Pedestrianism also depends on practice; for the citizen, whose excursions are limited to six or seven miles on a holiday, would be as much fatigued by a walk of double that distance, as a person in the country who is accustomed to travel, would be, by the accomplishment of a journey of fifty or sixty miles. Such is the nature of our physical and intellectual faculties, that they can be improved only by calling them into action, or what is the same thing, they can only be invigorated by the resistance they offer to the pressure of difficulties, and acquire power, therefore, in proportion to the obstacles which they have to overcome. The strength and activity of men who are inured to the exercise of walking, are truly astonishing. They will travel farther for a week or a month than a horse, and, if habituated to hunting, they will outrun him, and continue the chace much longer. The American Indians, it is said by travellers, pursue the elk with such rapidity, that they are able to fatigue and secure him, although he is as swift as the stag. It is also related of those men, that they will go journies of a thousand leagues in six weeks or two months; or at the rate of about sixty miles a day, over the most rugged mountains, and through tractless countries. But feats more astonishing than those performed by the Indians, or any other nation, have been accomplished of late years in Britain. Captain Barclay walked one hundred and ten miles in nineteen hours and twenty-seven minutes; and Glanville went a hundred and forty-two miles in twenty-nine hours. In the pages of this volume, we have recorded many examples of the almost incredible strength, agility, and perseverance of modern pedestrians. And as EXERCISE, particularly on foot, is attended by so many advantages to mankind, the Author thinks, he cannot conclude this work with any observations more apposite to the subject than those of the amiable CHRISTOPHER CHRISTIAN STURM. “Man, (says he,) in a state of civilization, does not know how much strength he possesses; how much he loses by effeminacy, nor how much he can acquire by frequent exercise. We cannot but regard with pity those indolent beings, who pass their lives in idleness and effeminacy; who never exert their strength, nor exercise their powers, for fear of injuring their health, or shortening their lives.” “Let us, in future, therefore, exert all our powers and faculties for the good of our fellow creatures, according to our situation and circumstances; and, if necessity require, let us cheerfully earn our bread by the sweat of our brow; even then our happiness is greater than that of thousands of our fellow men;” and “the more happy we find our lot compared with [that of] the unfortunate victims of LUXURY, the more seriously ought we to apply ourselves to fulfil our duties.”--_Sturm’s Reflections, Sept. XV._ APPENDIX. No. I. GENEALOGY OF THE FAMILY OF BARCLAY OF MATHERS AND URY, IN THE COUNTY OF MEARNS.