[ 1 £*< 
 
 <* 
 
 V s ** ' 
 
 'Kki# 
 
 7-W ^ 
 
 c^--, ■■ -■;* A>*' 
 
 • A. ^ 
 
 v*v- 
 
 B&2& 
 
 '—<:■*? .' 
 
CORNELL 
 
 UNIVERSITY 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
&an*rL2ZyCO& _ 
 
 "*r 
 
 
 
 
Cornell University 
 Library 
 
 The original of this book is in 
 the Cornell University Library. 
 
 There are no known copyright restrictions in 
 the United States on the use of the text. 
 
 http://www.archive.org/details/cu31924032003968 
 
CHINESE AND JAPANESE INDEMNITIES. 
 
 [The following paper from the New l[ork Tribune is timely, as the bill for 
 returning these Indemnities is now pending. Any influence you may exert for 
 this measure, with your member of Congress or through the press, will further a 
 worthy object.] 
 
 WONDERFUL DEVELOPMENT IN JAPAN. 
 
 An earnest letter from the Hon. B. G. Northrop, Secretary of the 
 Connecticut State Board of Education. 
 
 The report of the Committee on Foreign Affairs just made in favor of repaying 
 to China and Japan the unexpended indemnities so long held by us, calls for 
 information in regard to them. The Chinese indemnity was essentially an over- 
 payment made more than twenty years ago. Every President from Buchanan to 
 Hayes, and every Secretary of State from Cass to Evarts has held that to use this 
 money for our sole advantage would be derogatory to the honor and dignity of 
 our country. Our Ministers to China, including Burlingame, Ward, Low and 
 others to the present time, have all expressed the same sentiments. His imperial 
 Highness, Prince Kung, when consulted on this subject, said that self-respect and 
 National pride would forbid his doing anything that could be construed into a 
 request, being content to leave it to the American Government to follow its own 
 sense of justice, but the return of this indemnity would be highly honorable to 
 the United States and advantageous to both countries. 
 
 The Japanese people justly regard their indemnity as an extortion. The Dai- 
 mio of Chosiu, who warned off foreign vessels from the Straits of Shimonoseki — 
 for this was the offence — was then " a rebel," for whose acts the Japanese Gov- 
 ernment was hardly more responsible than ours was for those of Jefferson Davis 
 during our rebellion. The Japanese Government promptly expressed extreme 
 regrets for those " outrages on foreign commerce," an apology which would have 
 been accepted from any European Government. The Japanese might have con- 
 tended that this narrow strait — at some points less than a mile wide — was an 
 inland arm, subject by the laws of nations to their own control, even to the extent 
 of excluding foreign vessels, and that therefore no offense had been committed. 
 
 So far as I can learn there is but one opinion among intelligent people convers- 
 ant with this subject as to the injustice of this exaction. In December. 1872, I 
 sent to the Faculties of all the colleges and prominent educational institutions of 
 this country a form of petition to Congress in favor of returning these two indem- 
 nities, requesting their signatures. This request received a general and prompt 
 response. This collection of names was as remarkable in quality as in quantity. 
 When pasted together, this grand list of " petitioners" was presented to the House 
 of Representatives, Jan. 27, 1873, by Gen. Joseph R. Hawley, where it was found 
 long enough to stretch quite across the large hall of that body. This petition, 
 with the names of all the signers except mine, was printed and presented to the 
 members of Congress. 
 
 I also sent a small tract, prepared for that purpose, to the leading journals in all 
 the States. With one exception, so far as I could learn, the comments of the press 
 were favorable to the returu of these indemnities. Since then, lecturing on this 
 subject in ten different States, I have found ample proofs of the growth of this 
 sentiment in various parts of the country. Several successive Committees on For- 
 eign Affairs have recommended that this money be refunded. A bill for this pur- 
 pose once passed the House of Representatives. In 1872 another bill, remitting 
 the balance then unpaid, was passed unanimously in the House, but was not 
 reached in the order of business in the Senate. Their return has long since 
 seemed to me to be only a question of time. But the present time is specially 
 opportune for this movement. The present is a critical time in the history of 
 Japan, so long treated as if she had no rights which the great powers were bound 
 to respect, and thus brought to the verge of National bankruptcy." The Japanese 
 have been the victims of frauds and spoliations from foreign Governments as well 
 as foreign traders and contractors. They have also made enormous outlays in 
 their grand system of internal improvements. At one bound Japan has jumped 
 
from the fifteenth to the nineteenth century. Railroads, telegraphs, light-houses 
 and light-ships along their vast seacoast (far exceeding ours — Atlantic, Pacific and 
 Alaska coast all included), war steamers and iron-clads, dry docks, hospitals, iron 
 suspension bridges and a national army of 30,000 men, drilled in French tactics 
 and equipped with breech-loading rifles, are among the many signs of material 
 progress. 
 
 The moral and intellectual advancement is still more remarkable as indicated by 
 the new and general thirst for knowledge, especially of Western science aud civil- 
 ization, the introduction of modern inventions and all forms of internal improve- 
 ments, the organization of an admirable post office system, letters prepaid with 
 penny " 1 sen" stamps like ours, a mint rapidly coining gold and silver correspond- 
 ing in size and value to our own and far more elegant, daily and weekly papers — 
 some of them illustrated— adoption of our calendar making Sunday the rest-day in 
 the mint, post office, custom house and all Government offices, and prohibition of 
 the sale of obscene books and prints. According to the report of Postmaster- 
 General Mayesima for the year ending July 1, 1879, the number of letters, news- 
 papers, books and samples sent through the post offices the last year was 55,775,206, 
 giving an increase of 18 per cent over the previous year. There was a marked 
 development of their newspaper enterprise. The number of Japanese journals 
 mailed in 1879 was 16| per cent more than in 1878, and 52 per cent more than in 
 1877. Though there has been during the year a large increase of post routes and 
 1 35 new post offices, 635 new stamp agencies and 487 new street letter-boxes, the 
 income of the Department exceeded the expenditures by $122,978. The Tokio 
 Times, of January 31,1880, well says : " The Japanese Post Office, now thoroughly 
 and systematically founded, shows, in pecuniary results, an excess which has not 
 been achieved by similar establishments in any other part of the world." 
 
 But of all the progressive movements of Japan, her educational plans are the 
 most significant. Realizing that ignorance has proved a source of waste and 
 weakness, they have now learned that knowledge is power — the source of indi- 
 vidual thrift and of national strength and prosperity. When in February, 1872, 
 Arinori Mori, the former representative of Japan to this country, sent me from the 
 Legation in Washington a formal invitation (which was not confirmed by the Home 
 Government) " to accept a position under the Japanese Government which would 
 give you the supervision of educational affairs, and make you an adviser of the 
 Government on all those subjects in the Empire of Japan," he enumerated among 
 the duties to be performed, the aiding in organizing eight colleges, 256 high schools 
 or academies, and 53,500 public schools. Much as has already been done, this 
 magnificent scheme is still in abeyance, — not from any reaction or diminished 
 appreciation of education, but solely from the financial embarrassment consequent 
 upon their remarkable efforts to introduce all modern improvements in the briefest 
 possible time. Though still prospective in many of its details, this grand educa- 
 tional ideal is an inspiration to the Nation. Ardent and enthusiastic, perhaps the 
 Japanese consider less the obstacles to be overcome than the advantages to follow 
 the introduction of such a system of universal education. 
 
 The new measures must of course meet opposition. Conservatives are still found 
 who deprecate foreign influence and recount with all the force of glaring facts the 
 many wrongs already suffered from Europe and America. They glorify the past 
 and denounce the ills unknown in the good old days of isolation, and foremost 
 among these wrongs in the honest judgment of all Japanese and indeed of all hon- 
 est minds conversant with the facts is this indemnity outrage. But in the face of 
 manifold spoliations from abroad and difficulties at home, a new era has opened 
 for Japan, — the noblest in all her long history, and indeed this revolution is the 
 most remarkable that ever occurred in the world in the same limits of time. As 
 an act of justice and an expression of National sympathy, and what is still rarer, 
 an illustration of National conscience, the return of this indemnity would exert a 
 moral influence of greater value than the money refunded, removing existing prej- 
 udice and increasing American influence and commerce, for England, France and 
 Holland are involved in the same wrong, in which England was indeed the prime 
 mover. No nation ever more needed or merited the sympathy and encouragement 
 of the world than Japan in the present 'crisis of her affairs. Never in all our his- 
 tory have we had the opportunity of aiding so easily in the regeneration of a great 
 nation. This plain duty, or rather this privilege, we cannot afford to neglect. 
 
THE FIELD PARKS 
 
 BY 
 
 B. G. NORTHROP. 
 
 [From Report of the Connecticut State Board of Education.] 
 
 NEW HAVEN: 
 
 TUTTLB, MOREHOUSE & TAYLOR, PRINTERS. 
 
 1879. 
 
The example set in Haddam deserves to be copied in other towns. In the 
 language of Ex-Governor Hubbard, this " work of Village Improvement will not 
 fail, I trust, to awaken public attention and provoke imitation throughout our 
 State, and excite and even shame our own people into a larger public spirit and 
 better efforts to redeem from negligence our rural homes and villages." 
 
THE FIELD PAEKS.* 
 
 On the thirty-first day,of last October, the four surviving 
 sons of Eey. David Dudley Field, D.D., celebrated the seventy- 
 fifth anniversarj' of their father's marriage, by presenting to the 
 town of Haddam two tracts of land for public parks, one 
 known as Meeting House Green, the other including Isinglass 
 Rock, west of the Brainard Academy, and comprising ten 
 acres. The grounds of the Brainard Academy are thus virtually 
 enlarged and made exceedingly attractive. The whole park, 
 finely laid out with drives and walks by F. L. Olmsted of New 
 York, the landscape gardener, and adorned with the choicest 
 ornamental trees indigenous and imported, is a grand contribu- 
 tion to the taste, sociality, good fellowship,f education, growth 
 and prosperity of the town. The high bluff, "Isinglass Hill," 
 commands for many miles a magnificent view of the river and 
 its valley, with the .long range of hills beyond. This valuable 
 addition to the grounds of the Brainard Academy suggests and 
 
 * The following is the circular issued for the Park Presentation. 
 
 FIELD MEMORIAL. 
 
 Haddam, Conn., October 24th, IStS. 
 Dear Sir: 
 
 Messrs. David Dudley Meld, Stephen J. Field. Cyrus W. Field, 
 and Henry M. Field, surviving sons of Rev. David D. Field, D.D., having pur- 
 chased and laid out two plots of ground in the centre village of Haddam, will on 
 the 31st inst, at two o'clock, make a formal presentation of the same in trust to the 
 town as a public park, and as a memorial of their parents who spent a consider- 
 able portion of their lives here. The undersigned, representing the town in this 
 regard, beg most cordially to invite you to be present at the centre village of 
 Haddam, when such presentation is made, and there to meet the Messrs. Field. 
 It is believed that this is the first instance in which a gift with such an object has 
 been made, and it is thought that some public notice should be taken of it ; the 
 gift to the town is generous, and it is reasonable to hope that others may be led 
 to imitate an example so worthy, and so timely in view of the growing interest in 
 rural adornment throughout our State. . 
 
 • Respectfully Tours, Miner C. Hazen, A. H. Hatden, Geo. "W. Arnold, Cyrus 
 A. Hubbard, 0. F. Parker, Committee of Arrangements. 
 
 f It is already decided to hold in this park an annual festival to cultivate public 
 spirit and stimulate an interest in further village improvements. 
 
invites a corresponding enlargement of its funds. Brainard 
 Academy, useful as it was in Dr. Field's day, is now crippled 
 for want of an endowment. 
 
 Dr. Field was long the most prominent and pronounced friend 
 of popular education in this town and county. He took great 
 interest in the common schools and especially in the Brainard 
 Academy. Says A. B. Cook of Chicago, " I well recollect how we 
 boys in Haddam liked to have Dr. Field visit our school, with 
 his genial, kind face and benevolent smile of recognitions/or us all, 
 and how he cheered us in the Academy when we began the 
 higher branches." Hon. D. N. Camp speaks in strong terms of 
 the pleasure and profit with which, more than thirty-five years 
 ago, he " listened to his timely lectures on public schools, ably 
 setting forth broad and earnest convictions of the importance 
 of educational progress." The history of the Brainard Acad- 
 emy and its early association with Dr. Field, its beautiful and 
 healthful location, its surroundings in an orderly, intelligent and 
 moral community, and this grand park in the rear, practically a 
 part of its ,own grounds, render this a most eligible site for a 
 first class institution of learning. A large group of towns sur- 
 rounding Haddam are unfavorably situated for the maintenance 
 of separate High Schools, from which a well endowed Academy 
 in this central position, easily accessible, both by railroad and 
 river, would draw a liberal patronage. There is a hope, not to 
 say expectation, that some generous benefactions will place this 
 institution on such a basis, of wide and permanent usefulness as 
 shall realize the desires and anticipations of Dr. Field. What 
 worthier monument could be erected to. his memory than the 
 liberal endowment of this school, for the upbuilding and im- 
 provement of which he labored with such well directed zeal. 
 
 The Field Memorial Park is here noticed for the double pur- 
 pose of calling attention to the pressing needs of Brainard 
 Academy and giving a cordial acknowledgment of the dona- 
 tion of the Field brothers. In behalf of the friends of educa- 
 tion so far as I may represent them, I desire to express a high 
 appreciation of their grand gift to Haddam and thus to Con- 
 necticut, for our Slate takes a lively interest in the growth and 
 prosperity of each of her towns. This worthy example ought 
 to make many others, opportune as it is, in view of the growing 
 
interest in rural adornment throughout our State. There is 
 hardly one of our towns that has not at home or abroad some 
 favored sons who, by forming parks or founding schools or 
 libraries, could easily render this most fitting tribute to their 
 mother soil. 
 
 The sentiment that honors and cherishes one's birth-place, 
 is noble and ennobling. I am aware that a popular prejudice 
 associates weakness and effeminacy with such taste, refinement 
 and liberality. But this sentiment has ever characterized the 
 greatest and best of men and is a prime element of true man- 
 hood. The cold and selfish soul is sterile in heroic virtues. 
 There is a New England railway king, now a millionaire, who 
 seldom visits his native town, takes no interest in it, does noth- 
 ing for it, and leaves even the old homestead and grounds, 
 though still owned by him, neglected and forlorn. Indeed such 
 examples are too common. On the other hand, the greatest 
 grandeur of intellect accords with fervor of filial feeling, with 
 fondest home attachments and with refinement and delicacy of 
 taste. It is perfectly in keeping with the intellectual greatness 
 of Daniel Webster to find him fondly cherishing and beautify- 
 ing the old homestead, enriching and improving the paternal 
 acres and eloquently discoursing on the sacred associations of 
 home, the transcendent sweets of domestic life, the happiness of 
 kindred and parents and children. Washington was as delicate, 
 courteous and affectionate in his domestic relations and attach- 
 ments as he was wise in council and courageous in war. A 
 beautiful trait in Bryant's character was evinced by his devotion 
 to the old homestead and the little secluded town of Cumming- 
 ton among the Hampshire hills, hallowed to him by the memo- 
 ries of father and mother, and the sacred association of child- 
 hood. To that little town which he did so much to adorn and 
 enrich and educate, he ever deemed it a privilege to make an 
 annual visit — a summer visit with his household, often pro- 
 longed for weeks and months. That the old early associations 
 might remain, raising the old house, he built beneath and 
 around it a stately mansion, so that the paternal rooms remained 
 intact 
 
 It is a good omen that public interest in the embellishments 
 of rural homes and villages is widely extending, and that the 
 
6 
 
 varied charms of the country with its superior advantages for 
 the physical and moral training of children are attracting many 
 thoughtful men to the simpler enjoyments and employments of 
 rural life. 
 
 Dr. Bushnell, with his keen observation and intense love of 
 rural scenery was wont to say, " No part of our country between 
 the two oceans is susceptible of greater external beauty than 
 Connecticut. It is not in the great cities nor in the confined 
 shops of trade, but principally in agriculture that the best 
 stock or staple of men is grown. It is in the open air, in 
 communion with the sky, the earth, and all living things, that 
 the largest inspiration is drunk in and the vital energies of a 
 real man are constructed." A taste for rural adornment is a 
 source of physical, mental and moral health as well as enjoy- 
 ment. The parentage of parks, lawns, trees, flowers, vines and 
 shrubs becomes a matter of just pride and binds one to the 
 spot he has adorned. 
 
 Nature is the great educator. Birds, flowers, insects, and 
 all animals are our practical primary teachers. In God's plan, 
 facts and objects as best seen in the country are the earliest 
 and the leading instruments of developing the faculties of the 
 juvenile mind. They cannot be fully trained when cooped up 
 within brick walls, witnessing only city scenes. 
 
 The excessive passion for city attractions and ambition for 
 easier lives and more genteel employments have brought ruin 
 to multitudes and financial disaster to the nation. A great 
 peril to the land to-day comes from the swelling throngs, rang- 
 ing from the reckless tramp to the fashionable idler, who are 
 ever devising expedients alike foul or fair, to get a living with- 
 out work. The disparagement of country life has been one of 
 the worst tendencies of the times. The country has ever 
 been the great school of mind, and has sent forth far more 
 than its proportion of gifted men to the centers of influence. 
 
 Every influence should therefore be combined to foster these 
 home attachments, for there is protection as well as education 
 in the fervent love of home with its sacred associations. Patri- 
 otism itself hinges on the domestic sentiments. When one's 
 home becomes the Eden of taste and interest and joy, those 
 healthful local ties are formed which bind him first and most to 
 
the spot he has embellished, and then to his town, his State 
 and country. Whatever adorns one's home and ennobles his 
 domestic life, strengthens his love of country and nurtures all 
 the better elements of his nature. On the other hand, any man 
 without local attachments can have no genuine patriotism. As 
 happy, in one place as in another, he is like a tree planted in a 
 tub, portable indeed, but at the expense of growth and strength. 
 Said Monsieur Lariaux, the French Deputy to the American 
 Evangelical Alliance, in his farewell address, "your homes, 
 homes, sweet homes — these are the safeguards of your freedom. 
 Oh pray, as you gather at your family altars, that my poor 
 France may have such homes." 
 
 Dr. Field really was the father of the Brainard Academy. He 
 started the project, selected the site, planned the building and 
 prompted the Brainard brothers to build and endow the school. 
 He was chairman of the Board of Trustees and the chief man- 
 ager of the school. He laid the corner stone and gave an able 
 address on that, occasion, June 3, 1839, which was published 
 entire in the Middletown Constitution, a copy of which is furn- 
 ished me by the kindness of a citizen of Haddam who heard it. 
 A few extracts from this address are here pertinent. " The 
 corner stone of Brainard Academy on this beautiful site is now 
 laid. The institution owes its existence to the liberality of the 
 two brothers N. and Gr. Brainard. May they live to see the 
 good effects of their bounty in the growing intelligence, virtue, 
 and good order of this community. The Academy is designed 
 particularly for intellectual education, but knowledge should 
 be inculcated in connection with those principles and motives 
 which are most likely with the Divine blessing to lead youth 
 to virtue and piety. Our capacity for knowledge suggests the 
 importance of education. Endowed with understanding, we 
 are criminal if we do not cultivate our intellects. What is so 
 plainly a duty is also essential to our happiness. Ignorance 
 instead of being " the mother of devotion" is the mother of 
 errors, crimes, and abominations. innumerable. Penitentiaries 
 and prisons confirm this declaration. Ignorance is the mother 
 of nothing good. The animal gratifications which may be 
 enjoyed without education are the lowest allotted to man, and 
 even these education regulates and refines. Knowledge every- 
 
8 
 
 where is power, but associated with virtue, it is power for doing 
 good, power to get property, without which the great ends of 
 civilized society cannot be attained. The arts involved in hus- 
 bandry, manufactures and commerce are based upon science. 
 Were education more extended and elevated, more inventors 
 like Fulton and Whitney would arise to bless mankind. For 
 the want of education, how few things have savages to make 
 life comfortable. The attachments of husbands and wives, of 
 parents and children, and of members of their tribes, are more 
 like the attachments of bears and tigers to their mates, their 
 young and company. There is nothing of the taste and refine- 
 ment needful to make home wholly sweet home. But some, 
 admitting the importance of a common school education, aifirm 
 that the higher branches' are not needed. This is a mistake. 
 Both are essential to important purposes in society. Both need 
 to be more cultivated and elevated than they have ever yet 
 been anywhere in the world. Besides, the common branches 
 of education will not be cherished without the higher. The 
 common schools of our country were introduced by the best 
 educated men of the times. None know the value of education 
 so well as those who have enjoyed its benefits the most. These 
 are the most efficient and able advocates of education in all its 
 branches. All the light possessed and reflected by the inferior 
 orbs comes down from the sun. In view of these principles, 
 with what emotion should we regard the commencement of an 
 institution like this — an institution long needed here, long 
 hoped for, and now about to be realized. Such an institution 
 duly managed promises unspeakable good. And who are inte- 
 rested in this ? Primarily the youth whom I see around me 
 and who will soon experience its blessings. Many will attend 
 this Academy who could not command the means of going out 
 of town for their education. All may here gain a superior 
 education and enjoy at the, same time the guardianship of parents 
 and the kind offices of friends. Parents are interested for they 
 live in their children. The patriot, the philanthropist, the' 
 Christian is interested. Who then is there .that loves the young, 
 that loves society, that loves .the church, that loves the soul, 
 who will not pray that our sons may be as plants grown up in 
 their youth, that our daughters may be as corner stones polished 
 
9 
 
 after the similitude of a palace. Pray we must for except the Lord 
 build this house they will labor in vain who build it. Except He 
 prosper us, our fond anticipations for this institution will not be 
 realized." The dedicatory prayer which Dr. Field then offered 
 is remembered to this day by the older citizens of Haddam as 
 an earnest and almost an inspired production. 
 
 It is fitting to follow this address of Dr. Field by that of his 
 eldest son given at the dedication of the Field Park. 
 
 " Ladies and Gentlemen : — Y ou know that we are here to 
 deliver into your hands the parcel of ground on which we are 
 standing, and that other which lies in view before us, to be kept 
 as pleasure grounds for the people of Haddam in all time to 
 come. We give them in memory of our father and mother, 
 who were married seventy-five years ago to-day, and came 
 immediately afterward to make their abode on this river-side, 
 where he was soon to become the pastor of the church and con- 
 gregation. Here they lived active and useful lives, in the fear 
 of God and love of man, doing faithfully their several duties, he 
 in public ministrations from pulpit and altar, at bridal, baptism, 
 and burial, and she in the quiet tasks of her well-ordered house- 
 hold. Though now, after more than fifty years of wedded life, 
 they sleep side by side in the pleasant valley beyond the Con- 
 necticut hills, where their last days passed serenely away, they 
 were faithful until death ,to the love of their early home. 
 Natural indeed it was, for here they passed their first years 
 together ; here they raised their first domestic altar, and here 
 most of their children were borri. For this cause, and in grate- 
 ful remembrance of their love and sacrifices for us, we, their 
 surviving children, four of us only out of ten, present these 
 memorials, not of cold stone, though the hills about us teem 
 with everlasting granite, but of shaded walks, green lawns, and 
 . spreading trees, where this people may find pleasure and refresh- 
 ment, generation after generation, so long as these fertile 
 meadows, these rugged hills, and this winding river shall 
 endure. And remembering that "beauty is truth, truth beauty," 
 we hope, that they will cultivate here that love of nature, which 
 is a joy in youth and a solace in age ; which nourishes the 
 affections, and refines while it exalts; which rejoices in the 
 seasons and the months as they pass, with their varying beau- 
 
10 
 
 ties ; catches the gladness of June and the radiance of the 
 October woods ; and in every waking, moment, sees, hears, or 
 feels, something of the world around to take pleasure in' and be 
 grateful for. "We trust that they will come, not in this year 
 only or this century, but in future years and centuries, the fair 
 young girl, the matron in the glory of womanhood, the boy and 
 the man, grandson and grandsire, in whatever condition or cir- 
 cumstance, poverty or riches, joy or sorrow, to find here a new 
 joy or a respite from sorrow ; to drink in the light of sun and 
 moon, listen to the music of birds aud winds, feel the fresh 
 breath of life-sustaining air, thank God and take courage. 
 
 Eeverently then we dedicate these memorials of our parents, 
 to the enjoyment forever hereafter of those, and the descendants 
 of those, whom they loved, and among whom they dwelt." 
 
 The following letter of Governor Hubbard will be read with 
 interest. 
 
 Executive Department, State of Conn., ) 
 Hartford, October 29, 1878. j 
 
 I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your invita- 
 tion to be present at a memorial presentation by the Messrs. 
 Field, of a public park to the town of Haddam. Engagements 
 which I cannot control will oblige me to be absent I regret 
 this necessity; for, in the first place, I should be glad of an 
 opportunity to present my respects to the very distinguished 
 gentlemen to whom you are so much indebted for this endow- 
 ment, and. whose generosity and filial piety will cause the names 
 of both father and sons to be remembered by your townsmen 
 from generation to generation. 
 
 In the next place, I should be glad to mark my interest in a 
 work of Village Improvement, which will not fail, I trust, to 
 awaken public attention and provoke imitation throughout our 
 whole State ; and I shall not regret it, but hail it rather, if this 
 addition to the attractions' of your picturesque and historical 
 old town, furnished by gentlemen from without the State, one 
 of them from the other side of the continent even, shall excite 
 and even shame our own people into a larger public spirit and 
 better efforts to redeem from negligence our rural homes and 
 villages. 
 
11 
 
 Nearly all our towns are full of objects of natural beauty- 
 easy of development, and very many of them rich in legendary 
 and historical associations. What is greatly wanted is some- 
 thing more of rural art and adornment. Something which shall 
 beautify our country villages, educate public taste, make the 
 homes of the fathers dearer to their sons and the local associ- 
 ations of childhood dearer to old age, and thus turn back, in 
 part at least, the tide of migration from the rural towns, and 
 make the city seek the country life and make it what it used 
 to be in our own State, and what it still is in the oldest and 
 most cultivated nations of the world." 
 
 I beg to remain with the highest respect, 
 
 Your obedient servant, 
 
 E. D. Hubbard. 
 
 Letters were also received from President Porter, Ex-Presi- 
 dent Woolsey and General "Walker, of Yale College, and from 
 many other prominent gentlemen, and other able speeches were 
 made before a large throng of people gathered from far and 
 near. We regret that our limits do not permit the printing of 
 these interesting letters and addresses in full. The citizens of 
 Haddam provided a bountiful collation on the grounds. The 
 large attendance, the admirable programme of the Committee 
 of Arrangements, the fine music of the band, the excellent 
 addresses given, the generous tables, ample for all, spread on 
 these beautiful grounds, combined to make this an occasion of 
 rare interest. 
 
<OsiS??^Zj£4^. 
 
 -A? 
 
EDUCATION. 
 
 No. II. — November, 1880. 
 
 RESULTS OF METHODS OF TEACHING. 
 
 BY JOHN W. DICKINSON. 
 
 There is a prevailing opinion existing in the minds of a certain 
 class of educators that methods are of little importance. Many go 
 further than this, and believe that to make our acts conform to a 
 method is to give to them a mechanical character, which deprives 
 them of all appearance of being the products either of genius or of 
 free intelligence. 
 
 Such opinions are especially mischievous in our educational affairs, 
 as they encourage educators to think little of the philosophy of edu- 
 cation, or of those general principles on which alone can be founded 
 either a true science or art of teaching. 
 
 Every intelligent act implies a knowledge of its end from its 
 beginning. 
 
 All ends attained by human agency are attained by the use of 
 some means. 
 
 Success in attaining ends depends on two things, — on the use of 
 the right means, and on using them in the right way. The way 
 of using means or of performing our acts is called Method. 
 
 Those who have no definite methods to use can have no definite 
 ends to obtain. But all teaching worthy of the name has its well- 
 known ends to accomplish. These ends may be discovered by an 
 analysis of any good statement of what teaching is. 
 
 Teaching has been defined to be that act which consists in pre- 
 senting objects of thought to a mind so as to occasion the activity 
 which produces knowledge and a development of the powers. 
 
 The legitimate effects of teaching upon him who is led by it to 
 study and practise are to occasion his mind to acquire knowledge, 
 a training of its powers, and a method of performing all mental and 
 physical acts. These three ends may be occasioned by teaching. 
 
106 EDUCATION. [Nov, 
 
 The effects of methods of teaching will be perceived in the character 
 and amount of knowledge obtained, in the kind and degree of devel- 
 opment produced, and in the nature of the method of activity- 
 acquired. 
 
 Teaching occasions knowledge, development, and method. Meth- 
 ods of teaching determine the qualities of these things. This last 
 proposition is to be proved, and first it must be shown that a method 
 of teaching determines the quality of knowledge obtained. 
 
 Teaching may be attempted by two methods : one is called the 
 objective, the other the descriptive or written method. One presents 
 to the mind of the learner whatever is to be studied and known ; 
 the other substitutes for objects of knowledge, the language by which 
 they may be described. In the one case the kind of knowledge 
 obtained by study would be of its true objects; in the other it might 
 be simply of the signs of knowledge of objects, and it would be of 
 signs only, if the objects had not at some time been presented. 
 
 A knowledge of objects may have three qualities: 
 
 First. It may be clear, or such as to enable its possessor to set the 
 object of it clear from all other objects. It is such knowledge as is 
 expressed by a name denoting all the qualities of an object taken 
 together as one whole ; such knowledge as the mind always obtains 
 of an object of thought when first presented, and before its qualities 
 have been unloosed from one another, and have become themselves 
 the objects of special attention. 
 
 Second. Knowledge may be distinct, or such as may be expressed 
 by propositions whose subjects name the things known, and whose 
 predicates affirm of them their qualities. Distinct knowledge is 
 obtained by an analysis which turns our attention from an object 
 viewed as a whole, to its individual qualities or elements. After 
 such mental processes have been experienced, the mind is prepared 
 to describe its knowledge by the use of language which names not 
 only the things known, but names, also, whatever belongs to- them. 
 
 Third. Knowledge may not only be clear and distinct, but it may 
 also be comprehensive. Comprehensive knowledge is of classes, 
 and therefore is general and abstract. Clear knowledge is of indi- 
 viduals considered as wholes ; distinct knowledge is of individuals 
 considered to be made up of properties or elements, while compre- 
 hensive knowledge is of groups of individuals or .of classes,, and is 
 expressed by definitions which affirm what qualities or attributes are 
 common to every individual of the class defined. 
 
 The quality of the knowledge obtained by study in school will be. 
 clear or distinct or comprehensive in proportion to the kind and 
 
l88o.] RESULTS OF METHODS OF TEACHING. 107 
 
 degree of activity the mind of the pupil is led to exert by the method 
 of teaching employed. 
 
 The only occasion for genuine and complete knowledge of new 
 objects is the presence of the objects themselves. 
 
 Let it be remembered that the word "object" is used in this 
 discussion to mean anything of which the mind may be conscious. 
 It includes in its signification all manner of subjective as well as 
 objective objects. It names any state of mind, or product of a state, 
 which may be brought before the mind for its consideration, with no 
 less propriety than it .names a material thing. 
 
 After a knowledge of objects has been once obtained, and proper 
 signs associated with it, the knowledge may be reproduced through 
 the use of its signs, but its first appearance in the mind must, in all 
 cases, depend on the relations objects of knowledge are made to 
 hold to the knowing mind. 
 
 No teacher who has had a successful experience in teaching, or 
 who has made a successful study of the way in which the mind 
 acquires its knowledge, will be likely to deny the truth of this state- 
 ment, nor will he neglect to observe it in his teaching. 
 
 But great mistakes are sometimes made by those who think they 
 are observing this first principle of true teaching ; for in teaching, 
 models and pictures are too frequently substituted for the objects 
 themselves. This substitution is sometimes necessary, but when- 
 ever it is made, the things represented are not in themselves taught. 
 Only so far as illustrations of things are the things themselves, can 
 they occasion adequate and complete ideas. A picture may repre- 
 sent the color, form, and size of a natural object, but it cannot repre- 
 sent its structure and functions, or any of its secondary qualities. 
 
 Children are indeed interested in observing visible representations 
 of things. They learn to describe them with facility, and they not 
 unfrequently deceive themselves and others into the belief that they 
 have correct and adequate notions of the things represented. But 
 when they are put to the test it is generally found that the objects 
 of their thoughts are, to a degree, creations of their own imagina- 
 tions rather than realities known through observation. 
 
 Teaching has for its object new truth. Illustrations by pictures 
 and models may occasion true ideas of some of their relations, 
 but they can never fully present the objects they are intended to 
 represent. 
 
 Illustrated books for elementary lessons in language and in 
 natural history now abound, and they are better occasions for first 
 ideas than are words ; but no teacher of the elements of natural 
 
108 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 science, who has been well taught himself, or who knows the laws 
 that control the mind in its acquisition of. knowledge, will ever 
 accept a picture of a thing as a substitute for the thing itself. I 
 believe that our teaching is now threatened with a danger arising 
 from an unphilosophical use of illustrations, by which the mind of 
 the learner is prevented from coming in contact with the true object 
 of his knowledge. 
 
 If words only are employed, either no ideas at all will be suggested, 
 or they will be those some other mind, than the mind of the learner, 
 has invented and described, and there may not be anything in nature 
 corresponding to them. 
 
 From what has been said, we may learn that methods of teaching 
 determine the kind and amount of knowledge communicated or 
 occasioned. Another result produced by methods of teaching relates 
 to the character of the training acquired by the mental powers 
 through their exercise in learning. In describing this result it may 
 be well to show, first, what right mental training is, and second, 
 how it is to be secured. Whenever the mind exerts its power in a 
 right manner upon appropriate objects of thought, it becomes con- 
 scious of two results : one result is the possession of new knowl- 
 edge ; the other is an increased facility in the exercise of the powers 
 by whose activity knowledge is acquired. The facility itself is called 
 mental culture, or mental training. 
 
 The faculties are trained by their right use, and the kind and 
 amount of training produced will depend upon the kind and amount 
 of use to which they are subjected. One kind of use will give the 
 ability to produce effects, the other will give an increased capacity 
 for receiving effects. This statement expresses a most important 
 truth for teachers to observe, and should be fully understood. 
 
 Whenever the powers of the mind discover a truth or solve a 
 problem by an activity whose source is found in the powers them- 
 selves, they are called active powers. 
 
 The powers are called passive when their activity consists in 
 simply comprehending the truth other minds have discovered and 
 explained, or in understanding the solution of problems other minds 
 have given. 
 
 The mind exerts its active power whenever the objects of its 
 activity are brought into its presence for observation or for reflec- 
 tion. It exerts its passive power whenever it is engaged in learning, 
 through the medium of language, the knowledge other minds have 
 obtained. 
 
 That method of teaching which presents to the learner whatever 
 
l88o.J RESULTS OF METHODS OF TEACHING. ICX) 
 
 is to be studied and known, and simply directs his mind to an 
 orderly plan of study, will cultivate active power. Assigning lessons 
 to be learned from books, or communicating knowledge by expla- 
 nations in the form of lectures, will cultivate the passive powers 
 only. 
 
 The difference in the results of the two methods is most marked. 
 The one trains the pupil to invent his own ideas of things and to 
 think his own thoughts. The other prepares him to understand, 
 it may be, what others have done, but it gives him no power to do 
 anything by an independent exertion of his own power. 
 
 Ability to use language is acquired by using it, to solve problems 
 by solving them, and to perform any physical or mental or moral 
 act by performing it. A law of the faculties forbids the acquisition 
 to be made in any other way. The intelligent teacher knows this, 
 and so from the first he puts his pupils to performing those acts 
 that he would have them acquire the power of performing. If he 
 wishes to train his pupils to read, he does not waste his strength 
 and theirs in teaching and requiring to be learned the letters of the 
 alphabet, or the elementary sounds they represent, or spelling, but 
 he puts them to performing those acts that constitute reading. A 
 literal and persistent application of this plan has led to the marked 
 success some modern teachers have experienced in teaching reading. 
 A similar success would be attained in all forms of school-work if 
 the same principle of teaching should be made universal. 
 
 Mental training is dependent not only on a right method of 
 activity, but on the degree of it. I am not sure that serious mistakes 
 are not now made in attempting to make school-work entirely easy 
 as well as absolutely delightful. It may not be wise to compel the 
 pupil to grope in the dark for results that a small amount of well- 
 directed labor would easily produce, nor to add that severity to his 
 labor which will make it a disagreeable task for him to perform, but 
 it must not be forgotten by those who are engaged in training the 
 human mind, that an earnest and prolonged activity is the only price 
 that will purchase a vigorous development. A consciousness of 
 such activity and of the good results associated with it is the source 
 of a higher joy than is experienced in mere amusement. As the 
 mind acquires strength only by an exertion of its own power, it 
 must not be relieved from hard and independent labor by any 
 attempt on the part of the teacher to take the burden of work upon 
 himself. He must not attempt to think and speak for his pupils, 
 nor to consider his work is skilfully done, when he has made easy, 
 by explanations, whatever is assigned to be performed. 
 
no • EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 The use of such a method may make cheerful work in the school- 
 room, but when the results are known, it will be found that the 
 minds of those who have been subjected to the, method have lost 
 their active power for want of exercise, and that they have in its 
 place simply the capacity to receive information, and to imitate 
 what they see done by others. That method of instruction is faulty 
 which attempts to amuse the mind into the possession of a knowl- 
 edge of what is real, and into a state in which it can control itself. 
 by an independent exertion of its own strength. The active powers 
 of the mind will be led into a proper exercise when the teacher 
 presents to them the objects of study, and does nothing more than 
 direct them to a methodical and vigorous activity in producing 
 required results. The passive powers will be properly exercised 
 in receiving the effects produced by the presence .of whatever 
 demands attention, and in comprehending the directions given for 
 the proper exercise of active power. Good teaching prepares the 
 pupil for solitary work, and puts into his possession the means 
 of study, that is, the plan of study, the end to be attained, and then 
 leaves him to use the means in accordance with the plan. If the 
 mind is directed to a good manner of acting, then the degree of 
 energy it exerts will determine the amount of training it will receive, 
 and the amount of reliable knowledge it will obtain. 
 
 The third result produced by a method of teaching is found in the 
 method of thinking or study it communicates. Not much knowl- 
 edge or mental discipline can be obtained by the longest courses of 
 study now taught in the schools, but a good method of teaching will 
 always present a good plan of study, and occasion that discipline of 
 mind which will. enable it to use the plan in the further pursuit of 
 knowledge after the pupil has left his school, A plan of study 
 should be constructed in accordance with two principles, one of 
 which is found in the nature of knqwlgdge, the other in the nature 
 of the mind. Knowledge is of two kinds, elementary and scientific. 
 We obtain elementary knowledge when we observe things, and know 
 them and their qualities as mere existences of facts. This is the 
 kind of knowledge young minds possess. They call things by their 
 names, and describe their qualities, but they never say much of 
 causes or of classes. 
 
 After some years of study of individual objects for facts pertaining 
 to them, the student will gradually come to know that they have 
 common qualities by means of which they may be arranged in 
 classes. He also begins to understand the causes of the phenomena 
 he has observed, and sq comes into, possession of gen§raj truth, 
 
l88o.J RESULTS OF METHODS OF TEACHING. Ill 
 
 This is scientific knowledge. The two kinds of knowledge bear 
 certain fixed relations to each other. 
 
 First. Elementary knowledge must exist before scientific knowl- 
 edge is possible. 
 
 Second. The one must be obtained through observation, the other 
 through reflection. 
 
 Third. Elementary knowledge should be learned, not in a mis- 
 cellaneous order, as is generally the case, but in the order in which 
 it will be used in the study of the sciences. 
 
 There has been up to this time almost no attempt made by ele- 
 mentary teachers to teach facts with special reference to the sciences 
 that are to be built of them. This failure has confused our element- 
 ary teaching, and made it, in its relations to any definite results, 
 both aimless and barren. To prevent this the elementary teacher 
 must bear constantly in mind that the immediate ends to be secured 
 by his young learners are a well-arranged knowledge of facts, and a 
 right training of the observing powers, with all that is implied in 
 these results. Both the kind of knowledge to be learned and its 
 arrangement are to be determined by the demands which will be 
 made upon them in scientific study. The training to which the 
 observing powers should be subjected is to be inferred from a knowl- 
 edge of their modes of activity and the conditions of their develop- 
 ment. The necessity of storing the young mind with an orderly 
 arrangement of facts, that have been obtained by a systematic and 
 thorough observation of their objects, renders a philosophical method 
 of teaching and study imperative. 
 
 A clear and distinct knowledge of individuals finds its value in 
 the relation it holds to what is universally true, and general truths 
 furnish us with the only data from which we may derive the rules 
 of conduct that direct our lives. The mistakes that men make in 
 forming their notions of general truth are largely due to a loose and 
 limited observation of facts. If one is subjected to a wrong method 
 of observing the present, he must fail in his judgments of the future, 
 and be compelled to live an unproductive, disappointed life. 
 
 The result of methods of teaching will be modified by the spirit - 
 with which they are applied. If the teacher applies his teaching 
 with sole reference to some immediate good, such as is found in 
 knowledge or in anything that cannot be joined to the mind as a 
 part of itself, then the highest and best ends of teaching will not 
 be obtained. 
 
 To teach a child to read to the end that he may read, is as full of 
 folly as to train him to keep still to the end that he may be quiet. 
 
112 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 Reading and quietness may become means to some good end, but 
 they should never be exalted into the place of ends themselves. 
 Teachers, and especially young teachers, are often in danger of 
 attending too exclusively to the formalities of their work, and too 
 little to the purposes for which they labor. 
 
 A method of teaching may be so applied as to inform the mind, 
 and yet leave it without the power of an independent pursuit of the 
 truth or of an independent use of it after it has been found. A 
 method of school government may be so administered as to produce 
 conformity to established rules of conduct, and at the same time to 
 stimulate into a vigorous growth the malevolent affections, and 
 even to create the very spirit of disobedience. Methods of teaching 
 and of school government, without a knowledge and a constant 
 reference to the relations they hold to the power of self-control they 
 are designed to occasion, will be likely to degenerate into a meaning- 
 less if not a mischievous formality. 
 
 Comenius, John Locke, and Pestalozzi are classed among the most 
 famous educators of modern times ; but they owe their fame not so 
 much to the fact that they invented new methods of teaching, or 
 established new educational institutions, as to the fact that they 
 called the attention of the people to the true end of education, — the 
 harmonious development of all the faculties of man. A want of 
 method and of the true spirit of teaching will unfit the pupil of the 
 lower schools for successful work in the schools above, and rob the 
 scientific student of that general knowledge, and that complete 
 development of his powers, which fit a man for a successful life. 
 Thus we find that the legitimate results of a good method of teach- 
 ing are real knowledge, a trained mind, and a good method of exert- 
 ing its active power. Some, phases of our common-school work 
 have been sensibly improved during the past few years. Doubtless 
 some forms of teaching have been introduced that will not stand 
 the test of time. Yet something will be saved, and we shall find 
 that progress has been made. 
 
 What we now need is some wise man to take hold of our unsys- 
 tematized elementary work, and organize it with reference to the 
 relations different topics of elementary knowledge hold to one an- 
 other, and to the relations they all hold to the sciences. We need 
 also to have our methods of teaching conform more fully to the laws 
 of mental activity and mental growth. And, finally, we need to 
 have impressed upon our minds a more exalted notion of what the 
 results of school life should be. 
 
 Details of school work are important objects of study and practice 
 
1880.] RESULTS OF METHODS OF TEACHING. 1 13 
 
 when considered in their relations to a true education, but they 
 become contemptible when chosen as ends. The value and dignity 
 of a method of teaching appear only when it is associated with the 
 great end it is adapted to occasion, — the harmonious development 
 of all the faculties of man. 
 
"4 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 TECHNICAL TRAINING IN AMERICAN SCHOOLS. 
 
 BY E. E. WHITE, PRESIDENT OF PURDUE UNIVERSITY.* 
 
 The American people are awakening to the importance of technical 
 training, so universally recognized in the older countries of Europe. 
 The rapid exhaustion of the natural fertility of our soil, the.wonder- 
 ful increase in the variety of our manufactures, and the marked 
 improvement in the taste of our people, largely the result of general 
 education, all demand higher technical knowledge and skill on the 
 part of the American workman. 
 
 This increasing demand for better work has been attended by a 
 . steady decline of the apprentice system, which hitherto has been 
 our chief reliance for the training of artisans. It is becoming more 
 and more evident that if this decay of apprenticeship is not made 
 good by technical training, in some efficient form, the American 
 manufacturer will be at the mercy of the skilled labor of Europe. 
 The railroad, the steamship, and the telegraph have largely destroyed 
 industrial isolation, and all skilled labor is subject to a world-wide 
 competition. The American artisan must compete with European 
 workmen in skill, or retire from the shop, and surrender the market. 
 The day of muscle in industry has passed, and the day of mind, with 
 skill of eye and hand, has dawned. 
 
 The necessity of technical training being conceded, how can it 
 best be provided ? This, as is seen, involves the question to be 
 considered in this paper : viz., " What is the place of technical 
 training in American schools ? " And this involves the further 
 question, "To what extent can technical training be given in our 
 public schools?" It seems to the writer that the time has come 
 when an attempt to answer these questions involves no assumption 
 of superior wisdom. A vast amount of information respecting 
 technical schools and technical training in other countries has been 
 collected, and experiments have gone far enough to furnish the 
 requisite data for safe generalization and the adoption of a general 
 policy, details being left for future experience to test and settle. 
 
