originality to teach it even if he saw it, he reverts to drill as an easy means of getting his boys into some sort of shape for making a show on parade. At the same time, Scoutmasters occasionally go too far the other way, and allow their boys to go slack all over the place, without any apparent discipline or smartness. This is worse. You want a golden mean—just sufficient instruction to show them what is wanted of them in smartness and deportment, and a fund of esprit de corps, such as makes them brace themselves up and bear themselves like men for the honour of their Troop. Occasional drills are necessary to keep this up, but these should not be indulged in at the expense of the more valuable Scout training.

I know a very smart regiment in which the recruits received very little barrack-square drill; when once they had been shown how to hold themselves they were told that as soon as they could do it habitually they would be allowed to go out and take their pleasures and their duties as ordinary soldiers. It was “up to them” to smarten themselves up instead of having deportment drilled into them week after week for months. They drilled themselves and each other, and passed out of the recruit stage in less than half the ordinary time.

Education as opposed to instruction once more! The result was obtained by putting the ambition and responsibility on to the men themselves. And that is exactly the way by which, I believe, that you can best produce the physical development among boys.

But, after all, natural games, plenty of fresh air, wholesome food, and adequate rest do far more to produce well-developed healthy boys than any amount of physical or military drill.

Measurement Card.—With a view to promoting this sense of responsibility for his own physical development, we have published a card for the use of each boy. It gives the average size and weight for each year of age; the boy’s own measurements are recorded and compared, and if he does not come up to .the average in any one particular, tho Scoutmaster shows him which exercises he should take to build him up to supply the deficiency.

Swimming.—Denmark is perhaps the foremost country in the physical training of its rising generation. Norway and Sweden are not far behind. I have seen the remarkable proficiency of the children in swimming, which is there considered the best means to physical development. In Copenhagen are four large swimming schools. Each can accommodate from 1,000 to 1,500 children at a time. In Stockholm the ordinary schools have their swimming baths for the children, and practically every one of the pupils can swim as part of the scheme of education.

The advantages of swimming among many other forms of physical training are these:—

• The boy delights in it, and is keen to learn.
• He gets to enjoy cleanliness.
• He learns pluck in attaining the art.
• He gains self-confidence on mastering it.
• He develops his chest and breathing organs.
• He develops muscle.
• He gains the power of saving life and locks for opportunities of doing it.

Signalling.—Signalling practice, while it is educating the boy’s intelligence, is at the same time giving him valuable physical exercise hour after hour in body-twisting and arm-work, and in training the eye.

So, too, boat-rowing is an excellent muscle developer, and appeals very greatly to the Scout. It is only allowed after he has qualified in swimming, so induces a good lot of boys to train themselves in that line.

Body Exercises.—The six exercises given in Scouting for Boys (Chapter VI.) are all that are essential, for the reasons there stated. They can be taught without any danger to the lad by Scoutmasters who are not experts in anatomy, etc., and this is more than can be said of many other body exercises which are sometimes put into practice.

Health and Hygiene

Cleanliness.—Cleanliness inside as well as out, as described in Scouting for Boys (Chapter VI.), is of prime importance to health.

That rub down with a damp rough towel, where baths are impossible, is of very big importance to inculcate as a habit in your boys. Also, the habit of washing hands before a meal and after the daily rear. The need for scrupulous cleanliness may well be inculcated by the practice of “Kill that fly,” not merely as a useful public service which Scouts can perform, but also as a means of introducing them to the minuteness of disease-germs as conveyed on flies’ feet, and yet of such effect as to poison people.

Fresh Air.—I have drawn attention in Scouting for Boys to the value of breathing fresh air. Few people realise how poisonous is the air of a shut room or railway carriage where many are congregated.

Food is an all-important consideration for the growing lad, yet there is a vast amount of ignorance on the subject on the part of parents, and, therefore, on the part of the boys. It is helpful towards the energy and health of his boys—especially in camp—that the Scoutmaster should know something about the matter.

As regards quantity, a boy between thirteen and fifteen requires about 80 per cent of a man’s allowance. He will gladly put down 150 per cent if permitted.

The meal should be as simple and unmixed as possible, all vegetable (i.e. bread, oatmeal, vegetables, and fruit) or all animal (soup, meat, and cheese). The latter gives him the greater amount of protein to the ounce, and protein is the essential for body-building. The former gives him a greater amount of the natural salts needed. Cheese is for some indigestible though sustaining—if cooked it is much more easily assimilated.

Oatmeal is a grand food for boys. The Report of the National Food Inquiry Bureau gives results of inquiry among—

• 21,000 school children and Boy Scouts.
• 490 athletes.
• 547 medical men.
• 83 matrons of hospitals.
• 2,000 private families.

The very large proportion of these are strongly in favour of oatmeal as a good all-round food.

Eleven out of twelve athletes use it when training. Five hundred and fourteen out of the 547 doctors recommend it. One Boy Scout even writes poetry about it:

"I used to be so pale and thin,
  But now I'm fat and stout.
'Tis porridge that has changed me to
  A strong and healthy Scout."

Physically Defective Scouts.—Through Scouting there are numbers of crippled, deaf and dumb, and blind boys now gaining greater health, happiness and hope than they ever had before.

The reports we receive from medical officers and matrons in charge of them give me even greater pleasure than those recording big rallies or improvement in efficiency of the sound boys. The desire to obtain badges of proficiency seems to lead them on from one hobby to another with excellent results upon them, physically as well as morally.

It is astonishing what a number of badges crippled Scouts can take, and even for the blind the following are apparently not impossible:—Ambulance, Basketmaking, Bugler, Musician, Clerk, Interpreter, Master-at-Arms (Wrestling and Ju-jitsu), Pioneer, Poultry Farmer, Morse Signaller.

Scoutmasters can co-operate with Schoolmasters.—According to the Report of the Board of Education, the principal ills among school children are due to the following causes:—

Food-insufficiency and unsuitability, bad home surroundings and neglect, lack of fresh air and sunlight, unsuitable sleeping arrangements, insufficient sleep, employment out of school hours, want of cleanliness, unhealthy school conditions, congenital debility, disease (mouth-breathing, decayed teeth, adenoids, bronchitis, tuberculosis, heart disease, rheumatism, weakness).

Scoutmasters can in many cases help the schoolmasters in remedying these, and similarly schoolmasters can help Scoutmasters by informing them of results of the medical officer’s inspection of their boys as regards condition of heart, eyesight, hearing, teeth, etc. Working in co-operation in this way they should between them be able to do a great deal for the health of the lads under their charge.

From the Education Report one gathers that, of the children leaving school to take up work in the world :—

• 10 per cent. suffer from defective eyesight.
• 1 per cent. suffer from tuberculosis.
• 40 per cent. suffer from extensive decay of teeth (only about 10 per cent. have sound teeth).
• 3 per cent. suffer from deafness.
• 2 per cent. suffer from heart disease.

A large percentage of weaklings in our country could, if taken in hand in time by Scoutmasters and others, be developed into valuable citizens instead of becoming a misery to themselves and a burden to the nation. H. G. Wells describes Nelson as “a one-eyed, one-armed, fragile adulterer, prone to sea sickness.” So he may have been, but he had the robust courage of a wild boar, and he saved our country. General Wolfe was another weakling. Voltaire was thrown into a chair as dead when born, but his father accidentally sat down on him, and so revived him. Napoleon Bonaparte was another weakling as a child, and so was Theodore Roosevelt also, and many others who by exercise of their will and character afterwards overcame their physical defects and rose to be valuable men for their country.

Programme for Study Patrol

Subject III.—Physical Health