do the work as well by repeatedly striking the edge of the hand against the wooden arm of a chair, or upon the surface of a desk. At the outset this work should be done with the lightest blows possible, and the force of the blow should be but very gradually increased as the weeks go by. Whenever the edge of the hand becomes lame it is a sure sign that this exercise is being too severely done. A fairly hard edge of the hand should not be expected within six months. A student who devotes a few minutes at a time to this hand work, on three or four occasions through the day, will find that a year's persistence will enable him to duplicate the Japanese performance of breaking a stick with the edge of the hand. Few of the feats of self-defence can be excellently performed until the hand has been thoroughly toughened by this and other exercises that will be described in a later chapter.
In Japan every soldier, sailor, and policeman is compelled to take a government course in jiu-jitsu. Now that the samurai have been abolished as the distinctive fighting class, and strenuous life is open to all of the Emperor's