 Whatever may be true of the value of the information and ex- 
 perience now available, the views presented in this paper are 
 expressed with some assurance that they are neither hasty nor 
 visionary. 
 
 * The Indiana College of Science, Agriculture, and the Mechanic Arts. 
 
l88o.] TECHNICAL TRAINING IN AMERICAN SCHOOLS. 115 
 
 A concise statement of a few of the fundamental principles 
 involved may not only avoid misunderstanding, but may shed a 
 clear light on the question before us. 
 
 1. The state has a right to teach any branch of knowledge that 
 will promote the public welfare. This is the broad proposition on 
 which public education rests. The attempt to draw a line through 
 education, and deny the right of the state to cross it, is illogical 
 and futile. The state has either the right to teach all branches of 
 knowledge, or it has no right to teach any branch. There is no 
 middle ground. 
 
 2. The right of the state to teach all knowledge does not 
 necessarily make such instruction its duty. The right to teach is 
 one thing, and the obligation to teach is another. The duty of the 
 state in education is limited by its ability. It cannot teach all per- 
 sons all knowledge, and it is not its duty to attempt it. When the 
 teaching of one kind of knowledge necessarily excludes more impor- 
 tant instruction, the state is released from obligation to teach such 
 knowledge. If it has not the ability to cover the whole ground, 
 it becomes its duty to give attention to the more important and 
 useful. 
 
 3. The duty of the state to teach is also conditioned by necessity. 
 The state has no monopoly of education. The church, the family, 
 and the individual have also the right to teach, and every human 
 interest may organize and support schools for its promotion and 
 benefit. When needed instruction is or will be given by other 
 agencies, the state may or may not provide it. Its concern is to 
 see that such necessary instruction is efficiently given. 
 
 4. The primary and imperative duty of the public school is to 
 provide training and to teach knowledge of general application and 
 utility. It recognizes no class distinctions, social or industrial, but 
 provides a general education for all classes of youth. It is a common 
 school, a school designed to impart a common education, — an edu- 
 cation open to all and useful to all. 
 
 This primary function of the public school is of the highest 
 practical importance and value. Its comprehensive aim is to pre- 
 pare the child to discharge the duties and meet the obligations of 
 coming manhood, including his relations to the family, society, and 
 the state, — relations involving the highest and most important 
 activities of civilized life. In performing this function, the public 
 school assumes that every child that crosses its threshold to receive 
 instruction is to be a man, and that his first and highest need is to 
 have all the elements of manhood within him developed, quickened, 
 
Il6 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 and energized. The first element in this elementary training is 
 character, and the second is intelligence, — moral and intellectual 
 furnishing and force. 
 
 5. The public school, as above defined, exhausts neither the right 
 nor the duty of the state in education. The state may establish 
 higher institutions, and it may organize or encourage special schools 
 to promote important industries or to meet the wants of classes. 
 It has the right to supplement the public school by special schools 
 for technical training. 
 
 We are now prepared to ask whether any technical instruction 
 can be provided by the public school without subverting its primary 
 function, without sacrificing the more important and imperative for 
 the less important and the incidental. 
 
 The elements 'of technical knowledge which are of general appli- 
 cation and utility may clearly be taught in the public school. These 
 may include instruction in industrial or mechanical drawing, the 
 practical applications of geometry, the keeping of accounts, the 
 elements of the physical and natural sciences, modelling in clay, and 
 those elementary mechanical processes which may be made an 
 efficient means of general training. Such instruction is not only 
 the basis of technical training, but is of great value to all youth, 
 whatever may be their future occupations and positions in life. It 
 is useful as a general preparation for all pursuits. Time for this 
 instruction may be gained by reducing the time hitherto devoted 
 to several other branches of study. This has been done in many 
 schools without loss, and the adoption of truer ideas and better 
 methods of teaching would make it possible and feasible in all. 
 
 The technical instruction above indicated may properly be called 
 general, in distinction to that which relates to a particular trade or 
 pursuit, which is special Special technical training involves the use 
 of the tools and other appliances of given trades and occupations. In 
 the mechanic arts, it includes what is known as "handicraft," — skill 
 in the use of tools, machinery, and material. Its purpose is not 
 general training, but special preparation for a special pursuit. 
 
 Should this special technical instruction be made an integral part, 
 of the work of the public school? In the light of the principles 
 above stated, I unhesitatingly answer, no. It is not the duty of the 
 public school to teach trades, and an attempt to do this work on an 
 adequate scale would subvert public education from its primary 
 purpose, and end in disappointment and failure. The sooner this is 
 understood and accepted, the better for both industrial and general 
 education. 
 
l88o.] TECHNICAL TRAINING IN AMERICAN SCHOOLS. 117 
 
 Several objections to the teaching of trades in the public school 
 may thus be stated : — 
 
 1. It is impossible for the public school to teach a tithe of its 
 pupils the pursuit or occupation by which they are to earn a living. 
 A glance at the list of occupations given in the report of the census 
 of 1870 will satisfy any one that but very few of the three hundred 
 and thirty-eight occupations therein named can be made a part 
 of the public school course. Of the one hundred and seventy-two 
 occupations classed as " Manufactures, and Mechanical and Mining 
 Industries," not a score can be taught in a school-shop, and but few 
 of these can thus be taught with any efficiency. The public school 
 would make a large contract if it should undertake to train its pupils 
 to be bakers, bleachers, dyers, bookbinders, brewers, brick and tile 
 makers, butchers, candle and soap makers, carpet makers, carriage 
 and wagon makers, charcoal burners, cheese makers, cigar makers, 
 confectioners, coopers, trimmers, tanners, photographers, distillers, 
 engineers, gas-work employes, glass makers, gold and silver workers, 
 gunsmiths, locksmiths, harness and saddle makers, hat and cap 
 makers, shoemakers, iron-furnace and rolling-mill operatives, cotton, 
 woollen, and silk mill operatives, steam-boiler and steam-engine 
 makers, tobacco-factory operatives, upholsterers, wheelwrights, etc. 
 The attempt to teach one fifth of these and like trades to all youth 
 would exhaust the present resources of the public schools. 
 
 2. The teaching of a few trades to all pupils would crowd these 
 pursuits with workmen, and reduce the compensation of skilled labor 
 therein to the wages of common laborers. The turning of the pupils 
 in the public schools of our cities and towns into a few channels of 
 industry would glut these occupations, and leave many skilled work- 
 men without employment. The training of all the boys to be car- 
 penters and blacksmiths, for example, would be worse than industrial 
 folly. Not a tithe of them could earn a living as hand-tool mechanics, 
 Handicraft is fast disappearing, and more and more mechanical work 
 is done by machinery. The coming artisan will be the master of 
 the machine, as has been clearly shown by Prof. Thompson, of the 
 Technical School at Worcester, Mass. The teaching of handicraft 
 in the schools would give nine tenths of the pupils skill which they 
 would never use in after-life, or use only incidentally. 
 
 A reference to the statistics of industry will show that the above 
 statements are not too strong. A recent paper on technical educa- 
 tion contains a table of occupation statistics in Massachusetts, show- 
 ing that about one fourth of the laboring population of the State are 
 eneaeed in manufacturing and mechanical industries. It asserts 
 
"8 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 that these three hundred thousand workmen represent skilled labor 
 in productive industry, and the inference is suggested, if not stated, 
 that the skill of these artisans would be greatly increased by a 
 knowledge of mechanical drawing. The census of 1870 shows that 
 less than one .third of these artisans are working in wood and iron, 
 using handicraft skill, and we estimate that not more than fifty 
 thousand, or one twentieth of the working population of the State, 
 are hand-tool mechanics. Would it not be wiser, as well as cheaper, 
 to train these fifty thousand skilled artisans in well-equipped shops 
 and special schools than to make the weak and vain attempt to train 
 half a million mechanics in the public schools to supply several 
 mechanical industries with fifty thousand skilled workmen ? 
 
 This objection does not apply to the training of pupils in the use 
 of hand-tools and in simple mechanical processes, when such train- 
 ing is made a means of general education, — the training of the eye, 
 the hand, the mind, for educational purposes. Such training is not 
 the teaching of trades or handicrafts, but is general technical train- 
 ing, the same as mechanical drawing, and, as such, has a place in the 
 public school course. The extent of such training will depend on 
 its value as an element of general education. 
 
 3. Another objection to a partial system of industrial training, 
 the teaching of a few trades to a few pupils, is its manifest injustice. 
 The public school can provide such special training only at the 
 expense of its facilities and appliancies for general education. Why 
 should the value of the public school to the great majority of its 
 pupils be lowered to teach trades to a small number of youth ? 
 Why should a few pupils be thus taught trades, and the great 
 majority of youth be left without technical training? 
 
 The question has no satisfactory answer. The workshop cannot 
 be put into the public school without a sacrifice of its efficiency as 
 an agency for general education. Besides, the teaching of hand-tool 
 trades to a few pupils in the public schools is mere playing with the 
 great problem of industrial training. Every productive industry 
 needs the assistance of special technical training. 
 
 This objection does not apply to the teaching of trades in 
 reformatory schools, orphan asylums, institutions for the blind, the 
 deaf and the dumb, etc. These are special schools for classes of 
 unfortunate youth, and the pupils therein may be taught trades at 
 the public expense, on the same principle that they are fed and 
 clothed. 
 
 The three objections above stated show that the public school 
 cannot wisely undertake the work of special technical training. To 
 
l88o.] TECHNICAL TRAINING IN AMERICAN SCHOOLS. 119 
 
 do this, it must train all children for their respective .future pursuits, 
 or it must teach a few pupils chosen pursuits, and the objections to 
 each of these courses seem to us to be conclusive. 
 
 A recent report of the school committee of an Eastern city con- 
 tains this statement : " The question of teaching trades in our schools 
 is one of vital importance. If New England would maintain her 
 position as the great industrial centre of the country, she must 
 become to the United States what France is to the rest of Europe : 
 the first in taste, the first in design, the first in skilled workmanship. 
 She must accustom her children from early youth to the use of 
 tools, and give them a thorough training in the mechanic arts." 
 
 This has been pronounced " the most important official utterance 
 yet made in this country on the subject of technical education." 
 If the first sentence fully interprets the meaning of the statement 
 as a whole, we give it, as our humble opinion, that the utterance is 
 the most impracticable educational scheme which has yet received 
 official sanction. We submit that the teaching of trades in the public 
 schools should not be a question in the minds of the intelligent and 
 practical educators of the foremost school city of the country. The 
 maxim that the head and the hand should be trained together is, in 
 one sense, an important educational principle, but as a statement 
 that the public school should teach every pupil to work with his 
 hands while it trains him to think "with his head," it is imprac- 
 ticable and misleading. It may be true that every child of the 
 requisite age should be taught to work while he receives his school- 
 ing, but it does not follow that this work should be supplied and 
 directed by the public school. The family has something to do in 
 the training of children, and a considerable portion of child-life is 
 still under the parents' control. The public school has hitherto 
 recognized this fact, and it has wisely not attempted to do every- 
 thing which industry, religion, and civilization demand in the educa- 
 tion of each generation. The public school cannot wisely be made 
 a workshop for the training of apprentices, but it can and should 
 give such general technical training as underlies all industrial pur- 
 suits. The special instruction and practice needed to make a coat, 
 shoe a horse, or build a house, should be left to the shop, or to some 
 special trade school, properly equipped for this work. The public 
 school has done its part in preparing youth for special pursuits when 
 it has given them an efficient general preparation for all pursuits, 
 and all industrial experience shows that the more fundamental and 
 thorough this general preparation, the more fruitful will be the 
 special training. 
 
120 EDUCATION. L" Nov - 
 
 What is needed is to supplement the public school with a system 
 of special schools for technical or industrial training. But how are 
 these special schools for industrial training to be organized and 
 supported? The political, social, and industrial conditions of the 
 nations of Europe differ so radically from those of this country, that 
 it is not always wise to be guided by European experience in 
 education ; but it will be safe to assume that whatever private 
 enterprise has been equal to there, it will be equal to here. 
 
 As a rule, the higher technical and agricultural schools are there 
 directed and maintained by the government, arid many schools of 
 ■ arts and trades receive more or less state and municipal aid. The 
 more strictly industrial schools, especially those which teach indus- 
 trial arts or trades, are private institutions, supported and directed 
 by individuals or by the industries interested, or by philanthropic 
 societies. The number of these special schools has increased, until 
 nearly every art and industry has its training or trade school. 
 
 We see no reason why this experience may not be repeated in 
 this country. The national government has laid the foundation of 
 at least one industrial school of a high grade in each State, and, 
 in accepting this bequest, each State has pledged its faith for the 
 maintenance of the institution thus founded. Polytechnic and tech- 
 nical schools, but little less comprehensive, have been founded by 
 private munificence, and schools of art are springing up in our cities. 
 The conditional offer of state or municipal aid would induce every 
 important productive industry to establish technical or trade schools 
 for the training of skilled workmen. 
 
 What is needed to secure a full development of this system of 
 special schools is a popular demand for. technical instruction, and 
 this is coming. Experience is demonstrating the practical value of 
 such training, and every important American industry will soon 
 have its technical school, especially if the public school is held to 
 its own legitimate work. 
 
 For the complete success of this system of industrial training the 
 requirements of the public school should be so modified as to permit 
 pupils over say twelve years of age to devote a part of each day to 
 labor or to special technical training. I have long held that the 
 interest of both education and industry would be promoted by the 
 adoption of half-time courses of study, running parallel with the 
 present full courses and in the same classes. The half-time course 
 should contain only the essential and more important branches of 
 study, and the daily programme should be so arranged as to bring 
 the instruction in these branches into a half -day, — either the forenoon 
 
1880.] TECHNICAL TRAINING IN AMERICAN SCHOOLS. 121 
 
 or the afternoon. This arrangement would avoid the organization 
 of separate schools for half-time pupils, and their consequent separa- 
 tion from other pupils ; and, at the same time, it would afford the 
 advantages of full-time schools without loss to those pupils who 
 wish to devote full time to school work. The limits of this paper 
 forbid the giving of details. It must suffice to say that such an 
 adjustment has stood the test of experience in several of the German 
 States. * I received the idea from the school system of Bavaria. 
 
 Permit me, in conclusion, to deprecate that advocacy of technical 
 education which disparages the industrial value of general education, 
 and more than hints that the public school is an industrial failure. 
 If this be true of the public school, it is clear that neither industrial 
 drawing nor instruction in sewing will prove an adequate remedy. 
 But the public school is not an industrial failure. It has been and 
 is the most effective of all agencies for the promotion of American 
 industry. Its training touches both of the prime conditions of pro- 
 ductive industry. It awakens desires, and incites and impels man 
 to effort : enterprise and wealth are the results. It gives ingenuity 
 to the mind and cunning to the fingers. Thought in the brain of 
 labor is the alchemy of industry, turning everything it touches into 
 gold. Intelligence and character are the two great conservators 
 of wealth. Who can estimate the industrial value of the common 
 schools of New England ! 
 
 It is not claimed that the public school is doing its full duty in 
 promoting the productive industries of the country. It should give 
 a larger place in its course to general technical instruction ; it should 
 be pervaded by a more earnest industrial spirit ; and it should do 
 more to cultivate a taste for industrial pursuits and a respect for 
 honest labor. These practical advances are more important than 
 a weak attempt to make artisans. 
 
122 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 THE QUINCY METHODS. 
 
 BY E. G. NORTHROP, LL. D. 
 
 There is a striking contrast in the comments recently made on 
 the Quincy school system. "The new departure in education," 
 " The revolution in teaching," " The regeneration of schools," 
 " Quincy justly the 'Mecca of teachers," " Six thousand visitors in 
 her schools a year," "An exhibition so triumphant will carry all 
 •before it," "One half the school expenses elsewhere wasted," 
 "Our schools hitherto all sham and shoddy," — are not more ex- 
 treme laudations on the one side than the current disparagements 
 are on the other, when we read of Mr. Adams' "Monumental igno- 
 rance of schools outside of Quincy," " His reckless ignorance of 
 facts," "Nothing new in Quincy," "The best features of the 
 Quincy reform inaugurated long ago in many New England cities," 
 "The soaring Quincy bubble," and "The Quincy quackery and that 
 of Hop Bitters are equally well advertised." The schools of this 
 town (population 9,155) have suddenly become celebrated to a 
 degree unprecedented in the history of any town of its size in 
 America. They have been so numerously visited by school super- 
 intendents, teachers, and newspaper reporters, even from distant 
 cities and States, that restrictions were required to prevent the 
 overcrowding of certain rooms, or interference with school work. 
 Leading metropolitan journals have at great length described their 
 achievements and eulogized their methods. A surplus of volunteers 
 from abroad have tendered their services gratuitously as assistant 
 teachers, that they might thus thoroughly learn the Quincy methods. 
 Other teachers, after a visit of a single day or half-day, have sought 
 to advertise themselves or their schools by public announcements, 
 that henceforth their schools will be conducted on the Quincy plan. 
 This great and sudden celebrity of the Quincy schools is primarily 
 due to the able paper of Charles Francis Adams, Jr. The honored 
 name of Charles Francis Adams, Sr., has contributed to this result. 
 In various parts of the country I have found even intelligent pro- 
 fessional gentlemen attributing this paper to the distinguished 
 statesman who performed such eminent service during the late 
 war as our minister to England. One of many illustrations that 
 might be given will suggest the extent of this error. A president of. 
 a Western university, himself a Massachusetts man, says, "The 
 attention which the experiment in Quincy has received is greatly 
 
l88o.] THE QUINCY METHODS. 123 
 
 due to the illustrious name of the man who should receive much of 
 the credit of the experiment, but who published the results in lan- 
 guage not altogether wise nor modest." But the "junior" in this 
 family wields a vigorous pen, in no heed of factitious aid, and for 
 , thafc reason the mistake of father for son is the more natural. 
 Under these circumstances, an impartial account of the Quincy 
 schools, with such criticisms and comments as will prove most sug- 
 gestive to school superintendents and teachers, will meet a want 
 widely felt. What the Quincy schools are, and the far more impor- 
 tant inquiry, what all common schools should be and do, are the 
 questions which this paper seeks to answer. These questions are 
 now prominently before the country as never before, and no super- 
 intendent or teacher, worthy of his calling, can afford to ignore 
 them. 
 
 It is my privilege to know something of both the old and the new 
 in Quincy schools. In my ten years' service for the Board of Edu- 
 cation of Massachusetts, I was called officially to every town of that 
 State. In repeated visits to Quincy, I then found her schools mani- 
 festly inferior to those of the neighboring towns of Dorchester, 
 West Roxbury, Brookline, and Newton. That inferiority, then too 
 conspicuous to be questioned, was a matter of familiar comment 
 with prominent friends of education in Boston and its vicinity. A 
 recent inspection of the schools of Quincy showed that there had 
 indeed been a revolution there, — a change so marked, and happy 
 and suggestive, as to invite inquiry in relation to its causes, character, 
 and results. 
 
 Such was formerly the condition of the public schools there, that 
 the wealthiest families largely patronized private schools. Six years 
 ago, the average attendance was only seventy-four per cent, which 
 shows whether this class regarded public schools with pride or as 
 "pauper establishments." Quincy, with all her wealth, stood among 
 the lower half of the towns of the State, being the one hundred and 
 eighty-eighth in a list of three hundred and forty-four, or sixteen 
 below the average of the whole State. Tp-day she ranks as the 
 seventy-second in the State, or just one hundred above the average. 
 This means that in six years Quincy has risen one hundred and six- 
 teen degrees in the scale of the barometer, which indicates the 
 educational atmosphere of a town. Now her schools are justly 
 regarded as good enough for the sons of the richest, and yet none 
 too good for the children of the poorest. 
 
 This change, though nominally brought about by the agency of the 
 school committee, is really due to the influence of the distinguished 
 
124 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 family so long and justly the pride of this town. Some five years ago 
 Charles Francis Adams, -Sr., delivered a commencement address at 
 Amherst College, on the "Essentials and Aims of Higher Educa- 
 tion," irt which he traces certain crying evils to imperfect early train- 
 ing. In 1873, the school committee of Quincy, or rather Charles 
 Francis Adams, Jr., who has inspired this movement, on a careful 
 examination found their schools had fallen into a rut. To epitomize 
 his statement, "A retrospect of ten years indicated no progress. 
 The graduates of the grammar schools failed in speaking, spelling, 
 and writing their own language. Not one in twenty of them could 
 write an ordinary letter with ideas clearly expressed. When the com- 
 mittee took the examination into their own hands, the schools went 
 to pieces. When called to read from a book new to the scholars, 
 the result was bewildering. The children could neither write with 
 facility nor read fluently, for they had been trained only for an exam- 
 ination, and turned into parrots, and were making a meaningless 
 farce of education. Certain motions had to be gone through with, 
 but for real results the teacher cared nothing. It was all smatter, 
 veneering, and cram. To inaugurate a new departure, it was deter- 
 mined to employ a competent superintendent." 
 
 The three really new things at Quincy most essential to success 
 are, — 
 
 1. The appointment of a liberal and intelligent committee who 
 had clear and definite ideas of existing defects, and of the remedies 
 needed. 
 
 2. The continuance of the same committee in office, for they com- 
 manded in a rare degree the confidence and continued support of the 
 people. Rotation in office would have insured failure. 
 
 3. The appointment of an able superintendent, trained as a 
 specialist, a man of good sense, great zeal and enthusiasm, and an 
 indefatigable worker, patient in details, young at heart, and in closest 
 sympathy with the children, and beloved by them. 
 
 These three conditions of success are happily and remarkably 
 combined in Quincy. The school board, superintendent, and teach- 
 ers have acted in entire harmony, — all intent on one end. This 
 unity of aim has been itself an inspiration to teachers and scholars. 
 The superintendent has had a free field, crippled by no fear of the 
 jealousy or interference of the Board of Education, and he, in turn-, 
 gave the same liberty to all the teachers. While there was unity of 
 plan, there was room for invention and diversity in details. The 
 official criticism of the old system bore mainly on the grammar 
 schools, but the specialty of Superintendent Parker was primary 
 
I880.J THE QUINCY METHODS. 125. 
 
 instruction. "Let me begin at the foundation, and I will warrant 
 the right superstructure," was his motto. The revolution began with 
 the alphabet, and extended into the last efforts of the grammar- 
 school course. The new departure, therefore, started with the Quincy 
 primaries, and it left little in them that has not undergone a change. 
 Many of the Kindergarten methods were here introduced. Play- 
 tables and Kindergarten desks were used, with blocks, forms, and 
 Kindergarten gifts and occupations. The teachers were invited to 
 secure, or were provided with numerous objects, natural curiosities, 
 pictures on pasteboard, stuffed animals, and the like. The celebrity 
 given to the schools by Mr. Adams' paper attracted many pupil 
 teachers, some of them normal graduates, who were glad to serve 
 without pay, that they might gain a thorough practical acquaintance 
 with the principles and processes here applied. From numerous 
 applicants, only the best were accepted. With this ample and choice 
 corps of assistants, it was easy to divide each school into small groups 
 of ten or twelve, and secure the constant activity of every child, ^nd an 
 unusual amount of individual teaching. Not a listless child is to be 
 seen there. 
 
 It is not, however, mere interest or activity that can satisfy the 
 true teacher. There may be activity and interest in a dance, in 
 games of draughts or cards. Temporary expedients and a whirl of 
 excitement may produce an unwholesome activity, an itching for mere 
 novelty, fatal to quiet thought or habits of study. There may be 
 agitation without progress, and commotion without execution. The 
 indiscriminate clamor for "life, as the grand essential for teachers 
 and pupils," sometimes leads to the use of stimulants as noxious to 
 the mind as alcohol to the body. 
 
 The opportunities and causes of progress in the Quincy schools 
 were exceptional in more than the three particulars above named. 
 Their previous depression made their sudden elevation the more 
 conspicuous. The volunteers summoned by the brilliant rhetoric of 
 Mr. Adams rendered an important service in multiplying the num- 
 ber and reducing the size of classes, that cannot be elsewhere 
 expected. The celebrity of the schools 'gave a remarkable stimulus 
 to the pupils. Never did seven words so thrill an assembled host as 
 when Napoleon said to his army, standing under the shadow of the 
 pyramids of 'Egypt, " Frenchmen, forty generations look down upon 
 you ! " In like manner, the teachers of Quincy seem to have said to 
 their pupils, " The educational representatives of forty millions of 
 people are watching you." Their interest was frequently intensified 
 by the inspection and laudation of distinguished visitors from differ- 
 
126 ED UCA TION. [Nov. 
 
 ent and often distant parts of the country. That sort of inspiration 
 is not altogether natural or healthful, and there need be no regrets 
 that it cannot be generally felt. 
 
 Mr. Adams' chief points in his criticism of the old methods were 
 the inability of the scholars, even the graduates of the grammar 
 schools, to read and write their vernacular properly. Beginning in 
 the primaries,. Col. Parker at once gave the greatest prominence to 
 reading and expression, both oral and written. Adopting the word 
 system, they began writing in script at the outset. Discarding for 
 the first six months all books and . printed matter, except pictures, 
 reading and writing were taught and practised continually, both on 
 the blackboard and slate. Tact and didactic skill are needed in noth- 
 ing more than in the first steps in teaching reading and spelling. 
 
 Every study should be pursued not as an end, but as a means of 
 training the faculties. Rightly taken, even the first steps in reading 
 and spelling, instead of being a monotonous and mechanical drill, 
 may b# made an attractive intellectual exercise, cultivating the eye 
 and conceptive faculty by observing the form of each word as a unit, 
 just as one would look intently at a house, a dog, or robin, who 
 intended to draw the same from memory. It is an important art to 
 learn how to see so accurately that one's conceptions of visible 
 objects may be as clear as were the original perceptions. This art, 
 developed in reading and spelling, applies to all objects of perception 
 and description, and^ thus the child early gains a priceless power 
 which enters into all the higher operations of the mind in natural 
 science and history, in poetry, in the fine arts, and, indeed, in all 
 description. 
 
 Col. Parker wisely applied the theory that reading is by far the 
 most important study taught in our schools. Its early mastery is 
 here proved to be the surest way to facilitate all other and higher 
 studies, fostering a love of school and fondness for books. For- 
 merly, aversion to study and hatred of school were produced by 
 tasking children in grammar and the higher studies before they 
 could readily read them. Once implant a love of reading, and you 
 have a strong pledge of scholarship through life. Let a child learn 
 to read with facility and expression, and he has gained the key by 
 which he' can open any door in the temple of science. But so long 
 as a child finds it a toilsome tug to "spell out" the words, he can 
 take no pleasure in reading, and therefore reads little. Whoever 
 knew any man fond of books who retained the childish habit of 
 moving his lips as he deciphered the words ? 
 
 Of course the old a, b, c method was at once abandoned when Col. 
 
1880.] THE QUINCY METHODS. 12J 
 
 Parker made his influence felt in the primaries, as indeed it had been 
 discarded for many years by the best teachers of New England and 
 of the country. That its expulsion from Quincy awaited Col. Par- 
 ker's advent is another decisive proof of the previous low condition 
 of the schools of that town. The progressive teachers of Massachu- 
 setts and of the country, for a score of years, have condemned this 
 exploded method as strongly as Mr. Adams now does. His heavy 
 blows are struck with the vigor of one who is consciously commis- 
 sioned to slay that monster whom the best teachers of the whole 
 country regarded as dead and buried years ago. No doubt there 
 remain dark by-ways where this obsolete method still lingers, for old 
 usage as well as error dies hard. One cannot but smile, however, at 
 Mr. Adams' evident innocence of educational affairs out of Quincy, 
 when he thus describes "so daring an experiment" in "the new 
 departure" : — 
 
 "The drudgery of the alphabet was gone. It was robbed of 
 its terrors, and stole upon them unawares, while the most confound- 
 ing thing to the members of the committee was, that in hearing 
 the primaries read, not a child among them could repeat his letters.* 
 So daring an experiment as this can, however, be tested in but one 
 way, — by its practical results, as proven by the experience of a 
 number of years, and testified to by parents and teachers, as well 
 as observed in children. The method has now been four years in 
 use in the schools of Quincy, and has ceased to be -an experiment ; 
 its advantages are questioned by none, least of all by teachers and 
 parents. Among the teachers are those who, having for many years 
 taught class after plass in the old way, found themselves called upon 
 to attempt with deep misgiving the new, and to them mysterious 
 process. The ways of nature are the easier ways. After all, the 
 lesson is not a very profound one, and it is strange indeed that it 
 took so long to find it out. A child learns to talk and to walk, — the 
 two most difficult things it is called on to learn in its whole life, — 
 without any instruction, and by simple practice ; the process of learn- 
 ing is not painful to it or wearisome to others ; on the contrary, it is 
 an amusement to both. Why the same process should not have been 
 pursued in other and less difficult branches of education, is not appar- 
 ent. One thing only is clear : it was not furstied. In place of it, an 
 arbitrary system of names and sounds, having no significance in 
 themselves, was adopted; and with these generation after genera- 
 tion of children have been tortured. Only now do we deign, in 
 imparting knowledge,, to give any attention to natural processes which 
 
 * The italics are ours. 
 
128 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 have forever been going on before our eyes and in our families, and 
 yet we profess to think that there is no science in primary education, 
 and that all there is to it can be learned in a few hours. The simple 
 fact is, however, that within these few years it required a man of 
 absolute genius to discover how to teach the alphabet. The new 
 departure, therefore, started with the Quincy primaries, and it left 
 little in them that had not undergone a change. The reorganization 
 was complete." 
 
 Had Mr. Adams ten years ago visited the schools of St. Louis, under 
 the supervision of Dr. Harris, or those of Cincinnati, then under 
 John Hancock, of Cleveland, under Superintendent Rickoff, of 
 Oswego, N. Y., under Superintendent Sheldon, the model school in 
 Westfield, under Hon. J. W. Dickinson, many of the primaries in Bos- 
 ton, especially that truly model school under Miss Jennie Stickney, or 
 the primaries of New Haven, under Ariel Parish, not to name many 
 equally good in other States, he might have seen the same work 
 done as well, and children as early and thoroughly trained in reading. 
 " First Steps in Reading " was a topic discussed at length in my first 
 Teachers' Institute held in Connecticut, more than thirteen years 
 ago, when the plan of printing or writing words from the outset, 
 ignoring the names of letters, was advocated. Substantially the 
 same views were urged during the previous ten years in the institutes 
 of Massachusetts', from which the teachers of Quincy were then 
 conspicuously absent. 
 
 Whether the script alone should be used from the start, as in 
 Quincy, and Bridgeport, Connecticut, or printing, the first year, and 
 script thereafter, is a minor matter. The question of the word or 
 phonic method at the outset is non-essential. The phonic method 
 teaches the sounds of the letters the first fortnight, and then carries 
 all the advantages of the word method, including the rapid recogni- 
 tion of words as units. The tact and skill and enthusiasm of Col. 
 Parker would, I doubt not, secure as good results in one way as the 
 other. The remarkable success of Dr. Harris with the primary 
 schools of St. Louis has been achieved by the use of the phonic 
 method, so long and generally used in teaching reading in Germany, 
 Italy, and other European countries, and so generally indorsed by 
 the most eminent educational experts of the world, based, as it is, on 
 true philosophical principles. The word method, though in use long 
 ago, has been several times re-discovered, when a better knowledge 
 of the past would have saved that strain of inventive "genius." 
 
 Another prominent aim of Col. Parker in the primaries was to 
 train the senses and form habits of careful observation of common 
 
l88o.] THE QUINCY METHODS. 129 
 
 things. He recognized the fact that the child's intellectual life 
 begins with the reception of impressions from the senses, which are 
 the windows of the soul. The noblest of these, and the royal avenue 
 to his mind, is the eye. From the outset this is busy with form, as 
 seen first, perhaps, in its hand, its mother's face, the kitten, the win- 
 dow, and other common objects in the nursery. The child recog- 
 nizes hundreds of things by their shapes before he can count three. 
 In the new education, Nature becomes the great teacher. Facts, 
 objects, common things, are made the leading instruments of devel- 
 oping the faculties of the juvenile mind. Plato well said, "The 
 Deity delights in geometrizing, for the world itself, and everything 
 in it, is built after some geometric form or combination of these 
 forms." Accordingly a large portion of the course of study printed 
 during the last year to guide the teachers of Quincy is occupied 
 with lessons in form. If youth should be trained to study nature, 
 should we not give them the few exact forms which, singly or' 
 combined, are the patterns of all visible objects ? As the child's 
 mind naturally turns to form and size, if untaught in them, his 
 notions will be vague ; but if trained in these elements of geometry, 
 his perceptions are likely to be distinct and accurate. The majority 
 of our pupils will never pursue geometry proper, but all should learn 
 its forms. These ideas and terms will be especially useful to the car- 
 penter, joiner, mason, worker in tin, or any metal, or at any trade. 
 
 Form enters into all our perceptions, descriptions, comparisons, im- 
 aginations, calculations, and indeed into all the arts and occupations 
 of men, — into the very texture of daily life. It has been said that 
 these geometric elements are too difficult for the primaries. But the 
 experience of many schools in Germany and in America, as well as 
 at Quincy, shows that these elements are simpler than the first pro- 
 cesses in arithmetic. Ideas of extension are more elementary and 
 attractive than those of number. The relations of place, form, and 
 size are among the earliest conceptions of the juvenile mind. The 
 supposed difficulty of the subject is imaginary. The experience of 
 thousands of primary schools at home and abroad shows that form is 
 one of' their earliest, easiest, pleasantest, and most useful occupa- 
 tions. With the gonigraph in hand as a sort of magic wand, the 
 youngest children in all true kindergartens delight in making tri- 
 angles, squares, rhombs, rhomboids, oblongs, pentagons, hexagons, 
 circles, and other forms. Because they are made with facility and 
 rapidity by their own little hands, these forms are understood and 
 remembered. 
 
 In the primary schools of Quincy all are busy, and all is life. Col. 
 
13° EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 Parker visits them not as a mere spectator, for he habitually turns 
 teacher. With crayon in hand he is a worker, by turns, in all the 
 grades. His earnestness and enthusiasm give encouragement and 
 stimulus alike to teacher and scholar, and it is inspiration that is 
 everywhere needed even more than mere instruction, — or rather the 
 great want is such instruction as shall awaken self-reliance and 
 enthusiasm, and prompt the child every day to win some victory, and 
 go on from strength to strength. The child then feels that he is 
 doing something, and this consciousness of achievement gives pleas- 
 ant memories of the past and stimulus for the future. In visiting 
 schools, it is often sickening to see what a dreary, monotonous, stupid 
 task the exhilarating work of study becomes, from the want of fit in- 
 centives and methods. You witness a sluggish, passive receptivity, 
 or a mechanical movement fatal to all joyous activity. Happy the 
 child whom a skilled teacher has inspired with such taste for study 
 as will prompt and sustain spontaneous effort. Joy and hope ever 
 attend true energy. They quicken the mind as gloom and discour- 
 agement suppress its life. The one awakens interest and attention, 
 the other produces heedlessness and indifference. 
 
 Col. Parker has wisely aimed to stimulate the curiosity of the 
 children from the outset, realizing that curiosity is the parent of 
 attention and memory. Curiosity prepares the soil and fertilizes 
 the seeds of truth. A farmer might as well sow a field without 
 ploughing, as a teacher instruct pupils in whose minds no love 
 of knowledge has been awakened. Curiosity, or what is kindred, 
 love of knowledge, is one of the strong natural desires which God 
 has planted in the heart of every child. Though too often dormant, 
 it may become one of the vital forces in education. However strong 
 in childhood, it should grow with years and attainments. -When 
 this is not the result, such stinting comes from our' blundering. 
 Though at first a restless instinct, under fit culture it will mature 
 into an insatiable desire, a ruling passion. Curiosity is to the mind 
 what appetite is to the body. It creates a hungering and thirsting 
 for knowledge, which alone is the mind's food. Love of truth was 
 as strong a passion with Newton as love of conquest with Napoleon. 
 Under its healthful inspiration study is a pleasure, without it a task ; 
 fhe dullest drudgery, "the weariness of the flesh." Curiosity is the 
 primal desire to which the child's nature responds ; it is the impel- 
 ling power to which genius, when enriched with the treasures of 
 science, is most susceptible. What at first is but a blind impulse, 
 becomes an insatiable desire to observe and discover. The most 
 bountiful supplies only add 'fuel to the flame. Instead of surfeit, 
 
l88o.] THE QUINCY METHODS. 131 
 
 there comes an intense craving. Each new attainment gives 
 strength and stimulus for higher acquisitions. 
 
 The most serious charge ©f Mr. Adams against the old system 
 was its failure to develop the power of ■ expression. With his senti- 
 ments on this point I have long been in sympathy, and have often 
 said that just here is the greatest deficiency of American schools as 
 compared with the best schools of Switzerland, Germany, and Eng- 
 land. With us, nothing of equal importance is so underrated and 
 neglected as the culture of the expressive faculties. Until recently 
 grammar was the only study in our curriculum professing to teach 
 how "to speak and write the English language correctly." As 
 ordinarily taught to children under twelve years of age, it has about 
 as much adaptation to its professed design as the study of physiology 
 and anatomy would have to swimming. Useful as grammar is, it 
 is a difficult study, kindred to rhetoric and logic, and above the grasp 
 of young children. In Quincy, grammar was summarily put out of 
 school, and daily exercises in talking and writing put in. The result 
 is that the children write English earlier, write more and write it 
 better throughout all the schools of the town than is the case in all 
 the schools of any other town within my knowledge in our country. 
 Individual schools can here and there be found in this respect equal 
 to any in Quincy. The pen or pencil continually in hand has made 
 the Quincy scholars facile and felicitous in expression. They learn 
 words by using them, phrases by making them, and sentences by 
 writing them. Conversation is one of the attractions of the Quincy 
 schools, as it is of the well-regulated home. " What did you do last 
 evening ? " or "What did you see on your way to school this morn- 
 ing ? " are specimens of many simple questions to invite habits of 
 observation, and then of "telling the teacher." Thus conversa- 
 tion was cultivated as an art. So should it be in every primary 
 school. 
 
 To teach how to talk well should be the constant aim of both home 
 and school training. Conversation should be regarded not merely 
 as an art, but as a fine art, indeed the noblest of the fine arts, and 
 therefore should be cultivated with the zest of the amateur in paint- 
 ing and sculpture. Carefully practised, it becomes a prime educator, 
 awakening curiosity, sharpening perception, cultivating attention," 
 quickening both the memory and imagination, and developing ver- 
 satility, tact, and vivacity. In view of the range and grandeur of 
 its subjects, the greatness of its influence, and the brilliancy of its 
 victories, speech is the grandest of all arts. The leaders of men 
 in every age have gained their wide sway by this divine gift of 
 
132 ED UCA TION. [Nov. 
 
 speech. The greatest triumphs of truth are won by the tongue. 
 Though it is "a little member," it justly "boasteth great things." 
 
 The culture of expression includes "and promotes that of all the 
 other faculties. Perception, conception, and, memory, fancy and 
 imagination, the taste and sensibilities, the powers of imitation, 
 personification, and representation should be trained by and for 
 expression, for without it all these powers, imprisoned within the 
 soul, would droop and decay. That " crime against a human soul," 
 as Prof. Fauerbach calls the history of Kasper Hauser, illustrates 
 the sad effects of long isolation and enforced silence. The soul, 
 like a lake, grows stagnant without an outlet. Thought itself falters 
 when language fails. Felicity of expression favors clear thinking, 
 as much as exact logic helps language. A linguistic taste fosters 
 that love of literature and fondness for books which, like a divine 
 light, will illumine the scholar's daily life. 
 
 Language is the grandest product of the human mind, at once the 
 means and measure of its growth, the greatest instrument of human 
 investigation and progress. It is the index alike of individual and 
 national character. The refinement of the Greeks is still told by 
 their tongue. Now, as of old, whether barbarian or Greek, boor or 
 scholar, one's speech "bewrayeth him." Language, too, has a moral 
 bearing. Words influence as well as indicate character. A slovenly 
 style, like a slatternly dress, suggests and promotes want of self- 
 respect, if not purity, and tends to demean and degrade. As "evil 
 communications corrupt good manners," so a diction terse, refined, 
 and rich in noble thoughts, fosters every virtue. Or to put this 
 gem in its own sacred setting, "A word fitly spoken is like apples 
 of gold in pictures of silver." 
 
 A true workman must be master of the tools of his trade. The 
 teacher's tools are both ideas and words. But language is the vehicle 
 and vesture of his thoughts. Though thought is first in the order 
 of time and importance, it can be fully developed only through 
 expression. Strictly speaking, things come before names, and ideas 
 before words, but practically they should be conjoined, for language 
 is the casket which holds the ideas. The child should be treated as 
 an active as well as a receptive being, one who can give as well as 
 receive. He instinctively longs to speak as WeH as to hear. One 
 of his earliest needs is aid in utterance. The first aim should be 
 acquisition of ideas by objects, and then their fit utterance by words. 
 But repression, rather than expression, is often the result if not the 
 aim in school. The talking is by the teacher when the pupil should 
 first see and then describe. The teacher should not directly tell a 
 
l88o.] THE QUINCY METHODS. 133 
 
 child anything which he can be stimulated to find out by his senses 
 or reflection. A single fact or truth which he discovers for himself 
 is worth a thousand which he passively receives. Every discovery 
 and description thus made facilitates others, and forms the habit of 
 observation. Every fit description once given helps in the future 
 command of language and fixes the facts described in memory. 
 
 In the schools of Germany and Switzerland, scholars write tenfold 
 more than usually in America. The prominence there given to the 
 study of the vernacular is largely due to the influence of Pere Girard, 
 whose motto was, " The mother tongue the great educator." Well 
 would it be far the youth of America if some Pere Girard would as 
 effectually ring the changes on this cardinal maxim in this country. 
 Every school exercise, even the dryest drill in arithmetic, may be 
 a language drill, if the class are always kept on the alert to notice 
 (and correct when corrections are called for) all errors in language. 
 If a pupil can give an answer in fewer or better terms than those 
 used by a classmate, let him be encouraged to do it. Thus a gener- 
 ous rivalry may be awakened in the use of felicitous language. In 
 the German schools, the exercises are far more conversational than 
 with us. The text-books are thoroughly studied by the teacher as 
 well as by the pupils, and in all recitations, except in ancient or 
 modern lauguages, the teacher has no text-book in hand. To use 
 one would be a confession of ignorance of which a German teacher 
 would be ashamed. Hence, in the recitation, there is far more of 
 direct contact of mind with mind, of question and answer, of inspira- 
 tion and correction, than formerly with us. The best American 
 teachers, however, are now widely adopting this method, and with 
 good results. 
 
 An inspection of the schools of Quincy as they are now, contrasted 
 with their former condition, convinces me that the recent progress 
 has been striking in the following particulars : — 
 
 i. There is a great increase of interest on the part of the pupils. 
 They form a company of earnest and cheerful workers. 
 
 2. There has been a remarkable advance in the interest of parents 
 and the people at large. The citizens of the town are now proud of 
 their schools, and frequently visit them. The condition of schools 
 everywhere answers to local public sentiment. You awaken pa- 
 rental sympathy and co-operation by improving the schools, no more 
 surely than you improve the schools by intensifying popular interest. 
 
 3. There has been an increase in the aggregate attendance, as 
 well as in its regularity and punctuality. No truant officers or truant 
 schools are needed in Quincy. 
 
134 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 4. There is far better reading and spelling. Great excellence is 
 reached in these branches, especially in " sight reading," so called. 
 
 5. The training in expression is remarkable. The scholars have 
 learned to talk and to write well. They can tell what they know. 
 
 6. Habits of careful observation, as well as exact description, have 
 been formed. To describe actions is often more difficult than to 
 describe objects. To test one school in this matter, I went through 
 a succession of gestures and gymnastics, and called upon the scholars 
 each to write a narrative of my pantomime. The. result was a pleas- 
 ant surprise to me in the fulness and accuracy of the description, and 
 the propriety of their language. They see quickly, an4 can tell what 
 they see. 
 
 7. There is here an unusual amount of individual teaching. In 
 our system of graded schools, with all their, advantages, when 
 properly conducted, too many teachers see and teach only classes, 
 when the true instructor (or, as the term implies, the inward builder) 
 is building up individual pupils. His words impress an entire class 
 all the more, when each is wont to receive them as a personal appeal. 
 That power goes not out from the "schoolmaster," who treats all 
 minds as if they were cast in the same mould, and, like so many coins, 
 were to be stamped by the same die. A teacher must learn his 
 pupils, before he can successfully teach them. He must make each 
 child a study, to find out the strong and weak points of both mind 
 and heart, as a discriminating physician watches closely the symp- 
 toms of his patient. Until he does this, he must work in the dark. 
 There is a great variety of methods of illustrating each branch, and 
 only the teacher who understands both his profession and the char- 
 acter of his individual pupils can adapt these countless varieties of 
 method to the endless diversities of mind and character. 
 
