its into instincts. Within the last few weeks, I have
for the first time heard an Englishman say that he had eaten too much.
Doubtless this mistake does sometimes occur, but the fact that it puts
one at discredit to acknowledge it, is sufficient indication of the
popular feeling respecting it. A child, even, is seldom seen eating a
bit of fruit, or a bun, at other than the regular meals. Once I saw a
woman, in an Oxford street omnibus, eating a basket of gooseberries, and
so unusual was the sight, that I could not help wondering if she were
not some stray American.

Perhaps, in importance even before regularity of living we should rank
the athletic habits of the people, their large amount of vigorous
out-of-door exercise. The upper classes are, by the customs of society,
quite generally excluded from productive industry. They follow the
custom of feudal times and live mostly in the country, where walking,
driving, riding, and country sports furnish the chief employment and
amusement. Children are trained into habits of out-of-door exercise till
they get an appetite for it, as they have for their food, and it is not
unusual to hear an Englishwoman say, "I would as soon go without my
lunch as without a walk of an hour or an hour and a half in the day;"
and the habits of the upper classes, as I have already intimated,
percolate down through all ranks of life. As contributing in no small
degree to invite this open air exercise, we must include the moderate
and equable temperature, and the excellent and attractive roads and
walks.

IV. Almost as the tap-root of this long-lived, hardy race is the strong
and universal desire for family permanence, which makes the peculiar
constitution that gives the best promise of maintaining the family, the
ideal standard for the whole nation. Mothers know that their daughters
stand little chance of marrying an eldest son, unless they have a
well-developed physique, and daughters are not slow in learning the same
truth. This necessitates a high physical ideal for the women, towards
which they consciously strive, outside of and above the general national
habits.

These considerations, the repose, the care for health, the regularity of
habits, the open air exercise, the demand for a strong physique as
security for the permanence of the family, combine to produce a high
average of health in men and women alike. In looking into the habits
that more especially affect the health of the women, w