=The Forms of Athletic Games Best Suited to Women.=—Dr. Sargent’s conclusions as to the form of athletic games best suited to women, coming from a man of his wide observation and great experience, should be more generally known, and he says, without hesitation, that there is no athletic sport practised in which some women cannot enter, not only without fear of injury, but with great prospect of success. But the feminine type of build, whether found in men or women, is a handicap in many athletic contests. But these limitations do not apply to girls between ten and fourteen years of age. During this period girls, if properly trained, will often surpass boys of the same age in any kind of athletic performance. Moreover, if girls were given the same kind of physical training as boys receive all through their growing and developing period, they would be able to make a much more creditable showing as athletes when they became adult women. In the early history of mankind the men and women lead lives more nearly alike, and were consequently more alike physically and mentally than they have become subsequently in the history of highly civilized people. From a physiologic standpoint, woman needs exercise just as much as man does, but, in taking up athletics, these must be regulated on a different basis. Women, as a class, cannot stand prolonged physical or mental strain as well as men do, but give them frequent intervals of rest and relaxation, and they will often accomplish as much in the twenty-four hours as men do. From her physical configuration and her inability to bear prolonged physical and mental strain, there are certain athletic sports and games that would be likely to prove injurious to most women if played in the form in which they are played by men. In this group are foot-ball, ice hockey, polo, basket-ball, boxing, fencing, pole vaulting, and heavy gymnastics. If these sports and games should be so modified as to meet the peculiar characteristics of women, there are none of them that could not be played with reasonable hopes of physical, mental, and moral improvement. The athletic exercises and games to which women are best adapted, and in which they are most likely to excel, are all forms of dancing, calisthenics and light gymnastics, archery, lawn-tennis, swimming, field hockey, lacrosse, sprint running, bicycling, rowing, canoeing, golf, skating, fencing, basket-ball, and all gymnastic plays and games. In all athletic exercises in which women engage, good form, rather than great records, should be striven for. Women may be excused for not being as strong and enduring as men, but they cannot be excused for not being more finished and graceful. Good carriage, perfect poise, self-command, and exquisite grace and refinement should enter into women’s athletic performances, and these qualities should be taken into consideration by the judges in making their awards. CHAPTER X