 The difficulty of understanding little children is exceeded only by 
 its importance. The internal history of a child is veiled from us, 
 because it lies so far back of our present experience. In our eager- 
 ness to '.' put away childish things," we too soon forget how we " spake 
 as a child, understood as a child, and thought as a child." "Put your- 
 self in his place," should be the motto of the teacher. By thus becom- 
 ing childlike, renewing his youth, reproducing his own early feelings 
 and difficulties, the teacher can best prepare himself to meet the wants, 
 weaknesses, and primal aspirations of the juvenile mind. He who 
 can thus come down where children are, and be a child again, 
 instead of growing old in heart with advancing years, will ever 
 maintain that rare grace and beautiful ornament of age, the vernal 
 ■ freshness of youthful feeling, Such vivid reminiscences of child- 
 
l88o.] THE QUINCY METHODS. 135 
 
 hood, and such knowledge of the juvenile character, bring the teacher 
 into close contact and conscious sympathy with his pupils, open their 
 hearts, and win their love. 
 
 8. Col. Parker has taken great interest in dull and backward 
 pupils. From the large number of applicants and volunteer teachers, 
 he has made choice selections to fill vacancies. It was well under- 
 stood that want of success would create a vacancy, and that success 
 would be tested by one's treatment of dull and backward pupils. 
 Unfortunately the opposite theory and practice generally prevail. 
 The backward scholars, who really need most help get the least, and 
 the special efforts are devoted to the precocious and brilliant. It 
 was one of the many traits that combined to make Dr. Arnold the 
 model teacher, that he showed such sympathy and patience with 
 backward boys. Precocity is by no means a sure promise of pre- 
 eminence in life. Strong and gifted minds sometimes mature late. 
 Many a backward boy, deemed a dullard by an early teacher, has 
 developed rare ability when inspired by a competent teacher. 
 
 9. With the above facts in mind, it goes without saying that there 
 is a marked advance in the morale of the schools. This is a point 
 of supreme importance. The pupils are interested because they are 
 constantly and happily occupied, and are daily conscious of making 
 substantial progress. Of course tardiness, irregularity of attend- 
 ance, and truancy reach the minimum. "Every day is a new leaf 
 in your history,'' seems to be the motto of all, or rather the better 
 one of Emerson, "To-day is a king in disguise." A new inspiration 
 comes to every pupil who discovers the royal dignity and value of 
 to-day, and so prizes the now as to make it rich in results. The 
 tempting thought of youth often is, " To-morrow or next week, or next 
 month, or next year, then, oh then, I will wake up and do something." 
 But their achievements are always in the future, who slight to-day. 
 
 10. In geography the use of the moulding-board has made them 
 familiar with reliefs, and for this purpose it is a happy device, but 
 the contours of different countries and of the continents are more 
 difficult to imprint upon the mind than the reliefs. On the mould- 
 ing-board but one or two work at a time, and usually the work is 
 done by the teacher, though all serve as critics. But on the motto 
 so well carried out at Quincy in all other departments, that children 
 learn best by doing, I doubt the wisdom of making the moulding- 
 board so prominent, and of doing this work for the children instead 
 of leading each to mould for himself. Within narrow limits it is 
 very useful, but as a didactic drill, and as an aid in training in obser- 
 vation, memorv, and description, it is not comparable with the more 
 
136 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 general practice elsewhere of daily exercises in map-drawing from 
 memory. Even the relief maps so common in Switzerland, however 
 admirable and useful, are by no means an equivalent for our method 
 of daily practice in "memory maps." In this particular, our best 
 schools surpass anything which can be found in Europe. Two Eng- 
 lish school inspectors, familiar with the best schools of England, 
 Switzerland, and Germany, after witnessing the map-drawing in one 
 of the schools of New Haven, said, " That exercise and that method 
 of teaching geography far surpass anything we have ever witnessed 
 in Europe." The reliefs are represented by colored crayons al- 
 most as vividly as by the moulder's earth, by which the elevations 
 are often enormously exaggerated in their relative proportions. In 
 all our best schools pupils study the maps and recite them by 
 • making them, and often making them every day and always from 
 memory. That I may not seem partial to my own State, I will say 
 that, in my judgment, geography is taught generally in the schools 
 of New Jersey better than it is in Quincy. Their memory maps at 
 the Centennial Exposition surpassed those from any other State, 
 and they included specimens from nearly every school of the State. 
 I advise any sceptics to visit the schools of New Jersey for confirma- 
 tion of this view. On their journey thither I invite them to inspect 
 the classes in geography in the Dwight School of New Haven. 
 
 The attainments of the Quincy schools in arithmetic are in nowise 
 remarkable, and, in the important matter of rapid mental combina- 
 tions in figures, are far inferior to many elsewhere. They do not 
 promise a surplus of rapid reckoners or . first-class accountants. 
 With all the acknowledged progress there made, the people of the 
 Bay State are not likely to admit with Mr. Adams, that "the 
 statistics of the Board of Education show clearly enough that an 
 annual waste of some two millions a year is now regularly going on 
 in Massachusetts from the lack of a pervading and intelligent direc- 
 tion of expenditures for solid purposes." 
 
 Col. Parker does not join with Mr. Adams in his somewhat indis- 
 criminate disparagement of the schools of Massachusetts, but says, 
 in relation to the history of education in that State, " We have 
 inherited victory. A rich inheritance is ours, fellow-teachers, of 
 Massachusetts. He is a shallow critic, a builder unmindful of 
 foundations, who despises the past because something better can be 
 done in the present. A foundation laid deep and strong is ready 
 for the superstructure. Nowhere in the world has there been such 
 a grand foundation laid for the truest, best education, as- in our 
 Commonwealth, . , , We have nothing new in our schools (at 
 
1880.J THE QUINCY METHODS. 137 
 
 Quincy). The same methods have been used for years in Germany 
 and in this country. I claim nothing new whatever." 
 
 The grand success at Quincy, carrying the most improved and 
 approved methods alike to all the schools of the town, shows the value 
 of skilled supervision. Mr. Adams says of the result, " This was 
 entirely the work of Supt. Parker. The committee simply gave 
 him a free field to experiment in, and the result fully justified them 
 in so doing." The simple fact is, that frequently meeting his 
 teachers, and imbuing them with his zeal, he has become in all the 
 schools, omnipresent with his enthusiasm, magnetizing every teacher 
 and scholar, suggesting improvements, correcting errors, and giving 
 unity and efficiency to the whole system. While the time-table 
 programme was nominally abandoned, his frequent presence in every 
 school has kept all up to the standard he required. 
 
 Mr. Adams deserves great credit for the time and thought and 
 heart he has devoted to the question of common-school education, 
 and especially to the radical defect of neglecting to train our youth 
 in the use of our own language. The examination of hundreds of 
 schools and thousands of pupils by Mr. Walton, fully confirm all he 
 says on this point. Public attention has been called to this leading 
 defect of our schools as never before, and great good will come 
 from this discussion. Some obvious exaggerations in Mr. Adams' 
 paper on other points are not unnatural, and certainly are pardonable 
 in view of the great service he has rendered to Quincy, and to the 
 cause of education throughout the country. 
 vol. 1. 10 
 
138 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 SC HO PENH A UER ON ED UCA TION. 
 
 TRANSLATED BY G. A. HILL. 
 
 [The German philosopher, Arthur Schopenhauer, whatever may be 
 thought of his philosophy and its tendencies, possessed one of the most 
 original and powerful minds that has ever existed. He spent his life in 
 thought and meditation, in assimilating knowledge derived from all sources, 
 and in fashioning therefrom his own views upon the great problems of life. 
 The matured views of such a man upon the subject of education are emi- 
 nently worthy of attention. They were condensed by him in a short essay 
 on " Education," which appears to- have been written near the close of his 
 life, and a translation of which is given below. 
 
 ' Schopenhauer believed that the best education, both as regards matter 
 and method, is that which best fits a man to grapple successfully with the 
 practical questions of life, — the questions which every child has to face 
 when it enters upon the active duties of life. In this general statement, all 
 educators would agree ; but the striking feature of the essay is the emphasis 
 laid upon the natural order in the development of general ideas. It is here 
 that the experienced and successful teacher will quickly recognize the hand 
 of a master, of one who was both a profound psychologist and a self-trained 
 thinker. 
 
 It may be well to say that the word which is here translated intuitions, 
 includes everything which is immediately known to us in consciousness ; not 
 only sensations, but feelings, emotions, memories, and mental images in 
 general. This is the meaning which the word intuition in English ought 
 always to have. — Translator."] 
 
 I. 
 
 It is in harmony with the nature of our intellect that general ideas 
 should arise through abstraction from intuitions, hence that the 
 latter should exist before the former. When this course is actually 
 followed, as in the case of a man who has only his own experience 
 for both teacher and text-book, the man knows perfectly well just 
 what intuitions belong to each one of his general ideas, and are 
 replaced by it ; he has a precise knowledge of both, and accordingly 
 acts rationally under all circumstances. This is what may be called 
 natural education. 
 
 On the other hand, in what may be termed artificial education, the 
 head is crammed with general ideas by means of lecturing, teaching, 
 and reading, before there is any acquaintance, to speak of, with the 
 real world of objects and sensations. Here the intuitions corre- 
 sponding to these ideas must be acquired after the education ; till 
 
l88o.] SCHOPENHAUER ON EDUCATION. 1 39 
 
 then, however, the ideas are wrongly applied, and hence both men 
 and things are wrongly viewed, wrongly judged, and wrongly treated. 
 In this way it comes to pass that 'education makes warped minds ; 
 hence it happens so often that, after much learning and reading, we 
 step into the world full of silliness and perverseness, and in our con- 
 duct are either too timid or too headstrong. We have plenty of 
 ideas which we want to put to use, but we put them almost always 
 to a bad use. 
 
 All this is the result of that "last first," whereby, contrary to the 
 natural order of mental development, we .acquire general ideas first, 
 and intuitions afterward, simply because educators, instead of aiming 
 to develop the power to perceive, to compare, and to reason, are 
 mainly occupied in cramming the head full of strange and complex 
 general ideas. It requires a long and bitter experience in after-life 
 to correct the judgments which come from false applications of 
 these ideas ; and seldom, indeed, is even this equal to the task. This 
 explains why the learned are so often lacking in that sound common- 
 sense which we find so frequently among the unlearned. 
 
 n. 
 
 From what has been said, it follows that the first essential in 
 education is that the knowledge of the world, the attainment of which 
 is the aim of true education, should begin at the right end. And 
 how this is to be realized is also obvious ; in every subject intuitions 
 should precede general ideas, and the narrower idea the wider one, and 
 thus the whole structure of knowledge be built up in the exact order in 
 which one thought suggests another. The instant a link in the chain 
 of thought is omitted there arise imperfect ideas, and from imperfect 
 ideas false ideas, and finally distorted views of the world, of a kind 
 more or less peculiar to the individual, and such as we see most 
 people carrying in their heads for a long time, — in a majority of cases 
 through life. He who examines himself will discover that the 
 correct or the clear comprehension of many simple matters and 
 relations first dawned upon him at a late period in life, and some- 
 times very suddenly. Now these were dark spots in his knowledge 
 of the world, owing their origin to omitted links in the chain of 
 thought in early education, whether natural or artificial. 
 
 We ought, therefore, to try to discover the natural order in the 
 development of ideas in the different branches of knowledge ; and 
 then we ought to impart to children knowledge about things and 
 the relations of things methodically, and in harmony with this order. 
 
14° EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 This is the only way to prevent shams and false, notions from 
 entering their heads, which, once settled there, are so hard to 
 dislodge. 
 
 [Here Schopenhauer adds in a foot-note : Even children, as a rule, have 
 the unhappy tendency to rest satisfied with words instead of trying to 
 understand things, and to commit the words to memory, in the vain hope, 
 with their aid, to help themselves out of difficulty on future occasions. This 
 tendency at last becomes a life habit, and is the cause why the knowledge 
 of so many learned men is mere word-cram.] 
 
 The main thing is always the same : intuitions should come before 
 general ideas, and not the reverse, as is usually, but most unfortu- 
 nately, the case. 
 
 Thus it is the fashion, while the mind of a child is almost desti- 
 tute of objective knowledge, to indoctrinate him with ideas and 
 opinions, or rather prejudices ; with this finished apparatus he then 
 comes to observation and experience, instead of which his ideas and 
 opinions ought to have been derived from his observation and expe- 
 rience. The. knowledge of objects is boundless and many-sided; 
 herein it differs from the abstract idea, which is quickly stated in a 
 complete form. Whence it follows that observation and experience 
 are seldom able to finish the task of correcting preconceived ideas. 
 
 So it comes to pass that many a man journeys on through life 
 burdened with shams, delusions, fancies, and prejudices, which 
 finally become settled convictions. He has never made the attempt 
 to form his own ideas from his own experience ; he receives them 
 ready-made from the hands of others ; it is precisely this that makes 
 him, makes countless men, so weak and shallow. 
 
 In place of this, in childhood the course dictated by nature in the 
 growth of knowledge ought to be carefully followed. No idea should 
 find entrance into the mind save through the appropriate intuitions, 
 at all events not without being verified. In this way the child would 
 acquire few, but well-grounded and true ideas. He would learn to 
 measure things with his own rule, not with that of somebody else. 
 He would not lay hold upon a thousand whims and prejudices to the 
 outrooting of which the best part of his future life must be devoted ; 
 and his mind would, from the very start, accustom itself to solidity, 
 clearness, independence of judgment, and freedom from prejudice. 
 
 In particular, children never ought to know life in any point of 
 view earlier from a copy than from the original. Instead of has- 
 tening merely to put books into their hands, we should try to make 
 them familiar, step by step, with actual human affairs and relations. 
 Before all else take care to lead them to an adequate comprehension 
 
I880.J SCHOPENHAUER ON EDUCATION. ' 141 
 
 of what is real, to bring them to such a point that they will always 
 derive their ideas straight from the actual world, and form them into 
 harmony with the conditions of real life ; and take care that they do 
 not obtain their views and opinions from any other source, such, for 
 instance, as novels, fairy tales, conversation, etc. When this last 
 happens, — when, with a ready-made, stock' of ideas drawn from such 
 sources, and consequently with the head full of chimeras, — a man 
 comes to face the real world, on the one hand he misunderstands it, 
 and on the other hand he continually worries himself with fruitless 
 efforts to remodel it according to his chimeras ; and so he falls into 
 theoretical, or, what is far worse, into practical follies. It is really 
 inconceivable how much harm results from chimeras implanted in 
 early life, and the prejudices that grow out of them ; all subsequent 
 education gained from real life has to be devoted mainly to the task 
 of expelling them. 
 
 Hence the answer of Antisthenes, as reported by Diogenes Laertius 
 (VI., 7), when asked what kind of learning was most necessary : 
 " To unlearn bad things" replied he. 
 
 in. 
 
 Since the errors sown in early life, as a rule, are ineradicable, and ' 
 since the faculty of judgment is the last to reach maturity, we ought 
 to keep children till the age of sixteen, at least, aloof from all subjects 
 in which serious errors may exist, — hence, from philosophy, religion, 
 and from general views of all kinds, — and allow them to study only 
 subjects in which either errors cannot exist, as in mathematics, or 
 in which the errors are not dangerous, as in the languages, natural 
 philosophy, history, etc. And we ought to be very careful to intro- 
 duce in each period of childhood only such subjects as are suited to 
 it in respect to difficulty, and in every sense perfectly intelligible. 
 Childhood and youth are the time to collect data, and to acquire, first- 
 hand, a knowledge of the single and the individual ; while judgment 
 in reference to what is general ought to be kept in suspense, and 
 final explanations to be deferred till much later. Let the critical 
 faculty, which demands both maturity and experience, remain in 
 repose ; and do not try to anticipate its growth at the expense of 
 inculcating prejudices, and thereby making it a cripple for life. 
 
 On the other hand, the memory possesses its maximum strength 
 and tenacity in youth, and therefore claims the utmost attention, the 
 selection of topics, however, being made with extreme care and con- 
 sideration. For, since whatever is once thoroughly impressed in 
 early life on the memory always remains there, this precious store- 
 
H2 " EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 house of the mind ought to be used to the greatest possible advan- 
 tage. When we reflect how deeply graven on our memories are the 
 faces with which we were familiar during the first dozen years of our 
 life, and how, also, the events of that period, and, in short, everything 
 that we then saw, learned, or experienced, is indelibly stamped upon 
 our minds, surely it is a very natural idea to make this youthful sen- 
 sibility and tenacity the basis of education, by regulating all the 
 impressions which the young mind receives according to a judicious 
 and systematic plan. Now the period of youth is short, and the 
 capacity of the memory is limited, so that everything depends on 
 selecting in each subject that which is most essential and important 
 to the rigorous exclusion of all the rest. This selection should; in 
 the first instance, be made by the ablest men, and by the confessed 
 masters in each subject, after the most careful consideration, and 
 their decision should be accepted as binding. As the basis of the 
 selection, there should be a thorough sifting of that which is neces- 
 sary or important for all to know, from that which belongs to each 
 particular craft or line of business. The. knowledge of the first kind 
 should then be graded in wider and wider courses, according to the 
 different degrees of general culture designed' for different persons, 
 and keeping in view their different circumstances in life, from the 
 essential elements of the primary school to the most comprehensive 
 courses of study in the university. The choice of knowledge of the 
 second kind should be left to the acknowledged masters in eajch spe- 
 cialty. The whole would form a detailed exposition of the rules for 
 intellectual education, which, of course, would require revision every 
 ten years or so. 
 
 By a plan of this kind, we might utilize to the best advantage the 
 strength of the youthful memory, and insure a rich supply of material 
 for the judgment to work upon when it arrived at maturity. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Ripeness of mind — in other words, the degree of perfection which 
 mental action can reach in each individual — depends on the attain- 
 ment of perfect harmony between the abstract ideas and the intui- 
 tions ; a harmony such that each idea rests immediately or mediately 
 upon an intuitive basis, which alone gives it any real worth, and also 
 such that the man is always able to bring an intuition under the idea 
 which is appropriate to it. 
 
 This ripeness of mind, however, is the work of experience, hence 
 of time; for, as we acquire our intuitive and our abstract knowl- 
 edge, for the most part, in separate ways, the first naturally, the last 
 
1880.] SCHOPENHAUER ON EDUCATION. ' 143 
 
 through teaching good and bad, and information received from 
 others, the common result is that in youth there is very little 
 agreement and correspondence between our ideas gained through 
 mere words and our real knowledge derived from experience. Both 
 come by slow degrees nearer together, and tend mutually to correct 
 each other ; but only when they have grown into complete union do 
 we behold the full maturity of mental action. This maturity is quite 
 independent of the greater or less perfection of the individual powers 
 in other respects, inasmuch as this latter depends, not on the connec- 
 tion between abstract and intuitive mental action, but on the sepa- 
 rate intensity of the two. 
 
 v. 
 
 For the practical man, the most important study is the acquisition 
 of an exact and well-grounded knowledge of how things really go on in 
 the world. But this is also the most tedious of studies, for it con- 
 tinues to the very end of life ; while, in the so-called sciences, the 
 main facts may be mastered in youth. In this field of knowledge, 
 the boy and young man must take, as a tyro, his first and hardest les- 
 sons ; but how often must also the man of ripe years review and 
 readjust his knowledge! The intrinsic difficulty of the subject is 
 largely increased by reading romances, which represent a course of 
 events and of human conduct that has no real existence whatsoever. 
 These false representations are swallowed with the credulity of youth, 
 and mentally digested ; and the consequence is, that, in place of 
 mere negative ignorance, we have a whole tissue of absurd notions 
 and positive errors, which, later in life, are sure to vitiate the lessons 
 of experience, causing them, also, to appear in false colors. If the 
 young man, at first, was moving in the dark, now he is led astray by 
 treacherous lights. With girls the result is often far worse. Through 
 romances, totally false views of life are presented to them, and 
 hopes are aroused which can never be realized. All this has, as a 
 rule, the most unhappy influence upon the whole course of life. In 
 this respect men, like poor laborers and artisans who, in youth, had 
 neither time nor opportunity to read novels, enjoy a positive 
 advantage. 
 
 Few works of fiction can be excepted from the above charge, or 
 rather can be said to operate to the good of the reader ; among them, 
 and before. all others, "Gil Bias," and the other works of Le Sage 
 (or better, their Spanish originals) ; further, the "Vicar of Wakefield," 
 and some of Scott's novels. Don Quixote may be regarded as a 
 satirical picture of the very course of error of which we have been 
 speaking. 
 
144 EDUCATION: [Nov. 
 
 MORAL TRAINING IN OUR PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 
 
 BY GEORGE HOWLAND, A. M. 
 
 There are currents and tides of thought, as well as of wind' and 
 wave, — times when certain topics seize upon the public mind, and, 
 whether we will or not, demand a hearing. 
 
 The question of the claims and the usefulness of the higher schools 
 is fast passing away with the hard times, in which it had its source, 
 and from the ruins of fortune and reputation it is but natural that 
 men, and thinking men, should turn to search for the springs of this 
 wide-spread desolation. 
 
 And if in the decade following that of the rapid development of 
 the high-school system in our land be that when, above all others, 
 integrity is a myth, and honor a by-word, is it not fair to dwell there 
 for a little, and examine into the nature and workings of the system, 
 whether there be a deadly taint in the very streams that supply our 
 homes, our counting-rooms, our temples of justice, and from which 
 we fill the baptismal fonts upon our altars ? We need not, then, be 
 surprised or disheartened, when from the occupant of the pulpit, or 
 the platform, or the editor's chair, come complainings, doubts, and 
 questionings as to the moral training of our public schools. We 
 need not be offended, though many an honest and wondering citizen, 
 listening, in ignorance of the cause, to their clamor, like Gilpin's 
 neighbors, thinking they carry weight, cry out, " Well done ! " to their 
 unguided and unrestrained career, but rather should we throw wide 
 our gates to let them pass, glad by any means to learn the truth, 
 and apply, if need be, a remedy. For in a land like ours, if the 
 public school has any leave to be, it is from its being a sure and 
 efficient helper in making intelligent, industrious, and upright citi- 
 zens. 
 
 It were easy to show, if such were the purpose of the hour, that 
 much of the apparent dishonesty of the last few years — the unre- 
 deemed promise, the broken obligation, the violated trust, the com- 
 mercial, and official degradation — was, in a manner, forced upon 
 unwilling victims by the unyielding laws of value, as estimated by 
 a worthless measure, — laws by which the enterprising, the public- 
 spirited, the large-hearted, were not seldom the first and greatest 
 sufferers, rudely wakened from their fevered dreams of uncoined 
 wealth to the reality of want, hopelessness, and dishonor, 
 i That the school, by the quickening of the intellect, and the inspira- 
 
l88o.] MORAL TRAINING IN OUR PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 145 
 
 tion of new hopes and higher aims, may have disturbed the rest and 
 content of the lowly, we would not deny ; but rather claim, and glory 
 in the belief, that every child of the school, if not of the soil, whether 
 his inheritance be reached by the course of the National Academy 
 or by the tow-path, is born to a birthright of progress and honor. 
 
 The severest censure of our school system often comes from 
 those who, in acknowledged ignorance of the schools of to-day, 
 speak from the memories of their own experience of a generation 
 ago, seemingly all unconscious of the fact that the school has kept 
 fully abreast of the advance in other departments of social and moral 
 progress, of which their own charges, if rightfully regarded, would 
 afford the most conclusive proof. 
 
 A few weeks since, while riding with a friend through the suburbs 
 of an Eastern city, we drew up our horses upon a height, from whichi 
 across an intervening valley, we had a full view of the busy town 
 lying beneath a summer sky, seemingly embowered by green groves, 
 with their suggestion of soft lawns, cool shades, and sparkling foun- 
 tains, and the sweet scent of fresh verdure, with here and there a 
 white spire pointing through to the purer blue above, and with the 
 outlying farms of thrifty orchards, and fields of grass and grain, almost 
 rivalling Lamartine's picture of Damascus. 
 
 My friend said that an old citizen, long familiar with the dusty 
 streets, on seeing a photograph taken from the same point a few 
 days before, had remarked that the artist must have. had a vivid 
 imagination, as there was nothing of the kind there. 
 
 So, as with a sort of filial tenderness we turn our thought to the 
 old home and school of our early days, the green memory of some 
 task or sport — - some new book begun, or old one finished, some 
 hard problem solved, the snow fort, with the gallant assault, or 
 defence, the splendid slide down the long hillside, the brake booth 
 by the road, or perhaps some sweet, childish friendship — seems to 
 fill the whole field of view, and it is with a sigh of regret that we 
 compare the present with the dear old days. 
 
 But when from the old chest in the garret we bring forth a frag- 
 ment of the old thumb-worn, dog-eared book, from which the cover, 
 as we quickly recall, was torn, in a physical contest of the master 
 with one of the big boys, and turn the leaves traced with our frequent 
 autograph, the pictures colored with poplar buds, or the anther of 
 the lily, or, as we turn to the master's copy, from which we learned 
 to write, we can more justly fill up the picture ; and though we may 
 smile at the awkward figures, with their grotesque surroundings, we 
 can but feel that the childhood of to-day finds itself in the school- 
 
14-6 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 room upon a higher moral plane, and subjected to better methods 
 and kindlier influences. 
 
 In judging of the moral character and influence of our schools, 
 we are happily freed from the perplexing questions that divide the 
 different schools of philosophy and embroil the metaphysician and 
 the scientist. The cunningly devised theories of the origin of our 
 ideas of right and wrong, — whether an original endowment or a 
 gradual development, — we can safely leave to those who are prepar- 
 ing a system of ethics, or moral philosophy. 
 
 But it may not be amiss to remember that the original of the word 
 "moral " indicates a custom, a habit, pointing us not so much to our 
 philososphic belief, as to the conduct of life. And it is for us to 
 inquire, not whether we teach our pupils the views of this or that 
 school, but whether they do acquire a power of self-control, a com- 
 mand of their affections, passions, and desires, with the intent and 
 will to direct them to worthy ends ; whether, with a true and honest 
 purpose, they go forth from our doors with a greater abhorrence of 
 what is low and base, more faithful to the right, more sensitive to 
 the breath of merited blame ; whether, in regard for all that is en- 
 nobling, in courtesy to their equals, in respect for their superiors, 
 they leave us better than they came, or rather, I would say, with a 
 truer respect for the rights of all, even their inferiors. For to his 
 superiors the boy, terrible as he is, is respectful, — not his superiors 
 in position, in acquirements, in age, but in the. essentials of true 
 manhood or womanhood. 
 
 And the keen sagacity, the almost intuitive facility and accuracy 
 
 with which a class of boys or girls will .determine the quality and 
 
 fix the position of a new teacher, might well puf to the blush our 
 
 examining committees and superintendents, with their nice bal- 
 
 • ancings of merits and demerits, and summings of averages. 
 
 Nor are we to judge of our schools by now and then an exceptional 
 case. " There is no flock, however watched and tended," of which 
 we are always sure, though the committee of the National Association 
 in July report no graduate of a high school yet found in jail. 
 
 The school is not the only force working within and upon the 
 pupil during the school age. Even with the most punctual and 
 regular in attendance, not more than a fourth of the waking hours 
 are passed under the teacher's care. And who can tell the home 
 influences of many of them, their associates upon the street, the 
 exhalations from doorway, and basement, and window ? 
 
 Faithful and efficient as the teacher may be, there are influences 
 and examples stronger than his, and more constant and enduring. 
 
l88o.] MORAL TRAINING IN OUR PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 147 
 
 " Let me make the ballads of a people," says some one ; but with 
 how much more truth might it be said, Give me the first six years, 
 and send to what school you will. The question of submission or 
 lawlessness, of truthfulness or falsehood, of deceit or honesty, is 
 decided, we believe, for most children, before they are supposed 
 capable of understanding it. 
 
 Not from the school, but in the home, do children learn their first 
 lesson. In their own neighborhoods are they taught to look for 
 wealth without work, for profit without capital, and honors without 
 honesty. Teach contentment and industry to the toiler and the 
 needy, with the palace home, or storied warehouse of their mates 
 rising before their gaze, the fruit of some bold venture or fortunate 
 speculation ? Not till disappointment has deadened hope, and suf- 
 fering numbed ambition, will they accept the lesson. 
 
 Nowhere, as in the well-directed school, is the spirit developed 
 that regards character above surroundings, where merit is rewarded 
 with success, and honor bestowed where it is due ; and never, we 
 believe, have our schools had a healthier influence, never made more 
 earnest and successful endeavor for uprightness of purpose, or been 
 surrounded or pervaded by a purer or more life-giving atmosphere. 
 
 In their very constitution are found the most efficient means for 
 inducing a well-ordered life. If order is heaven's first law, it must 
 be the first and abiding rule of the school; not that fixed and 
 monotonous routine enforced by the mere martinet in discipline, that 
 deadens the vital force, stifles thought, quenches generous ambition, 
 and, regarding more the outward form than the inner life, aims only 
 at uniformity, though only of dulness and stupidity, but that quiet, 
 unconscious harmony that results from each member moving undis- 
 turbed in his proper sphere, in willing conformity to an unfelt but 
 all-controlling power ; no rules for the sake of ruling, no friction or 
 jarring of ill-adjusted parts, none of the pomp and circumstance of 
 military display, but all moving on to the attainment of a desirable 
 end. 
 
 We may all recall such instances, as far removed from the hushed 
 stillness and bated breath of the one extreme, as from the restless, 
 noisy turbulence of the other, — an order which of itself is " able 
 almost to change the stamp of nature," and is no insignificant factor 
 in forming the character of a peaceful, law-abiding citizen. 
 
 But the most harmonious order, pleasing though it be, is of itself 
 but a passive, fruitless, virtue, — but the casket whose golden orna- 
 ments and satin lining furnish no sufficient reason for its being, till 
 the jewels are placed within, — but the well-founded structure, 
 
I48 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 where the whirring wheels of a busy industry are still to be put in 
 motion. \ 
 
 And from the initiation of the inchoate man or woman of presuma- 
 bly six years into all the mysterious possibilities of slate and pencil, 
 through the little, round of prerequisites for a high-school diploma, 
 the pupils of a wisely planned school are learning lessons of patient, 
 persevering industry. Despite the idle charges often made, it is not 
 from our school-rooms that the lounging squads of the saloons are 
 recruited, or the street-corners replenished. A search for the grad- 
 uates of our high and grammar schools would lead us through the 
 stores, the workshops, the counting-rooms, and the public or private 
 offices of our city, — to the records of Boards of Education, or into 
 many a cultivated, happy home. And in this day of invention who 
 can blame them, if, instead of finding our sons delving in the dirt 
 amid the horny-handed laborers, we see them, with upright form and 
 comely attire, with steam and electricity to do their bidding, guiding 
 and controlling a broader industry, and higher interests ? 
 
 If a habit of intelligent and productive industry be not the parent 
 of moral virtues, it is, at least, their foster-mother, and most approved 
 nurse. 
 
 And surely it cannot be that the intellectual culture of the school, 
 small and imperfect as it is, the history of the past, the rise and 
 fall of individuals and nations, with the open or more hidden causes, 
 the unbarring the gates of science and pointing them to the bound- 
 less and rich fields beyond, the unsealing of the wisest thought and 
 the truest sentiment of the deepest thinkers and divinest poets of 
 the ages, — it surely cannot be that all this is devoid of meaning for 
 the moralist. We sometimes tire of listening to the dangers of 
 intellectual, without moral education. The performing, horse and 
 trained dog may, perhaps, feel no special stirring of their moral 
 nature, but we are not made up of two so distinct natures, that, 
 farther apart than the Siamese twins, the one can be wrought 
 upon, and the other feel no sympathetic throb. The child may, 
 indeed, be taught to lie and steal, but that is not what we mean by 
 mental discipline and intellectual culture. It is rather a maiming 
 and torturing of the spirit. As well might we call the foot-ban- 
 daging of the Chinese an athletic exercise, and Simeon Stylites a 
 gymnast ; yes, and the warped and shrunken starveling, or the phe- 
 nomenal and gormandizing Tanner, a professor of gastronomy. 
 
 No ; the order, the industry, and the culture of our schools, though 
 indirect, and often unconscious, are yet efficient and ever-present 
 moral influences, which we cannot well overestimate. 
 
l88o.] MORAL TRAINING IN OUR PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 149 
 
 Nor is the school wanting in that more direct and positive teach- 
 ing and guidance that promote and establish a well-ordered life and 
 character ; not always or most frequently given in the set phrase of 
 formal discourse and threadbare homily. It was not by permission, 
 but by an undoubted inspiration, that Paul spoke the "foolishness 
 of preaching." Though made the means of " saving those that 
 believe," the trouble is that the school-boy does not believe, — in 
 preaching, or in the teacher that preaches. 
 
 Well do I recall one such in my school life, who set apart his reg- 
 ular half-hour for so-called moral instruction ; and if there was a half- 
 hour in the day in which he wasted words, squandered the esteem, 
 forfeited the respect, and lost the control of his pupils, it was that 
 same moral half-hour. .It was the appointed time for restlessness, 
 inattention, and disorder, when the exhausted patience of his hearers 
 found relief in whispered, if not in muttered complaint, from which 
 a wiser man might have learned that it is not all of morals to 
 moralize. 
 
 Noble as are the unquestioned motives of those who would intro- 
 duce a text-book of morals for a half-hour of each day, we can but 
 feel that, beneath the tender memories of their young days, a closer 
 search would somewhere reveal an hour made irksome and unprofit- 
 able by that bane of a bright boy's life, — a moral lecture. 
 
 The good old days of our fathers and mothers, when the pastor ap- 
 propriated the last half-day of each week to instruction in the cate- 
 chism, was not far back of the time of Deacon Giles's famous distillery ; 
 and when the practice passed away, it was no exception to the law of 
 the survival of the fittest. And even in the reading of the Scripture 
 it is by no means certain that within the solemn covers may not lie 
 concealed a leaf of Caesar or Legendre. 
 
 The trouble with the dishonest and the vicious is not so often 
 their ignorance of the true and the right, as their failure, through 
 neglect or evil example, to have formed those habits of thought and 
 action which constitute a well-ordered, a self-controlled, a moral 
 character and life. 
 
 That we have attained the limit of moral excellence, or are doing 
 all that can be expected, we do not believe, and certainly do not 
 hope. It has been said that, when any work is completed, all real 
 interest begins to abate. It is only in the progress, the pursuit, that 
 the earnest zeal, the ardor, the deep interest is aroused and held fast. 
 
 But it is not to the stated lecture, or the carefully devised manual, 
 that we would most securely trust for improvement. Our memory 
 and experience point rather to the quiet suggestion, the fitly chosen 
 
ISO EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 word, the interested inquiry, the look, the unfeigned sympathy, the 
 favored opportunity, the firm but calm decision of the loved and lov- 
 ing teacher. 
 
 First, and best of all, would we look to the personal character and 
 example of the true, the large-hearted, right-minded man or woman. 
 
 Perhaps I cannot better express my thought than as I have else- 
 where written, of this personal influence, which is the test and the 
 crowning excellence of the true teacher, — an influence unseen, per- 
 haps, and unobtrusive, but all-pervading; free from the slightest 
 taint of distrust or suspicion, but checking insubordination before 
 the thought of it has taken form ; exacting a faithful performance of 
 duties, yet encouraging by its inspiration before despondency has 
 attaineda conscious existence ; soft and gentle as amother's hand on 
 the brow of a sick child, yet holding the reins of authority, and con- 
 trolling the very motives of action, like the hand of fate. 
 
 For the due and full exertion of this influence we need to realize 
 that, as teachers, we are engaged in the formation and development 
 of character, into the warp or woof of which all the habits thought- 
 lessly formed, the modes of feeling, the pupils' deportment towards 
 their teachers or towards each other, the kindly way or the uncouth 
 manner, the listlessness or attention, the polite address or the un- 
 seemly reply, are all daily and hourly inwrought in permanent out- 
 line and unfading colors. 
 
 As compared with the life-giving, soul-saving influence of such a 
 teacher, what were the dull routine of a daily half-hour of blundering 
 monotony over the cold and dismal abstractions of some closet- 
 conned and primer-planned system of morals ? 
 
 Bishop Huntington, at last summer's Commencement, spoke, with 
 eloquent words of censure, of parents consulting the wishes of their 
 children, whose wishes and choice they should themselves control ; 
 but such a personal influence as I have indicated, like the breath of 
 heaven, penetrates the soft texture of the. child's nature, quickening 
 and shaping the very promptings of desire. 
 
 We can conceive no more sacred duty, or one which, with an eye 
 to the public weal, should be performed with more wisdom and care, 
 free from bias or prejudice, than that of choosing the teachers of our 
 public schools. Suitable means and appliances are desirable ; books 
 for study and reference, worthy of our most intelligent regard ; but 
 we may safely leave all this to chance, or the whim of the hour, if 
 sure in the choice of the intelligent, cultivated, and worthy teacher, 
 of generous, sympathizing character, as essential to the mental and 
 moral growth of his pupils, as. is. good light and pure, air to. their. 
 
1880.] MORAL TRAINING IN OUR PUBLIC SCHOOLS. IS I 
 
 bodily health. What a parody on the highest of callings, the reasons 
 daily urged for engaging in it ! A sick husband, brother, or child ; 
 my mother a widow ; my wages insufficient ; have been unfortunate in 
 business ; I should be benefited by a change ; want an opportunity to 
 review my studies ; need rest before engaging in my profession ; 
 think I should like Chicago, — in all the endless variety into which 
 these types may be developed. 
 
 Thankful may we be that from the ranks of the weary, the needy, 
 the changeling, the improvident, the unfortunate, so few of the 
 unworthy have found a refuge in our school-rooms. 
 
 In the management and .discipline of the school, notwithstanding 
 the doubts and forebodings of individuals, and notwithstanding the 
 example and protests of our wise Eastern brethren, we believe that 
 the prohibition of corporal punishment is a real forward step in the 
 moral training of our schools. It may be questioned whether such 
 chastisement is ever inflicted by the thoughtful teacher, or parent, 
 without an after-sentiment of regret or shame, from the feeling that, 
 after all, it was but a victory of brute force, simply because he was 
 the stronger, and must have ended in the same way even if the child 
 had been in the right. " Do you know why I whip you ? " asked a 
 fond father of his little son. " Yes, sir, because you are the biggest." 
 And not unfrequently there is a rude awakening, on one or both 
 sides, of the mere animal nature, insensible alike to the claims of 
 right or reason. But cut off from this ready resort, the difficulty of 
 the situation often necessitates a timely delay and a more careful 
 examination, a study of the child's character and needs, resulting in 
 a calmer and juster decision and treatment, and certainly leaves the 
 teacher less open to the suspicion of angry or revengeful motives. 
 A suggestion need not always be given in the form of a reproof, and 
 in cases of deserved censure it will be found, in most instances, more 
 wholesome if administered in private. A spirited boy of ten or 
 fifteeen, called up for rebuke in the presence of his mates, all watch- 
 ing with eager interest, and to whose opinion of his brave and manly 
 bearing he is keenly alive, and the same boy listening to the quiet, 
 earnest, and kindly words of his teacher, with none of his compan- 
 ions near, or knowing of the interview, are two very different char- 
 acters, in whose judgment the r61e of the teacher, too, is greatly 
 changed! What in the one case was the harsh, unfeeling censor, to 
 whom concession savored of cowardice, is, in the other, the feeling 
 and judicious friend. 
 
 Nor is it always the pupil most familiar with the rules of kindness 
 and courtesy' at home who most readily responds to the voice of 
 
IS 2 EDUCATION. [ Nov - 
 
 reason. And among the sweetest, the most genuine pleasures of 
 these later years, I count the thanks, sometimes mingled with regrets, 
 of the troublous, bothersome boys of old. 
 
 And of the eight or ten whom I would recall as the phenomenally 
 bad boys of school, I do not know of one who is not to-day a use- 
 ful and respected citizen, though some of them drew upon our stock 
 of patience and forbearance to the very verge of bankruptcy. 
 
 There are those, I am aware, to whom all this is a dead language ; 
 who, at the suggestion of kindness, understand weakness, and for 
 politeness imagine only a -sickly sentimentality, ever ready with 
 the reply that they could be easy, as well -as any one, in not correcting 
 faults, or insisting upon good lessons, their very excuses showing an 
 utter want of apprehension of what is intended. I would abate no 
 jot of any healthful requirement, but only ask for a prompter, because 
 a willing obedience ; and more thorough preparation, because a work 
 of the heart as well as the head. 
 
 A command may be in order in the prison or the barracks, but in 
 • the school, as in the family, never, except as a kind of punishment. 
 At the stern order to " take my hand out of my pocket," what a 
 strange yearning ran tingling down to the very ends of my fingers, 
 till the blood seemed to settle under the nails, — an inextinguishable 
 yearning for the bottom of that pocket. 
 
 You have no time, you say, amid the press of school duties, to 
 waste on mere forms of polite phraseology ? What ! no time to be 
 a lady or a gentleman ? Then you have no place in the teacher's 
 chair, whose occupant should never be aught else. 
 
 And when all efforts prove futile, and the benefit to the pupil 
 becomes hopelessly incommensurate with the harm his presence 
 brings upon the school, let him be becomingly remitted to the care 
 of his legal and responsible guardian, to whose natural or parental 
 instincts we may assume, as the law has done, the charge may be 
 more safely confided. In the school-room, and within his own 
 domain, the teacher stands in his own right, and will wisely omit 
 those functions, which only, as installed in loco parentis, he is allowed 
 to exercise. 
 
 I am aware of the heresy, to some minds, of these views, but am 
 trying to present what seems to me the only true basis for the 
 teacher's authority, — that his powers inhere of right in his office, 
 whatever dicta to the contrary may be burrowed from among the 
 dusty decisions of forgotten judges. We need not that any parentis 
 locus should be assigned us by the hocus-pocus of legal or judicial 
 legerdemain, nor would we extend the limits of our domain beyond 
 
1880.] MORAL TRAINING IN OUR PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 153 
 
 their natural bounds. We believe that school grounds are defined, 
 as any other grounds, by their legal boundaries, arid that if the unruly 
 urchin break his neighbor's windows, or pilfer his peanut-stand, on 
 the way to or from school, the sufferer should look to the parent for 
 redress ; and that in case of accident or harm, the parent, and not the 
 teacher, should employ the physician and pay the nurse. But we also 
 believe that whatever exerts a baneful influence upon the school, or 
 serves to bring it into disrepute, whether done within the precincts 
 of the school yard, upon the neighbor's grounds, " or in the continuous 
 woods where rolls the Oregon," conies under the legitimate cogni- 
 zance of the teacher, who, in the jealous care of his charge, may 
 counsel, censure, or condemn. 
 
 But why the school grounds should extend to the father's door, 
 rather than the home circle expand to the school entrance, is to us 
 a mystery. 
 
 The parent is charged with the duty of providing clothing, food, 
 shelter, and home-training, and is responsible to society for any neg- 
 lect ; and under a like responsibility is the teacher charged with his 
 montal and moral training at school. The duties and the rights of 
 the one, within his province, are as sacred and original, we apprehend, 
 as the other. 
 
 What is to be gained by this assumption of another's part, which, 
 by the way, is never urged, as we remember, except as involving 
 the right to maul, maim, or mangle, — a right that teachers or parents 
 desirous of exercising it should be left to maintain with their best 
 blows upon each other, with the children behind to prick and goad 
 them on. 
 
 As to the proper treatment of specific cases, and, in truth, as to 
 general management and instruction, there is no rigid, unvarying 
 method suited to all individuals, or to the same individual at all 
 times. But for those fitted by culture, character, and disposition to 
 be teachers, within certain limits, on which all thoughtful experience 
 agrees, then usefulness is largely increased by a large infusion of 
 their own personality ; and, we fancy the weightiest charge that can 
 be brought against normal schools is, that their pupils are so often 
 charged and overcharged with the idea that theirs is the way, and 
 the only way, and hence their unwillingness to adapt themselves to 
 their situation and surroundings, impervious to the advice and coun- 
 sels of their associates or superiors. 
 
 But, if there be one thing never to be lost sight of, it is that some- 
 how the children should be interested in their work. The only point 
 that Col. Parker insists upon, and the one that makes the thought 
 
 VOL. I. II 
 
154 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 of school a delight to every parent's heart, is that the school shall be 
 made pleasant to the children ; that they may no longer " creep like 
 snail unwillingly to school," but that the subjects shall be so vivified, 
 and so presented, that a necessary absence shall be a day of pleasure 
 lost. Many a boy has doubtless been made a worthless, if not a 
 dangerous, member of society by the irksomeness of his school days. 
 
 It is not alone by enforced restraint that these little bundles of 
 activities are to be brought into relations of harmony and usefulness. 
 Not more eager for what is new were Paul's hearers on Mars Hill, 
 than they. Of quick discernment, of keen insight, and small respect 
 for sham and pretence, they have not learned, as we, by long pupil- 
 age, to sit contented with teachings they do not understand, or to 
 keep step to music not in unison with their young heart-beats. 
 
 Along the paths of learning, as well as in the world's highway, 
 they do not follow kindly the straight and beaten track, but soon pull 
 away from the hand that leads them, now picking berries by the 
 roadside, now in the field with hat in hand, in full chase of some 
 bright butterfly, and again bending down to paddle in the pebbly 
 brook ; arid he is the wiser guide who, yielding somewhat to their 
 wild humors, brings them in at the end, weary, it may be, but with 
 many a little lesson learned, and childish treasure garnered. 
 
 Kindly and wisely to gather up these wild and changing humors, 
 and without subduing the spirit, or abating the ardor, to unite them 
 in one grand earnest purpose of life, is not the work of a novice, or 
 a trained dullard. 
 
