To fhew the abfolute neceffity of EXERCISE in cold climates, I must beg leave to relate the botanical excurfion of Dr. SOLANDER, Sir JOSEPH BANKS, and others, on the heights at Terra del Fuego. Dr. SOLANDer, who had more than once croffed the mountains which divide Sweden from Norway, well knew that extreme cold produces a torpor and fleepinefs almost irresistible, he therefore conjured the company to keep always IN MOTION, whatever pain it might coft them, and whatever relief they might be promifed by an inclination to reft: "Whoever fits down, fays he, will fleep; and whoever fleeps, will wake no more." Thus, at once admonished and alarmed, they fet forward; but while they were still upon the naked rock, and before they had got among the bushes, the cold was fo intenfe, as to produce the effects that had been moft dreaded. Dr. SOLANDER himself was the first who found the inclination, against which he had warned others, irrefiftible; and infifted upon being fuffered to lie down. Mr. BANKS (now Sir Jofeph Banks) intreated and remonftrated in vain: down he lay upon the ground, though it was covered with fnow; and it was with great difficulty that his friend kept him from fleeping. One of his black fervants also began to linger, having fuffered from the cold in the fame fame manner as the Doctor. Partly by perfuafion, and partly by force, the company made them go forward. Soon, however, they both declared " they would go no farther." Mr. BANKS had recourfe again to intreaty and expoflulation, but these produced no effect: when the black was told, that if he did not go on he would in a fhort time be frozen to death; he answered, that he defired nothing fo much as to lie down and die; the Doctor did not fo explicitly renounce his life; he faid he would go on, but that he must first take fome "fleep," though he had before told the company that "to fleep was to perish." They both in a few minutes fell into a profound fleep, and after five minutes Sir JOSEPH BANKS happily fucceeded in waking Dr. SOLANDER, who had almost lost the use of his limbs, and the mufcles were fo fhrunk, that his fhoes fell from his feet; but every attempt to relieve the unfortunate black proved unfuccefsful. It was a principle among the ancients, that acute difcafes are from heaven, and chronical from ourselves; to die, fays Dr. JOHNSON, is the fate of man, but to die with lingering anguish is generally his own folly. Inactivity never fails to induce an universal relaxation of the contractile fibres. When these fibres are relaxed, neither the the digeftion, the circulation, nor the perifialtic motion, can be duly performed. It is abfolutely impoffible to enjoy health, where the perfpiration allo is not duly carried on; and that can never be the cafe where exercife is neglected. The neceffity of action is not only demonftrable from the fabric of the body, but evident from the obfervation of the univerfal practice of mankind, who for the prefervation of health in thofe, whofe rank or wealth exempts them from the neceffity of lucrative labour, have invented fports and diverfions, though not of equal use to the world with agricultural employments, yet of equal fatigue to those who practise them, and differing only from the drudgery of the husbandman, as they are acts of choice, and therefore performed without the painful fenfe of compulfion. The huntsman rifes early, pursues his game, through all the dangers and obftructions of the chace, fwims rivers, and scales precipices, till he returns home, no lefs haraffed than the foldier, and has, perhaps, fometimes incurred as great hazard of wounds or death: yet he has no motive to excite his ardour; he is neither fubject to the commands of a general, nor dreads any penalties for neglect and difobedience; he has neither neither profit nor honour from his perils and his conqueft, but toils without the hopes of mural or civil garlands, and must content himself with the praise of his tenants and companions. But fuch is the conftitution of man, that labour may be styled its own reward; nor will any external excitements be requifite, if it be confidered how much happiness is gained, and how much mifery escaped, by frequent and violent agitation of the body. The defire of exercise is coeval with life itself. Were this principle attended to, many diseases might be avoided. But, while indolence and fedentary employments prevent two thirds of mankind from either taking fufficient exercise themselves, or giving it to their children, what have we to expect but difeafe and deformity? The rickets, fo deftructive to children, called by the French the English diforder, never appeared in BRITAIN till manufactures began to flourish, and people, attracted by the love of gain, left the country to follow fedentary employments in great towns *. Every animal makes an early use of its organs of motion; and many young creatures, even when under no neceffity of moving in queft of food, cannot be restrained without force. This is evidently the cafe with the calf, the lamb, and the kitten. If thefe harmless animals were not permitted to frisk about and take exercise, they would foon die, or become difcafed; and fo ftrong is this principle implanted in the human breast, that a healthy youth can hardly be kept from exercife. This love of motion is furely a strong proof of its utility. Nature im plants no difpofition in vain. It feems a catholic law throughout the whole brute creation, that no creature, without exercise, shall be able to find fubfiftence. Every creature, except man, takes as much exercife as his nature requires. He alone sleeps till late in the morning in beds of down, and often lolls all day in eafy chairs, and, deviating from the great law of his Creator, he fuffers accordingly. If fashion must prevail, and young children be fent to crowded fchools, we would recommend it to their teachers, as they value the lives of those entrusted to their care, and the account they must one day give, that they would allow their pupils a fufficient time to run and frisk about, instead of keeping them HOUR AFTER HOUR in close and irksome confinement, which fubjects them to a dreadful train of disease, flatulence, indigestion, colics, worms, |