 Too often, I fear, we send forth even our best pupils with no aim 
 beyond the diploma, no ambition but for the- high mark, who, when 
 the pressure of the class-room is lifted, float aimlessly out of the spark- 
 ling current of progress, like the bits of driftwood that we see on the 
 scum-covered pool below the busy mill of our New England streams. 
 
 We, too, as teachers, need to keep ourselves in line and sympathy 
 with the world's advance, and not, like Hamlet, with the ghost of 
 some dead past forever rising before us, permit it to chill our warm im- 
 pulse, and hold us back from all worthy endeavor and achievement. 
 
 We, too, need to join our strength and share our counsels with 
 those of our own calling. We need to preserve so much of youth 
 in our hearts as to find beauty and music in the floating butterfly, 
 and the babbling brook of boyhood. 
 
 There are leaders and teachers among us, whose spoken or written 
 thought we may not ignore. There is, too, the poetry, the science, ■ 
 the philosophy, the art, the history, the romance of our own and 
 other days around us, that we may not neglect. And it may well 
 
I880.J MORAL TRAINING IN OUR PUBLIC SCHOOLS. 155 
 
 be matter of astonishment how few are the fruits and flowers, from 
 any of these sources, that may not be put to use in our daily work, 
 in suggestion, in striking example, in apt illustration, in encourage- 
 ment, in instruction. 
 
 And some such allurement is ofttimes required to draw us out * 
 of ourselves, to relieve that depression and weariness, that sinking 
 of heart, that sometimes come on us, when the day's work is over, 
 and we feel exhausted of our electric force by five hours' contact with 
 threescore bristling fragments of humanity. 
 
 When all else fails, and " this whole round world seems flat, stale 
 and unprofitable," as a sure and safe resource there is nothing 
 for health, strength, and recreation, like a good reliable hobby. 
 Though it be nothing rarer or more costly than moth hunting, the 
 jingle, or jangle of rhymes, or even reformed spelling, they are, 
 some of them, as I well know, of boundless possibilities. 
 
 But at your daily mount of your hobby-horse, take not your way 
 down the crowded street, and through the thronging mart, nor over 
 the choice flower-beds and fragrant exotics of your friends ; but 
 rather turn aside into the quiet lane, or the unfrequented country 
 road, or, still better, off for a free stretch over the wide, open prairie, 
 where, with tossing arms and expanding chest, you can shout forth 
 your happiness, till with loud, answering echo, the solitary places 
 shall be made glad with your presence. 
 
 Still onward till your beast and yourself are weary, and returning, 
 see that he is well groomed and stalled, and in due time properly fed, 
 in preparation for another day, and it may be the coming age will 
 raise to you and it a monument. 
 
 We conclude, then, that leaving to the philosopher the abstruse 
 questions of thought, and without trenching upon the beliefs or prej- 
 udices of any respectable portion of society, we have in our public 
 schools the most certain and most efficient agencies for the moral 
 culture of the young : the habit of quiet order, the diligent industry, 
 the systematic method, and above all, or rather the pledge and secur- 
 ity for all, the generous, the disciplined, the cultured, the ever-pro- 
 gressive teacher, one whom we would gladly receive into our homes 
 as companions, and as guides and guardians of our children. 
 
 In the mutual rights and duties of the family and social relation's, 
 the rights of the child, we believe, are paramount. If the parent or the 
 State has a claim upon the child for devotion and service, much more 
 has the child, as the involuntary partner, a moral right to be edu- 
 cated for these relations. And with the truer aims and better 
 methods of to-day,- may we not fairly hope for an ever-increasing 
 recognition and fuller satisfaction of this, his supreme right ? 
 
156 EDUCATION. |" Nov - 
 
 OVER A NEW ROAD. 
 
 BY ANNA C. BRACKETT. 
 
 In considering the question of the head of a college for girls or 
 young women, many elements which should enter into the discussion 
 are often, in the popular mind, altogether omitted. It is thought suffi- 
 cient, if the candidate be shown to have passed through his own col- 
 lege course successfully, to have had some experience in literary or 
 professional work since that time, to have sustained an irreproachable 
 moral character, to possess executive and diplomatic talent in some 
 degree, and, too often, that he be a member in full standing of some 
 special distinct body of Christian believers. This last is to be re- 
 gretted, because, where the choice between a number of otherwise fit 
 candidates is narrowed by a special demand as to religious belief, it is 
 often very much narrowed in the present time, when the number ot 
 first-class educators is embarrassingly small. 
 
 Let us suppose, however, that all these conditions are satisfactorily 
 met ; now this man we propose to place in the position of highest 
 authority and influence over the minds of say three to four hundred 
 girls and young women, at one of the most susceptible times of a 
 woman's very susceptible life. These girls are isolated from the 
 tempering and quieting influences of the world almost as much as if 
 they were in a convent. They are removed from the society of 
 fathers, brothers, and male friends, and are almost constantly in that 
 of girls of their own age, or of older women, who, from the same 
 cause, are themselves under equally abnormal conditions of life. The 
 larger number of teachers and professors will naturally be women, 
 and the, perhaps, half a dozen members of the Faculty who are men 
 are so far removed from the familiar society of the students that 
 their pupils see none of their foibles and weaknesses. 
 
 There is, generally speaking, no being more generously willing to 
 admire than the young girl, full of enthusiasm, full of earnestness, 
 with all her life full of promise, but only of promise, just opening 
 before her. She is prone, to a. dangerous degree, to hero-worship; and 
 even when she is in the balanced society of the world, this tendency 
 sometimes leads her into follies and extravagances which have some- 
 thing so morbid in them as to be rather sad than ridiculous. As an 
 extreme case, witness the erection of a sort of altar to a favorite 
 actor not many years ago in a New York home. The aforesaid altar 
 was decorated, adorned with photographs of the actor in different 
 
l88o.] OVER A NEW ROAD. 157 
 
 characters, and with a candle kept burning upon it. This was an 
 extreme case, but will serve to manifest the dangerous tendency of 
 which we spoke. But in "narrowing nunnery walls " this danger is 
 increased a hundred-fold, till an outsider is astonished, amused, and 
 disgusted to see the admiration in which a very ordinary man pro- 
 fessor in some one of these colleges is held by his girl pupils. Ordi- 
 nary in appearance, in manner and intellectual abilities, he moves the 
 centre of an admiring throng, who eagerly drink in his common- 
 places, laugh at his cheap jokes, and suffer all the time, in so doing, a 
 loss of their own native dignity and perception. 
 
 The tendency of any conventual life is narrowing, and towards all 
 the excesses of a convent. The ecstasies of St. Catherine, or the rap- 
 tures of St. Francis, have in them nothing elevating. They are the 
 fruit of emotion allowed to transgress the bounds of reason ; and the 
 human being self-abandoned to his emotions, of whatever kind, is less 
 than human. The religious feeling which can utter itself in such 
 poetry as the following, is not. healthful either to mind or body. It is 
 by a celebrated nun, and to the Saviour : — 
 
 " Say to my Master 
 That here I lie 
 The thing of his pleasure ; 
 His slave am I." 
 
 And although such utterances are given us as from an inspired saint, 
 they betoken to our cooler judgment a totally depraved and per- 
 verted emotional nature. 
 
 This is an extreme ; but many of. our hymns in common use will bear 
 witness how very narrow is the line which separates the utterance of 
 intense earnestness of emotion, even when it be religious, from erotic 
 poetry. 
 
 If a man is to have the misfortune to be placed in such an atmos- 
 phere, if he is to direct and sway, as the president unquestionably 
 must direct and sway, the mental current of a whole institution, if he 
 is to be made a hero of, as he in all probability will be, is it not at 
 once evident that to fill the requisitions of so very anomalous a post 
 he must be not at all an ordinary man ? 
 
 He must be not only exact, unselfish, true, but he must be mag- 
 nanimous and noble, with broad and catholic sympathies, and yet so 
 full of well-earned self-respect as to be utterly incapable of vanity. 
 
 And the difficulty of finding a man to combine these almost oppo- 
 site qualities would seem to be almost insuperable. If he be true and 
 sincere, but cold, and too far removed by age or temperament from 
 
158 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 the warm sympathies of the minds with which he is to deal, his 
 better qualities will hardly touch them. They will respect him .with 
 a kind of formal respect, but he will speak to them as from out of 
 another and a foreign sphere. His chapel prayers will be a dead 
 letter to them, and his influence, only restrictive, will be of no last- 
 ing power on those minds, so-impressionable, so ready to be informed 
 then as never afterwards, with a principle of life and growth. 
 
 He should be a creator, like any great artist, and he is none. The 
 college life leaves no enduring stamp. He does conscientiously and 
 faithfully all that he can do, but the all is not enough. 
 
 This is a misfortune. If, now, on the other hand, we have in that 
 all-important place a man in whom the qualities before wanting pre- 
 ponderate, we have a worse danger. If we have a man whom, for 
 want of a better term, we characterize as "magnetic," — a man of 
 strong sympathies, quick emotions, and lively imagination, — we are 
 incurring a danger the magnitude of which can hardly be overesti- 
 mated. Between the two we stand disheartened, and ask, What is to 
 be done ? Are there no more Dr. Arnolds ? 
 
 It seems sometimes as if the only solution would be to place, if she 
 can be found, some strong, noble woman at the head of such an 
 institution. If the woman could be found wise enough to assume the 
 responsibility, however, she would shrink from the place, for none 
 knows better than she the terrible drain upon the very springs of life 
 which it would involve. 
 
 So to impress herself, upon that army of girls as to create in them 
 a spirit which should go on working in them as leaven through all 
 their lives, would be, indeed, to sacrifice her own life. None but a 
 woman of immense physical power could undertake the work, as none 
 but a woman of the strongest emotional force, combined with the 
 wisest and most ripened judgment, is equal to it. If this combina- 
 tion could be found, it would make a life in any college that would 
 last in its impulse long after its inspirer was dead. 
 
 But as when, in an algebraic solution, we arrive at a negative result, 
 we conclude, and not unjustly, that the conditions of the problem 
 were irrational, may not, after all, the trouble which we find in the 
 solution of ours arise from the same fact ? Is it not, after all, an 
 irrational thing to do to seclude four hundred girls from general 
 society, with its levelling, depolarizing influences, and then demand 
 that we shall find a man or a woman who is capable of doing for 
 them what ought to be done, under such abnormal conditions ? 
 
 And now, after our long and devious route in our honest effort by 
 discussion to arrive, at some solution of a vexed problem, what is that 
 
l88o.] OVER A NEW ROAD. 159 
 
 which we perceive before us as we turn the last corner, but the 
 much-vexed theory of coeducation ? Is not that the result at which 
 we have come, by a circuitous and untravelled road, perhaps, but 
 ' none the less surely there, with no intention on our own part, and 
 quite as much to our own surprise as to that of our readers ? 
 
 Our reasoning has been rather after the manner of induction than 
 of deduction.. We have made no postulate which we were to try to 
 establish. We have simply allowed ourselves to be led along by the 
 natural drift of the question, and have endeavored to speak the truth, 
 the whole truth, and nothing but the truth. 
 
 This paper can in no sense be stamped as intentionally an argu- 
 ment for coeducation in colleges. It is simply a study. Its object 
 was, to formulate, in some clear way, the character of the man who 
 was the proper person for the presidency of a girls' college. But, 
 after stating, the requisites, we found them with difficulty to be com- 
 bined in any one man ; at any rate, the number of men 'combining 
 them would certainly never be large enough to furnish presidents 
 for all the girls' colleges. 
 
 We then inquired whether trie requisite qualifications, without the 
 dangers, might not be found by appointing as president a woman 
 instead of a man. But here other difficulties presented themselves, 
 all these difficulties arising, from the fact that the college in question 
 was to be composed of girls. 
 
 Failing, then, to obtain a solution to our inquiry under these condi- 
 tions, we not unnaturally concluded that the conditions were unrea- 
 sonable, and that, instead of trying to decide on the qualifications for 
 the presiding officer of our girls' college, it would be wiser to make 
 it a college for both sexes. As soon as it should be made this, all 
 the conditions which rendered our selection of a suitable president 
 so difficult would be changed, and no problems would remain. In a 
 college for both sexes, the harmful and dangerous tension which we 
 have indicated as existing, to a greater or less degree, in all institu- 
 tions where girls, separated from the general current of society are 
 placed together, would not exist. It would be harmlessly dissipated 
 under the more natural conditions, and thus the mind would be 
 freed for nobler and more strengthening work. 
 
160 EDUCATION. L Nov 
 
 AN EXPERIMENT IN READING GREEK AT SIGHT 
 WITH VOLUNTEER CLASSES IN COLLEGE. 
 
 BY A. C. MERRIAM, PH. D., COLUMBIA COLLEGE, NEW YORK. 
 
 Numerous are the methods of teaching Greek, and each has its 
 partisans to press its claims with more or less zeal. The following 
 account of an experiment carried on for the last three years is 
 presented, not because it is unique in itself, though something new 
 to the writer at its inception, but. because the details may prove of 
 interest, if not of service, to educators : — 
 
 The Class of j88i of Columbia College was observed to be so 
 much interested in reading the Odyssey, as Freshmen, that a favor- 
 able opportunity seemed to be presented for putting to the test sev- 
 eral questions of a practical bearing ; whether, for instance, there was 
 any inclination among the students toward a wider study of Greek 
 than the prescribed course of three hours a week, and if so, how 
 great ; what would be the effect of reading extensively, mainly for 
 the translation, as compared with the painstaking .work done in class, 
 or as superadded to it ; how great a facility in reading Homer could 
 be acquired in this way by the end of the collegiate year, etc. In Co- 
 lumbia College the exercises were then all completed at one o'clock, 
 and the students departed to their homes till the following day. 
 Accordingly, the announcement was made to the class that if some 
 half-dozen or more would volunteer for the reading of Homer from 
 one to two in the afternoon twice a week, the experiment should be 
 tried. On their part they were to undertake to do what their time 
 would permit toward making out the translation of one hundred 
 lines for each reading, but the instructor, expected to act the part 
 not only of commentator, but also, in a degree, of a dictionary. The 
 class assembled for the first reading directly after the Christmas 
 holidays, with twenty-four members from the Freshman Class, and 
 five from the Sophomore. Twelve of this number withdraw within 
 the first four weeks, for various reasons. The average attendance 
 of the remaining seventeen to the end of the collegiate year was 
 sixty-one per cent. The plan pursued in the work was to give each 
 student a short passage to translate, and this was then carefully 
 rendered by the instructor and commented on. The translations 
 made by the class were found to be much better than was expected 
 or contemplated ; in fact, they were almost as good as the regular 
 class recitations, and some who withdrew towards the close of the 
 
l88o.J AN EXPERIMENT IN READING GREEK AT SIGHT. l6l 
 
 year advanced the reason that they could not continue to devote the 
 time to it which such careful work required, and their scholarly pride 
 would not suffer them to make an insufficient preparation. The 
 great majority, however, were unflagging in their zeal, and for the 
 last month or more, at their own option and suggestion, the readings 
 were increased to one hundred and tweny-five lines at each sitting. 
 The entire amount read was some 3,250 lines. On the last day of 
 meeting, the test of reading at. sight was applied, and the result 
 showed that such proficiency had been acquired that any part of the 
 Odyssey could be read with considerable fluency. In addition to 
 this, their regular work in class appeared to be strengthened, and to 
 be given a wider grasp, as would be naturally expected. 
 
 Such were the results of the first and tentative period, answering 
 the questions which the enterprise was originated to solve with 
 such good promise, that its continuance for another year seemed to 
 be demanded, in order to determine what could be done with the 
 same students, beginning upon the foundation which they had now 
 acquired, and reaching out into less familiar and more difficult fields. 
 
 In consequence, the class was formed on the 1st of November of 
 the following year, and was composed of fifteen Sophomores and 
 Juniors, mainly those who had pursued the course during the pre- 
 ceding year. It was believed that now, with the vocabularies which 
 they had acquired, and the experience which they had had, the work 
 could be made one purely of reading at sight. The result justified 
 the belief. An especial request was made that no preparation be 
 undertaken beforehand, not only that the experiment of reading at 
 sight might be tested, but that the feeling so prevalent that a Greek 
 sentence is a fortress to be stormed only when the student is arrayed 
 in all the panoply of lexicon, commentary, and grammar, might grad- 
 ually wear away and disappear. The meaning of unfamiliar words 
 was not given them outright, but they were traced back to their 
 roots/which, in general, the student was familiar with, and then by 
 the application of the rules for suffixes the sense would be evolved 
 along such connecting links as would bring into play the laws of 
 growth in language, and leave the word connected in the mind with 
 some idea already there, and so more securely domiciled for future 
 use. In this way the class was able to read the first book of the 
 Cyropcedeia and a part of the second, the Clouds of Aristophanes, 
 all of Anacreon and the Anacreontics, and extracts from Alcman, 
 Arion, Sappho, Alcseus, Stesichorus, Ibycus, and Simonides of Ceos. 
 
 For obvious reasons it seemed quite inexpedient to join with this 
 advanced class such of the incoming Freshmen as desired to pursue 
 
162 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 this course ; a separate class was therefore formed early in Decem- 
 ber, composed entirely of Freshmen, and the same system as before 
 in reading the Odyssey was pursued, previous preparation being 
 required, and manfully performed, through the year, by ten members 
 who devoted themselves to the task. Toward the close of the 
 season, however, it became mainly a reading at sight, and one hun- . 
 dred and seventy-five to two hundred lines would be sometimes 
 accomplished in the hour. Altogether, 4,000 lines .of the Odyssey 
 were read. 
 
 During the collegiate year just closed,* the undertaking was car- 
 ried on with larger classes and a better average attendance. Both 
 classes were started at the opening of exercises in October. The 
 advanced class was composed of Seniors, Juniors, and Sophomores. 
 The Egyptian History of Herodotus was read, and a practical 
 acquaintance was formed with more than forty of the famous poets 
 of the Gnomic 'and Lyric Schools, such as Callinus, Tyrtasus, Mim- 
 nermus, Solon, Phocylides, Pseudophocylidea, Xenophanes, Theognis, 
 -Archilochus, Simonides of Amorgus, Hipponax, Babrius, Terpander, 
 Alcman, Sappho, Erinna, Alcseus, Anacreon, the Anacreontics, etc. 
 All this was read at sight upon the same plan as before. 
 
 The class just entered was requested to prepare its one hundred 
 lines of the Odyssey, but it was made a point now to finish that in 
 time to devote one quarter of the hour to reading beyond the limit 
 prescribed, so as to become accustomed to the work without prepara- 
 tion. This produced results so satisfactory that, when half the year 
 was past, it was deemed expedient to drop preparation altogether, 
 a course justified by the success attending it. This class read twelve 
 and a half books of the Odyssey, — about 6,000 lines all told. 
 
 On the last days' of April an examination of both classes was held 
 in writing, to determine definitely in that way the facility they had 
 acquired in reading without any assistance the authors upon which 
 they had been engaged. Writing was limited to one hour, and the 
 amount to be translated was so selected that it could be fairly done 
 within that time, without opportunity for much puzzling over knotty 
 phrases. The passages were taken from the authors read, but not 
 from the parts read, the advanced class being examined upon Hero- 
 dotus I. 36, Theognis 743-752, and the thirty-third Anacreontic; the 
 other, on Odyssey I. 34S~3S9» IV - 696-710, and IX. 360-370. The 
 papers handed in were examined and marked with the strictness of 
 an ordinary class-examination, upon a basis of one hundred maxi- 
 mum, with results varying from ninety-eight to eighty in the ad- 
 
 *June, 1880. 
 
l88o.] AN EXPERIMENT IN READING GREEK AT SIGHT. 163 
 
 vanced class, and from ninety-six to seventy-four in the other. On 
 the whole, the sense of the passages was fairly given, the main diffi- 
 culty arising from ignorance of single words, which were either new, 
 or were confounded with others quite similar in form, this confusion 
 of words being quite noticeable and curious, but chiefly in the first 
 year's class. 
 
 This experience and this practical exhibit have quite converted 
 me to the belief that " reading at sight," in Greek that is not over 
 difficult and abstract, is feasible, and in fact is actually attained by 
 the methods here described. They will scarcely make one capable 
 of reading with fluency the Odes of Pindar, the Agamemnon of y£s- 
 chylus, the GZdipus Tyrannus of Sophocles, the Periclean speeches 
 of Thucydides, or Demosthenes De Corona; but a. royal demesne 
 of the most delightful Greek literature flings its doors wide to the 
 student, courting his entrance, and welcoming him when he comes 
 to a seat at a hospitable board, instead of presenting that forbidding 
 aspect and those formidable battlements commonly imagined, which 
 must needs be stormed and taken at the point of the sword if ap- 
 proached at all. A taste for the literature is thus created as the 
 difficulties vanish, marauding expeditions may gradually be made 
 into the closed precincts, and finally, when the student graduates, 
 he may carry with him a continual refutation of that question which 
 we hear on all sides, so benumbing because so often all too true, 
 " What is the use of studying Greek, when the college graduate, 
 after six or seven years' work upon it, cannot take up a Greek text 
 he may not have previously read, and turn it into English?" 
 
 Within a few days past my attention has been called, by a distin- 
 guished gentleman whose interest is unceasing in all that may tend 
 toward making our college work more effective, to the words of 
 President Porter relative to this subject in his "American Colleges 
 and the American Public," which I had never had the good fortune 
 to see before. There I found advocated for adoption in regular class 
 work, after the Freshman year, quite the same methods that I had 
 been practising with my volunteer classes, and I cannot do better 
 than to close by quoting some of his words which my experience 
 proves both wise and practicable. After sounding the warning that 
 we are as much in danger of "too high grammar" in our teaching 
 as the English are of " too high verse-making," he says : — 
 
 " We would propose that the following experiment should be fairly 
 tried. Let the time of short lessons and of special analysis terminate 
 with the Freshman year, or a little later. For the remainder of the 
 course let the lessons be very long in comparatively easy Greek 
 
164 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 authors. . . . Let the attention be directed to the import of the mat- 
 ter, to the logical connections and transitions of the thoughts, to the 
 peculiarities of diction, and to a constant praxis in felicitous and 
 idiomatic English rendering. . . . Let reading by phrase and by the 
 eye, without reconstructing the words after the English order, be 
 recommended and enforced. . . . Let an intellectual spirit, and an 
 assthetic feeling for the peculiarities in thought and diction of the 
 author read, be earnestly fostered. . . . Our interest in the matter 
 arises from our desire that a new enthusiasm may be kindled in 
 classical studies. We are especially desirous that the taste for 
 Greek literature, and the interest in the Greek language, should be 
 fostered in the colleges of .the country, as one of the essential condi- 
 tions of a generous and refined culture. The Latin language is so 
 much more thoroughly mastered as less to need fostering care." 
 
 Such words, from such a source, lend an additional interest to my 
 independent experiment, and serve strongly to reinforce its lessons. 
 
l88o.] OBJECT-TEACHING. l6S 
 
 OBJECT-TEACHING : ITS PURPOSE AND PROVINCE. 
 
 BY N. A. CALKINS. 
 
 Bacon first proclaimed that philosophy which afterwards became 
 the corner-stone of object-teaching, in his "Novum Organum" : 
 " Man, being the servant and interpreter of nature, can do and under- 
 stand so much, and so much only, as he has observed, in fact or in 
 thought, of the course of nature ; beyond this he neither knows any- 
 thing, nor can do anything." 
 
 In his endeavors to direct the attention of teachers to the world 
 around, he urged them to "turn away from the broken cisterns of 
 traditional science, and quaff the pure waters that flow sparkling and 
 fresh, forever, from the unfathomable fountain of creation." He bade 
 them " go to Nature, listen to her many voices, consider her ways, 
 and learn her doings." He told them that "men read in books what 
 is said concerning stones, plants, animals, and the like, but to inspect 
 these with their own eyes is far enough from their thoughts." He 
 thus pointed them to the better way : " We should fix the eyes of the 
 mind upon the things themselves, and thereby form a true conception 
 of them. It is none the less true in this human kingdom of knowl- 
 edge, than in God's kingdom of heaven, that no man shall enter into 
 it except he become first as a little child." 
 
 Bacon was a philosopher, and looked on the work of education 
 from the side of nature. He saw clearly that real knowledge must 
 be built up from an observation of things. Although the thoughts 
 which he uttered produced no decided changes in the methods of 
 education during his lifetime, their influence has been strongly felt 
 through all subsequent generations. 
 
 Comenius, who was over thirty years old when Bacon died, acknowl- 
 edged the influence of his philosophy. He became both a celebrated 
 teacher and philosopher, and applied the principles of Bacon to edu- 
 cation. He published his "Orbis Sensualium PictUs " in 1657, and 
 therein laid a foundation for object-teaching more than a hundred 
 years before Pes"talozzi was known. An examination of some of his 
 statements relating to elementary education will show that he builded 
 wisely and firmly ; and, at the same time, these will aid in unfolding 
 the. purpose of this system of education : — 
 
 " Instruction will succeed if the method follows the course of 
 nature. It must begin with actual inspection, not with verbal 
 
1 66 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 description of things. What is actually seen remains faster in the 
 memory than description a hundred times repeated. 
 
 "The first education should be of the perceptions, then of the 
 memory, then of the understanding, then of the judgment. The 
 schools are wrong in first teaching languages, and then proceeding to 
 things. ■ Things and words should be studied together, but things 
 especially, — the object both of the understanding and of language. 
 
 "Hitherto the schools have done nothing with the view of devel- 
 oping children like young trees, from the growing impulse of their 
 own roots, but have been engaged in hanging them over with twigs 
 broken off elsewhere. They teach youth to adorn themselves with 
 others' feathers, like the crow in the fable. They do not show them 
 things as they are, but tell them only what others have thought and 
 written about them. 
 
 "In God are the ideas, — the original types- which He impresses 
 upon things ; things impress their representatives upon the senses ; 
 the senses impart them to the mind, the mind to the tongue, and the 
 tongue to the ears of others. The mind thinks ; the tongue speaks ; 
 the hand makes ; hence we have sciences of things, and acts of speak- 
 ing and working. To learn is to proceed from something known to 
 the knowledge of something unknown. To know is to be able to rep- 
 resent a thing, either by the mind, or the hand, or the tongue. 
 
 " During the first six years the foundation should be laid for all 
 that children are to learn during their lives. In physics, they should 
 begin to know stones, plants, animals, etc., and the names and uses 
 of the members of their own body. In optics, to distinguish light 
 and darkness, and colors. In geometry, they should begin with ideas 
 of shape, length, breadth, lines, squares, circles, solids, etc. Iri 
 arithmetic, with counting. In geography, with the knowledge of the 
 room, the house, the streets, the fields, the farm, their neighbors. 
 In history, with what happened to-day, yesterday, the day before, 
 last week, last year. In chronology, they should obtain a knowledge 
 of day and night, hours, weeks, months, seasons, years, festivals, 
 etc. In astronomy, they should learn to know the sun, moon, stars, 
 and that the moon is sometimes round and sometimes sickle-shaped. 
 In language, they should commence with the pronunciation of words, 
 with talking, reading, and writing. 
 
 " The school is a manufactory of humanity ; it ought to work its 
 subjects into the right and skilful use of their observing powers, 
 their reason, speech, and talents for occupation ; into wisdom, 
 eloquence, skill, and readiness. 
 
 " Learning is by steps, from the easy to the difficult ; from the 
 
I880.J OBJECT-TEACHING. 1 67 
 
 simple to the compound ; from the nearer to the more distant ; from 
 the regular to the anomalous. It is good to use several senses in the 
 understanding of one thing. The attention should be fixed.upon only 
 one object at a time, and upon the whole first, and the parts after- 
 wards. The subject to be apprehended must be made clear, and pre- 
 sented in an' orderly manner. The faculty to be directed to it must 
 be calm. Retaining will be made easier by repetition ; and recollect- 
 ing by means of the relations of things, and by proper associations of 
 them. Rules should not be given before examples. Artisans under- 
 stand this well, that doing can only be learned by doing." 
 
 Rousseau, who lived about a hundred years after Comenius, 
 obtained great insight into child nature, and became an earnest advo- 
 cate of the development of the minds of children by the exercise 
 of their senses through attention to objects. He was an educational 
 reformer rather than a teacher; and his theory of education exerted 
 great influence upon the mind of Pestalozzi, who subsequently 
 applied its principles to a series of object-lessons. 
 
 Nearly a hundred and fifty years after Comenius had become a 
 practical educator, and while his published works on education 
 were popular, Pestalozzi, at the age of fifty-two years, — and after 
 many failures in other occupations, — began his real work of teach- 
 ing. His school was composed of orphans, and other poor children ; 
 and the numbers attending became so great that he found much 
 difficulty in arresting their attention. As a" means of overcoming 
 this, he introduced object-lessons to gain their attention through 
 their senses. At first his methods were very crude ; but through his 
 own experience, and by the aid of teachers who were subsequently 
 associated with him, more systematic methods were introduced. 
 Pestalozzi was more successful in directing attention to better prin- 
 ciples for guiding teachers to the discovery of good methods for 
 instruction than in devising them himself. He became distinguished 
 as an educator more through that which he stimulated others to 
 accomplish, than by what he did through his own method of teach- 
 ing. It does not appear that he had brought his methods of teaching 
 into harmony with his own theory of education. He was guided in 
 his work by his great humanity for children, and his convictions as 
 to the importance of training their minds in habits of observation, 
 and their characters in the ways of right acting. 
 
 Pestalozzi did not claim that he invented a new system of educa- 
 tion for children, but that he had " lighted upon truths little noticed 
 before, and principles which, though almost generally acknowledged, 
 were seldom carried out in practice." He found teachers pursuing 
 
1 68 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 the' most mechanical modes in their school exercises, notwithstand- 
 ing the principles which direct to better methods were known to 
 many. He endeavored to point out ways of teaching in harmony 
 with the child's nature, and to lead to the acquisition of knowledge 
 by the pupil's own experience. 
 
 His most celebrated works were " Lienhard and Gertrude," written 
 when he was thirty-four years of age ; and " How Gertrude teaches 
 Her Children," written when he was fifty-five years of age. Through 
 the influence of these, and his school at Yverdun, which was his 
 most successful one, he attracted the attention of distinguished 
 teachers, who took up his principles and applied them to elementary 
 education throughout Germany, Austria, and Switzerland. 
 
 Froebel successfully applied the principles of developing all the 
 powers of the child — physical, mental, moral, and social — by means 
 of systematic exercises adapted to each. He took children before 
 they were old enough to attend to the ordinary studies of school, and 
 trained them under circumstances most favorable to good results, 
 and thus prepared them for school-life and work. 
 
 Object-teaching occupies an important position in the elementary 
 schools of several countries of Europe, and also in the schools of 
 many cities and towns in the United States and in Canada. It is 
 making good progress in the schools of the Argentine Republic, and 
 of Chili, and other parts of South America, through the use of works 
 on this system of teaching which have been translated and published 
 in the Spanish language. Its principles and methods are embraced 
 in the course of instruction for training teachers in Cape Colony, 
 Africa. 
 
 Many teachers use methods which they call object-teaching, that 
 have neither the spirit nor the real form of this system. Others fol- 
 low some of its principles, but do not employ enough of its methods 
 to render their instruction systematic. With some of its disciples 
 the aim has been chiefly to furnish exercises for the development of 
 the senses, but without systematic connection in the matter of the 
 instruction. With others, it maybe said the chief purpose has been 
 to provide better illustration and instruction of the facts pertaining 
 to the subject of the lesson. 
 
 True object-teaching embraces both of these aims ; and the great- 
 est need with the teachers of to-day is a better understanding of the 
 real principles of this system, and a thorough acquaintance with 
 proper methods for applying them. 
 
l88o.] OBJECT-TEACHING. l6g 
 
 ITS PURPOSE. 
 
 For the further explanation of the principles of object-teaching, 
 and its real import and purpose, let us consider what it is claimed to 
 be and do. 
 
 Object-teaching has for its purpose a thorough development of all 
 the child's faculties, and their proper employment in the acquisition 
 of knowledge, instead of the plan too commonly pursued of depend- 
 ing upon the memory for this purpose. It is not a plan of fixed, un- 
 changeable methods, but a system of training based upon and 
 controlled by the fact that the beginnings of real knowledge must 
 come through the appropriate exercise of the senses. Its purpose 
 is not the attainment of facts, nor the cultivation of language as 
 an end ; but the development, to a vigorous and healthy action, of 
 the child's powers of getting and using knowledge, both by the 
 methods of obtaining it and by the knowledge itself. It furnishes 
 exercises to produce ability to learn, and methods to aid in the 
 learning. 
 
 It does not signify the things about which something is taught, 
 nor that. which is taught about them, so much as it does the princi- 
 ples by which the teaching is performed, and the purpose and manner 
 of the teaching. It deals with things, and it considers subjects also. 
 It attends to realities and their relations, rather than to ideals and 
 their representations. It furnishes a means of attaining clear and 
 intelligent ideas of distant objects and events through those that are 
 near and known. 
 
 Object-teaching prepares the learner's mind by development begun 
 through sense-perceptions, and continued by observation and reflec- 
 tion, to understand clearly the important facts concerning things and 
 acts, and their relations to spoken and written language. It does 
 not propose, however, that the child shall gain all its knowledge by 
 the long process by which the human race was led through the wil- 
 derness of personal experiences to the attainment of the present 
 sciences ; but it does propose to lead the young, inexperienced 
 learner into the midst of objects and influences that will awaken 
 the several senses to activity. And, as their activity develops* 
 knowledge, even though elementary in form and nature, the learner 
 will thereby become able to profit by the greater experiences of 
 others, and thus increase his progress in knowledge. It proposes to 
 guide the young learner till his own enlarged experiences prepare 
 him to extend his acquisitions through the experiences of others, as 
 
 VOL. I. 12 
 
17° EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 they are furnished by means of books ; and also to confirm the facts 
 thus gained, by his own observations. 
 
 Once more, object-teaching implies, — 
 
 First. — The use of systematic exercises with objects for the 
 development of the power of gaining the elements of knowledge. 
 
 Second. — A training in habits of getting knowledge from objects, 
 models, pictures, and diagrams, by careful observation ; both of 
 these ends being reached through the guided personal experiences of 
 the learner. 
 
 Third. — Teaching the pupils how to avail themselves of facts pre- 
 viously discovered by others, and recorded in books ; and training 
 them to verify those facts, so far as practicable, by personal exam- 
 ination. 
 
 Prof. S. S. Greene, in "A Report on Object-Teaching, before the 
 National Teachers' Association," 1865, happily indicates its purpose 
 as he describes what it is : — 
 
 " Object-teaching is that which takes into account the whole realm 
 of nature and art, so far as the child has examined it, and assumes 
 as known only what the child knows, and works from the well 
 known to the obscurely known, and so onward and upward till the 
 learner can enter the fields of science, or of abstract thought. . . . 
 It is that which insists upon something besides mere empty, verbal 
 expressions in every school exercise ; in other words, it insists upon 
 expression and thought, in place of expression and no thought. It 
 is that which makes the school a place where the child comes in con- 
 tact with realities, just such as appeal to his common-sense when he 
 roams at 'pleasure in the fields. It is that which relieves the child's 
 school task by making it intelligent and possible. It bids him exam- 
 ine for himself, discriminate for himself, and express for himself, 
 while the teacher stands to give hints and suggestions, not to relieve 
 the labor. In short it is that which addresses itself directly to the 
 eye, external or internal ; which summons to its aid things present 
 or things absent, things past or things to come, and bids them yield 
 the lessons which' they infold, which deals with actual existence, and 
 not with empty dreams." 
 
 ITS PROVINCE. 
 
 In describing the province of object-teaching, which has already 
 been foreshadowed, I shall consider it in three stages, so that its 
 relations to school instruction may be clearly seen. 
 
l88o.] OBJECT-TEACHING. 171 
 
 First Stage. — The province of the first stage of object-teaching 
 is chiefly, occupied with the development of the child's perceptive 
 powers through proper exercise of his several senses. At this period 
 it does not propose to 'engage in teaching objects, nor subjects, but 
 rather in the use of a systematic plan by which objects shall become 
 the means of awakening the child's slumbering energies, of develop- 
 ing their activity, and thus opening wide the gateways _to his mind. 
 
 This work should be commenced by the mother before the child 
 is old enough to enter school, with supplying suitable objects to 
 induce the proper exercise of each of the senses, and a training in 
 the use of these materials in such a way as to lead to noticing their 
 easily perceived properties. The desire for knowledge which the 
 child expresses by those familiar and oft-repeated questions, — " What 
 is it?" — "What is it for?" — "Why does it do so?"— should be 
 carefully heeded, and the child led through his own experience, as far 
 as practicable,- to find answers to his questions. It is what the child 
 is taught to do that educates him. Kindergarten training belongs 
 to this stage of object-teaching. And where children enter school 
 without having received any systematic training for the development 
 of their senses, this stage of the work should be employed during 
 the first term of school attendance, in the lowest primary class, as a 
 means for preparing the young pupils for subsequent instruction. 
 
 Second Stage. — The province of the second stage of object-teach- 
 ing is to prepare the young pupils for taking the elementary steps- in 
 learning the simple facts of those subjects which are included in the 
 course of instruction for the first two years at school. During this 
 stage objects are employed both as a means of development and as 
 subjects of instruction, through the child's personal experience. 
 The teacher provides suitable materials, and stimulates and guides 
 the pupils to such attention to them as will secure that mental ac- 
 tivity and habit of careful observation necessary to develop properly 
 the powers of the mind, and to gain real knowledge, and cultivate 
 the right use of language. 
 
 Third Stage. — The province of the third stage of object-teaching 
 is the acquisition of knowledge from objects, and the proper associa- 
 tion of facts with their appropriate subjects. The teacher chooses the 
 object, or subject,' leads the pupils to group around it the known facts 
 which relate to.it, and guides them in the way of learning more concern- 
 ing it. Facts acquired and associated become knowledge. Methods of 
 teaching produce habits of learning that greatly influence all the 
 pupil's subsequent attainments of knowledge. It is the province of 
 object-teaching to give special attention to those modes of instruc- 
 
172 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 tion which will lead to a right manner of learning. During this stage 
 of teaching, the use of objects, the use of the child's remembered ex- 
 periences, and the observations of others, which can be learned from 
 books, are all combined for supplying the pupfl with complete knowl- 
 edge of the subject, thus leading to classification and science. 
 
 Herbert Spencer indicates its appropriate province, in his " Edu- 
 cation," where he says : " Object-lessons should be extended to a 
 range of things far wider than now. They should include those of 
 the fields and the hedges, the quarry and the sea-shore. They 
 should not cease with early childhood, but should be so kept up 
 during youth as insensibly to merge into the investigations of the 
 naturalist and the man of science. Here we have but to follow 
 Nature's leadings. Where can be seen an intenser delight than that 
 of children picking up new flowers, and watching new insects, or 
 hoarding pebbles and shells? And who fs there but perceives that 
 by sympathizing with them they may be led on to any extent of 
 inquiry into the qualities and structures of these things? Every 
 botanist who has had children with him in the woods and the lanes 
 must have noticed how eagerly they joined in his pursuits', how 
 keenly they searched out plants for him, how intently they watched 
 whilst he examined them, how they overwhelmed him with questions. 
 The consistent follower of Bacon, the ' servant and interpreter of 
 Nature,' will see that we ought modestly to adopt the course of 'cul- 
 ture thus indicated." 
 
l88o.] LEARNING OR TRAINING: WHICH? \J$ 
 
 LEARNING OR TRAINING: WHICH 1 
 
 BY . ALBERT PRESCOTT MARBLE. 
 
 'In calling attention to the defects of the school system, some of 
 our critics seem to be confused as to the aim of schools. There have 
 been common schools in this country, of one sort or another, for 
 nearly two hundred and fifty years. With the varying conditions of 
 society, modifications in the system have been needed from time to 
 time, and changes have been made. The schools are not by any 
 means perfect ; they must be adapted to the times ; but they must 
 not be overthrown. And through all the changes, the fundamental 
 idea must be preserved. It is worth while to inquire whether the 
 schools may not be reformed to death ; whether the tendencies of 
 certain of our revolutionists are not destructive of that which should 
 be the purpose of public school education. 
 
 When our forefathers first settled this continent, they fled from the 
 tyranny of a government founded on the idea that power was con- 
 ferred upon the rulers by the grace of God. The government which 
 they founded later has for its central idea, that power is derived from 
 the consent of the governed. As long as the country was new and 
 sparsely settled, this fundamental idea had its full realization. But 
 when Boston becomes a metropolis, with a quarter of a million inhabi- 
 tants, the application of the idea has to be modified a little. In the 
 time of Gen. Gage the boys, we are told, played on the Frog Pond on 
 the Common, and they brooked no restraint in their play. Now, police- 
 men guard that little lake and the well-kept lawn, and the boys are 
 restrained. Numerous restrictions have become necessary in the 
 great city, and in the country around, compelled by the denser pop- 
 ulation, and the consequent changed conditions. . We have gravi- 
 tated towards some of the restraints from which our fathers fled. 
 
 But the fundamental idea still underlies our government. The 
 stern necessities of civil war have centralized and consolidated the 
 governing power ; but through it all, the origin of the power is still 
 with the people. 
 
 Popular education was provided for at an early day. It has, all 
 along, been enforced by legislation as a necessary part of our form 
 of government ; and, like that, all its further modifications must pre- 
 serve the fundamental idea, the preparation of American youth for 
 citizenship and intelligent participation in the conduct of public 
 affairs. Led by men eminent for their name or their well-known 
 
174 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 ability in one direction or another, there is something of a clamor 
 against the public schools. The methods of those schools are 
 attacked. The results are belittled. What remedy do these revolu- 
 tionists propose ? What have they ever done to improve the deplorable 
 state of things which they think they see ? Generally nothing what- 
 ever. Dogs in the manger, they do nothing but try to impede those 
 who, with all the skill they can command, have been trying and are 
 trying to conduct and to improve the education of American youth. 
 
 John Milton said, in the preface to his book, " Let him that finds 
 fault produce a better." Let the zealous maligners of public schools 
 show us a better way, and prove that it is better. This is just what 
 we want. But have they, the new lights, proceeded far in the 
 demonstration in those localities which have been placed in their 
 control? Is it yet certain that "Jack the Giant-Killer" and "Jack 
 and the Bean-Stalk" are altogether better than the "New England 
 Primer" ? I do not say they are not. It takes time to find out. 
 
 The most furious attacks upon the public schools do not always 
 proceed from bottom facts. One of the most encouraging signs 'of 
 the times is that such a paragraph as the following appears in a lead- 
 ing daily newspaper in the city of Boston : — * 
 
 "Mr. Richard G.White's success in calling public attention to some 
 of the mistakes and lacks in our public school system has apparently 
 raised a little bump in the 'ego' centre of his usually level head. 
 He is speaking for himself, or for his own man of straw, when he 
 gives the reason of the advocates of public schools for their mainte- 
 nance, in the plea that 'society owes every child an education.' That 
 is not the bottom idea, Mr. White, though it is n't a bad one for a 
 republican State that calls itself civilized, not to say Christianized. 
 The real position is, that society owes it to itself to educate the chil- 
 dren who are in the future to constitute the State and society. On 
 the low ground of self-protection society can make no better or more 
 needed investment. And to ask, 'why is it that society owes every 
 child an education any more than it owes him or her a pleasant home 
 and good clothes,' is no more conclusive than it would be to demand 
 why it is that society owes every man legal protection in his personal 
 and property rights, any more than it owes him a mounted body- 
 guard or a nice block of government bonds. The schoolmaster is 
 as much a part of the equipment of a well-ordered State as a police- 
 man or a judge. Mr. White may never have had occasion to invoke 
 the services of the police or the courts, and yet he pays taxes — we 
 trust uncomplainingly — to support them. Society does not, perhaps, 
 * See " Herald " of Oct. 13, 1880. 
 
tS8o.J LEARNING OR TRAINING: WHICH? 1 75 
 
 owe very much to Mr. White as an individual, or care very much 
 about him ; but, as a member of the State, it looks after him, whether 
 he owns anything to pay taxes, on or not. The Republic is so far 
 removed from barbarism on the one side, and a government of the 
 many by the few and for the few on the other, that it does not say 
 to its members, .' Every man for himself and the devil take the hind- 
 most ; let those who can, or who choose, educate their children and 
 the rest go untaught.' Mr. White ought to know that to destroy 
 is not the sole end of criticism." 
 
 The attacks upon the schools are, as a rule, vague and general. 
 They consist of mere assertion. When Mr. White says "the 
 schools not only do not prepare youth for American citizenship, but 
 they positively unfit them for the duties of life," I may get up and 
 say that the schools do prepare American youth for citizenship, and 
 they do not unfit them for the duties of life. At this point the 
 argument has not advanced a step. Mr. White makes an assertion, 
 and I make a counter-assertion. Mr. White is an eminent writer, 
 but as he confesses, I believe, he is not familiar with schools. I am 
 not an eminent writer, but I have seen a good many public schools. 
 When Mr. White will curb his Pegasus, and bring himself down to 
 one little fact, then it will be time enough to see about that little 
 fact. Mere generalities, when put in forcible language, such as this 
 class of writers use, are quite entertaining to read ; but they are not 
 argument, and they do not much move the American people. One 
 thing these malcontents have proposed, and it is to speak of this 
 that I drop for a moment my busy work in the schools of a growing 
 city. They howl against technical grammar ; they raise a cry against 
 geography ; they decry arithmetic ; they are especially furious against 
 what they call " dry 'routine," and "drill"; they call the teaching 
 mechanical, and speak of the " company-front " plan in education. 
 To say all in one word, they call the public school system " the 
 machine." On the same principle, the little boy said to his brother 
 who had been worsted in a quarrel with another boy, "Call him 
 names, Jim." 
 
 In place of this disagreeable study, our critics propose the oral 
 method. The teacher should " make it interesting," and so forth, 
 and so forth. 
 
 Now, poor teachirig there is ; and poor teaching is bad. Unintelli- 
 gent study there is ; and this is bad. Let us try to correct all that. 
 It is the constant effort of teachers, and all who are at work in the 
 interest of schools, to correct it. A good deal has been done in this 
 .direction. A good deal more is being done, even though Mr. 
 
I7 6 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 Charles Francis Adams, Jr., will not allow any school superintendent 
 to call himself a reformer,* and the Boston school committee want to 
 do, as some one says, — though I don't believe it, — just what the 
 masters do not want. 
 
 But for poor teaching shall we substitute diffusive, everlasting 
 talk ? For study, sometimes irrational, shall we ordain no study ? 
 Can children be fitted for citizenship without effort on their part ? 
 Has anybody who amounts to anything — have even our eminent 
 critics themselves — been developed on the taffy plan ? If I mistake 
 not, the substitute proposed for the work in our schools tends very 
 largely to nambypambyism. If, for study and intelligent work in 
 school, we introduce a passive entertainment, — and this is what 
 much of the talk tends to, — the future citizens will be a very help- 
 less set, without nerve or muscle ; cowardly and effeminate. 
 
 The new lights that sweep across the educational field are brilliant 
 and striking. Like comets, they spread over the firmament. By 
 their novelty they almost conceal the stars. They are the wonder 
 of the time. In the minds of some, they inspire a kind of supersti- 
 tious awe. But the scientific investigator is not alarmed. They 
 have no disk. Close inspection shows them to be composed of thin 
 vapor. Their diffusive lustre photographs no permanent image on 
 the youthful mind, and they disappear with the day. Little stars 
 are not striking, but they stay ; and you know where to find them. 
 
 The aim of school is training ; it is not mere acquisition of facts. 
 Right training requires work, and a few things, well hammered in, 
 points like stars, not diffusive lectures like comets' tails very broad 
 and very thin. In this training even technical grammar and the old 
 courses of study are not wholly nonsensical. They may not be the 
 best, but they are better than the nothings that must take their 
 place if they are abolished without a substitute. For training — cul- 
 ture — it is doubtful whether there is so much that is new. And it is 
 certain that the whole field of knowledge cannot be covered in the 
 public schools. Says a writer in the " Contemporary Review," August, 
 1880, "The true purpose of the school is not to anticipate the lessons 
 of life, but so to discipline the mind that it may be prepared to learn 
 them from experience. . . . Our incessant experiments in educational 
 reform serve only to interrupt the traditions, and therefore to lessen 
 the prestige of our culture ; they perplex teachers, scholars, and 
 parents alike ; they lead to doubt and hesitancy, and must all end 
 in a simple return to the old system." The question is whether there 
 is not something for Americans to think of in this view. 
 * See Chautauqua speech, July, 1880. 
 
l88o.] THE RENASCENCE AND ITS INFLUENCE. 177 
 
 THE RENASCENCE AND ITS INFLUENCE ON EDUCATION. 
 
 REV. R. H. QUICK, A. M. 
 II. 
 
 In the last number, I endeavored to set forth some of the evils 
 which have descended to us from the educational ideal of the Re- 
 nascence. We saw that when the school course was settled, the only 
 notion conceived of the educated man was the classical scholar. 
 From this it followed that the highest distinction was awarded to the 
 student of other men's words and other men's thoughts, so that doing 
 and thinking came to be considered of far less importance in education 
 than learning and remembering. Again, the adoption of a literary- 
 ideal caused an exaggerated importance to be attributed to literature, 
 and made books the sole apparatus of instruction ; and at the same 
 time, by a singular anomaly, it banished literature proper from the 
 school-room, and sought to confine the learners' attention to the 
 phraseology and the idioms of two dead languages. 
 
 There is yet another weakness about the Renascence ideal, — a 
 weakness from which most ideals are free. 
 
 Most ideals have this merit, at least, that he who makes even 
 a feeble and abortive effort to reach them is benefited in proportion 
 to his advance, however small that, advance may be. If he fails to 
 seize the coat of gold, he carries away, as the proverb tells us, at 
 least one of the sleeves ; or, to use George Herbert's metaphor, — 
 
 "... Whp aimeth at the sky, 
 Shoots higher far than he who means a tree." 
 
 But the learned ideal has not even this advantage. The first ; 
 stage, the study of the ancient languages, is so totally different from 
 the study of the ancient literatures to which it is the preliminary, 
 that the student who never goes beyond this first stage either gets 
 no benefit at all, or a benefit which is not of the kind intended. 
 Suppose I am within a walk, though a long one, of the British 
 Museum, and, hearing of some valuable books in the library, which I 
 can see nowhere else, I set off to consult them. In this case it 
 makes no difference to me how valuable the books are if I do not 
 get as far as the Museum.* My friends may comfort me with the 
 
 * This illustration was suggested by a similar one in Prof. J. R. Seeley's essay on the 
 teaching of English in his lectures and essays, 1S70. 
 
178 EDUCATION. I Nov. 
 
 assurance that the walk must have done me good. Perhaps so ; but 
 I left home to get a knowledge of certain books, not to exercise my 
 legs. Had exercise been my object, I should probably have chosen 
 another direction. 
 
 Now schoolmasters, since the Renascence, have been in -the habit 
 of leading all their pupils through the back slums of the Seven Dials 
 and Soho, in the direction of the Museum, with the avowed purpose 
 of taking them to the library, although they knew full well that not 
 one pupil in ten, not one in fifty, would ever reach the door. To 
 produce a few scholars able to appreciate the classics of Greece and 
 Rome, they have sacrificed everybody else ; and, according to their 
 own showing, they have condemned a large portion of the richer 
 classes, nearly all the middle classes, and quite all the poorer classes 
 to remain " uneducated." And, according to the theory of the 
 school- room, one half of the human race -r- the women — has not 
 been supposed to need "education." For them "accomplishments " 
 have been held sufficient. 
 
 In conclusion, I must point out one effect of the Renascence ideal 
 which seems to me no less mischievous than those I have already 
 mentioned. The ideal led the schoolmasters to attach little impor- 
 tance to the education of children. Directly their pupils were old 
 enough for Latin grammar the schoolmasters were quite at home ; 
 but till then the children's time seemed to them of small value, and 
 they neither knew, nor cared to know, how to employ it. If the 
 little ones could learn by heart forms of words which would after- 
 wards "come in useful," the schoolmasters were ready to assist such 
 learning by ready application of the rod, but no other learning 
 seemed worthy even of a caning. Absorbed in the world of books 
 they overlooked the world of nature. 
 
 Galileo complains that he could not induce them to look through 
 his telescope, for they held that truth could be arrived at only by 
 comparison of MSS. No wonder, then, that they had so little sym- 
 pathy with children, and did not know how to teach them. It is by 
 slow degrees that we are breaking away from the bad tradition then 
 established, are getting to understand children, and with such leaders 
 as Rousseau, Pestalozzi, and Froebel, are investigating the best edu- 
 cation for them. We no longer think of them as immature men and 
 women, but see that each stage has its own completeness, and that 
 there is a perfection in childhood which must precede the perfection 
 of manhood just as truly as the flower goes before the fruit. " Child- 
 hood," says Rousseau, " has its own ways of seeing, feeling,- think- 
 ing "; and it is by studying these that we find out how children should 
 
l88o.] THE RENASCENCE AND ITS INFLUENCE. 179 
 
 be educated.. Now our connection with the world of nature seems 
 much closer in our early years than ever afterwards. The child's 
 mind seems drawn out to its surroundings. He is intensely inter- 
 ested in the new world in which he finds himself, and whilst so many 
 of us grown people need a flapper, like the sages of Laputa, to call 
 our attention from our own thoughts to anything that meets the eye 
 or ear, the child sees and hears everything, and everything seen or 
 heard becomes associated in his mind not so much with thought as 
 with feeling. Hence it is that we, most of us, look back wistfully to 
 our early days, and confess sorrowfully that though " years " may 
 have brought " the philosophic mind," 
 
 "... Nothing can bring back the hour 
 Of splendor in the grass, o£ glory in the flower." 
 
 The material world, then, seems to supply just those objects, whether 
 birds, beasts, or flowers, by which the child is attracted, and on which 
 his faculties will therefore be most naturally and healthily employed. 
 But the Renascence schoolmasters had little notion of this. If you 
 think the greatest scholar is the greatest man, you will, as a matter 
 of course, place at the other end of the scale those who are not 
 scholars at all. An English inspector, who, no doubt, thought chil- 
 dren had been created with due regard to the revised code of the Privy 
 Council, spoke of the infants who could not be classed by their per- 
 formances in "the three R's," as "the fag end of the school" ; and 
 no doubt the Renascence schoolmasters considered children the fag 
 end of humanity. The great scholars were, indeed, far above the 
 race of pedants; but the schoolmasters who adopted their ideal 
 were not ; and what is a pedant ? " A man who has got rid of his 
 brains to make room for his learning." * The pedantic schoolmasters 
 of the Renascence wished the mind of the pupil to be cleared of 
 everything else, that it might have room for the languages of Greece 
 and Rome. But what if the mind failed to take in its destined 
 freight ? In that case the schoolmasters had nothing else for it, and 
 were content that it should go empty. 
 
 * Miss J. D. Potter, in "Journal of Education." London, June, 1879. 
 
l8o EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 THE RELATION OF NORMAL- SCHOOL WORK TO THE 
 
 STATE. 
 
 BY S. N. FELLOWS, D D. 
 
 Dr. Mark Hopkins says that "government has no right to be 
 except as it is necessary to secure the ends of the individual in his 
 social capacity, and it must therefore be bound so to be as to secure 
 these ends in the best manner. ... To obviate practical difficulties, 
 however, it must be observed that when it is said that government is 
 for the individual, it is not meant that it is for one individual espe- 
 cially, but for all the individuals of whom society is composed." 
 
 Among the objects of the government asset forth in the preamble 
 of the United States Constitution, are these : " to provide for the 
 public defence," and "promote the general welfare." 
 
 It is a principle universally recognized in every department of 
 government, that the right to attain and secure any great national 
 interest or end, implies the right to construct and use every legiti- 
 mate and necessary means for attaining that end. It is as a neces- 
 sary means to an end that the right to educate pertains to the State. 
 If education is the best and " cheapest defence of nations," then the 
 nation should educate for the same reason that it establishes military 
 and naval academies, builds ships, ports, arsenals, and prepares the 
 munitions of war. If it can be shown, as it can be, and has been 
 done, that the education of the people is necessary to the " general 
 welfare," and that it is unsafe to leave this education to private en- 
 terprise, it becomes not only the right but the duty of the State to 
 educate the people. 
 
 But the State is bound also to secure its ends in the best manner 
 and at the least expense. It is of the highest interest to the farmer 
 to have his land tilled and cultivated after the best and most scien- 
 tific methods, otherwise loss, and even financial ruin may follow. 
 The manufacturer who studies his truest and best good, employs 
 only skilled labor, in order to avoid waste and secure the best results. 
 It is of far greater importance to the State to have its seven millions 
 of children, — the most precious jewels of the nation, — during the 
 six years of their average school-life, receive their instruction and 
 training from skilled teachers ; otherwise, blunted intellects, warped 
 characters, and wasted lives may be the terrible national result. 
 The duty of the State then " to provide for the public defence and 
 promote the general welfare " implies the duty to educate the people. 
 
 o 
 
l88o.] NORMAL-SCHOOL WORK. l8l 
 
 The duty of the State to educate the people in the best manner, im- 
 plies the duty to provide trained teachers to whom the work of edu- 
 cation may be intrusted. 
 
 The extent to which the State should educate is determined by its 
 own needs and ability. If it is necessary for the "general welfare" 
 that all the people should have an elementary education, provision 
 for a universal elementary education should be made. If the "gen- 
 eral welfare " demands that a portion of the youth should possess, and 
 all should have the privilege of acquiring such mental and moral 
 discipline as only a university education can secure, provision should 
 be made for a university. State education of every degree and kind 
 can be maintained only as a sound public policy. 
 
 The provision for teacher training should be commensurate with 
 the wants of the schools of the State. If the State should provide 
 and maintain primary, grammar, high schools, and the university, it 
 follows necessarily that schools should be established for the instruc- 
 tion and training of teachers for all these grades, and if these cannot 
 be secured by private enterprise, the duty to establish and' maintain 
 them devolves upon the State. 
 
 The right and duty of the State to make necessary provision for 
 the education and training of the teachers in all grades of schools 
 being proved, the practical question arises, how can this be done in 
 the best manner, and at the least expense ? Let it be remembered 
 that we have a system of schools so organized and adjusted that 
 pupils may enter the primary, and pass step by step through the 
 grammar and high school and university. This system, in order to 
 be complete, and carried forward to its highest efficiency, and thus 
 truly " promote the general welfare," needs to be supplemented with 
 facilities for teacher training. 
 
 Where should this work begin? I answer, in the universities. 
 Who are the pioneers of progress in every department of life ? They 
 are those in the highest circles of thought and investigation. All 
 reforms in art, literature, science, law, politics, and religion have their 
 origin in the minds of a few, who, with clearer and broader vision, 
 stand on higher heights, and scan a wider horizon. Thence the 
 reform, the new truth in discovery, passes down to those on lesser 
 heights, until it reaches the masses in the valleys below. It is in 
 this way that " the philosophy of one generation becomes the common- 
 sense of the next." The same principle governs in national educa- 
 tion. All reforms in school work or teacher training should begin in 
 the highest institutions of the land. The foundations should be laid 
 here. 
 
1 82 EDUCATION. [Nov 
 
 It is related in the history of Poland, that many years ago it was 
 a Protestant country. In an evil hour a Jesuit minister of public 
 instruction was appointed. This to a casual observer would seem 
 to be an unimportant fact. This minister of public instruction 
 soon secured, by his own appointment, Jesuit professors in the 
 national university. In a few years, Jesuit graduates of the univer- 
 sity were sent out as teachers into the academies and secondary 
 schools. These in turn supplied the primary schools with Jesuit 
 teachers, and Poland passed under " the control of Roman Cathol- 
 icism. Whether the above be fact or fiction, it illustrates the 
 point. 
 
 Suppose that instead of organizing the first elementary normal 
 school in the United States in 1839, Yale and Harvard Colleges had 
 established chairs of didactics, and that other colleges had followed 
 their example, who can estimate the results that would have fol- 
 lowed ? This recognition of the need and value of teacher training 
 by the chief institutions of learning would have started an influence 
 that would have been felt in every school-room and home in the 
 land. The science and art of education would have been far more 
 rapidly developed. The courses of study and methods of teaching 
 in the colleges themselves would have been greatly improved. The 
 graduates of these colleges who have become teachers, principals, 
 and superintendents of schools would have entered upon their work, 
 not only disciplined, educated in the truest sense of that word, but 
 also with a clear understanding of the principles and methods of 
 education, familiar with its history and progress, and also with the 
 philosophy of teaching. With superintendents and principals pos- 
 sessed of the zeal and enthusiasm born of such knowledge and skill, 
 to organize and marshal the educational forces, stimulate the scholars, 
 and inspire the subordinate teachers with a spirit of earnest work, 
 it is difficult to overestimate the grand results that would have been 
 accomplished in our graded schools. Besides, these schools would in 
 turn have become training schools for teachers in grammar and 
 primary grades, and so a mighty impetus would have been given all 
 along the lines of our educational forces. The greatest need to-day, 
 in educational as well as in other departments of industry, is directive 
 power. This directive power implies a ground-work of general edu- 
 cation that can be obtained only in the highest and best-equipped 
 institutions. Let the State then provide in its universities for the 
 best instruction and training possible in language, mathematics, and 
 science, and supplement this in its chairs of didactics with needful 
 professional instruction and training for those who become teachers, 
 
l88o.] NORMAL-SCHOOL WORK. 1 83 
 
 and the possible results described above will become realities in the 
 near future. 
 
 Secondly, how can the State best provide for the training of 
 teachers for grammar and primary grades ? It is in connection with 
 this grade of normal work that the question of separate schools 
 arises. If it be claimed that culture, or the knowledge of subjects, 
 or both, are legitimate branches of normal teaching, then it follows 
 that the separate normal school involves a double system of sec- 
 ondary general instruction. The high school is universally recog- 
 nized as the secondary school for general culture. It is the connect- 
 ing link between the higher and primary schools, and binds all into 
 unity and system, and is therefore regarded as a vital and necessary 
 part of the whole. If normal schools are established on essentially 
 the same basis and do the same work, the people fail to see the rea- 
 son for their existence. Hence the criticism on normal schools. 
 
 It is believed, therefore, that normal schools should become more 
 distinctively professional. To meet present necessities, it may be 
 wise to maintain preparatory departments, in which all academic in- 
 struction shall be given. In the normal school itself, let the instruc- 
 tion, as near as possible, be wholly professional, including, of course, 
 such reviews of branches as may be necessary for illustration of 
 methods. Again, in order to secure a more hearty support of nor- 
 mal schools, the element of confidence or trust should be more fully 
 introduced into their management. This is as essential in education 
 as in business. In this age, when all nations interchange goods,- 
 compete in the same markets, and possess mutual commercial inter- 
 ests, it would be impossible, without the element of confidence, to 
 carry on successfully any branch of trade or business. So in our 
 complex educational affairs, as teachers we labor in different depart- 
 ments, or schools, and yet we have mutual interests, are working for 
 a common end. We, too, interchange goods, compete in the same 
 markets, and without the element of mutual confidence we cannot 
 hope for the highest success. Students from accepted graded 
 schools should be received, on certificate of scholarship in the re- 
 quired branches, into the normal schools for professional training 
 alone. As normal schools become more and more distinctively pro- 
 fessional, and draw students already prepared in scholarship from the 
 graded schools around them, the reason for their separate existence 
 will become more apparent, and they will receive a heartier support 
 from the people and the State. 
 
 But the people will never incur the expense of a sufficient number 
 of separate normal schools to meet our educational demands, and 
 
1 84 EDUCATION. \ [Nov. 
 
 therefore some other provision must be made. It is believed that 
 this can be best and most economically done by providing, as far as 
 possible, for a normal school, or department, or teacher, or class, in 
 connection with every high school in the State. If it be true that 
 " graduates of well-organized high schools are likely to make the 
 most successful teachers, and from this source our graded schools 
 are destined to draw recruits to their teaching force," it would seem 
 that to supplement the drill and culture of the high school with the 
 professional training required would secure the best results and at 
 the least expense to the State. And as these high schools are es- 
 tablished in almost every county, it may be claimed that soon no 
 further provision for teacher training need be made. 
 
 Another means of teacher training by the State is the institute. 
 As a temporary expediency, the teachers' institute is of great value. 
 It serves to arouse public attention to the need of better methods in 
 education. It reaches the great mass of teachers who intend to teach 
 only a year or two, and causes even them to strive to render better 
 service. It elevates the ideal of teaching, increases sympathy, and 
 cultivates enthusiasm among all classes, and lays foundations for 
 more thorough training in the future. It must be admitted, however, 
 that it has been often perverted. So far as it is merely an opportu- 
 nity for cramming for a subsequent examination, it is an educational 
 fraud, — a fraud upon the teachers themselves, and upon the people, 
 for it conduces neither to sound scholarship nor- professional skill. 
 In the present stage of advancement of teacher training, however, 
 the institute cannot be dispensed with, and under such guidance as 
 will guard against abuse, and carry it forward to its greatest effi- 
 ciency, it should be vigorously supported by the State. 
 
 In conclusion, it is claimed that the State should provide for 
 normal-school work commensurate with the wants of the schools of 
 the State. That the provision should include : — 
 
 1. Chairs of education in universities. 
 
 2. A normal department in every high school. 
 
 3. Separate normal schools which shall be strictly professional. 
 
 4. Maintain temporarily, preparatory departments in normal 
 schools and teachers' institutes. ' These, being temporary, should be 
 dispensed with as soon as the educational facilities of the State will 
 permit, leaving the first three mentioned above as the permanent 
 provision of the State for teacher preparation. 
 
 In this way it is believed the State, in the matter of education, 
 will promote the " general welfare " in the best manner and at the 
 least expense. 
 
EDUCATION 
 
 No. 2. — NOVEMBER, 1880. 
 
 EDITORIAL. 
 
 Mr. Thomas Hughes's visits to America are always most welcome. The 
 genial author of "Tom Brown at Rugby" and "Tom Brown at Oxford" is 
 well and kindly known by all American students, while his efforts to improve 
 the interests and condition of the working classes have rendered him popular 
 among the middle and lower ranks of English-speaking people on both sides 
 of the Atlantic. Mr. Hughes is really an international man, whose real 
 home is in the hearty fellowship and esteem of both continents. His recent 
 trip to America has an interest which connects itself with the labors of 
 scholars and philanthropists, in the settlement of an English community in 
 Central Tennessee, on some of the principles of a co-operative society. 
 
 About three years ago the attention of English capitalists, led by Thomas 
 Hughes, Esq., had been directed to the Cumberland Plateau as a locality 
 to which young Englishmen of wealth, who desired to follow agricultural 
 pursuits, could emigrate. At about the same time, a company of Boston 
 gentlemen formed what was known as the " Board of Aid to Land Owner- 
 ship." As the result of conferences and negotiations between these English 
 and American gentlemen, a union was formed in an incorporated company 
 for the purpose of encouraging such immigration and settlement. 
 
 After six months' constant travel and investigation, the Board secured for 
 its proposed settlement an area of land on the Cumberland Plateau of 
 Northern Tennessee, about one hundred miles from Nashville and six or 
 eight hours by rail from Cincinnati. The plateau has an elevation of two 
 thousand feet above the sea and about one thousand feet above the general 
 plane of the State. The soil is said to be good, easily tilled, and adapted 
 to almost all agricultural products. The country is heavily wooded, and the 
 grass is of luxuriant growth. The air is pure, and the temperature agree- 
 able the year through. No malaria exists, and the climate is peculiarly 
 favorable to the recuperation of consumptives. The lands have been sur- 
 veyed ; buildings are in process of erection, among which are a hotel, a 
 school-house, and a church ; and New Rugby has been set in operation by a 
 company of young English gentlemen, with their wives aud others, who have 
 taken possession of their new home in Northeastern Tennessee, on the line 
 of the Cincinnati Southern Railroad. The Board retains supervision over 
 vol. 1. 13 
 
1 86 • EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 the whole territory in very many matters, similar to the practice in Vine- 
 land, N. J., and Greeley, Col. ; to secure a community such as is desired, 
 and to insure homes for a refined cjass of people, with moderate means. 
 
 The plan (as set forth by Mr. Hughes) is to aid colonists, by an advan- 
 tageous purchase of land in large areas, and its sale in small parcels, at low 
 prices, on credit mainly of years; by systematic plans of towns, streets, 
 farms, and building restrictions, to the benefit of all ; by an arrangement 
 for reduced rates of transportation ; construction of school-houses, and aid 
 to churches ; furnishing of steam or water power, portable mills, etc., as far 
 as practicable ; securing a population that will insure a good neighborhood ; 
 sale of seed, fuel, lumber, tools, etc., to colonists, at minimum cost; con- 
 struction and ornamentation of roads ; encouraging tree culture ; prohibit- 
 ing, in original deeds, manufacture of and traffic in intoxicating drinks ; 
 economizing fences ; establishing barrel factories, and drying and canning 
 establishments ; employing an efficient superintendent, who shall teach the 
 best methods of farming, etc. 
 
 The essential features of this movement are now so well established as 
 sound, its success being made dependent only on the class of people who 
 enter the scheme, that it is quite evident that Mr. Hughes will establish 
 on this side of the Atlantic a fair memorial of his intelligent zeal in behalf 
 of his countrymen. 
 
 PROSPERITY AND EDUCATION. 
 
 We have entered upon an era of solid prosperity. During a season of 
 stagnation and enforced economy, this country has accumulated wealth to 
 the extent of turning the credit balance of trade with foreign nations largely 
 in our favor, bringing our bonds home to stay, and starting gold shipments 
 towards our shores in a steady, shining stream. Never for fifty years, if 
 indeed ever before in the history of this country, were gold, silver, and bank- 
 notes equally acceptable to the people, because equally reliable as money. 
 With gold coin, silver legal-tender, national-bank notes, greenbacks, silver 
 certificates, and gold certificates equally available for currency, the demands 
 of trade are not yet satisfied, and the call for fractional paper currency is 
 urgent and well-grounded. At present, the capacity of our people to absorb 
 currency is uncertain. Before the war we floated only $j per capita in 
 paper money, whereas now we have reached the figure of %\^per capita, a,nd 
 instead of a plethora the cry is still for more, until it seems not improbable 
 that we may yet reach the average in France, where the paper circulation 
 for every man, woman, and child is $44. The cause of the increased 
 amount of paper money per capita is the greater confidence in the currency 
 than that which prevailed during war times and the ante-bellum wild-cat 
 banking period, when the disposition was not to hoard but to get rid of 
 
l88o.] PROSPERITY AND EDUCATION. 187 
 
 currency, which disposition, in the years subsequent to the war, led to the 
 wild speculation to which the panic of 1873 gave an effectual quietus. 
 
 ■Glancing at the productive interests of the country, the picture is as cheer- 
 ful as that presented by the monetary situation. A series of good seasons 
 at home, synchronous with a series of unfavorable seasons abroad, has put 
 our farmers on the high road of prosperity, and all other industries have 
 caught the cheerful pitch and are chorusing in the harmony of abundant and 
 profitable production. The manufactories and railroads are so alive with 
 the impulse of business, that it is even proposed to re-erect the broken col- 
 umn of our shipping interests, that the cycle of production, enhancement, 
 and delivery may be complete, and the entire profit on the commodity, from 
 the moment it is taken from the soil or from under it, till the laying of it 
 down' in a foreign port, may redound to the benefit of our own people. 
 Immigration is another source of wealth to this country, and at present the 
 influx of immigrants is unprecedented. Population is a most valuable 
 import. People not only extract wealth from the land in excess of what 
 they consume, but also, by furnishing a market near at hand for the farmer's 
 produce, enhance the value of his possessions, and by increasing the 
 demand for building sites, cause the value of real estate in towns and cities 
 and their vicinage to appreciate in a degree far beyond its value as a factor 
 of natural production. 
 
 The development of the South is an element of wealth to the nation at 
 large, which partisan feeling at present prevents many good people from 
 discerning. But it is apparent that the era of ill feeling and mutual misun- 
 derstanding and misrepresentation is drawing to a close, and that the vast 
 energies of that section, which were misdirected in slavery times, and have 
 been allowed to lie dormant a good portion of the time since the war, will 
 soon be called into full play for the development of the incalculable wealth 
 that awaits the " open-sesame " signal of enterprise and labor. Immigration 
 on this continent, as was the case in the eastern continent, after surging 
 westward to the natural limits, will recoil on itself and flow southward in a 
 living, wealth-giving, wealth-receiving tide. Small farming, diversified farm- 
 products, mining, and manufacturing, with the inestimable adjuncts of com- 
 merce by rail and water way, will, at no late day, make the industrial condi- 
 tion of the South as rich as her soil and mineral deposits, and her social 
 temperament as sunny as her sky. Area for area, sugar land is seven times 
 as productive as wheat land, and the possibilities of a Southern farm would 
 bewilder the brain of a Northern market-gardener. Cotton seed, once an 
 iricumbrance on the plantation, manufactured into oil, oil-cake, and paper, 
 has become a perennial bonanza, and the rolls of cotton fabric yielded by 
 the plant will have, in the future, to look to their laurels against the rivalry 
 of the woollen goods that may be derived from the fleeces of sheep, feeding 
 on and doubly enriching the fields in the intervals of cotton-growing. 
 
 But what has this to do with education ? Education is at once the cause 
 ■ and the fruition of industrial prosperity. But it is not our purpose at pres- 
 
1 88 • EDUCATION. [Nov, 
 
 ent to dive into the deeper philosophy of this correlation. A few surface 
 facts and practical suggestions are all we aim at. Let all who have the 
 cause of education at heart bear in mind that material prosperity is not 
 necessarily a factor of educational progress. In the impulse to make hay 
 while the sun of prosperity is shining, there is danger that the rising genera- 
 tion, or a portion of it, may be deprived of the benefits of schooling, in 
 order to supply a part of the demand for labor. It is not the very poor, 
 but the penurious and covetous that keep their- children out of school and 
 at work. Money-getting is a disposition that is apt to be indulged in at the 
 expense of principle and feeling, at the expense of future prospects and 
 flesh and blood. The hopelessly poor, if not depraved, strive, in the wreck 
 of their own lives, to float their children by giving them a good education. 
 Times of intense industrial activity supply temptations to the young to 
 engage in business, which are absent in periods of stagnation. Hence a 
 panic is not an unmixed evil, inasmuch as, besides clearing the surcharged 
 financial sky, it drives a whole generation of youth out of work and into the 
 schools, — a class of youth who will always work when work is to be had. 
 It is an error to suppose that hard times compel children to labor. The 
 essence of hard times is the scarcity of work for the adult, and much more 
 so for children. Hence, in the present prosperity, there lurks a danger to 
 our special interest, which it would be well for social scientists to guard 
 against by agitation and legislation, or at least by the enforcement of the 
 laws already on the statute book. 
 
 This is not a time to rake up the industrial-education problem. The 
 danger is that our youth will be tempted from the school to the work-shop. 
 The work that children do in some places, such as picking slate out of coal 
 in certain mines of Pennsylvania, is barbarous, and should be prohibited by 
 law. No country or section of country is ever richer, in the long run, by 
 yoking its children, its women, or its cows to hard labor. Such a course 
 may be necessary in some countries ; but here, where machinery is used to 
 subdue nature, such a measure is not only cruel, but also bad economy. 
 Children put out to work, and deprived of the mental cultivation that is due 
 them, are not efficient agents of social well-being in after life, but rather 
 stones in the field of industry, snags in the stream of progress. If any poor 
 boy rises in position, it is because he will not stay where fate placed him, 
 but is determined to do for himself what his parents ought to have done for 
 him. Self-made men are such because, as boys, they followed the wise 
 suggestion of Mahomet, and went to the school, inasmuch as the school 
 will not come to them. In times of prosperity, let the old work, and the 
 young study and play. A few years' study at the formative period of the 
 mind raises the individual to a higher plane of activity, and puts the long 
 arm of the lever in his hand through life. There is no great dearth of 
 labor that is not speedily remedied by inventive genius. Invention is the 
 favorite child of intelligence, whose fostering mother is the school. 
 
 In one particular the present prosperity brings peace. During the period 
 
l88o.] MISSIONARY EDUCATORS. 189 
 
 of speculation, one evidence of confidence in the future was the building of 
 expensive schools in various parts of the country. When the pinching of 
 business depression was felt, it was found difficult to pay the interest on the 
 bonds issued for the erection of these structures, to say nothing of the prin- 
 cipal. Popular dissatisfaction at this condition took the form, under the 
 guidance of demagogues, of opposition to public high schools, in cases 
 where the economical pressure did not find sufficient vent in the reduction 
 of teachers' salaries. With both high schools and teachers, in many places, 
 it was a " struggle for existence," under circumstances more adverse than 
 the inventor of that expression could have anticipated. The high schools 
 in most cases survived ; in many cases the teachers survived. The present 
 prosperity should mean restored salaries to the teachers who suffered reduc- 
 tion during the period of depression. It is to be hoped, too, that the same 
 prosperity means peace for the public high school. Its apparent expensive- 
 ness furnished a weapon of attack upon it to the hand of the open enemy, 
 or the" "fool friend" of the schools, during the bad times; but now that 
 plenty prevails, if anybody raises hand or voice against the public high 
 school, let him be anathema. 
 
 MISSIONARY EDUCATORS. 
 
 Two great missionary associations have just closed their annual sessions 
 in America, both being held in New England, — The American Board of 
 Commissioners for Foreign Missions, and The American Missionary Association. 
 As organizations for the spread of religious truth these two bodies have a 
 remarkable history, but their history as organizers of great educational 
 movements is equally marked. The earlier policy of the American Board 
 was to confine itself to the planting of mission stations, the translation of 
 the Bible, and the preaching of the truths of the Christian faith ; but the 
 ever-opening door of civilization, as well as Christianity, has demanded the 
 establishment of schools, colleges, and seminaries in all parts of what was 
 recently styled heathendom. It may be of interest to note the growth and 
 dimensions of the educational department of this great organization, as pre- 
 sented in the report of Dr. N. G. Clarke, the foreign secretary of the Board : 
 
 MISSIONS. 
 
 Number of missions 17 
 
 Number of stations 75 
 
 Number of out-stations 639 
 
 LABORERS EMPLOYED. 
 
 Number of ordained missionaries (seven being physicians) 156* 
 
 Number of physicians not ordained 6 
 
 Number of other male assistants 8 
 
 Number of female assistants 246! 
 
 Whole number of laborers sent from this country 416 
 
 * Including nine still supported at Sandwich Islands, 
 t Including eleven at the Sandwich Islands. 
 
1 90 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 Number of native pastors I4 2 
 
 Number of native preachers and catechists 4 Z 5 
 
 Number of native school-teachers 5 2 ^ 
 
 Number of native helpers '74 
 
 Whole number of laborers with missions 1,269 
 
 1.685. 
 
 THE PRESS. 
 
 Pages printed, as far as reported (Turkish, Japanese, North 
 
 China, and Zulu missions only) 20,606,478 
 
 THE CHURCHES. 
 
 Number of churches 272 
 
 Number of church members, nearly as can be learned I 7>'65 
 
 Added during the year, nearly as can be learned, with additions 
 
 not previously reported 2,485 
 
 EDUCATIONAL DEPARTMENT. 
 
 Number of training and theological schools and station classes. . 29 
 
 Number of pupils in the above I>°5I 
 
 Number of boarding-schools for girls 37 
 
 Number of pupils in the same 1,361 
 
 Number of common schools 7°9 
 
 Number of pupils in common schools 25-374 
 
 Whole number of pupils 28,098 
 
 When the bill of particulars is read, from which the above statistics are 
 compiled, it becomes one of the most luminous pages of modern history, 
 and illustrates the wonder-working power of education vitalized by the 
 great principles of Christianity, in which all Christian teachers and edu- 
 cators may rejoice. We cannot do better than to quote from Dr. Clarke's 
 able and lucid report : — 
 
 " In Armenia, no efforts have been spared to bring the churches up to 
 self-support and to self-government, and to secure to them such educational 
 institutions as shall prepare an efficient body of educated Christian men 
 and women to take up and carry forward the work of evangelization. This 
 object alone justifies the large expenditure from the Otis bequest of over 
 $50,000 the past year, on the colleges at Aintab and Harpoot, as* grants in 
 aid for raising up a native ministry, on the theological seminaries at Marash 
 and Marsovan, and on high schools and seminaries at Erzeroom, Csesarea, 
 Van, and elsewhere. 
 
 " The greatest progress in the Turkish missions the past year is to be 
 noted in the direction of education and of woman's work. No longer con- 
 tent with the elementary studies, there is a demand, as never before, for 
 high schools, and a readiness to make generous efforts to secure them. 
 The attendance of students in the colleges and in the seminaries is steadily 
 increasing. The wise direction of this newly awakened intellectual life, that 
 it be not secularized but imbued with the spirit of the gospel, imposes the 
 gravest responsibilities on the missionaries. 
 
 " The newly awakened interest in education is bearing its richest fruit in 
 the social and moral elevation of women. Graduates from the seminaries 
 at Aintab, Harpoot, Csesarea, Marsovan, and the Home at Constantinople 
 
l88o.] MISSIONARY EDUCATORS. 191 
 
 are to be found teaching girls and women in their native villages, til! the 
 number of girls' schools has more than quadrupled during the last five years. 
 " In Western Turkey, the schools for Greek girls at Broosa and Manisa 
 are well attended. Nearly half of the large church at Casarea is made up 
 of Greeks, and Greek students are found in the theological seminary at 
 Marsovan. At Constantinople, a large part of the time and strength of 
 the missionaries is given to the production of a Christian literature for the 
 whole empire. 
 
 " A graded system of schools has been introduced in Sivas, which has 
 excited general admiration. Where less than $500 was given for education 
 ten years ago, more than ten times that sum is now given, and the number 
 of pupils has increased from five hundred to fifteen hundred in the public 
 schools. In Tocat it is proposed to establish a high school, to be named 
 after Henry Martyn, in honor of the noted missionary whose grave is in that 
 city. No pains have been spared to provide the best opportunities for theo- 
 logical study at Marsovan. The men connected with the seminary are such 
 as would do honor to similar institutions at home. Of the recent grad 
 uates from the mission seminary, four are already engaged as teachers in 
 different places. The most hopeful feature of the work in some places is 
 the school taught by a graduate from the seminary, — perhaps the wife of 
 a native pastor. 
 
 " The most remarkable feature in the history of Cassarea is the changed 
 sentiment in regard to female education. The graduates from Miss Clos- 
 son's school are eagerly sought as teachers, so' that where not a single girls' 
 school was to be found five years ago, sixteen are contemplated for the 
 coming year. Indeed, there seems to be no limit to the opportunities of 
 reaching the women and the girls in thousands of homes. 
 
 " In Ceylon almost the entire expense of the education of over seven 
 thousand youths of both sexes is now met by the native population. In 
 Japan, the training school at Kioto is doing most effective work, having an 
 attendance - of eighty-eight pupils. The English course, embracing the study 
 of the classics, and such text-books as are usually taught in this country, 
 has been extended to five years. Then follows a special theological course 
 of two years, for such young men as are proposing to enter the ministry. To 
 meet the pressing needs of preachers, a special course of Biblical instruction 
 has been provided for such as cannot take a full course. 
 
 "The schools for girls at Kobe, Kioto, and Osaka have had over one 
 hundred and twenty pupils, and the course of study includes many of the 
 branches taught in high schools in this country, only giving more promi- 
 nence to Bible studies. 
 
 " The mission has issued about two millions of pages of Christian litera- 
 ture during the year, including a religious newspaper, the only one of the 
 kind in the empire. The event of the year, however, was the completion of 
 the translation of the New Testament, in April last, on which Dr. Greene 
 with others has been employed for the last six years." 
 
192 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 EDUCATION IN PARIS. 
 
 * 
 
 Paris, no doubt justly, boasts of being the most cosmopolitan city of 
 Europe. The artist, the scholar, and the votary of pleasure alike find 
 abundant scope for their pursuits. Two hundred years before the discovery 
 of America, she was recognized as occupying an important position in the 
 world of letters ; and mediaeval poems of the twelfth century treat of her 
 traditional twelve men, who seem to bear some resemblance to the seven 
 wise men of Greece. She was indeed, long ago, renowned for her university, 
 to which flocked men of all nations, for the mysteries of her scholasticism, 
 and the active enterprise of her commercial and industrial pursuits. 
 
 It should, however, be noted that Paris was a city where learning held high 
 carnival and walked in the palaces of the great, rather than ministered to 
 the wants of the people. Rapidly as has progressed the matter of primary 
 education during the life of the present republic, there yet remains a wide 
 field to be covered, before the primary schools of Paris can be compared to 
 those of Boston. 
 
 It would seem that, during seven hundred years, greater attention 
 has been paid to higher education than it has been thought worthy to bestow 
 upon less distinguished branches. Therefore, we find among more than 
 20,000 educational institutions, only about five hundred devoted to primary 
 instruction. 
 
 According to the " Liste des Establissements Scolaires communaux de la 
 Ville de Paris, 1879,'' there are one hundred and forty-nine, schools for boys, 
 and one hundred and fifty-five for girls, — about one third of which are under 
 the instruction of congreganiste brothers or sisters. There are seveu special 
 schools for boys. The total number of pupils is about 200,000, and the 
 salary of teachers about two francs a day. Reading, writing, arithmetic, 
 a little history and geography, and the catechism are taught. There are 
 also fifty-eight classes for adult men and apprentices ; thirty-nine classes 
 of the same character for women. The pupils, numbering about 14,000, 
 receive gratuitous instruction in reading, writing, arithmetic, grammar, 
 drawing, geometry, and vocal music every evening from eight to ten. 
 
 There are one hundred and fourteen salles d'asile, or infant schools, for 
 both sexes, in which are found daily about 15,000 children. The schools 
 are adapted to the requirements of very young pupils, who are supposed 
 to graduate at about the age at which children in America enter school, — 
 namely, six years. 
 
 The schools of a higher grade are of two kinds, — classical and scientific, 
 and industrial ; these are called lyceums and colleges. The superior mu- 
 nicipal schools are, College Chaptal, with about 1,300 pupils, who receive 
 instruction at a cost of 200 francs each, or if boarders, 1,000 francs a year; 
 College Turgot, of somewhat inferior instruction, and six hundred pupils ; 
 and Colleges Colbert, Lavoisier, and J. B. Say. 
 
1880.] EDUCATION IN PARIS. 193 
 
 The College Rollin belongs to the city, and has forty professors and three 
 hundred pupils. 
 
 The lyceums are exclusively classical or scientific, and comprise three 
 divisions: 1, elementary; 2, grammar, for all under fifteen years of age; 
 and 3, a superior division, in which are taught sciences and literature, 
 Greek, Latin, English, German, philosophy, mathematics, history, chemistry, 
 physics, and geography, with gymnastics and military drill. There are six of 
 these lyceums, and together with that at Versailles, the pupils join in com- 
 petitive trial for annual prizes. 
 
 There are private establishments, — too many to enumerate, — of 
 much the same character. Prominent among them is College Stanislaus, 
 with thirty professors and two hundred boarders ; College Ste. Barbe, with 
 one hundred professors, and 1,000 boarders and day scholars. 
 
 There is an icole superieure du commerce, in which pupils receive a prac- 
 tical commercial education; and a somewhat similar establishment under the 
 superintendence of the Chamber of Commerce, in which the pupils number 
 about four hundred. These are taken on excursions to large ports and 
 foreign countries, and brought into practical contact with commercial in- 
 terests and transactions. 
 
 There are two normal schools under municipal authority, one for training 
 male teachers, the other for female teachers, conducted upon much the same 
 plan as the American schools. 
 
 A superior normal school, intended for the education of young men 
 fitting for professorships, has about eighty pupils, spacious cabinets, lecture- 
 rooms, laboratory, and a library containing 20,000 volumes. 
 
 An hole d' apprentisage, under municipal direction, is largely attended 
 by young men preparing for trades ; and the Central School of Arts and 
 Manufactures, established on the old Polytechnique plan, attracts many young 
 men who are intending to become civil engineers, builders, or directors of 
 manufactories. 
 
 Most of these special schools are founded by government, and are under 
 the various departments or governmental bureaus. The Polytechnique school, 
 under the direction of the Minister of War, trains pupils for service in the 
 artillery, the staff, mining and marine ; bridges, highways, and telegraph ; 
 term of study, two years. 
 
 A school of civil engineering, under the authority of the Minister of 
 Public Works, consists of about one hundred pupils, chosen from the 
 Polytechnique, who receive instruction in whatever relates to the different 
 branches of civil engineering. Foreigners are admitted to these lectures 
 through their ambassadors. There is, in addition to the regular military 
 school, a superior school, where pupils for staff service are received by 
 competition. 
 
 A school of mines, under the Minister of Public Works, gives instruction in 
 mineralogy, geology, mining, etc. During five months of the year gratuitous 
 lectures are given in the other sciences. A large library is open to public 
 use, except on Sunday. 
 
194 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 A school of charts, at the Palace of the Archives of the Kingdom, is 
 supplied with three professors and four assistants, who give daily lectures on 
 paleography, political institutions, and diplomacy. 
 
 A school of Oriental living languages has eleven professors, who lecture 
 publicly" and gratuitously on vulgar Arabic, Persian, Turkish, Armenian, 
 modern Japanese, Russian, Malay, and Javanese, while a practical school 
 of high studies receives young men of decided talent for scientific research. 
 This latter school is divided into four sections : i, mathematics ; 2, natural 
 philosophy and chemistry ; 3, natural history and physiology ; and 4, 
 history and philology. 
 
 The Conservatory of Arts and Sciences was intended for the technical 
 education of manufacturers and mechanics. It has fourteen professorships, 
 — geometry, agriculture, mechanics, economy, natural philosophy, legisla- 
 tion relating to manufactures, civil architecture, statistics, chemistry, 
 drawing, ceramic arts, spinning, weaving, dyeing and printing textile 
 fabrics. All lectures are gratuitous. In addition, it has a museum of 
 models of all industrial machines, and a library of 20,000 volumes. It 
 occupies the church and buildings of an ancient abbey, some ruins of 
 which have a great historical interest. 
 
 The Conservatory of Music and Lyrical Declamation enables young people 
 of both sexes to receive gratuitous instruction from the best teachers of the 
 world. Pupils enter from all nations and enjoy equal advantages. At 
 present they number about 600. A grand prize enables the successful com- 
 petitor to study two years in Rome, at the expense of the state. A library 
 of 8,000 volumes is attached to the establishment. In the museum of 
 musical instruments are the flute of Frederick II. of Prussia, a harp of the 
 time of Louis XVI., which has the pame of the Princess Lamballe inside 
 of it, and a harpsichord belonging to Marie Antoinette. The library has a 
 collection of English songs of the days of the Cavaliers. 
 
 With the School of Fine Arts, to which all nations come, Americans are 
 familiar. It is devoted to painting, sculpture, and architecture. Lectures 
 are gratuitous. Annual prizes are distributed, — the first prize entitling 
 the winner to a residence of two years in Rome at the expense of the 
 state. 
 
 There is a free school of mathematical, sculptural, and ornamental 
 design, for the instruction of artisans in drawing and architecture, geom- 
 etry, mensuration, timber cutting, etc.; and several special schools of 
 design maintained by the city, in which plain and freehand drawing from 
 casts, and from life, are taught. Also in every arrondissement or ward there 
 are one or more evening schools for drawing, which are largely attended. 
 
 Connected with the Jardin des Plantes is a museum of natural history, 
 and a college where a corps of seventeen professors give lecture's on all 
 branches connected with plant and animal life. 
 
 Napoleon I. founded a school for the instruction of the daughters of 
 members of the Legion of Honor. It now consists of three large establish- 
 
1880.] EDUCATION IN PARIS. 1 95 
 
 merits, presided over by the Congregation de la Mere de Dieu, an order of 
 nuns. No Protestants are admitted. 
 
 Institutes. 
 
 Thus far, we have not spoken of the more illustrious institutes of Paris, 
 and can now give only a brief sketch of their character. 
 
 The Institute of France is composed of five divisions : i. The Aca- 
 de'mie Franchise. 2. The Acade'mie Royale des Inscriptions et Belles Let- 
 tres. 3. The Academie Royale des Sciences. 4. The Acade'mie Royale 
 des Beaux- Arts. 5. The Acade'mie des Sciences Morales et Politiques. 
 
 The institution comprises two hundred and twenty-three members, seven 
 secretaries, thirty-five free academicians, thirty-one associates, and two hun- 
 dred and twenty-five correspondents. 
 
 The Acade'mie Franchise gives no instruction, but is charged with the 
 composition of the Dictionary and the purification of the language. It 
 consists of forty members. 
 
 The Acade'mie des Inscriptions et Belles Lettres is also composed of 
 forty members and ten free academicians, with foreign correspondents and 
 associates. Its object is to cultivate the learned languages, antiquities, and 
 monuments. 
 
 The Acade'mie des Sciences has sixty-eight members, ten free academi- 
 cians, eight foreign associates and correspondents. It is divided into eleven 
 sections of scientific pursuit. 
 
 The Acade'mie des Beaux-Arts has forty members, ten free academicians, 
 and has in charge the encouragement of poetry, sculpture, architecture, 
 engraving, and musical composition. 
 
 The Acade'mie des Sciences Morales and Politiques has forty members 
 and five, sections : philosophy, legislation, public law and jurisprudence, 
 political economy and statistics, political administration and finance, are the 
 subjects of study. 
 
 The Academy of Paris consists of five faculties, — letters, sciences, 
 theology, law, and medicine. The first three are ef^blished at the Sor- 
 bonne. The number of students attendant upon the law course is about 
 2,500 ; for medicine, 3,000 ; for the sciences, 1,500. Foreigners matriculate 
 in law, letters, medicine, or sciences, on producing a certificate from their 
 own countries of having been admitted into corresponding faculties. 
 
 The Bureau des Longitudes and the Observatory are each distinct estab- 
 lishments, with faculties and correspondents. 
 
 Public instruction in France is divided into superior, secondary, and 
 primary. The first comprises faculties ; the second, lyceums and communal 
 schools; the third, elementary schools. The Academy of Paris is com- 
 posed of these five faculties, as above noticed. 
 
 Instruction Superior was thrown open by a law of July, 1875, to any 
 Frenchman twenty-five years of age, or any association of Frenchmen 
 
I9 6 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 who wished to open schools of letters, law, medicine, or theology, under cer- 
 tain conditions of morality and ' capacity ; but the right to confer a, bach- 
 elor's degree was not granted. This was reserved by the state. For higher 
 degrees, candidates having followed the courses of the free faculties, as they 
 were called, could claim an examination by a mixed jury composed of both 
 state and free professors. 
 
 A Catholic university was at once inaugurated in the Church of the 
 Carmelites, and many other schools under free faculties of congreganistes. 
 The attitude of these schools became such that a modification of the law 
 became necessary, placing the right of degrees wholly in the hands of the 
 state, and subjecting the organic laws as well as educational methods of all 
 free faculties to state inspection. The clause of the bill which aimed at 
 this result having failed to become a law, the schools at which it is aimed 
 are to be closed, and the faculties expelled from the country. This is the 
 centre of the great religious conflict now agitating France. There are 
 about three hundred and fifty private boarding-schools for boys in Paris, and 
 four hundred and fifty for girls. There is an Irish college here for the edu- 
 cation of Catholic priests, with an average of one hundred pupils, and a 
 Scotch college, to which are sent young men chosen by Scotch and English 
 bishops for a clerical education. 
 
 In addition to the above enumeration of educational institutions, there are 
 numerous societies which sustain courses of lectures, museums, and libraries. 
 For instance, the Societie Polonaise has a library of 50,000. The different 
 public offices contain libraries pertaining to their peculiar interests: the 
 Depot de la Marine, 25,000 volumes; Home Office, 22,000; Polytechnique 
 School, Civil Engineering, Seminary df St. Sulpice, and the Observatory, 
 have each their particular library of 20,000 volumes. 
 
 The National Library contains, of printed works, 2,157,000 volumes, and 
 300,000 pamphlets; 125,000 volumes in ancient and Oriental languages, 
 30,000 of which relate to the history of France. There are conserved in 
 this library about 300^000 maps, the topography of Paris alone occupying 
 fifty-six folio volumes. There is a cabinet of 1,320,000 engravings. The 
 library of the Sorbonne contains 110,000 volumes, and that of St. Genevieve 
 contains 150,000. The city library, although destroyed by the Commune, 
 now numbers 24,000 volumes; the Mazarin, 150,000, and 6,000 manu- 
 cripts ; School of Law has 8,000 ; of Medicine, 35,000 ; the Corps Legis- 
 latif, 65,000 ; Archives, 500,000 ; and the Arsenal, 350,000, with 5,800 manu- 
 scripts and beautiful missals. All of these are within the reach of the 
 student at any time. 
 
 France has learned the secret of higher education, and understands the 
 value of the eye in the instruction of the mind. Wherever and whenever it 
 is possible, she presents an object to her pupil, and tells him to look at it 
 
l88o.] BOOK NOTICES. 
 
 197 
 
 until he knows it and can draw it. Art is first and last in the curriculum of 
 education. One does not know how little he knows of an image until he 
 attempts to draw it. When he can do that, he has gained sufficient use of 
 the eye to know how to see ; and until then, object teaching is comparatively 
 futile. There is not a school of any character in which works of art, such 
 as paintings, engravings, and designs, are not found. By these the eye is 
 taught what to see, as well as how to see it, guided by one who is acknowl- 
 edged to be a master. The government pays annually 300,000 francs for 
 works of art, and these find a place not alone in galleries, but in the 
 schools of higher education. 
 
 I have alluded to various museums and collections of materials peculiar to 
 the instruction of each establishment. This is true even of the primary 
 department of public instruction, which boasts a music pedagogique, where 
 every article pertaining to education, which is devised in France or any 
 other country, is on exhibition; — a library of French school literature, 
 another of German, another of English and American; a globe room; 
 one of maps, charts, and plans ; one in which are to be found the nat- 
 ural products of the earth ; specimens of woods, grains, eggs : and in time, 
 ^certain departments of natural history will be added. This is presided 
 over by the accomplished inspector-general of primary instruction, M. B. 
 Beger, who will be pleasingly remembered as the representative of public 
 instruction at the Centennial Exposition at Philadelphia. 
 
 F. H. A. 
 
 Dictionary of American Biography, including Men of the Time : 
 containing nearly 10,000 notices of persons of both sexes of native and 
 foreign birth, who have been remarkable, or prominently connected 
 with Arts, Sciences, Literature, Politics, or History of the American 
 Continent ; giving also the pronunciation of many of the foreign and 
 peculiar American names, a key to the assumed names of writers, and 
 a supplement. By Francis S. Drake. 8vo. 1019 double-column pages. 
 Price $6.00 to $12.00 according to binding. Boston : Houghton, Mifflin 
 & Co. 
 
 The contrast is very marked between ancient and modern biography. 
 Anciently the leading incidents of eminent men's lives were narrated in 
 their historical sequence, without much attempt to analyze character, and 
 dealing sparingly with eulogy or censure. 
 
 Modern biography, like modern history, is much more given to analysis 
 and criticism. The work before us is one of the best specimens of general 
 biographical writing of the modern type, and includes just what is specially 
 valuable to the student of American history. It shows extensive and well- 
 directed research, and makes a very complete and accurate manual of refer- 
 ence, containing in a condensed form all the more important data of Amer- 
 ican biography. Sketches of many eminent persons still living are included, 
 all of which are judiciously written. The value of such a dictionary 
 
198 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 depends largely upon its correctness, and a careful examination of Mr. 
 Drake's work proves that it is in the main reliable. The wonderful array of 
 facts and dates, with numerous references to other sources of fuller informa- 
 tion, adapts it to the wants of every school where American history is 
 studied, and representative characters are analyzed. 
 
 In New England, New York, and in many of the older States, the students 
 of biography and history have made available a vast amount of materials 
 for such a work as this, while in many sections of America the materials 
 are exceedingly scanty. The effort has been successfully made to condense 
 the easily obtained matter, and to search out that which is essential to the 
 biography of all who have been connected in any way with the history and 
 development ' of the whole continent of America. Its value is materially 
 enhanced by its continental character ; embracing, as it does, sketches of 
 notable persons in every part of the land. Heretofore, biographical knowl- 
 edge has been barely limited to statesmen (politicians), authors, and clergy- 
 men, while the field of industries, inventions, and the arts has been practi- 
 cally overlooked. Mr. Drake has built for himself a monument of untiring 
 industry in searching out and giving the biographies of American scientists, 
 inventors, engineers, and artisans, to whom the American nation owes very^ 
 much of its rapid progress in all the arts of civilization. The field is a 
 wide one, and the volume includes nearly 10,000 notices of persons, in 
 which are given the leading points in the life and works of those deemed 
 worthy of such mention. 
 
 The pronunciation of all names of difficulty, and the furnishing of a key 
 to assumed names, enhance the value to teachers and students of this bio- 
 graphical dictionary. It is a great convenience, often, to be able to trace the 
 authorship of writings published under a pseudonym. This work is a fit 
 companion to the great books of reference which American scholarship and 
 enterprise have produced in other departments of knowledge*. w. e. s. 
 
 An> Elementary Treatise on the Differential Calculus. By Prof. 
 J. M. Rice and Prof. W. W. Johnson. Published by Messrs. John 
 Wiley & Sons. New York. 
 
 Sir William Thomson has remarked that those mathematicians who con- 
 fine themselves to the purely abstract side of their science are likely to miss 
 many beautiful and interesting theorems (beautiful and interesting even from 
 a strictly mathematical point of view), which, were they to give more atten- 
 tion to the physical meaning of many of their processes, could not fail to 
 occur to them. 
 
 That there must be truth in this remark is shown by the history of mathe- 
 matics itself. Thus some of Gauss's finest mathematical speculations were 
 obviously suggested by his astronomical and physical researches. Even his 
 recondite speculations on the theory of numbers seem to have arisen in con- 
 nection with his work on " Elliptic Integrals," and this work in turn to have 
 been connected with his studies on planetary perturbations, and his concep- 
 
l88o.] DIFFERENTIAL CALCULUS. 
 
 199 
 
 tion of a planetary mass distributed in an elliptical ring of variable thick- 
 ness around its orbit. 
 
 Again, the method of solving differential equations by the variation of 
 parameters was first used by Lagrange in the problem of planetary pertur 
 bations. 
 
 It is said of- Euler that almost every form of movement in nature sug- 
 gested to his mind some problem in dynamics, which in turn often led to 
 some new analytical process. 
 
 Prof. Sylvester has recently acknowledged the great help which chemical 
 formulas, and ideas concerning .atomicity, have been to him in "conveying 
 an intelligible conception to the minds of others " of the nature of invariants 
 and covariants, of quantics and their relations to each other and to their 
 primitive forms. 
 
 It is therefore very desirable, at least for the average mathematical stu- 
 dent, that he constantly endeavor to have a clear notion of the physical or 
 geometrical import of his analytical theorems. In many cases they will be 
 unintelligible to him otherwise ; at the best he will be in danger of having ' 
 his mathematical power degenerate into a mere mechanical aptitude, while 
 his logical and imaginative faculties suffer from disuse. Such students .often 
 show marked inability to apply, especially to practical problems, the very 
 theorems and processes they have so laboriously acquired. An eminent 
 astronomer once said to the writer of this article, concerning students trained 
 in this purely abstract way, " When I attempt to put them at work, I find 
 them unable to do anything with the mathematics they have." Such students 
 often differentiate or integrate expressions set before them remarkably well, 
 and sometimes show considerable ingenuity in the use of analytical artifices 
 to obtain results ; but they show a most lamentable deficiency in capacity to 
 take a given problem, and express its conditions analytically in a form appro- 
 priate to the case in hand. 
 
 To the student of physics no idea is more familiar than that of the rate of 
 increase or of decrease in the values of certain quantities, corresponding to 
 changes of position, temperature, or time to which bodies are subjected. It 
 is only necessary to recall rates of expansion or contraction with change of 
 temperature, condensations and rarefactions with varying pressures, veloci- 
 ties, accelerations, inductions of electricity, absorption of light, change of 
 wave length, etc. It is very desirable that an idea so fundamental should be 
 utilized in mathematical instruction, especially in those parts of it peculiarly 
 appropriate to the discussion of this class of changes, viz., the differential 
 calculus. 
 
 Notwithstanding its fertility in many ways, the idea of infinitesimals will 
 continue to leave on the minds of many students the impression which was 
 expressed by an otherwise excellent student, that " the whole of calculus was 
 a mass of approximations in which as much was neglected as was retained." 
 On the other hand the idea of a limit still suggests to other minds than 
 Berkeley's a relationship between " the ghosts of departed quantities." 
 
200 EDUCA TION. [Nov. 
 
 The authors of the present treatise do not ignore the idea of a limit as the 
 true logical foundation of the calculus ; but they reserve the discussion of 
 the differential coefficient as the limit of a ratio, until the student is well 
 grounded in all the ordinary operations of the differential calculus, and is 
 familiar with many of its applications, particularly to the discussion of the 
 theory of plane curves. To use their own language : — 
 
 " It is not the intention of the authors to disparage the use of the limit 
 as an instrument of mathematical research. It is only claimed that the dif- 
 ficulties attending the employment of this notion are so great as to render 
 it desirable to avoid introducing it into the fundamental definitions of a 
 subject necessarily involving many other conceptions new to the student. 
 
 " The distinction between the view of the differential calculus here pre- 
 sented, and that found in most of the standard works on the subject hitherto 
 
 published, may be stated thus : The derivative -j- is usually defined as 
 
 the limit which the ratio of the finite quantities Ay and Ax approaches 
 when these quantities are indefinitely diminished \i. e., as the ratio of zero 
 divided by zero] : when this definition is employed, it is necessary, before 
 proceeding to kinematical applications, to prove that this limit is the measure 
 of the relative rates of x and y. In this work the order is reversed, — that 
 is, dx and dy are so defined that their ratio is equal to the ratio of the relative 
 rates of x and y; and in Chap. XL, by applying the usual method of evalu- 
 ating indeterminate forms [of which zero divided by zero is one], it is shown 
 
 that the limit of ?, when Ax is diminished indefinitely, is equal to the 
 
 ratio -j-. Thus the employment of limits is put off, until we are prepared to 
 dx 
 
 show that the limit has a definite value, capable of expression in a language 
 
 already familiar to the student. 
 
 " The early introduction of elementary examples of a kinematical char- 
 acter (see pp. 28, 37, and 57 ; also, Sect. X., p. 76), which this mode of pre- 
 senting the subject permits, will be found to serve an important purpose in 
 illustrating the nature and use of the symbols employed." 
 
 That this is the true method of instruction, few teachers of mathematics 
 or of mathematical physics will doubt. 
 
 We find in this volume much that is usually altogether omitted from a 
 college course of mathematics, but which students of physics especially 
 need to know. We notice particularly the sections on hyperbolic functions, 
 De Moivre's Theorem, Bernouilli's numbers, and the extensive chapters on 
 curve-tracing. 
 
 That the last, considering its interest and general usefulness, should be so 
 much neglected in American colleges, has been remarked by many math- 
 ematicians with surprise and regret. Prof. Olney, of Michigan University, 
 has endeavored, in his excellent treatises on algebra and the calculus, to 
 remedy this evil to some extent. 
 
1880.] BIBLIOGRAPHY OF EDUCATION. 201 
 
 We think the authors have made a mistake in entirely excluding the 
 integral calculus from this volume. 
 
 The mechanical execution of the book is excellent, and we have noticed 
 but two typographical errors. 
 
 We are informed that a corresponding work on the integral calculus is to 
 follow shortly. 
 
 BIBLIOGRAPHY OF EDUCATION. 
 
 RECENT BOOKS AND ARTICLES ON EDUCATION. 
 
 BOOKS. 
 
 Education, Intellectual, Moral, and Physical. By Herbert Spencer. New, cheap 
 edition. 283 pp. '2mo. Paper, 50 cents. New York : Applcton. 
 
 Data of Ethics. By Herbert Spencer. 47 pp. Quarto. (Humboldls Library of Pop- 
 ular Scientific Literature. No. 9, Vol. I.) Paper, 15 cents. New York: J. Fitzgerald 
 & Co. 
 
 Xenophon's Memorabilia of Socrates. Edited by S. R. Winans. 290 pp. i6mo. 
 Cloth, $1.50. Boston : J. Allyn. 
 
 Works of Virgil. Translated into English prose, with an essay on the English trans- 
 lators of Virgil. By John Conington. Edited by J. A. Symonds. Library edition. Cloth, 
 463 pp. Boston : Willard Small, and Lee & Shepard. 
 
 Literary Studies from the Great British Authors. By H. H. Morgan. 438 pp. Cloth. 
 St. Louis : G. I. Jones & Co. 
 
 The Student's Shakespeare. Thirty-seven plays, analyzed and topically arranged for the 
 use of clergymen, lawyers, students, etc. By Henry J. Fox, D. D. Cloth, $5.00. Boston : 
 13. A. Fowler & Co. 
 
 Report on Education. By E. Sequin, United States Commissioner on Education at the 
 Vienna Universal Exhibition. Second edition. 215 pp. 121110. Milwaukee, Wis. 
 
 Protestant Foreign Missions, Their Present State : A Universal Survey. By Theo- 
 dore Christlieb, D. D. ; from fourth German edition, by D. Ailen Reed. Authorized 
 American edition. 264 pp. S. Map. Cloth, 75 cents. Boston : Congregational Publish- 
 ing Society, 1880. 
 
 History of Philosophy in Epitome. By Albert Schwegler. Translated from first 
 edition of the original German by Julius H. Seelye. Revised from ninth edition, with 
 appendix by B. E Smith. 469 pp. i2mo. Cloth, $2.00. New York: Appleton, 1880. 
 
 Begins with the Greek philosophers and ends with Hegel. The new appendix added 
 
 to this volume continues the history from the time of Hegel to Schopenhauer, Hart- 
 
 mann, Comte, Spencer, and Hickok. This edition, by a friend and former pupil of Prof. 
 
 Schwegler, also contains the new matter and modifications of the latest German edition. 
 
 True Manliness. From the writings of T. Hughes. Selected by E. E. Brown, with 
 introduction by James Russell Lowell. 302 pp. i2mo. (Spare Minute Series.) Cloth, 
 $t.oo. Boston : D. Lothrop & Co., 1880. 
 
 Selections from the writings of T. Hughes, author of " Manliness of Christ," " Tom 
 
 Brown's School Days," etc. ; chiefly relating to such characteristics as ambition, belief, 
 
 courage, doubt, education, enjoyment, humility, providence, rest, strength, toleration, etc. 
 
 An autobiographical letter from Mr. Hughes is embraced in Mr. Lowell's introduction. 
 
 Encyclopaedia Britannica. Ninth edition. Vol. XL, Gou— Hip. American reprint. 
 Philadelphia, Pa. : J. M. Stoddart & Co. 
 
 History of the English People. Concluding volume. By John Richard Greene. Vol. 
 IV. The Revolution, 1683-1760. Modern England, 1760-1815. With three maps. 
 Svo. Cloth, $2.50. 
 
 Greene's History of the English People. Complete in four volumes. 8vo. Cloth, $2 50 
 per volume. 
 
 Methods of Teaching. By John Swett. i2mo. Half leather, $1.25. New York: 
 Harper & Brothers. 
 
 The Mound Builders. The remarkable people who once inhabited the valleys of the 
 Ohio and the Mississippi. By J. P. MacLean. Illustrated. i2mo. Cloth, #1.50. 
 
 The Antiquity of Man. By the same author. i2mo. Cloth, $1.00. 
 
202 EDUCATION. [Nov. 
 
 Mastodon, Mammoth, and Man. By the same author. i2tno. Cloth, 60 cents. 
 Footprints of Vanished Races in the Mississippi Valley : Their Monuments, Relics, etc 
 By A. J. Conant. Illustrated. 8vo. Cloth, $1.50. 
 
 Some Early Notices of the Indians of Ohio. To what Race did the Mound Builders ' 
 belong ? By Hon. M. F. Force. 8vo. Paper, 50 cents. 
 
 Prehistoric Man. Darwinism and Deity. The Mound Builders. Three Essays. By 
 Hon. M. F. Force. 8vo. Paper, 75 cents. 
 
 Our Indian Wards: A History and Discussion of the Indian Question. By Hon. 
 G: W. Manypenny, late Commissioner of Indian Affairs. 8vo. Cloth, $3.00. 
 
 Hygiene and Education of Infants ; or, How to take Care of ISabies. By the Societe 
 Francaise d'Hygiene, of Paris. Translated by Dr. G. E. Walton. 24mo. Paper, 25 
 cents. Cincinnati, Ohio: Robert Clarke & Co. 
 
 Art of Securing Attention, The. Joshua G. Fitch, M. A. 43 pp. i8mo. Paper, 15 
 cents. Davis, Bardeen & Co. 
 
 Glimpses of Education in the Sixteenth Century. Roger Ascham and John Sturm. 
 Chautauqua Text-Book. W. F. Phelps, A. M. 53 pp. 24mo. Paper, 10 cents. Phillips 
 &' Hunt. 
 
 British and American Education. Mayo W. Hazeltine. 32mo. 40 cents ■ paper, 25 
 cents. Harper & Brothers. 
 
 Chautauqua Hand-Book, The. Chautauqua Text-Book. John H. Vincent, D. D. 61 pp. 
 24mo. Paper, 50 cents. Phillips & Hunt. 
 
 Child Culture, Early, Four Lessons on. W. N. Hailmann. 77 pp. umo. Flex., 4to. 
 Paper, 25 cents. Hailmann & Doerflinger. 
 
 Kindergarten, The : Its Aims, Methods, and Results. C.B.Morehouse. 44 pp. i2mo. 
 Paper, 25 cents. E. Steiger. 
 
 Learning and Health. Benj. Ward Richardson. 39 pp. i8mo. Paper, 15 cents. 
 Davis, Bardeen & Co. 
 
 New Departure in Collegiate Control and Culture. Rev. Caleb Mills. 52 pp. 8vo. 
 Paper, 30 cents. A. S. Barnes & Co. 
 
 New York State Association of School Commissioners and Superintendents. Proceed- 
 ings of the Twenty-Fifth Annual Meeting, at Auburn, December, 1879. 64 pp. i2mo. 
 Paper. Davis, Bardeen & Co. 
 
 Oxford: Brief Historical and Descriptive Notes. With 10 etchings and numerous 
 illustrations. Quarto. $840. Scribner & Welford. 
 
 Princeton Book, The. History of the Organization and Present Condition of the Col- 
 lege of New Jersey. By Officers and Graduates. Illustrated. Quarto. $20.00 ; sheets, 
 $18 00 ; half morocco, $25.00 ; morocco, $30.00. Houghton, Osgood & Co. 
 
 Teaching, Mistakes in. James L. Hughes. 113 pp. i6mo. 50 cents. W. J.Gage 
 & Co. 
 
 Woman's Work and Worth. With Hints on Self-Culture, and Chapters on the Higher 
 Education and Employment of Women. W. H. Davenport Adams. 552 pp. Crown 8vo. 
 $2.50. Cassell, Petter, Galpin & Co. 
 
 A History of Painting — Ancient, Early Christian, and Mediaeval. From the German of 
 Prof, Alfred Woltman and Dr. Karl Woerman. Translated and edited by Prof. Sidney 
 Colvin, of Cambridge University. One large 8vo volume with over 200 illustrations. 
 Cloth, $7.50; half morocco, $10.50; tree calf, $15 00. 
 
 A Library of Religious Poetry. Collected and edited by Philip Schaff, D. D., and 
 Arthur Gilman, M. A. 1 vol., royal 8vo. over 1,000 pages, illustrated. Cloth, full gilt, 
 $6.00. This collection, popular in character, and similar in general plan to the wide-selling 
 collections of Bryant, Dana, and Contes, differs from all of them in that its field is reli- 
 gious poetry. It will thus be seen that while it does not trench on any of these collections, 
 it supplements them all. Sold by subscription only. New York : Dodd, Mead & Co. 
 
 MAGAZINE ARTICLES. 
 
 Our Common Schools. Charles Francis Adams, Jr., Harper's, November. A sharp, 
 bold criticism of schools, methods, and systems, with the burden of argument in favor of 
 school supervision. Some of Mr. Adams's overdrawn pictures are excellent caricatures of 
 educational methods and work. 
 
 Brain and Mind. 5 pp. Appleton's Journal, October. A statement of the scope of 
 Dr Bastian's treatise on " The Brain as an Organ of Mind." 
 
 "Romance of Literary Discovery. Temple Bar. An interesting account of the discov ■ 
 cries of various valuable literary works. 
 
l88o.] BIBLIOGRAPHY OF EDUCATION. 203 
 
 Oxford and Cambridge. 12 pp. R. Grant White, Atlantic Monthly, September. 
 Literary Success a Hundred Years Ago. 5 pp. Margaret Hunt, Appleton's Journal, 
 November. 
 
 The Growth of Sculpture. 12 pp. Grant Allen, Appleton's Journal, November. A 
 brief sketch of the primitive stages of plastic art. 
 
 The Photophone. 12 pp. . Alexander Graham Bell, Journal of the Franklin Institute, 
 October. This remarkable paper was read before the American Association for the 
 Advancement of Science at Boston, 1880, by Prof. Bell, and sets forth his new discovery of 
 the producing of sounds by the agency of light. 
 
 Evolution and Female Education. S. Tolver Preston, Nature, Sept. 23, 1880. A dis- 
 cussion of Darwin's statement that " The law of the equal transmission of characters to 
 both sexes prevails with mammals." 
 
 Hours in a Library. Sterne. 15 pp. Leslie Stephen, Cornhill Magazine, and 
 Eclectic. 
 
 English, Rational and Irrational. 21 pp. F. Hall, Nineteenth Century, September. 
 A plea for liberalism in philology. 
 
 A Viking's Ship. Architect. This is an account of a remarkable discovery of a war 
 vessel in a funereal hill in Southern Norway. 
 
 The Success of the Electric Light. 6 pp. Thomas A. Edison, North American 
 Review, October, 1880. In this article, Mr. Edison states the results of his studies and 
 experiments in photo-electricity, and the superiority and cheapness of electric light 
 
 The Ruins of Central America. Parts I. and II. D^sir^e Charnay. North American 
 Review, September and Octobsr. These are illustrated articles on the recent remarkable 
 discoveries in Central America. 
 
 Public Education before the Reformation. 10 pp. Robert Rea, Catholic World, 
 November. This article sets forth the agency of monasticism as a preserver and encour- 
 ager of learning. The term " public education " has a very limited signification. 
 
 Rights and Duties of Science. 24 pp. Principal Dawson, LL. D., McGill Universily, 
 Montreal, Princeton Review, November. 
 
 Philosophy as Scientia Scientiarum. 20 pp. Robert Flint, D. D., LL. D., University 
 of Edinburgh, Princeton Review, November. 
 
 Copyrights and Patents. 23 pp. Leone Levi, F. S. A., F. S. S., King's College, Lon- 
 don, Princeton Review, November. 
 
 Eclipses. of the Sun. 17 pp. Simon Newcomb, LL. D. And The Recent Solar 
 Eclipse. 24 pp. Prof. Young. Princeton Review, November. 
 
 ' Education as a Hindrance to Manual Occupations. 15 pp. Prof. S. P. Thompson, 
 Popular Science Monthly, November. 
 
 Henry and Faraday. 4 pp. Prof. A. M. Mayer, Popular Science Monthly, November. 
 
 The Ruins of Central America. Part III. 9 pp. Desiree. Charnay, North American 
 Review, November. 
 
 The Coming Revision of the Bible. 7 pp. Rev. Howard Crosby, D. D., North 
 American Review, November. 
 
 On the Sources of History, and How they can best be Utilized. 10 pp. James 
 Gairdner, Contemporary Review, October. 
 
 "The Origin of Music. 18 pp. J. F. Rowbotham, Contemporary Review, October. 
 
 West Point and the Colored Cadets. 20 pp. Prof Geo. L. Andrews, International Re- 
 view, November. 
 
 The Muster " Vorstellungen," at Munich. 14 pp. T. C. Felton, International Review, 
 November. 
 
 The Unity of Nature. II. Man's Place in Nature. 12 pp. Duke of Argyll, Con- 
 temporary Review, October. 
 
AD VERTISEMENTS. 
 
 ECLECTIC MAGAZINE 
 
 OF 
 
 Foreign Literature, Science and Art. 
 
 1880 -36th YEAR. 
 
 THE ECLECTIC MAGAZINE reproduces from foreign periodicals all those 
 articles which are valuable to American readers. Its field of selection em- 
 braces all the leading Foreign Reviews, Magazines and Journals, and consults the 
 tastes of all classes of readers. Its plan includes : — 
 
 SCIENCE, TRAVELS, 
 
 ESSAYS, POETRY, 
 
 REVIEWS, NOVELS, 
 
 SKETCHES, SHORT STORIES, 
 
 ETC., ETC. 
 
 The following lists comprise the principal periodicals from wbich selections are made, and the 
 names of some of the leading writers who contribute to them : — 
 
 PERIODICALS. 
 
 QUARTERLY BEVIEW. 
 
 BBITISH QUABTEELY BE VTEW. 
 
 EDINBURGH BEVIEW. 
 
 WESTMINSTER BEVIEW. 
 
 CONTEMPORARY BEVIEW. 
 
 FORTNIGHTLY BEVIEW. 
 
 THE NINETEENTH CENTUBY. 
 
 POPULAR SCIENCE BEVIEW. 
 
 BLACKWOOD'S MAGAZINE. 
 
 CORNHILL MAGAZINE. 
 
 MACMILLAK'S MAGAZINE. 
 
 ERASER'S MAGAZINE. 
 
 HEW QXJAETEBLY MAGAZINE. 
 
 TEMPLE BAB. 
 
 BELGRAVIA. 
 
 GOOD WORDS. 
 
 LONDON SOCIETY. 
 
 SATURDAY BEVIEW. 
 
 THE SPECTATOB, ETC., ETC. 
 
 AUTHORS. 
 
 BT. HON. W. E. GLADSTONE. 
 
 ALFRED TENNYSON. 
 
 PROFESSOR HUXLEY. 
 
 PROFESSOR TYNDALL. 
 
 RICHARD A. PROCTOR, B. A. 
 
 J. NORMAN LOCKYER, F. R. S. 
 
 DR. W. B. CARPENTER. 
 
 E. B. TYLOR. 
 
 PROF. MAX MULLEB. 
 
 PROFESSOR OWEN. 
 
 MATTHEW ARNOLD. 
 
 E. A FREEMAN, D. O. L. 
 
 JAMES ANTHONY FHOUDE. 
 
 THOMAS HUGHES. 
 
 ANTHONY TBOLLOPE. 
 
 WILLIAM BLACE. 
 
 MBS. OLIFHANT. 
 
 TUEGENIEFF. 
 
 MISS THACKERAY, ETC., ETC. 
 
 *g- THE ECLECTIC MAGAZINE is a library in miniature. The best writings of the beet 
 living authors appear in it, and many costly volumes are made from materials which appear fresh in 
 its pages. 
 
 STMJEZ-BNGJRATXtfOS. Each number contains a Fine Steel- Engraving — usually a portrait 
 — executed in the best manner. TheBe engravings are of permanent value, and add much to the attrac- 
 tiveness of the Magazine. 
 
 TM RMS. — Single Copies, 46 cents ; one copy, one year, $5 ; five copies, $20. Trial subscription 
 for three months, f 1. The ECLECTIC and any $4 magazine to one address, $8. Postage free to 
 all subscribers. 
 
 &«T* Clergymen and teachers supplied at club price, $4 per year. 
 
 E. R. PELTON, Publisher, 
 
 35 BOND STREET, NEW YORK. 
 
TREE . PLANTING, 
 
 FORESTRY IN EUROPE, 
 
 AND OTHER PAPERS. 
 
 BY 
 
 B. G. NORTHEOP, 
 
 Secretary of Co^neotioht Board of Education. 
 
 -/ 
 
 NEW HAVEN: 
 
 TUTTLE, MOREHOUSE & TAYLOR. 
 
 1880. 
 
Public interest in home and rural adornment is rapidly increasing in Connec- 
 ticut; where some fifty aBSoaiations for Village Improvement have been already 
 organized. A little foresight will show that no community can afford to be 
 without such an association. This good work should go on till not a school 
 house, dwelling or street is left without the simple and grand adornment of 
 shade trees, or shrubbery, vines, flowers or lawn. In many towns such organi- 
 zations have already done incalculable good in promoting public health, culti- 
 vating public spirit, quickening social and intellectual life, and enhancing the 
 value of real estate. I shall be happy to cooperate with public-spirited citizens 
 who are moving in this matter, and will lecture on this subject without charge 
 either for services or expenses in any town in Connecticut. Tree-planting, 
 both economic and ornamental, commands new attention year by year. These 
 papers, reprinted from an official Report, retain a few local allusions to show 
 the original aim of the writer and the application of kindred plans and prin- 
 ciples to other fields. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Tree Planting, - 3 
 
 Schools of Forestry, - ... 33 
 
 Industrial Schools, - - - - - 60 
 
 Education and Labor, - - - 61 
 
 What Boys are Reading, - 65 
 
 What Should our Boys Read 1 -11 
 
 Compulsory Education in England, - 15 
 
 Schools and Communism, - 81 
 
 Schools and Pauperism, - - 86 
 
 National Schools, ... . 90 
 
 Decennary of Free Schools, - - - 95 
 
 Neglected Children, - - 100 
 
 French Views of American Schools, _; - - 103 
 
 Clinton Rural Improvement Association, - - - - 124 
 
ECONOMIC TREE-PLANTING. 
 
 BY HON. B. G. NORTHROP. 
 
 Being neither a scientist nor farmer, I have made no origi- 
 nal investigations or practical experiments in forestry. Lest 
 I may seem presumptuous in attempting to instruct others on 
 a great subject in which I am myself a novice, reference is 
 made to my opportunities for learning the matured views of 
 those who, devoting their lives to this study, have made inves- 
 tigations and experiments on a broad scale. Three months 
 of last summer were occupied in visiting " the Foresters," 
 forest schools, and forest plantations of Europe. The letter of 
 Governor Hubbard,* and one from Hon. Wm. M. Evarts, Sec r 
 retary of State, bespeaking the cooperation of our ministers 
 and consuls, whose aid might be needed, gave free access to 
 all desired sources of information, especially the official 
 " Departments of Forestry," forest schools and their professors, 
 forest plantations, national, communal, or private, and their 
 managers, and the parks and gardens on the Continent and in 
 England. With note-book always in hand, I conferred with 
 numerous authors in this department, as well as practical 
 foresters. Gathering facts from so many experts, and con- 
 densing statements from so many sources, it is impracticable 
 in this address to formally quote their language, which I have 
 freely modified and abridged. In addition to the professors 
 of the forest schools visited, and to many diplomatic agents, I 
 
 ♦ Executive Department, Hartfobd, CoNN.,June 12, 1877. 
 I have signed these presents for the purpose of duly accrediting the Hon. 
 B. G. Northrop, of the Board of Education of this State, who is commissioned 
 by said Board to visit the Schools of Forestry and Forest Plantations, and the 
 Industrial Schools of Europe, and report the results of his observations for the 
 benefit of the schools and people of this State, and especially to encourage the 
 reclamation of waste lands by the propagation of trees. I beg to commend Mr. 
 Northrop to the courtesies and co-operation of all persons to whom these pres- 
 ents shall come, and particularly to those who are managers of the institutions 
 above named, and are interested therein. In testimony whereof, I have hereunto 
 set my hand. RICHARD D. HUBBARD. 
 
am especially indebted to Hon. George P. Marsh, the Ameri- 
 can Minister to RomeJ Captain Campbell Walker, Conserva- 
 tor of State Forests in New Zealand, J. C. Brown, LL. D., long 
 Colonial Botanist at Cape of Good Hope, and J. McGregor, 
 Forester of the Duke of Athole, for information given in per- 
 sonal interviews as well as for that derived from their pub- 
 lished works. i 
 
 The literature of forestry, already large, is now rapidly 
 increasing by the cooperation of professors in forest schools, 
 and government officials specially commissioned to investi- 
 gate different branches of the subject, and many other writers. 
 A German catalogue gives the titles of 1,815 volumes on 
 forestry issued prior to 1842, and the titles of 650 works pub- 
 lished in the six years prior to 1876. On an average, over 
 one hundred new books on forestry appear annually in the 
 German language. One of the Spanish Commissioners to the 
 Centennial Exposition, Sefior Morera, published a list of 
 1,126 volumes on forestry in the Spanish language alone. 
 
 Little attention has been given in this country to sylvicul- 
 ture. Nature has been wonderfully bountiful in the magnifi- 
 cent forests which once adorned this land, but our people 
 have been recklessly prodigal in wasting this rich inheritance. 
 As if they were the enemies of man, forests have been con- 
 sumed without a thought of renewing them, and fire has been 
 made to help the axe in destroying what it required ages to 
 produce. 
 
 The progress of a nation may be measured to a large extent 
 by its consumption of wood. Extensively as brick, stone, and ' 
 iron may be substituted for wood in building, and coal xised for 
 fuel, the timber demand for purposes of utility and ornament 
 will everywhere increase as civilization advances. The rail- 
 ways are enormous consumers qf wood. Says Professor C. S. 
 Sargent : " Supposing the life of a sleeper is seven years, the 
 85,000 miles of track in the United States consume annually 
 84,000,000 sleepers, or thirty years' growth on 68,000 acres 
 of the best natural woodlands. At least 125,000 miles of fencing 
 are required to enclose the railroads of the country, costing 
 not less than $43,000,000, with large expenditures for annual 
 
repairs. For the construction of 65,000 miles of telegraph 
 lines in the United States, 2,000,000 trees for poles were 
 required, while the annual repairs must call for 250,000 more." 
 A late Agricultural Eeport of Illinois says: "The fences of 
 the United States cost more than any other class of property 
 except real estate and railroads ; the total amount being esti- 
 mated at eighteen hundred millions of dollars, with an annual 
 expense of ninety-eight millions for repairs." Desirable as 
 may be live hedges, stone walls or ditches, wooden fences are 
 likely to be long used. 
 
 But aside from the need of fencing, and the demands for 
 railway and telegraph companies, there are nearly seventy 
 occupations enumerated in the last United States census 
 which in whole or in part use wood as their raw material 
 for manufacture, employing more than one million of 
 artisans, such as carpenters, cabinet-makers, chair-makers, 
 coach-makers, coopers, boat and ship builders, wheelwrights, 
 manufacturers of brooms, brushes, matches, furniture, agri- 
 cultural implements, machinery and the like. There are 
 63,928 establishments manufacturing articles made entirely 
 of wood, employing 393,387 persons, and using materials 
 worth 1309,921,403 annually. There are, besides, 109,512 
 establishments in which wood is an important material, as for 
 example, in pianos, carriages, bridges and ships, employing 
 700,915 persons, and using materials worth $488,530,844. 
 With these facts before us, there need be no fear of an over- 
 production of wood. It is estimated that in our whole coun- 
 try over three million acres of wood-growing land are cleared 
 annually, and this usually without any proper plans for refor- 
 esting them. Favorably situated as Connecticut is, in the 
 midst of these industries and near the great market centers, 
 and with new calls for exportation, there is sure to be a grow- 
 ing demand for all desirable lumber. 
 
 George Peabody, who did so much to encourage schools and 
 learning, originated the motto, so happily illustrated by his 
 own munificent gifts to promote education : " Education — the 
 debt of the present to future generations." We owe it to our 
 children to leave our lands the better for our tillage, and we 
 
i 6 
 
 wrong both ourselves and them if our fields are impoverished 
 by our improvidence. But much as foresight is admired 
 when its predictions are realized and its achievements made, 
 all history too plainly tells that the mass of men are not 
 easily persuaded to provide for exigencies far in the future. 
 It was more than two centuries after the death of Bernard 
 Palissy, the famous " Potter of the Tuilleries," and after 
 many sad lessons of devastating mountain torrents resulting 
 from excessive forest denudation, before Prance learned to 
 heed his earnest warning. Expressing his indignation at the 
 folly of such general destruction of the woods he said : " I call 
 it not error, but a curse and a calamity to all Prance. When 
 I consider the value of the least clump of trees, I marvel at the 
 great ignorance of men who do now-a-days study only to break 
 down, fell and waste the fair forests which their forefathers did 
 guard so choicely. I would think no evil of them for cutting 
 down the woods, did they but replant some part of them 
 again, but they care naught for the time to come, neither 
 reck they of the great damage they do to their children."^ In 
 1680, the eminent French statesman, Colbert, said to Louis 
 Xl^". : " France will perish for want of wood." 
 
 It was not, however, till 1859 and 1860 that stringent laws 
 were passed for the protection of existing woodlands and the 
 formation of new forests. The former of these laws passed 
 the Assembly by a vote of 246- against 4, and the latter with 
 but a single negative voice. The unanimity with which these 
 laws were enacted, though they seriously interfere with the 
 rights of private domain, shows at last the strength of the 
 popular conviction that the protection and extension of forests 
 were matters of national interest and necessity, and would 
 arrest the devastations of mountain torrents and river inun- 
 dations. The law of 1860 appropriated 10/100,000 francs, 
 at the rate of 1,000,000 a year, in aiding the replanting of 
 woods. In 1865 a bill was passed "for securing the soil in ex- 
 posed localities by grading, and the formation of greensward. 
 
 This measure, proved to be beneficial in France, Mr. Marsh 
 highly recommends for adoption in the United States. The 
 leading features of this system are marking out and securing 
 
from pasturage and browsing a zone along the banks of ravines, 
 which is carefully turfed and planted with shrubs and trees ; 
 consolidating the scarps of the ravines by grading and wattling 
 and establishing barriers of solid masonry, or more commonly 
 of fascines, or other simple materials across the bed of the 
 stream, and cutting narrow terraces along the scarps. Many 
 hundred ravines, formerly the channels of formidable torrents, 
 have been secured by barriers, and by grading and planting, 
 and the success of the system has far surpassed all expectation. 
 The plan of circling, long used in this country, is now adopted 
 in Prance. This plan prevents the wash of the surface, and' 
 provides irrigation by running horizontal furrows along the 
 hill-sides, and thus cheaply securing a succession of small 
 terraces, checking the rapid flow of the surface water, obvi- 
 ating one cause of inundations, and greatly fertilizing the 
 lands thus irrigated. 
 
 The evils of widespread forest denudation both as regards 
 climatic changes, uniform flow of springs and streams, devas- 
 tation by mountain torrents, and the exhaustion of once fertile 
 lands, have been long and sadly felt in the Old World. Many 
 rich and fertile countries have become arid wastes when 
 denuded of trees. The Mediterranean coast of Africa is a 
 case in point. Tunis and Algiers were once fertile regions, 
 supporting a dense population. Their decadence is traceable 
 largely to the destruction of their forests. Rentzsch ascribes 
 the political decadence of Spain almost wholly to the destruc- 
 tion of the forests. 
 
 Mr. George P. Marsh says: "There are parts of Asia 
 Minor, of Northern Africa, of Greece, and even of Alpine 
 Europe, where causes set in action by man have brought the 
 face of the earth to a desolation as complete as that of the 
 moon, and yet they are known to have been once covered with 
 luxuriant woods, verdant pastures, and fertile meadows; and 
 a dense 1 population formerly inhabited those now lonely dis- 
 tricts. The fairest and fruitfulest provinces of the Roman 
 empire once endowed with the greatest superiority of soil, 
 climate, and position, are completely exhausted of their fer- 
 tility, or so diminished in their productiveness as, with the 
 
8 
 
 exception of a few favored cases that have escaped the general 
 ruin, to be no longer capable of affording sustenance to civil- 
 ized man. If to this realm of desolation we add the now 
 wasted and solitary soils of Persia and the remoter Bast, that 
 once fed their millions with milk and honey, we shall see that 
 a territory larger than all Europe, the abundance of which 
 sustained in by-gone centuries a population scarcely inferior to 
 that of the whole Christian world at the present day, has been 
 entirely withdrawn from human use, or at best is inhabited by 
 tribes too few, poor, and uncultivated to contribute anything 
 to the general, moral, or material interests, of mankind. The 
 destructive changes occasioned by the agency of man upon the 
 flanks of the Alpg, the Appenines, the Pyrenees, and other 
 mountain ranges of Central and Southern Europe, and the 
 progress of physical deterioratiou, have become so rapid that 
 in some localities a single generation has witnessed the begin- 
 1 ning and the end of the melancholy revolution. A destruction 
 like that which has overwhelmed many once beautiful and 
 fertile regions of Europe awaits an important part of the ter- 
 ritory of the United States, unless prompt measures are taken 
 to check the action of the destructive causes already in 
 operation." 
 
 Indeed we have already a great Sahara in Connecticut pro- 
 duced by improvidence and neglect. The local traditions tell us 
 that the " sand-blow," covering so large an area in the towns 
 of North Haven and Wallingford, which, with its clouds 
 of dust, is a literal eye-sore to all travelers on the New Haven 
 & Hartford Railway, was once finely wooded. Here and 
 there clumps of low cedars and pines, the lone relics of a 
 former growth, still resist the drifting sands. So general is 
 the conviction that this sand blow is utterly irreclaimable 
 that it has long since been abandoned to hopeless sterility. 
 I shall be happily disappointed if my plan for utilizing it is 
 not regarded by many farmers as visionary and impracticable. 
 The feasibility of reclaiming the barren sands of Connecti- 
 cut, even the, wastes of Wallingford and North Haven, is 
 proved by many facts. While agent of the Massachusetts 
 State Board of Education I visited every town of that State, 
 
and found thousands of acres in Plymouth and Barnstable 
 counties — once sandy plains — covered with fine forests. The 
 common pitch pine has there been most generally used for the 
 reclamation of sand barrens. Recently the Scotch pine has 
 been widely planted. The seeds were sometimes sowed broad- 
 cast, and sometimes dropped in furrows. The cost was trifling, 
 and the profit has been satisfactory. ' 
 
 Hummel attributes the desolation of the Karst, the high 
 plateau lying north of Trieste — until recently one of the most 
 parched and barren districts in Europe — to the felling of its 
 woodsy centuries ago,' to build the navies of Venice. The 
 Austrian government is now making energetic, and thus far 
 successful efforts for the reclamation of this desolate waste, 
 having planted over half a million of young trees, and sown 
 great quantities of seed. In the vicinity of Antwerp less than 
 fifty years ago was a vast desolate plain. Looking to-day in 
 the same direction from the spire of the cathedral, one can 
 see nothing but a forest, whose limits' seem lost in the horizon. 
 Forest plantations have transformed those barren lands into 
 fertile fields. French writers point with pride to an experi- 
 ment begun eighty years ago on the very crest of a peninsula 
 in Dauphiny, where stands a long stretch of fine forest, and 
 where it had been confidently affirmed trees could not be made 
 to grow. 
 
 On the Adriatic, Baltic, Mediterranean, Biscayan, and other 
 coasts, the disastrous encroachments of the sea have been 
 checked by forest plantations. Extensive plains, once barren 
 sands south of Berlin, about Odessa and north of the Black 
 Sea and vast steppes in Russia, are now well wooded. 
 R. Douglass & Sons of Waukegan, Illinois, who have been 
 the pioneers in promoting economic tree planting in the "West, 
 began four years ago the experiment of reclaiming barren sand 
 ridges near the shore of Lake Michigan, trying pitch pine, 
 white pine, Austrian pine, and Scotch pine. Here, as on 
 Cape Cod, the Scotch pine proved the best for reclaiming 
 sandy barrens. With these facts from abroad and at home it 
 cannot be denied that even the poorest soils in Connecticut 
 may be reclaimed. The Pinus maritima, which proved best 
 
10 
 
 for the sandy soils in Prance, is not adapted to the climate of 
 New England. It has been amply tried, and though growing 
 rapidly for a season or two, is likely to winter-kill. But our 
 native pitch pine, and still better the Scotch pine, are specially 
 adapted to sandy barrens. 
 
 Daniel Webster planted many pines at Marshfield, and 
 induced farmers in Plymouth and Barnstable counties to try 
 the same experiment. This has been done very extensively 
 by Mr. J. S. Pay, in Falmouth, near "Wood's Hole. In visit- 
 ing Falmouth I was happily impressed with the beauty and 
 remarkable growth of his tree plantations. There, is a tract 
 of over one hundred and twenty-five acres now densely cov- 
 ered with fine trees. When purchased by him, Mr. Pay 
 says, "It was a barren waste, the soil dry and worn out. 
 On a hundred acres there was not a tree of any kind, unless 
 an oak sprang out from the huckleberry bushes here and 
 there, but hardly lifting its head above them. Indeed, when I 
 bought my place in 1853, except a few stunted cedars on Par- 
 ker's Point and in the swamps, there was not an evergreen 
 tree within three miles of my house, and hardly any tree of 
 any kind in sight of it. It was maintained that trees could 
 not be made to grow there. The seeds sown were of the 
 native pitch pine with some white pine, the Austrian, Scotch, 
 and Corsican pine, the Norway spruce, and the European 
 larch — in all about thirty-five thousand imported plants, and 
 many thousand native pines. As to the kinds which have 
 done the best, the Scotch pine from the seed, including 
 prompt germination, has proved the best grower, and very 
 hardy. The Norway spruce and English oak have done well. 
 The larch did not start well from the seed, but from the nurs- 
 ery or as imported it has grown remarkably. The hardy 
 Scotch pine does finely either from the seed or the nursery. 
 All these imported trees have done better than the native pitch 
 pine. The larches are about forty feet high, and fourteen 
 inches in diameter one foot from the ground. Some Scotch 
 pines from seed sown in 1861, well situated and in good soil, 
 are thirty feet high, and ten inches through, a foot from the 
 ground. As to profits, one thing is sure. The land, originally 
 
11 
 
 poor, has been enriched by the deposit of thousands of loads 
 of leaves upon it, and by the shade afforded, while the soil has 
 been lightened and lifted by the permeation of the roots of 
 the trees ; and though no present profit has been yet realized, 
 (which already might have been by sales of the wood,) it 
 should be considered as an investment for future results. 
 Considering the position of my place, on a coast exposed to 
 violent sea winds permeated with salt spray, the vigorous 
 growth and promising appearance of my forest plantations are 
 very encouraging to those more favorably placed. Not only 
 may the destruction of our forests be partially remedied at a 
 cheap cost, but the waste and sterility of our land by long cul- 
 tivating be replaced with fertility by the simple process of 
 nature." 
 
 The Scotch fir or pine, which Mr. Fay so highly commends, 
 is a native of the Highlands, a hardy tree, and the most rapid 
 grower of all the evergreens suited to our climate — the Euro- 
 pean larch, a still more rapid grower, being deciduous. It will 
 thrive in the most dissimilar soils and on poorest sands where 
 most other evergreens will not flourish, and makes an excel- 
 lent wind-break. Its timber is not duly appreciated in this 
 country. In England it is as highly prized as the best Baltic 
 pine, and regarded as superior to our white pine for general 
 purposes. While skeptical on this point, we must at least ad- 
 mit that it is harder, more durable, and more resinous than 
 the white pine. It is light, stiff, and strong, freer from knots 
 than any other fir, easily worked, and well adapted to all kinds 
 of house carpentry. It is extensively used for masts and in 
 naval architecture. In England it yields large quantities of 
 tar, turpentine, and resin. Next to the larch it is the tree 
 most commonly planted in Great Britain. It should be ex- 
 tensively used in Connecticut in reclaiming lands too poor for 
 the larch. It proved a great success in the sandy wastes of 
 Kincorth and Culbin in Scotland, which are now thriving 
 forests. 
 
 Among the foresters of largest experience in Europe, I found 
 the planting out system growing in favor, in place of sowing 
 the seed, whether in furrows or broadcast in the fields where 
 
12, 
 
 the trees are to remain. If sowing is adopted, the land, ex- 
 cept on sand barrens! must be well prepared. The general ' 
 practice abroad is to sow the seed in beds, as beet, or onion beds 
 are prepared with us. The Germans speak of the seedlings 
 while in the nursery beds as " in the school," and this phrase 
 happily suggests how they should be treated. The aim is here 
 to start, harden, and root the young plants in a small area 
 where they can be sheltered with brush or otherwise from the 
 scorching sun, and watered if need be in case of drought. 
 
 If the seedlings are to be put out close by the garden, they 
 may be planted direct from the mother bed at the end of one or 
 two years. But when they are to be removed to any distance 
 or planted as forests, they should be transplanted at the end 
 of the first or second year and planted for forests one year 
 later. The larch and Scotch pine are usually planted perma- 
 nently, two years from sowing in beds and one year from the 
 planting, that is three years from the seed. The direction 
 is constantly repeated to let the trees grow up very thickly for 
 a few years, as they will at first thin themselves on the 
 theory of the, survival of the .fittest, and after the fifth year 
 the value of the poles will pay for the further thinning re- 
 quired. When planted, the rows should not be more than 
 three feet apart, and the plants stand two feet apart in the 
 rows, giving some seven thousand to the acre, varying with the 
 kind of trees. At the outset the trees are planted more thickly 
 in Europe than in America. 
 
 Will it pay the average farmer of Connecticut to plant 
 trees ? Certainly not if early profit is essential. The answer 
 depends on various circumstances, such as the size of one's 
 farm, its soil and situation. But in an ordinary Connecticut 
 farm of from sixty to one hundred acres and upwards, I answer 
 yes. If you are looking ahead and seeking an investment for 
 future profit, " trees will make dollars, for they will grow in 
 waste places where nothing else can be profitably cultivated. 
 A soil too, thin and rough for cereals may be favorable for 
 trees. Hillsides and plains exhausted and worn out by the 
 plow have often been reclaimed by planting forests. Ravines 
 too steep for cultivation are the favorite seats of timber, and 
 
13 
 
 wherever a crevice is found in a rocky ledge, the root of a tree 
 Will burrow and spread, taking a hold so firm as to defy the 
 storm, and acting mechanically to disintegrate the rock and 
 change its constituent elements into useful products. By the 
 road-side, the river-bank, along the brook, and on the over- 
 hanging cliff, a tree may be alwaj3 earning wealth for its 
 owners, both in our densest settlements and in the waste 
 places of our most valuable lands." In no way can we ulti- 
 mately enrich Connecticut more than by planting the choicest 
 trees on our exhausted and unproductive lands. In such situ- 
 ations forests will yield a large percentage of profit. This is 
 a duty we owe to ourselves and to our children. 
 
 In many positions forests are of great service as wind-breaks ; 
 even narrow strips of trees afford a needful shelter to fruit trees 
 and to various crops, as well as a shield to cattle from piercing 
 winds. Evergreens serve best for screens, as deciduous trees 
 are leafless when their shelter is most needed, especially for 
 stock and around farm buildings. The evergreens most suit- 
 able for this purpose are the Norway spruce, white pine, Scotch 
 pine, and Austrian pine ; and next to these are the American 
 arbor vitse, hemlock, and spruce. Sheltered orchards are 
 most productive and less likely to lose their fruit prematurely 
 by violent winds, and the farmer with proper wind-sereens 
 consumes loss fuel in his house and less forage in his stables. 
 Stated in the order of their obvious advantage to individual 
 farmers, the benefits of tree-planting would be, first, direct 
 profit in timber and fuel ; second, the reclamation of waste 
 land ;' third, shelter ; fourth, climatic gain and hygienic influ- 
 ence ; and fifth, ornamentation. 
 
 The climatic influence of forests has been of late the subject 
 of extensive investigation in Europe, and much evidence gath- 
 ered showing that forest denudation may result in detriment 
 to the health and welfare of a community. The influence of 
 forests on rainfall, climate, and water supply, has been freely 
 discussed in the schools of forestry and in scientific circles. 
 It is not proved that extensive denudation will cause a marked 
 decrease in the total rainfall of any large country. While this 
 is still an unsettled question, recent observations in France, 
 
14 
 
 made with great care and complete sets of instruments at 
 different stations, seem to establish the facts, first, that 
 throughout the year six per cent, more rainfalls in the forests 
 than in the open fields ; second, that of the total rainfall ten 
 per cent, in the forest is caught by the leaves and reaches the 
 earth very gradually, or not at all ; and, third, that the evap- 
 oration in the open country is five times as great as in a 
 forest. 
 
 But on the question of the influence of forests on climate 
 and the permanent water supply, there is a growing unanimity 
 among practical foresters and professors in the forest schools 
 of Europe. Their theories and observations plainly show 
 that the wholesale clearing of forests has an injurious effect 
 on both, while the extensive planting of trees on arid regions 
 has ameliorated the climate, prevented mountain torrents, and 
 rendered the water supply more permanent. These investi- 
 gations show that the general destruction of forests has ren- 
 dered the climate dryer, more changeable and trying, and that 
 forests on the one hand tend to lower the general temperature 
 of a country and promote the fall of rain at more regular in- 
 tervals, and on the other hand they ward off sudden meteor- 
 ological changes which result in heavy falls of rain and 
 disastrous floods. 
 
 It is well known that houses too closely surrounded by trees 
 are damp. Beautiful and healthful as shade trees are, they 
 may stand too near the house. Dense evergreens growing so 
 close as to shut out all sunlight, are harmful. It is an old 
 Italian proverb, that " where the sunlight cannot come the 
 doctor must;" and sometimes the wisest direction of the 
 physician to his rheumatic patient is, to cut down the tree 
 which too densely overshadows the house and excludes all 
 sunlight. The wetness of roads completely overshadowed by 
 trees, shows how forests affect the humidity of the ground 
 they cover. Mr. Marsh says : " One important conclusion at 
 least is certain and undisputed, that within their own limits 
 and near their own borders forests maintain a more uniform 
 degree of humidity in the atmosphere than is observed in 
 cleared grounds." Speaking of the indiscriminate clearing in 
 
15 
 
 America, he says : " with the disappearance of the forest, all 
 is changed. At one season, the earth parts with its warmth 
 by radiation to an open sky, and at another receives heat 
 from the unobstructed rays of the sun ; hence the climate be- 
 comes excessive, and . the soil is alternately parched by the 
 fervor of summer and seared by the rigors of winter." 
 
 Wm. Cullen Bryant says : " Our summersare becoming dryer 
 and our streams smaller. Take the Cuyahoga as an illustra- 
 tion. Fifty years ago large barges loaded with goods went up 
 and down that river. Now, in an ordinary stage of the water, 
 a canoe or skiff can hardly pass down the stream. And from 
 the same cause — the destruction of our forests — other streams 
 are drying up in summer." Almost every work on forestry 
 abounds in evidence that extensive forest denudation has 
 everywhere diminished the flow of springs. The case of the 
 famous spring in the Island of Ascension is often cited, which 
 dried up when the adjacent mountain was cleared, but reap- 
 peared in a few years after the wood was replanted. Several 
 lakes in Switzerland showed a depression of their level after a 
 general devastation of the forests. Siemoni says : " In a rocky 
 nook in the Tuscan Apennines there flowed a perennial stream 
 from three adjacent springs. On the disappearance of the 
 woods around and above the springs the stream ceased, except 
 in rainy weather, but when a new growth of wood again shaded 
 the soil, the springs began to flow." Marchand says : " The 
 river that from time immemorial furnished ample water-power 
 for the factory at St. Ursanne dwindled so much when the sur- 
 rounding woods were cut that the factory was at last obliged to 
 stop altogether." President Chadbourne says that Salt Lake 
 contains nearly twice as much water as it did when the Mor- 
 mons came, and that the water supply is increasing throughout 
 the territory, not by an increase of rain, but cultivation 
 and extensive groves of trees have checked the influence of 
 drying winds and lessened evaporation.* 
 
 * Near my residence (Woburn, Massachusetts,) there is a pond upon which 
 mills have been standing since the early settlement of the town. These have 
 been kept in constant operation until within thirty years, when the supply of 
 water began to fail. The pond owes its existence to a stream which has its 
 source in the hills stretching some miles to the south. Within the time mentioned, 
 
16 
 
 I visited the planted forests of the Duke of Athole — whose 
 estates, beginning near Dunkeld in Scotland, extend forty 
 miles by ten- — in company with Captain Campbell Walker, 
 now the Conservator of State Forests in New Zealand, 
 who was long employed in the same service in India. He 
 said he had personally observed the drying up of springs and 
 decrease of the average amount of water in some of the 
 mountain forests in India, in which extensive clearing had 
 taken place, and that such clearing had unquestionably less- 
 ened the regular supply for springs and permanent flow in 
 the streams and rivers. While I was in England, the terrible 
 famine in India resulting in the starvation of over seven 
 hundred and fifty thousand people — more than the entire 
 population of Connecticut and Rhode Island — was a promi- 
 nent theme of public thought and talk and sympathy. Cap- 
 tain Walker, Dr. J. C. Brown, and other foresters expressed 
 the view that forest denudation, diminishing the springs and 
 lessening the former sources of artificial irrigation, was the 
 leading cause of this terrible calamity. Under the early rule 
 of the East India Company, there was a wide-spread devasta- 
 tion of the forests, and in later years the construction of 
 extensive railway and telegraph lines have created a new 
 demand for timber. Recently the English Government has 
 adopted energetic measures for re-foresting the mountains, 
 and placed the remaining forests under the supervision of 
 competent foresters. 
 
 In a paper read to the Vienna Geographical Society in 
 1875, Herr Wex, Counsellor of State, and Director of the 
 Government Works for the regulation of the flow of the 
 Danube, affirms that in the last fifty years the decrease in 
 the average level or comparison of the highest and lowest 
 flow of the Elbe and Oder has been seventeen inches, the 
 Rhine twenty-four, Vistula twenty-six, Danube at Orsova, fifty- 
 five. These measurements, embracing the greatest flood 
 
 these hills, which were clothed with a dense forest, have been stripped of trees, 
 and what was never heard of before, the stream itself has been entirely dryw 
 Within the last ten years a new growth of vood has sprung up on the land 
 formerly occupied by the old forest, and now the water runs through the year. 
 De. Pipeb — Trees of America. 
 
17 
 
 heights, the lowest flow, and the medium average flow, show 
 that the floods are unquestionably higher than in former 
 years, and the contrast between the highest and lowest flow 
 is greater, and that these higher floods are no compensation 
 for the diminution of the medium and low flood, and that many 
 manufactories built during the last fifty years have experi- 
 enced a marked diminution in the water supply of their 
 streams, and steam-engines have been employed to meet the 
 deficiency of water-power, once ample to do the same work. 
 
 The cause of this remarkable phenomena lies in the exten- 
 sive clearing away of the forests, especially in the mountains, 
 where deluges of rain occur more frequently ; for, in lands 
 devoid of trees, the rain water sinks less into the soil, 
 but more speedily reaches the brooks, streams, and rivers, 
 and fills and overflows these water-courses, and results 
 in disastrous floods. The correctness of this conclusion is 
 sadly attested by the now frequently recurring inundations in 
 Italy, in the south of France, Hungary, Bohemia, and in 
 many other lands. It may be worthy of inquiry whether the 
 general clearing of the mountain forests around Salisbury, 
 Connecticut, to meet the growing demand for charcoal for the 
 furnaces, had any connection with the desolating flood which 
 occurred in that town four years ago. A resident of Salis- 
 bury, whose farm lies near the base of the mountain skirting 
 that town, says that a stream on his land, formerly never fail- 
 ing, has dried up every summer for the last twenty years. 
 
 By several learned societies — like the Eoyal Academy of Sci- 
 ence of Vienna, and the Imperial Academy of Science of St. 
 Petersburg — commissioners were appointed to report upon the 
 paper of Wex, and their reports substantially confirm his 
 views, and say : "Forests exercise a beneficial influence which 
 can hardly be estimated too highly in an increased humidity 
 of the air, a reduction of the extremes of temperature, a 
 diminution of evaporation, and a more regular distribution of 
 the rainfall, while the injurious effects of their destruction is 
 seen in an alternation of periods of drought at one time with 
 wasting floods at another." The forests serve as storehouses 
 of moisture, both from their leafy canopy which shuts out the 
 
 2 
 
18 
 ^ 
 
 sun, and the myriads, or rather millions, of leaves covering 
 
 the soil and acting like a sponge, soaking up and retaining the 
 rain and regulating its distribution, while the roots act as ver- 
 tical drains, favoring infiltration and promoting the descent of 
 the water into the lower strata of the earth, there to nourish 
 the springs. 
 
 -Among the works of Dr. J. C. Brown on Forestry — the 
 most voluminous writer on this subject in the English lan- 
 guage — is one on " Meboisement in France," or the replanting 
 of the Alps, the Oevennes, and the Pyrenees, to arrest and 
 prevent the destructive consequences of torrents. He clearly 
 shows from official documents what fearful inundations 
 resulted from the over-clearing of forests, and describes the 
 remedial measures now in progress, which are to extend 
 through many years and to cost over twelve millions of francs. 
 But the loss of property by the terrible inundations in the 
 south of France in 1875 was estimated by the government at 
 seventy-five millions of francs, besides the loss of over three 
 thousand lives. This was the work of a single year. The 
 sad lessons of other torrents and other years have now at 
 length led to systematic efforts to re-clothe their mountains. 
 
 The benefits that may accrue to our country from the dis- 
 cussion of tree-planting, were strikingly exhibited two hundred 
 and fourteen years ago, when Sir John Evelyn published his 
 celebrated work, entitled, " Sylva ; or, a Discourse on Forest 
 Trees and the Propagation of Timber. ' ' It was at once received 
 with great public favor, and honored with royal commendation. 
 He had remarkable success in awakening general interest in 
 sylviculture. It was written while he was employed in an 
 entirely different branch of public service, but, as he says, 
 " from an earnest desire to support the credit of the Royal 
 Society, and to convince the world that philosophy was not 
 barely an amusement, fit only to employ the time of melan- 
 choly and speculative people, but a high and useful science, 
 worthy the attention of men of the greatest parts, and capable 
 of contributing in a supreme degree to the welfare of the 
 nation." He was one of the founders of the Royal Society, 
 and 'wrote this book at its special request, and that society 
 
19 
 
 has originated few books in the last two hundred years more 
 useful than this which still survives in its grand results, 
 although his other works on painting, sculpture, architecture, 
 and medals have long since been forgotten. In many ways 
 England has recognized her great obligations to the man who 
 worked so lovingly and effectively for the good of his country- 
 men. 
 
 Disraeli, in his " Curiosities of Literature," fittingly says : 
 "Had Evelyn only composed the great work of his Sylva, 
 his name would have excited the gratitude of posterity. The 
 voice of the patriot exults in the dedication to Charles II, 
 prefixed to one of the later editions, in which he says : * I 
 need not acquaint your Majesty how many millions of timber 
 trees, besides infinite others, have been planted throughout 
 your vast dominions at the instigation of this work, because 
 your Majesty has been pleased to own it publicly for my 
 encouragement.' Surely, while Britain retains her situa- 
 tion among the nations of Europe, the Sylva of Evelyn will 
 endure with her triumphant oaks. It was a retired philoso- 
 pher who aroused the genius of the nation, and who, casting 
 a prophetic eye towards the age in which we live, contributed 
 to secure our sovereignty of the seas. The present navy of 
 Great Britain has been constructed with the oaks which the 
 genius of John Evelyn planted." , 
 
 What trees shall we plant in Connecticut? One of the 
 most valuable of our native trees is the white ash, and, all 
 things considered, it is one of the most profitable for planting. 
 Combining lightness, strength, toughness, elasticity, and 
 beauty of grain in a rare degree, it is in great and growing 
 demand for farming tools, furniture, interior finishing of 
 houses and railroad cars, the construction of carriages, 
 for oars and pulley-blocks, and many other purposes. The 
 excellence of our ash is one secret of the preference given 
 abroad to American agricultural implements. It is hardy, 
 will bear the bleakest exposure, is a rapid grower, and attains 
 large size, but will not thrive on poor lands. It is every way 
 superior to the European ash, much as that has been cultivated 
 and lauded abroad. It is now found widely in the nurseries 
 
20 
 
 and young plantations attached to the forest schools of 
 Europe. Director-General Adolfo Di Be'ranger, President of 
 the Royal Institute Forestale at Vallombrosa, pointed me to 
 his plantations of Fraxinus Amexiecmq with a tone which 
 implied that is the tree of which Americans may well be 
 proud. 
 
 The ash is a fine ornamental tree for private grounds, 
 public parks, or for the way-side. When planted closely 
 for timber they grow straight and free from low laterals, 
 and early reach a size that makes the thinnings valuable 
 for poles and fencing. Mr. Budd, a tree grower of Iowa, says: 
 "A grove of ten acres thinned to six feet apart, containing 
 twelve thousand trees, at twelve years were eight inches in 
 diameter and thirty-five feet high, the previous thinning pay- 
 ing all expenses of planting and cultivation. Ten feet of the 
 bodies of these trees Were worth, for making bent stuff, etc., 
 forty cents each, and the remaining top ten cents, making a 
 total of 16,000 as the profit of ten acres in .twelve years, or a 
 yearly profit of $ 50 per acre." Mr. Edward Norton of Earm- 
 ington has about sixteen thousand white ash plants, raised 
 from last year's seed, now in rows to be planted next spring. 
 They are very thrifty, and average about one foot in height. 
 Very few of them died during the summer. He has gathered 
 seed ^enough for about one hundred thousand plants, which he 
 intends to start next spring. 
 
 The seeds of the ash are abundant, ripening by the first 
 of October. They may be easily gathered after the first 
 frost. If sown in the fall they should be covered with 
 three inches of straw. If to be sown in the spring the seed 
 may be mixed with damp sand. With all seedlings care 
 should be taken to keep down the weeds. In some of 
 the nurseries connected with the forest schools, I noticed 
 the seed-beds were protected by green bushes during 
 the hottest and dryest part of the summer. For field planting, 
 the land should be plowed and made mellow in the autumn, 
 that the trees may be planted early in the spring. A little 
 over five thousand plants will be required to the acre, where 
 they are set in rows four feet apart, and two feet apart in the 
 
21 
 
 rows. The weeds can be kept down for three years with a 
 cultivator, when the ground will be sufficiently shaded to 
 require no further cultivation. 
 
 Connecticut is rich in its variety of native trees, having 
 nearly sixty species, of which about forty are sizable for tim- 
 ber. Among the native trees worthy of cultivation may be 
 named the white ash, white oak, sugar maple, chestnut, hick- 
 ory, butternut, white pine, willow, and the elm. The latter, 
 when growing under favoring conditions, has been pronounced 
 " the most magnificent vegetable of the temperate zone." 
 Much as the willow has been used as an ornamental tree, its 
 economic value has not been appreciated in this country. The 
 white willow is especially commended by experienced arborists. 
 While most at home in low grounds and beside streams, it is 
 hardy and will grow, though not as thriftily, on dry uplands 
 and in poor soils. Professor William H. Brewer says: "In 
 England, where it is often sixty or seventy feet high in twenty 
 years, there is no wood in greater demand than good willow. 
 It is light, very tough, soft, takes a good finish, will bear more 
 pounding and knocks than any other wood , grown there, and 
 hence its use for cricket bats, for floats to paddle-wheels of 
 steamers, and brake-blocks on cars. It is used extensively for 
 turning, planking coasting vessels, furniture, ox-yokes, wooden 
 legs, shoe-lasts, etc. Its charcoal is used for making gun- 
 powder, its bark for tanning, its sprouts for withes and bas- 
 kets. In some sections of Europe it has been planted from 
 remote times as one of their most valued trees." Starting 
 from cuttings and growing rapidly it can be very easily prop- 
 agated. Fuller says: " It groweth incredibly fast — it being a 
 by-word that the profit by willows will buy the owner a horse 
 before that by other trees will pay for the saddle." Mr. Sar- 
 gent says: "As willow timber could be produced far more 
 cheaply than that of any of our native trees, it should soon 
 come into general use here for the purposes requiring light- 
 ness, pliancy, elasticity, and toughness — qualities which it 
 possesses in an eminent degree, and for which more valuable 
 woods are now employed. Less than one-third of the willow 
 used in the United States for basket making is produced here. 
 
22 
 
 the remainder being imported from Great Britain, Prance, 
 Holland, and Belgium, at an annual 'cost of five millions of 
 dollars. The osier proper, the product of Salix viminalis and 
 its allies, can be grown without trouble in any wet, undrained 
 soil, capable of producing little else of value ; but the better 
 sorts of basket willow are only successfully produced with 
 careful cultivation on rich, well-drained soil. Under such 
 conditions it is a prdfitable crop, capable of netting at least 
 $150 a year to the acre, and well worth the attention of our 
 farmers." The experiment of raising willows is worth trying, 
 though I do not anticipate so large profits as Professor Sar- 
 gent promises. 
 
 For the reclamation of our pastures and waste lands aban- 
 doned to hard-hack, sumac, and other worthless brush, the 
 European larch deserves to become a favorite. A native of 
 the Alps, Apennines, of the Tyrol and Carpathian Mountains, 
 it is a very hardy tree, and at home in a variety of well- 
 drained soils, especially on rough, rocky, or gravelly ground, 
 and the most rugged ravines. There are in our State large 
 tracts of bleak hill-sides and mountain declivities or summits, 
 now practically worthless, where the larch, thickly planted, 
 would soon choke out brush, weeds, and grasses. As an orna- 
 mental tree it grows finely even in deep and rich loam, but its 
 extraordinary qualities for timber may be impaired when 
 grown on the' rich prairies of the West or the best lands of 
 the Bast. When raised under right conditions it combines 
 the two qualities of rapidity of growth and durability of wood 
 more than any other tree. This wood was in high favor with 
 ihe Romans for the building of ships and bridges. Julius 
 Cassar spoke strongly of its strength and durability. 
 
 Last summer I heard a lumber-man in Venice say that its 
 durability was amply attested there, as most of the houses of 
 the city are built upon larch piles, many of which, though in 
 use for centuries, show no signs of decay. In a large Doge's 
 palace, now used as a hotel, he showed me some very ancient 
 larch window-casings which are still sound. For gondola 
 posts in the canals adjoining the houses the larch is preferred. 
 In wharves and many other positions in England where there 
 
23 / 
 
 is an alternation of wcu and dry with the tide, the larch has 
 stood this most trying test far better than oak. In England 
 it is regarded as the best timber for railway ties. Monville 
 says: "In Switzerland, the larch, as the most durable of 
 woods, is preferred for sbingles, fences, and vine-props. These 
 vine-props remain fixed for years, and see crop after crop of 
 vines bear their fruit and perish without showing any symp- 
 toms of decay. Props of silver fir would not last more than 
 ten years." Evelyn says: "It makes everlasting spouts and 
 pent-houses, which need neither pitch nor painting to preserve 
 them." Michie affirms that " For out-door work it is the most 
 durable of all descriptions of wood. I have known larch posts 
 that have stood for nearly fifty years." Professor Sargent 
 expresses the opinion that "For posts it will equal in dura- 
 bility our red cedar, while in the power to hold nails it is 
 greatly its' superior." The chestnut railway sleeper loses its 
 power to hold iron in about seven years, though the tie itself 
 may not so soon seriously rot. The larch, while it holds iron 
 as firmly as oak, unlike the latter, does not corrode iron. 
 
 The Boston & Albany Railway have larch ties in use for six- 
 teen years which are still sound. The president of the Illinois 
 Central Railway, having examined the vast planted forests of 
 larch in Europe and learned its remarkable fitness for railway 
 ties, offers to transport the young plants free of charge to any 
 point on their lines or leased lines, provided they are to be 
 planted in the vicinity of the same. It is, however, an experi- 
 ment which time alone can determine, whether the larch will 
 retain its durability when planted in the level, deep, vegetable 
 mould of the prairies, with their retentive sub-soil. That it 
 will grow there rapidly and luxuriantly is amply proved, but 
 its history for many centuries shows that elevated lands suit 
 it better than low grounds, and side-hills and mountain slopes 
 better than flats. In the rich river flats of Kew Gardens and 
 in the* vicinity of London the larch does not thrive. The 
 specimens found in that remarkable collection of all known 
 trees are puny. The Kew arborist informed me that in the 
 two hundred and seventy acres appropriated to the arboretum, 
 no spot had been found suited to the larch. Mr. James Brown, 
 
24 
 
 an experienced forester of Scotland, attributes the disease, 
 which has of late prevailed in many larch plantations in that 
 country, to planting it, both in the nursery and the field, in 
 uncongenial soil. 
 
 No other tree has been planted so extensively in Scotland. 
 It attains maturity long before the oak, and serves well for 
 nearly all purposes. for which oak is used. Larch trees thirty 
 years old are sometimes sold' for fifteen dollars each, while 
 oaks of the same age are not worth three dollars each.. 
 ■ According to Newlands the strength of larch timber is to that 
 of British oak as 103 to 100; its stiffness as 79 to 100; while 
 its toughness is as 134 to 100. As the larch grows erect, with 
 short and slender laterals, it may be planted much thicker 
 than the oak. According to Loudon ten acres of larch will 
 furnish as much ship timber as seventy-five acres of oak. Its 
 large timber yield per acre is one source of its popularity in 
 Britain. It was first planted on the estate of the Duke of 
 Athole, in 1741. Some stately specimens over one hundred 
 and thirty years old may be seen near the cathedral at Dun- 
 keld. Mr. McGregor, the duke's forester, informed me that 
 on this one estate have been planted over twenty-seven millions 
 of larch trees, covering over sixteen thousand acres, some of 
 which was formerly worth only from one to two shillings per 
 acre. 
 
 Dr. James Brown says he has seen matured crops of larch of 
 sixty-five years' standing sold for from $750 to $2,000 per acre, 
 when the land was originally worth only from $2 to $4 per 
 acre. Mr, Sargent, director of the Botanic Garden and 
 Arboretum of Harvard College, gives a detailed estimate of 
 the profits of a plantation of European larch of ten acres to 
 last fifty years,, calculating the cost for land, N fencing, plants, 
 labor, taxes, and interest, and makes the net gain to be 
 $52,282.-75, or about thirteen per cent, per annum for the 
 entire fifty years, after retaining the original capital, and he 
 adds: "There are in Massachusetts fully 200,000 acres of 
 unimproved land which could, with advantage, be at once 
 covered with larch plantations, and if so planted their net 
 yield, according to my estimate, in fifty years would be 
 
25 
 
 $1,045,660,000. Supposing that these 200,000 acres will, in 
 the natural course of events, produce, during the same time, 
 one hundred cords of fire-wood to the acre, worth six dollars 
 a cord, amounting to $120,000,000, and subtracting this sum 
 from the net yteld of the larch, we have left, as created wealth, 
 the respectable sum of $925,000,000." 
 
 Mr. Sargent, however, admits that this is farming on paper, 
 and that considerable allowances should be made for such 
 contingencies as fire^ tree diseases, insect attacks, and other 
 dangers now unforeseen. Robert Douglas of Illinois, who has 
 had far more experience in larch planting than any other 
 American, writes me that the larch in this country is remark- 
 ably free from all disease and insect depredations. 
 
 My special aim has been to encourage the recuperation of 
 sterile lands by tree planting. The experiments of thus 
 reclaiming barren tracts, which have been tried on a large 
 scale in many European countries, prove the superiority of the 
 larch for this purpose over all other evergreens, because it is 
 deciduous. - Grigor says : " No tree is so valuable as the larch 
 in its fertilizing effects, arising from the richness of its foliage, 
 which it sheds annually. The yearly deposit is very great ; 
 the leaves remain and are consumed on the spot where they 
 drop." Trees also enrich the soil by a curious chemistry 
 which disintegrates even the rocks, and transmutes their par- 
 ticles into forms of life and beauty. The radicles and rootlets, 
 in their underground laboratory, secrete acids which dissolve 
 the very sands and stones. 
 
 The frequency of forest fires is urged as an objection to 
 tree-planting. Here is a real discouragement ; but forests are 
 no more likely to be burned than are our barns and dwellings. 
 More property is consumed every year by the burning of 
 stores and houses in this country than by forest fires. This 
 danger, therefore, should no more prevent tree-planting than 
 house-building. But such views need to be spread among all 
 classes of the American people as will produce the general 
 conviction that the interests of all classes are concerned in 
 the protection and conservation of forests. The schools of 
 forestry have made this sentiment wellnigh universal in 
 
26 
 
 Germany, and all classes there appreciate their value and the 
 need of protecting them. Browsing and pasturage in certain 
 limits are prohibited, and yet the forests are not fenced. Simple 
 marks designate where cattle may pasture and where they 
 may not, and an intelligent public sentiment is a better 
 guardian of the national or communal forests than official 
 watchers or national police. 
 
 In some portions of Germany the law formerly required 
 every landholder to plant trees along his road frontage. 
 Happy would it be for us if the sovereigns of our soil would 
 make each such a law for himself. Happy, also, if the law 
 of usage, fashion, or interest here, as did the civil law there, 
 required that every young man before he married should 
 plant a tree. In some of our Western States tree-planting 
 by the road-side is encouraged by a bounty from the State 
 treasury, and in the fields by both a bounty and exemption 
 from taxation for a term of years. The law in Minnesota 
 provides that " every person planting, protecting and cultiva- 
 ting forest trees for three years, one-half mile or more along 
 any public highway, shall be entitled to receive for ten years 
 thereafter an annual bounty of two dollars for each half-mile 
 so planted and cultivated, to be paid out of the State treasury ; 
 but such bounty shall not be paid any longer than such line 
 of trees is maintained." If I may be pardoned for repeating 
 a personal allusion, the maples which I planted, when a mere 
 boy, before the old homestead in Litchfield county, are now 
 beautiful and stately trees. As I have often said, they have paid 
 me a thousand-fold for the work they cost, and added new 
 charms to that beautiful spot, to which I count it a privilege 
 to make an annual visit. , Among the memories of my boy- 
 hood, no day has recurred with such frequency and satisfaction 
 as that then devoted to tree-planting. My interest in the 
 subject is due to. this incident (or perhaps accident) of my 
 boyhood. I should be thankful if I could help put a similar 
 incident, and an equally grateful experience, into the child- 
 hood of our boys of to-day. In this good work may I earn- 
 estly bespeak the cooperation of the farmers of Connecticut. 
 
 In tree-planting, the economic and ornamental touch at so 
 
27 
 
 many points that the cases are rare where they really diverge. 
 Nothing, for example, can add so much to the beauty and 
 attractiveness of our country roads as long avenues of fine 
 trees. I saw this beautifully illustrated in France, last sum- 
 mer, where, for over a hundred miles on a stretch, the road 
 was lined with trees. In many ways the first Napoleon's inter- 
 est in arboriculture proved a benefaction to France. No time 
 should be lost in securing the same grand attraction to the 
 highways of Connecticut. Growing on land otherwise running 
 to waste, such trees would yield most satisfactory returns. 
 The shade and, beauty would be grateful to every traveler, 
 but doubly so to the owner and the planter, as the happy 
 experience of many Connecticut farmers can testify. A 
 grand work in this direction is already well started. No 
 class can ^contribute so much to the adornment of our public 
 roads as the farmers. They have already in abundance the 
 very best trees for the roadside, such as the elm, maple, ash, 
 American linden (or bass), oak, and in some localities the 
 walnut. The hard maple will thrive in dry and gravelly soils, 
 while the elm, and red maple are specially desirable for moist, 
 low ground. As the maples should be planted twenty-five 
 feet apart, and the elms from forty to fifty, poplars or willows 
 or trees growing rapidly from scions, may be placed between, 
 to be cut down when their statelier neighbors require the 
 room for their full development. 
 
 Tree-planting is fitted to give a needful lesson of forethought 
 to the juvenile mind. Living only in the present and for the 
 present, too often youth will sow only where they can quickly 
 reap. A meager crop soon in hand, outweighs a golden 
 harvest long in maturing. Youth should learn to forecast 
 the future as the condition of wisdom. Arboriculture is a 
 discipline in foresight— it is always planting for the future, 
 and sometimes for the distant future. Says Washington Irv- 
 ing, " There is something nobly simple and pure in such a 
 taste for trees. It argues a sweet and generous nature to 
 have this strong friendship for the hardy and glorious sons of 
 the forest. There is a serene majesty in woodland scenery 
 that enters into the soul, dilates and elevates it, and fills it 
 
28 
 
 with noble inclinations. There is a grandeur of thought 
 connected with this heroic line of husbandry. It is worthy 
 of liberal and free-born and aspiring men. He who plants 
 an oak, looks forward to future ages and plants for posterity. 
 He cannot expect to enjoy its shelter, but he exults in the^ 
 idea that the acorn which he has buried in the earth shall 
 grow up into a lofty pile, and shall keep on nourishing and 
 increasing and benefiting mankind long after he has ceased 
 to tread his paternal fields." It Was the trees of his own 
 planting at Sunnyside-on-the-Hudson, more than the beauty 
 of the surrounding landscape, that led Irving to say, " After 
 all my wanderings, I return to this spot with ■ a heartfelt 
 preference for it oVer all others in the world." It was the 
 simple beauty , he had created at Marshfield, — the grassy 
 lawns, the shaded approaches, the hundreds of trees of his 
 planting, — that bound Daniel Webster so strongly to that 
 sequestered spot. The charm of Abbotsford, the grand Mecca 
 of Scotland, comes mainly from its beautiful ivy and shrub- 
 bery and the thousands of trees planted by the hand of its 
 illustrious proprietor. Says Sir Walter Scott, " My heart 
 clings to this place I have created. There is scarce a tree in 
 it that does not owe its being to me. Once well planted, a 
 tree will grow when you are sleeping, and it is almost the 
 only thing that needs no tending." 
 
 Any wealthy citizens of Connecticut, who desire to become 
 public benefactors, can hardly find a more inviting field for 
 their liberality than by offering prizes for sylviculture. A 
 few thousand dollars placed in the hands of the Connecticut 
 Board of Agriculture would widely stimulate tree-planting, 
 and greatly enrich the State. The Massachusetts Society for 
 Promoting Agriculture, offer three thousand dollars in the 
 following prizes : 
 
 First. For the best plantation of not less than five acres, 
 11,000 ; for the next best, $600 ; and for the next best, 1400. 
 For these prizes the European larch must be planted, except 
 in Barnstable, Dukes, and Nantucket counties, where the 
 Scotch pine or C'orsican pine must be used, as best adapted 
 to sandy plains. Only plantations made on poor, worn-out 
 
29 
 
 land, or that which is unfit for agricultural purposes, and 
 containing at least 2,700 trees to the acre, can compete for 
 these prizes. * 
 
 Second. For the best plantation of American white ash, of 
 not less than five acres in extent, $600 ; for the next best, 
 1400. Plantations originally of less than 5,000 trees to the 
 aore, cannot compete for these prizes. 
 
 The following directions for tree-planting are condensed 
 from the recommendations given by the trustees of the prize 
 fund. For planting larch and pine, shallow furrows four feet 
 apart should be run one way across the field. Then by plant- 
 ing in the furrows four feet apart each way, 2,720 plants will be 
 required to the acre. On hilly, rocky land which cannot be 
 plowed, it will be only necessary to open with a spade, holes 
 large enough to admit the roots of the plants. The larch 
 must be planted as early in the 'Season as the ground can he 
 worked. No other tree begins to grow so early, and too late 
 planting is a common cause of failure. The Scotch and Cor- 
 sican pines can be planted up to the first of May. The roots 
 should be exposed to the wind and sun as 'little as possible. 
 Carelessness in this particular is often fatal to the young 
 plants. The trees should be carried to the field in bundles, 
 covered with wet mats, and not be removed till they are re- 
 quired for planting. The roots should be carefully spread 
 out in the holes or furrows prepared for them, and the soil 
 worked among them with the hand, and finally pressed down 
 with the foot. A cloudy or rainy day is especially favorable 
 for this work. All young plantations must be protected from 
 ' browsing animals, the greatest enemies, next to man, to young 
 trees and the spread of forest growth. 
 
 If the New York, New Haven & Hartford Railroad reclaim 
 the strip of land bordering their line through the " sand-blow," 
 the example would be a benefaction to the State as a demon- 
 stration of what may be accomplished under the most un- 
 favorable circumstances. If that desert can be reclaimed, 
 surely all other barrens in Connecticut may be fertilized by 
 forests. This enterprise will require time, faith, patience, 
 and money. For the first four years the young trees may seem 
 
30 
 
 to barely struggle between life and death, after which they 
 are likely to grow rapidly. As this scheme will be regarded 
 as chimerical by those who have not investigated the subject, 
 I give below extracts from letters which I have received from 
 practical tree-planters on Cape Cod and elsewhere, embody- 
 ing interesting facts and practical suggestions. 
 
 John Doane, Orleans. (Mr. Doane, now eighty-six years of age, is the oldest 
 living sylriculturist in Barnstable County.) I have planted one hundred acres 
 iu Orleans and seventy in Brewster. The whole plantation in Orleans is about 
 five hundred acres ; in Eastham seven hundred acres ; in Wellfleet four hundred ; 
 in Truro six hundred; in Chatham, Harwich, Dennis, and Yarmouth, about four 
 hundred each; and in Barnstable six hundred acres. In regard to the other towns 
 on Cape Cod I have no definite information, though trees have been planted in many 
 towns on the Cape. I have made a machine for planting the seed, that I have 
 lent to the tree-planters in five of the neighboring towns. The land I have 
 planted with pines was not worth over fifty cents per acre before planting, and I 
 have sold some since covered with young pines, for fourteen dollars per acre. I 
 consider it a good investment. 
 
 John Kenrick, South Orleans. — My experiments in tree-planting have been 
 made on over a hundred aqres now covered with trees > from one to thirty-five 
 years old, chiefly pitch pine. I am now trying Scotch and Corsican pine, and 
 European larch. My first aim has been to cover my worn-out lands with beauty 
 and verdure, and it has proved a successful and economic experiment. The seed 
 of the pitch pine is worth from one to two dollars a pound, the higher price 
 being in the end the cheapest. Fresh seeds, carefully gathered, are as sure to 
 vegetate as corn, but obtained from seedsmen, they are very unreliable in germi- 
 nating. European nurserymen take far greater pains in gathering forest tree 
 seeds, and understand the art of curing them better than Americans. I have 
 tried every method of tree-planting, transplanting trees from the smallest to 
 those that are two feet high. This is a costly plan, but may be adopted when 
 one wishes to save time, and desires a few trees as a wind-break or otherwise. In 
 transplanting trees immediately from my own nursery to the field, my favorite 
 time is just as the buds begin to start in the spring. I have planted seeds both 
 with a planter and by hand. On our light sands a man and boy will plant three 
 acres in a day. Dropping six seeds in a hill, it will take about half a pound of 
 seed to the acre. This is my favorite method, and is more satisfactory in results, 
 though more costly than that of using the plow and planter. When the ever- 
 greens are about two feet high I would thin them, leaving one thrifty plant in 
 each hill. I do not trim till they get large, and then cut off only the deaid 
 branches. «• 
 
 Tully Crosby, Brewster. In our small town about fifteen hundred acres of old 
 waste land have been planted with pitch-pine. The Norway pine has not proved 
 a success with us. Many old fields bought for fifty cents per acre, and planted 
 with pine twenty-five years aa;o, are now worth from ten to twenty dollars an acre. 
 The pines grow well for twenty-five or thirty years, and when cut off a second 
 crop springs up immediately, and this crop does better than the first. The pitch- 
 pine takes root and grows on our barren beach sand where no soil is perceptible. Our 
 people are now planting trees every year. I have recently planted twelve acres. 
 Two years ago I cut off a lot planted thirty years since, and the land is now 
 full of young pine trees growing from the seed scattered by the first growth. A 
 man with a two-horse team can plant ten acres in a day, and three pounds of 
 seed will do the whole. 
 
 Ei Higgins, Eastham. Thirty years ago twenty acres of condemned tillage 
 land, worth one dollar per acre, was planted with pitch pine. The present value 
 of this land is fifteen dollars per acre. Prior to 1870, two hundred and twenty- 
 five acres more of the same sort of land was thus planted, the present value of 
 
31 
 
 which is eight dollars per acre. About one hundred and fifty acres of sandy 
 land, utterly barren and not worth fifty cents to the acre, have been planted, the 
 present value of which is seven dollars per acre. 
 
 John G. Thompson, North Truro. About six hundred and fifty acres have been 
 planted in this town. The price of pitch-pine seed for the last few years has been 
 one dollar and fifty cents per pound. Thirty years ago land in this town could 
 be bought for twenty -five cents per acre for tree-planting ; now the same kind of 
 barren land sells for two dollars per acrerfor tree-planting. I find the expense 
 of planting the pines to be two dollars and twenty-five cents per acre. 
 
 S. B. Phmney, Barnstable. Large tracts of worn-out lands in this county, that 
 were worth comparatively nothing, have been planted from the seed of the pitch- 
 pine. These experiments have proved successful. I know of no way in which 
 the light sandy lands in this section can be made so valuable as by planting them 
 with the pitch-pine. Our experience proves that the cultivation of forest trees is 
 feasible and profitable in New England seaport towns. In 1845 I planted in this 
 town a ten-acre lot with pitch-pine seed, much as corn is planted, dropping three 
 seeds in a hill and covering them with half an inch of soil. To-day many of these 
 trees will girth more than a man's body. Hundreds of acres in this section are 
 being planted annually. 
 
 J. E. Crane, Bndgewater. The most profitable tree we have planted in this 
 region is the white pine, with which about two hundred acres have been planted 
 on old worn-out pasture and light sandy soil. The cost of planting, that 
 is, setting out young trees twelve to eighteen inches high, is about eight dollars per 
 acre. Properly set out, scarcely one in fifty will fail. There is in this vicinity 
 an acre that was set out thirty-five years ago, that has just yielded in cash for 
 the wood and lumber, $350. On another acre, planted twenty-eight years ago, 
 there is estimated to be from eighty to one hundred cords. These are unusual 
 specimens, but fifty cords per acre in twenty-five years, is a low estimate on land 
 natural to pine, and pine is the most valuable growth of wood in the Old Colony. 
 
 F. Collamore, Pembroke. Forty years since, Hon. Morrill Allen, "the model 
 farmer " of Plymouth county, planted white pines which grew rapidly, and have 
 proved very valuable for the manufacture of wooden packing-boxes. His exam- 
 ple has been followed to a limited extent. Every one believes in the profit of it, 
 out we are in a well-wooded region, and when a lot is cut off it soon starts up 
 again. 
 
 Robert Douglas and Sons, WauJcegan, Illinois. We have propagated the Euro- 
 pean larch for nearly twenty years. For a number of years, and until the finan- 
 cial collapse, we sowed over one thousand pounds of larch seeds annually, averaging 
 five to seven thousand plants to the pound of seed. The larch grows finely and 
 rapidly in the New England States, in northern Illinois, Iowa, Minnesota, and 
 Wisconsin. It grows nearly as fast, and makes more durable timber on poor 
 lands than on very rich lands. There is no land so poor, except blowing sands, 
 but that it will make a rapid growth after it is once fairly established. It is a 
 tree adapted to a northern climate, and does not thrive in Kansas, southern Illi- 
 , nois, and south of Pennsylvania. We are growing the native cherry ( Cerasus 
 seratina) in large quantities, as it is healthy, transplants well, grows rapidly on 
 land far from rich, and the timber is very valuable. We will send our catalogues, 
 giving fuller information, to any party in Connecticut on application. The Euro- 
 pean larch should be planted as early as possible in the spring. It shonld never be 
 planted on low wet ground. Set out early, no tree will bear transplanting better. 
 Scotch pine and larch do well mixed. We recommend planting a few rows of 
 the admixture on the margin of the plantation. When planted four feet by four, 
 as we advise, they can be worked both ways with the cultivator for two or three 
 years, when the branches will shade the ground so densely as to destroy the 
 undergrowth. When the trees are received from the nursery, the boxes should 
 be immediately unpacked and the roots dipped into a puddle made of rich, mellow 
 soil about the thickness of paint, and kept in a shaded place till ready to plant, 
 but the tops should be kept dry. Set the trees a little deeper than they stood in 
 the nursery. After treading the earth firmly about the roots, draw a little loose 
 earth up to the trees to prevent the surface from baking. 
 
32 
 
 Francis Skinner, BrooMine, a Trustee of Massachusetts Society for Promoting Agri- 
 culture. I will receive and transmit orders for any number of trees for plantations in 
 Connecticut to Douglas & Sons, Waukegan, Illinois. By arrangement with them, 
 such orders transmitted through you are subject to fifteen per cent, discount from 
 the catalogue prices, and such orders can be transmitted up to April 1st, except 
 for European larch, for which the closing time will be March 1st. We are filling 
 our Massachusetts orders from Douglas & Sons in preference to importing from 
 England, as they are cheaper when ordered in large quantities, and the chances 
 of their success far greater. American white ash, one or two years old and about 
 one foot high, are from $3 to $5.50 per thousand ; European larch from K4 to $8 
 per thousand. As this duty is undertaken solely from a desire to facilitate tree- 
 planting, and not for the purpose of any personal gain, I cannot be held respon- 
 sible in any way for the results. 
 
 A. W. HoUey, Salisbury, Conn. — The consumption of wood in this and sur- 
 rounding towns has been very great in supplying charcoal to our numerous iron 
 works. Some of the mountains have been stripped of their trees three times 
 within the last century. The second growth was rapid. Each subsequent one 
 has been less vigorous and less rapid. Other varieties, aided by artificial means, 
 such as seeding, placing cuttings, or transplanting the young trees, might soon 
 render onr mountains valuable again for the production of forests. Our land- 
 owners have not paid sufficient attention to the propagation of trees. The 
 denudation of the mountains in Salisbury have lessened our streams. In the 
 season of rain there is a more rapid rise and a greater flood than formerly when 
 the forests were standing and the foliage and falling limbs lay quietly covering 
 the earth beneath. Many smaller streams which flowed continuously through 
 the entire season forty or fifty years ago, fail altogether in the summer, and the 
 . larger ones are proportionately diminished. Your suggestions in regard to fer- 
 tilizing onr sandy plains are practical, and should be carried out, 
 
 Experiments are now in progress to fix the dunes or sand 
 hills which threaten the Suez Canal, by planting the maritime 
 pine and other trees. Last summer I visited the celebrated 
 forest of Fontainbleau, in France, which covers an area of 
 sixty-four square miles. The soil of this wide tract is com- 
 posed almost entirely of sand, and apparently as dry as the 
 sand plains of Wallingford. Jules Clare", a student of forest 
 science of world-wide fame, says : " The sand here forms 
 ninety-eight per cent, of the earth, and it is almost without 
 water ; it would be a drifting desert but for the trees growing 
 and artificially propagated upon it." What has been done 
 with signal success at Fontainbleau shows the practicability 
 of reclaiming the worst deserts that can be found in our 
 State. Many other facts might be cited were it necessary, 
 both from home and foreign fields, to prove the feasibility of 
 this plan of reclaiming sterile lands. If one is to be com- 
 mended who makes two blades of grass grow where but one 
 grew before, how much more the farmer who makes forests 
 thrive where nothing now grows. 
 
33 
 
 SCHOOLS OF FOEESTEY. 
 
 The experience of Europe long since demonstrated the value 
 and necessity of "Forest Schools" so numerous on the Conti- 
 nent. As these institutions are unknown in this country, a 
 detailed statement of their aims and character will not only be 
 of interest, but I hope, will help towards the organization of 
 similar schools in America. In connection with either of our 
 Colleges, the endowment of two additional professorships, or 
 even one at the outset, might inaugurate a Department of 
 Forestry. As the applied mathematics and the sciences com- 
 prise so large a part of the curriculum of Forest Schools, a 
 Forest Department could very easily and economically be an- 
 nexed to the Sheffield Scientific School, where the existing 
 cabinets, laboratories and philosophical apparatus could be 
 utilized in forestral instruction. The endowment of such a 
 department would prove a great benefaction to the State and 
 to the country, opening new' fields of investigation which would 
 bear directly on the ultimate resources and permanent pros- 
 perity of the nation. The conclusions of foreign foresters, 
 though confirmed by the broadest observations and experience 
 in Europe, cannot all be wisely adopted in American Sylvicul- 
 ture. Difference in soil, climate and other conditions, may 
 affect trees in regard to their rapidity of growth, health, dura- 
 bility of timber, texture, elasticity and grain of the wood, and 
 many other qualities. These vital questions can be determined 
 only by careful investigations carried on in each country. The 
 Lombardy poplar, for example, sending out its almost upright 
 laterals from the. very ground all along its tall stem, grows 
 beautifully in Italy, and is still a favorite with the Italians as 
 of old with the Eomans, who, it is said, gave it the name arbor 
 populi. But in New England so many of its branches winter- 
 kill that it soon becomes an unsightly collection of dead limbs. 
 
 Another object of my recent visit to the leading schools of 
 Forestry in Europe was to gather the practical plans and 
 suggestions embodied in my paper on " Economic Tree 
 Planting," first published in the Eeport of the Connecti- 
 cut Board of Agriculture, and thus help reclaim our ex- 
 
34 ^ ; 
 
 hausted lands by tree planting. As these lands have been 
 abandoned to hopeless sterility, and their reclamation has 
 already been pronounced a visionary and impracticable scheme, 
 I have shown that the experiment of reclaiming vast barrens 1 
 in France, Germany, Eussia, Austria and other European 
 countries, has been tried with conspicuous success. What 
 has been done on so broad a scale and with such grand results 
 in Europe surely can be accomplished in the comparatively 
 narrow barrens of the New England States. 
 
 Another purpose of my journey was to do something 
 towards making our youth practical arborists by, awaken- 
 ing a love of trees and an interest in their study and cul- 
 ture. From a wide field of observation, I tried to collect 
 such facts as seem fitted to further the work of rural 
 adornment, in which encouraging progress has already been 
 made in our State. A few oral lessons in our schools on 
 rural art, and especially on the beauty, variety and value 
 of trees and the ease and ways of their propagation, would 
 be as good seed sown in good ground bringing forth fruit an 
 hundred fold. Very little time would be required for those 
 school talks which would be sure to inspire an interest in the 
 study and culture of trees, and in the broader subject of rural 
 art and adornment. To all of the teachers of Connecticut in- 
 clined to give such instruction in their schools my " Economic 
 Tree Planting" will be sent without charge, at least so long as 
 the thousand copies printed for that purpose may last 
 
 The planting of the Syrian Willow, the supply of which fell 
 far short of the demand, was designed as a mere beginning, sure to 
 lead to something more and better, and to interest our teachers 
 and youth in the broad subject of tree-planting. Beautiful as is 
 the weeping willow,~I was careful to say "I should greatly pre- 
 fer to start five thousand elms or maples if it coukl be done as 
 easily as my five thousand willows seem likely to be stuck in 
 the ground." While regretting that so many applicants should 
 be disappointed, I urge those who failed to get the willow (and 
 I expect the same of all who succeeded), to try the far better 
 plan of planting our common but very beautiful white ash or 
 elm, maple, white oak, tulip, American linden — or the Scotch 
 fir and^European larch. I advise our boys also to raise these 
 
35 
 
 trees from the seed which may be easily gathered every 
 autumn. 
 
 The Schools of Forestry have e&erted a remarkable influence 
 in, Germany in diffusing among the people a general and genu- 
 ine interest in arboriculture. They regard forests as their friends, 
 and understand their climatic influence and economic value in 
 staying spring torrents, preventing summer droughts and sup- 
 plying lumber and fuel. The Germans have a passion for 
 nature, and love to frequent their beautiful groves and gardens, 
 for parks and woods abound in or near their cities and towns. 
 The rural and suburban adornment, now the pride and glory 
 of so many beautiful towns in Germany, and the fruit of this 
 revived love of arboriculture, is largely due to the influence and 
 literature which have emanated from her Schools of Forestry. 
 Hence the wanton forest fires so common and destructive in 
 America are comparatively unknown in Germany. The forest 
 incendiary would be regarded as a common enemy, like the 
 poisoner of an acqueduct, recklessly destroying that which it is 
 the interest of all to preserve. The Forest Schools have created 
 a healthful public sentiment which constitutes the best possible 
 protection of the woods. 
 
 Efforts are now making to organize a Department of Forestry 
 in connection with the University and new Arboretum of Edin- 
 burgh. Hitherto Forestry has been little taught in England, 
 and her young foresters have therefore been educated on the 
 Continent. There is a growing conviction of the need of such 
 institutions in England, due largely to the able and persistent 
 exertions of Kev. J. C. Brown, LL.D., to whom I am indebted for 
 many statements given in this paper. The London Journal of 
 Forestry says : "The University of Edinburgh possesses remark- 
 able facilities for the creation of a School of Forestry, which with 
 some slight additions could be easily converted into a thoroughly 
 equipped Forest Department, capable of teaching the science of 
 Forestry in the most complete and efficient manner.* Such an 
 Institution is one of the greatest wants of the age in this country, 
 and no country in the world requires it more. With India, 
 Canada, Australia, New Zealand and South Africa, not to 
 mention numerous smaller dependencies of the British Empire, 
 
 * This language is equally applicable to the Sheffield Scientific School and to 
 several scientific schools in other States, 
 
36 
 
 crying out to us to furnish them with thoroughly educated 
 foresters, to conserve and restore their fast disappearing forests, 
 or to create new ones, it is a standing blot on . the institutions 
 of our country that we cannot educate and qualify at home 
 the men who are needed for this important service. Such 
 an institution would be of inestimable value to India and all 
 our colonies, and exert a most beneficent influence on the 
 management and productiveness of our home forests and the 
 rural prosperity of the whole country. The forest wealth of 
 Canada is being rapidly exhausted. The great pine forests on 
 the Ottawa, St. Maurice and Saguenay rivers, with their won- 
 derful net-work of tributary streams, are rapidly disappearing' 
 beneath the ruthless ax- of the lumberman. All the more 
 accessible parts of these great forests are already cleared of pine 
 timber. That huge tract of forest between the Ottawa and the 
 St. Maurice, which once seemed inexhaustible, is fast disappear- 
 ing beneath the destroying ax." 
 
 Dr. Hooker, Director of 1 the Eoyal Gardens at Kew, says : 
 " Forestry, a subject so utterly neglected in this country, that 
 we are forced to. send all candidates for forest appointments to 
 France or Germany for instruction both in theory and prac- 
 tice, holds on the Continent an honorable, and even a distin- 
 guished place, among the branches of a liberal education. In 
 the estimation of the average Briton, forests are of infinitely, 
 less importance than the game they shelter, and not long since 
 the wanton destruction of a fine young tree was considered a 
 venial offence compared with snaring a pheasant or rabbit. 
 Wherever the English rule extends, with the single exception 
 of India, the same apathy prevails. In South Africa, millions 
 of acres have been made desert, and more are being made desert 
 annually, through the destruction of the indigenous forests ; 
 in Demerara the useful timber trees have all been removed 
 from accessible regions, and no thought is given to planting 
 others ; from Trinidad we have the same story ; in New Zea- 
 land there is not now a good Kauri pine to be found near the 
 coast, and the annals of almost every English colony repeat 
 the tale of willful, wanton waste and improvidence. On the 
 other hand, in France, Prussia, Switzerland, Austria, Italy and 
 Bussia, the forests and waste lands are the subjects of devoted 
 
37 
 
 attention pn the part of the government, and colleges provided 
 with a complete staff of accomplished professors train youths 
 of good birth and education to the duties of State foresters. 
 Nor, in the case of France, is this law confined to the mother 
 country ; the Algerian forests are worked with scrupulous solic- 
 itude, and the collection of vegetable produce from the French 
 Colonies in the Museum at Paris, shows that their forest pro- 
 ducts are all diligently explored." The above criticism of the 
 neglect and inaction of England applies equally to America. 
 
 One of the oldest and best schools of forestry in Europe is 
 at Nancy, a beautiful city of great historic interest, pleasantly 
 located on the left bank of the Meurthe, and at the base of a 
 long range of. wooded and vine-clad hills, about two hundred 
 miles east of Paris. The parks and gardens of the city are 
 finely adorned with trees and shrubbery. The Department of 
 Meurthe, of whict^ it is the capital, owes much of its rare rural 
 beauty to the influence of this celebrated school. Forestry 
 began to be studied as a science in France during the last 
 century, though these investigations were long interrupted by 
 the French revolution and the consequent wars. On the 
 re-establishment of peace this study was resumed, and the 
 School of Forestry was organized at Nancy, which, enlarged 
 and more fully equipped, is now liberally supported. The 
 cabinets, museums, apparatus and appliances of every sort, 
 seemed to me most complete and ample, although the Director 
 informed me that their choicest material was already packed 
 for the Paris Exposition. Instruction is given gratuitously to 
 those who prepare for the State Forest Service, and the 
 importance of this service may be inferred from the fact that 
 the State forests cover an area of nearly three millions of acres, 
 or about the size of Connecticut, with a gross revenue of about 
 seven millions of dollars, or deducting all expenses, a net 
 revenue of over five millions of dollars. The total expense 
 for board, lodging, uniform, instruments and pocket money, is 
 from four to five hundred dollars a year. To "foreign stu- 
 dents" a moderate charge is added for tuition I found a 
 considerable number of English students in attendance here 
 last summer, who are candidates for forest service in India 
 
 The course occupies three years. The daily work requires ten 
 
38 
 
 hours, and fifteen hundred hours must be given to study, each half 
 year. In the Winter Session, from November 1st to May 1st, 
 seventy-five lectures of an hour and a half each are given on 
 forest economy, and the same amount of .time is allotted for 
 preparation of the special topic of each lecture, embracing in 
 the cOurse, the exploitation of forests; relation of forests to 
 climate; natural history of different kinds of trees; manage- 
 ment of forests ; conversion of one form of forest into another ; 
 and desirable qualities and defects of woods. The same num- 
 ber of lectures and the same amount of study are devoted to 
 .botany — the structure) organs, physiology and geographical 
 distribution of plants. Of the seventy-five lectures devoted 
 to mathematics, twenty are taken! Up with land-surveying and 
 levelling, fifteen hours are given to the preparation of plans 
 under the direction of a professor, twenty-two hours to eleva- 
 tions in Water-colors, the same time to sketches and descriptions 
 of rising grounds and to diagrams and calculations of polygonal 
 figures, and also to elevations and designs in hatchwork. There 
 are also lectures and lessons in road and bridge building, such 
 as may be required in the exploitation of forests ; in forest law 
 and in the German language, together with some military 
 instruction and drill, and practice in horsemanship. 
 
 In the Summer -Session, from May to September, thirty-one 
 days are spent in botanical and professional excursions in the 
 Vosges, the Jura and other mountains, in which are visited 
 forests in all stages of treatment-and exploitation, and where the 
 students are required to practice in the mensuration of wood 
 and timber. Six days are allotted to preparing a report of the, 
 tour of observation and an herbarium of the plants collected. 
 Seven days in the field and fifteen hours in the study are 
 given to- making a diagram with report, full calculations and 
 topographical plan, including levels and a reduced drawing of 
 the same, and one day in each section of the forest visited to 
 a mensuration of a supposed felling and the preparation of an 
 official report of it. Five days of work on the ground are 
 given to the study of an imaginary projected road, and twenty 
 days to making drawings and specifications and estimates 
 relating to embankments, consolidating the scarps of ravines, 
 building barriers of masonry or fascines across the bed of 
 
39 
 
 streams, and cutting terraces along the scarps. Six days are 
 spent in military reconnaissance with reports and sketches, and 
 in competitive rifle-shooting. The examinations occupy twenty- 
 one days, and eighteen are spent as holydays. 
 
 In the second year substantially the same topics of an advanc- 
 ing grade are pursued with an equally full course of study and 
 lectures. The season for cutting timber, the ages of different 
 kinds of trees to be felled, the proper time for a revolution or 
 forest crop and its restoration; mineralogy, lithology and the 
 geological features of France ; saw-mills and everything relating 
 thereto, are among the additional studies of the third term.t In 
 the summer session, twenty-three days are spent in the forests 
 of Meurthe-et-Moselle and of the l'Aine, in the study of the 
 management of fellings formed of mixed timber, and of coppice 
 being converted into timber forest, and fourteen days are 
 allotted to the preparation of reports of these observations. 
 Two days are devoted to land surveying and six to trigono- 
 metrical surveys, making a trigonometrical survey of a forest 
 in the environs of Nancy or of the Yosges, reconnoitering the 
 ground, planting signals, measuring a base line and observing the 
 angles. Twelve days are assigned to the preparation of dia- 
 grams and calculations of the net-work of angles and a connec- 
 tion of this net-work with the lines on the map of Prance. 
 Eleven days are given to the study of the saw-mills in the 
 Vosges, five days of work on the ground and six in the class- 
 room are given to preparing a sketch and a description of 
 diagrams of the mechanism of five saw-mills selected as the best 
 specimens found in operation ; to experiments in the gauging 
 of water-courses, the effect of water-wheels, and the time 
 required in the work of sawing, and to the general coefficient of 
 waste. 
 
 The Winter Session of the third year extends over the five 
 months from November to April, and is designed for advanced 
 students. In addition to some branches already enumerated, 
 zoology with especial •attention to entomology, the ravages 
 committed by insects upon forests, the means of averting or 
 destroying them and of recovering a forest ravaged by them ; 
 the fixation of sand dunes, the reclamation of barren wastes, 
 and the re-foresting of denuded mountains ; the geology and 
 
40 
 
 mineralogy of the mountains of France, mountain torrents, 
 their causes and the means of preventing them, the plans of 
 work projected and the works accomplished ; the chemistry of 
 vegetation and all that relates to the production and assimila- 
 tion of atmospherical and terrestrial elements. The Summer 
 Session of the third year, continuing five months from the first 
 of April, is largely occupied with field-work and observa- 
 tions, especially in the study of the oak forests of Central, 
 France, the coniferous forests of the Vosges and Jura and the- 
 reforested regioDS of the Alps. During the entire course the 
 field excursions are made under the direction of competent 
 professors, and careful memoirs of these journeys and observa- 
 tions, with sketches, plans and diagrams are always required. 
 
 Italy has experienced the disastrous effects of forest denuda- 
 tion, in climatic excesses, in spring torrents and summer 
 droughts, or at least, in the great diminution of the summer 
 streams and rivers — the sources of irrigation. A code of forest 
 laws has lately been passed, for the extension and protection of 
 the national forests, and for the replanting of communal and pri- 
 vate woods. The scientific training of professional foresters is 
 found needful to repair the great waste and damage done in pre- 
 vious centuries. The officers charged with' the administration 
 of these forest laws are mainly graduates of the Royal Instituto 
 Forestale at Vallombrbsa. "While in Switzerland, a letter from 
 our Minister at Rome, Hon. George P. Marsh (who had been 
 informed of my errand in Europe), strongly advised me to visit 
 Vallombrosa, and a letter from Mr. Marsh to the Director Gen- 
 eral, Adolfo di Be"renger, secured every facility for observation 
 and information when T did visit that institution. Founded as 
 an abbey by Pope Alexander II. in 1070, it early became one 
 of the most celebrated monasteries of Italy, if not of the world, 
 remarkable for its romantic situation (vallis umbrosa, or shady 
 valley of the Appenines, nearly six thousand feet above the sea), 
 its great wealth, the extent of its lands and of its grand planted 
 forests. The present magnificent buildings were erected about 
 two hundred and fifty years ago (1637). For centuries this 
 place has been visited by distinguished travelers. Dante 
 delighted to ramble among these magnificent scenes. Mrs, 
 Browning says of Milton ; 
 
41 
 
 " He sang of paradise and smiled, 
 Remembering Vallombrosa." 
 
 When penetrating these dense forests and clambering up the 
 steep ascents to the valley summit, I felt the fitness of his 
 familiar words, and familiar they deserve to be with all our 
 youth. 
 
 " Thick as autumnal leaves that strew the brooks, 
 
 In Vallombrosa, where the Etrurian shades 
 
 High over arched, embower. 
 
 . . . And overhead up grew, 
 
 Insuperable height of loftiest shade, 
 
 Cedar, and pine, and fir and branching palm, 
 
 A sylvan scene ; and as the ranks ascend 
 
 Shade above shade, a woody theater of stateliest view." 
 
 An hour's ride from Florence by the Arezzo Eailway brings 
 one to P,ontassieve.. Thence a drive of some eight miles by a 
 series of zigzags and through avenues of cypress and mulberry 
 trees, leads to the terminus of the carriage road. Grand and 
 extensive views of the beautiful valley of the Arno (Val 
 d' Arno), open at every turn, with fine vineyards, orchards 
 and highly cultivated fields, here and there protected by long 
 dykes from the river floods which forest denudations on the 
 tributaries of the Arno have occasioned. From the road a foot 
 and mule path of three miles up a s^eep ascent leads to the an- 
 cient monastery. Here were workmen cutting spars for ship 
 building, to be floated down the Arno to Pisa, or into the Medi- 
 terranean. These Benedictine monks centuries ago understood 
 well the economic value of tree planting. It is due to their 
 sagacity and foresight that these vast lands are now densely 
 covered with various pines, firs, beech and chestnut. The very 
 position of the trees, standing in exact rows, shows that tree 
 planting on a large scale has here been successfully carried on 
 for centuries. The silver firs, planted around the abbey centuries 
 ago, are now magnificent and stately trees. 
 
 The following sketch of this Forest School is condensed from 
 a fuller history given me by Director Be'renger. This monastery 
 was appropriated by the State in 1865, and opened as a Forest 
 School in 1867, though its organization was not completed till 
 nearly two years later. As the snow lies deep for three months 
 pn these mountain heights, the school is transferred for four 
 
42 
 
 mouths, from November to March, to the old castle of the Counts 
 Guidi at Paterno near the base of the mountain, and only twelve 
 hundred feet above the sea. During the remaining eight 
 months the head-quarters are at the high elevation of Vallom- 
 brosa. The contrast in the elevations of the two locations 
 favors the maintenance of two distinct arboretums, the one at 
 Paterno showing the vegetation of Southern Italy, and even 
 the tender exotics of the tropics, while on the heights of Vallom- 
 brosa are planted the trees of Northern Europe and America as 
 well as of the Alps. Great varieties of pines, firs, larch, ash, 
 chestnut, oak, beech are cultivated' in the nurseries for planting 
 on ,the slopes and heights of the Appenines. The Director 
 expressed special interest in the culture of the Fraxinus Ameri- 
 cana—our white ash. The students each have their small 
 nursery lots in which they try their hands in planting and 
 trans-planting various trees, thus uniting theory and practice. 
 
 The Institution has its director and five professors, a library 
 containing nearly 2,500 volumes of forest literature; a well 
 furnished chemical laboratory ; a meteorological observatory, 
 where the indications of the therniometer, barometer, pluviom- 
 eter, anemometer, hygrometer and seismometer are regularly 
 recorded; instruments for tree-measuring and surveying and 
 various arboricultural instruments, models of timber slides; 
 timber carts ; sections of wood, indigenous and exotic, and ob- 
 jects of natural history relating to forestry. The professors 
 are appointed by the King, on the recommendation of the 
 Minister of Agriculture. The number of pupils admissible is 
 sixty. Besides the common rudiments, candidates for admission 
 must pass an examination in history, natural history, algebra, 
 geometry, physics and chemistry. The students wear the neat 
 uniform of the Institution, which is that of a forest guard, with 
 oak twigs of gold lace on the collar and cap. The discipline is 
 mildly military, the students respond to the call of the trumpet 
 instead of a college^ bell, cannot leave the precincts without 
 permission, and are liable to confinement for insubordination. 
 The students make frequent and sometimes extensive excur- 
 sions through the national and communal forests, with the 
 Professor of Natural History, to observe and collect specimens ; 
 with the Professor of Mathematics and Surveying, to make plans 
 
43 
 
 and, elevations of the surrounding lands, measure the height anu 
 girth of trees, calculate the amount of timber, and learn the 
 •various methods of management and exploitation of forests, and 
 with Director Berenger for special exercises in practical forestry. 
 Besides regular lesson trips, a long excursion is made annually 
 to some extensive woods. One of these journeys of observation, 
 occupying a month, extended to Naples during the International 
 Exhibition of Woods used in Ship building, and included the 
 inspection of the leading forests in Southern Italy. 
 
 The following is the Curriculum : 
 
 First Year. Mathematics, including Algebra, Geometry 
 and Trigonometry. Chemistry — Organic and Inorganic, with 
 experiments. Natural History — Botany, Systematic and Veget- 
 able Physiology. Forestry — Theoretic and Practical. Lan- 
 guages — Italian, German and French, with Eeading, Writing 
 and translating of Forest Literature. 
 
 Second Year. Mathematics applied — Differential and Inte- 
 gral Calculus, Conic Sections, Measuring Heights of Trees and 
 Cubic Contents, Plan Drawing and Valuation Surveys. Climat- 
 ology and Forest Meteorology. Natural History — Botany, Den- 
 drology, Forest Entomology, Geology and Mineralogy. Forest 
 Economy — History of Forest Science, Practical Sylviculture, Sea- 
 soning of Timber and Exploitation of Forests. Elements of Agri- 
 culture — Improvement of Soils, Pasturage, Drainage, Agricul- 
 ture, etc. Languages — Exercises in Italian, German and French. 
 
 Third Year. Mathematics applied — Rates of Growth of 
 Trees. Mensuration, Preparing Charts and Levels, Estimating 
 Condition and Value of Forests, Forest Administration — Statis- 
 tics of different Woods, Classification of Forests, Reclamation 
 of Barrens and Wastes, Planting of Sand Dunes, and of Marshes. 
 Forest Land — Government and Pastoral Rights. Forest Economy 
 — Political and National. Languages — Italian, German and 
 French. . 
 
 The first year is mainly devoted to scientific training, and in 
 the second and third years the practical details of forest man- 
 agement are taught. Tracts of land bearing evergreen and 
 deciduous trees of various ages are set apart to be managed by 
 individual students. In the nursery also, each has a division 
 .bearing his name where he may show his skill, patience and 
 
44 
 
 fidelity in preparing the soil, sowing the seed, watering the 
 plants, and trans-planting the young trees. 
 
 In Italy, Germany and France, the advice of the Government 
 foresters is given gratuitously to all tree-planters, and the young 
 trees are furnished from the nurseries connected with the 
 Schools of Forestry at a nominal price far below the cost, in 
 order to encourage tree-planting to the utmost. With all pro- 
 prietors of forests, whether the State, the Commune, corpora- 
 tions or individuals, the Government enjoins first, what must 
 be done in all cases, and secondly, sets forth what may be done, 
 that is, what is desirable but optional. In certain localities, the 
 owner must get the 1 permission of the forester of his province 
 before he may fell trees on his own grounds. If the/interest of 
 that province and of the country require the retention of trees 
 on the mountain tops, the State compensates the owner of the 
 land for any loss thus incurred, or the older and larger trees 
 only are cut, and a continuous forest growth maintained. It is 
 their theory that the forests belong not to one generation only but 
 to all, and each is bound to leave them as good as it found them. 
 
 Schools of Forestry in Europe are of two kinds ; first those 
 designed exclusively for the study of forest science and its 
 collateral branches, the Forstahademie ; second the Allgemeirie 
 Eochschuh, or the collegiate or polytechnic institution with a 
 comprehensive course of study, of which forestry is one promi- 
 nent department. Nancy and Vallombrosa are examples of 
 Forest Schools, pure and simple. Carlsruhe and Hohenheim 
 will illustrate the other class. " The Polytechnic" in Carlsruhe 
 comprises six separate departments, viz: Mathematics, Engi- 
 neering, Machinery, Architecture, Chemistry and Forestry, with 
 a staff of forty-nine professors, lecturers, tutors and assistants. 
 I was struck with the extent of the eleven " Collections " here 
 provided to aid in instruction, including objects connected with 
 forests; models connected with engineering, machinery and 
 architecture, besides the usual botanic, mineral, and philosophic 
 collections, and an arboretum or forest garden. Professor Meyer 
 said that each of these departments really helps all the others, 
 and the union plan proves the most economic and feasible, 
 'and that the two Professors of Forestry here by the aid of their 
 associates accomplish results which require. from five to seven 
 professors in the isolated Forstahademies: 
 
45 
 
 The Boyal Wurtemburg Academy at Hohenheim is a School 
 both of Agriculture and Forestry. Its immense edifice, formerly 
 a summer palace of the Wurtemburg kings, is delightfully 
 situated on very high, ground nine miles from Stuttgart. Near 
 the building is a fine park and experimental and botanic gar- 
 dens, groves and an arbpricultural nursery. The botanic garden 
 covering over twelve acres contains some two thousand species 
 and varieties of plants important in forest and naval economy, 
 and an " exotic garden " of twenty acres specially adapted to 
 forest botany. Near by upon the same mountain range is a 
 forest district of about six thousand acres, embracing a variety 
 of soil and of trees. The institution has an extensive. collection 
 of implements used in practical forestry, with models of machines 
 and studies pertaining thereto ; a museum of forest products, 
 an herbarium containing over ten thousand species, and a very 
 interesting collection of microscopic preparations more extensive 
 than I had elsewhere seen, with a curious collection of patholog- 
 ical specimens, illustrative of diseased malformation and some 
 seven thousand specimens of fruits and seeds. Great varieties 
 of fine wood showing the texture and grain, are exhibited in 
 the museums of all Forest Schools, but this is a remarkable 
 collection of "microscopic specimens" — transverse sections of 
 wood thin as the finest paper arranged in books as photographs 
 ,are set in the spaces of an album. Held up to the light, 
 these thin sections are translucent, almost transparent, and show 
 the most delicate shades in the grain of the wood. Here is also 
 a collection of noxious insects and all animals harmful to trees. 
 The insects are shown in all their progressive states, as eggs, 
 larvas, pupa or chrysalis, caterpillar and moth, with their nests, 
 and perforations in the stems or branches, and with samples of 
 the trunk, bark, branch, root, leaf, cone or fruit, both sound 
 and injured. For a careful comparison, the healthy and . dis- 
 eased specimens are placed side by side. 
 
 The curriculum fills two years, and in the forest department 
 embraces among others the following topics : Forest Economy ; 
 History and Literature of Forest Economy ; Forest Products, in- 
 cluding Forest Botany, Sylviculture, Forest protection, Tech- 
 nical properties of timber, Uses of forests and forest technology ; 
 Forest administration including mensuration of trees and forests, 
 
46 
 
 'partition of forests for exploitation, valuation of forests and 
 practical management of forests, forest excursions, " demonstra- 
 tions " in different forest districts, Botanic Garden and Museum 
 of Forest Products, cubic measurements of trees and cubic 
 contents of woods, land surveying and levelling and mensura- 
 tion of forests with theodolite. 
 
 For lodging and tuition, the students,, if subjects of.Wurtem- 
 burg, pay less than forty dollars a year, but foreign students 
 are charged threefold more. Foreigners are admitted who pass 
 the required examination and produce the " ticket of legitima- 
 tion " from the proper authorities. Dom Pedro appreciates the 
 national importance of forestry in Brazil. I was much inter- 
 ested in an intelligent and ambitious young Brazilian who is 
 here training himself for a forest appointment in his native 
 country. 
 
 A striking illustration of the influence of Forest Schools is 
 found in the authorship of their professors and graduates. In 
 the long run, the influence of any institution may be measured 
 largely by the authorship which it prompts. Judged by this 
 test, the Forest Schools of Europe have made a worthy record. 
 By the cooperation of their professors and other writers, and 
 sometimes of government officials especially commissioned to 
 investigate different branches of the subject, the literature of 
 forestry, already large, is now rapidly increasing. A German 
 catalogue gives the titles of 1,815 volumes on forestry issued 
 prior to 1842, and the titles of 650 works published in the six 
 years prior to 1876. On an average, over one hundred new 
 books on forestry appear annually in the German language. 
 One.of the Spanish Commissioners to the/Centennial Exposition, 
 Senor Morera, published, a list of 1,126 volumes on forestry in 
 the Spanish language alone. Director Berenger of Vallombrosa 
 has published over thirty books and pamphlets, among them 
 one prqnounced by Hon. George P. Marsh of great value on 
 "The Absolute. Influence of Forests on the Temperature of 
 the Air." He also edits an able Journal of Forestry, "The 
 Giornale di Economia Forestale." 
 
 The question has been much mooted in Europe of late, 
 whether Schools of Forestry should be isolated, or connested as 
 an additional, department with existing universities or Poly- 
 
47 
 
 technic or other institutions of a more comprehensive character. 
 This was the leading topic of discussion at the last Congress of 
 Foresters which was held at Freiburg in Baden, and attended 
 by nearly four hundred members, representing all parts of 
 Germany, also Switzerland, Austria and Eussia. The leading 
 German writers on forestry and the most prominent govern- 
 ment officials in the management of the Crown and Communal 
 forests were there. The President of the Convention was Dr. 
 Nordlinger, the eminent Professor of Forestry at Hohenheim. 
 The discussion, which was virtually a continuation of the debate 
 begun at the Convention in Miilhausen the year before, awak- 
 ened great interest and occupied six hours, the sederunt com- 
 mencing at 8 A. M. and continuing, with an hour's intermission, 
 till 3 p. M. 
 
 A brief summary of the leading arguments shows the 
 feasibility of connecting . a Department of Forestry with the 
 Sheffield Scientific School. The discussion wag opened by 
 Professor Danckelmann, Director of the School of Forestry at 
 Newstadt-Eberswalde in Prussia, defending the separate Forst- 
 akademie. He contended that ' Universities are designed to 
 aid thorough investigations in the abstract rather than in the 
 concrete. Though rich fountains of knowledge, they do not 
 teach practical skill. The Forest Academies on the other hand 
 keep the practical ever in view, and the attainment of knowl- 
 edge is always combined with practice. Four things are essen- 
 tial ; first, instruction in the technical work of forestry ; next, 
 in the management of forests ; thirdly, in scientific research ; 
 and lastly, in the practical application of theories. Special 
 schools are best fitted to secure these results. The Hochschulen 
 are located far away from any forest, and the professors there- 
 fore are less acquainted with practical forestry, and the students, 
 though more varied in their ' attainments, will fail to know 
 thoroughly the things most essential for their profession ; they 
 will remain strangers to forests, and will not learn how to-ques- 
 tion trees ; they may see cases of dead insects and yet learn 
 nothing of the lives and habits of insects. To be a means of 
 instruction, the forest must be a demonstration ground, and 
 should be so situated that it can be visited daily without 
 fatigue or expense. Though the University is the center of 
 
48 
 
 culture and aristocracy, each of these is of secondary impor- 
 tance in the traini ng in forest technology. The professors of the 
 accessory sciences are out of sympathy with the forest, and 
 busy themselves with problems irrespective of their relation to 
 forest science. If it be said that the Universities have pro- 
 duced more eminent writers and thinkers than the forest 
 academy, the remedy should be found in the academy and in 
 the enlargement of its course of study, with opportunity for the 
 student to resort to the forest every day, proposing and solving 
 his questions on vegetable" physiology and zoology. 
 
 The speaker appointed to ,open the discussion on the other 
 side, Dr. von Seckendorff from Vienna, attributed the origin of 
 . isolated schools of forestry to the former state of forests, and 
 the limited education required for forest service in a by-gone 
 day. But now a more scientific method of research in forest 
 matters has been introduced, and a higher testing examination 
 is demanded of students in forest science. A liberal education 
 is essential here as well as in the other professions. The advo- 
 1 cates of separate forest schools claim two points of especial 
 superiority ; first, that their students are better trained in prac- 
 tical forestry, and second, that in these only are the studies 
 conducted with due reference to the requirements of the forester. 
 They assume that in the vicinity of the Allgemeine Hoch- 
 schulen there are no forests suitable for the instruction of stu- 
 dents, and that a purely theoretical education only must here 
 prevail. These assumptions are unfounded. 
 
 The number of University and Hbchschuh towns in Germany, 
 richly surrounded by woods is very great. In a line drawn 
 from the coast of the German Ocean to the place of this meet- 
 ing, alone, there are Hanover, Gdttingen, Marburg, Giessen, 
 Heidelberg, darlsruhe and Freiburg, all so surrounded. It is 
 not the extent of a forest which decides its suitability as a 
 means of instruction, so much as its variety of trees and modes 
 of treatment and exploitation. 
 
 The second assumption will not Dear examination. Science 
 and practical work are not antagonistic to each other. In the 
 Universities instruction does not go beyond what is desirable 
 for every educated man.. And there ought to be no ground for 
 the suspicion that any students of forestry choose that depart' 
 
49 
 
 ment because it makes the least demand upon them. Situated 
 near railways, the Universities have the best facilities for 
 forestral excursions and for fullest demonstrations in the field. 
 As a matter of fact, the special schools do not turn out more 
 practical men, and are not supplied with better districts for 
 excursions, while on the other hand, in the Allgemeine Hoch- 
 schulen, the instruction in the accessory sciences can be more 
 complete and extended, and be given at no additional expense 
 to the State. 
 
 After a long a/nd spirited discussion by prominent professors 
 from both classes of Forest Schools, the President, Dr. Nord- 
 linger, desired those who were in favor of combining instruction 
 in forestry with other departments ia the university or 
 Allgemeine Hochsohulen to rise, when seemingly the whole 
 assembly rose, which was followed by vehement applause. 
 When those who favored the separate system were invited to 
 rise, only sixteen members stood up. It will thus be seen that 
 the result of the fullest and latest experience of Europe is in 
 favor of organizing a forest department in connection with 
 some existing collegiate institution. 
 
50 
 
 INDUSTRIAL SCHOOLS. 
 
 No feature of the Educational Systems of Germany, Switzer- 
 land, Austria, Belgium, France and other European countries 
 is more striking to an American observer, than the large 
 number of Industrial Schools, specially designed to train ap- 
 prentices and make skilled workmen and competent foremen. 
 These schools are very numerous, and as various as the kinds of 
 industry pursued in each country or province. There has been 
 the greatest progress in manufactures in those countries where 
 these schools have been maintained longest and most liberally. 
 Geneva has for many years maintained a Horological School, 
 and the Swiss watches have' long been celebrated throughout 
 the world. Last summer I visited the new Horological Institute 
 then building in Geneva, a magnificent edifice to cost over 
 $200,000, and also witnessed the work of the school then in its old 
 quarters. The course of study and practice covers three years. 
 There were seven instructors, who are experts both in the 
 theory and practice. No one can graduate till he has proved 
 his skill, again and again, by making an entire watch of stand- 
 ard excellence. The patient training of these classes, or rather 
 of each individual member, in the minutest particulars, both in 
 theory and practice, and the criticism of defects in the work 
 done, illustrate the attention given to details in all Industrial 
 Schools. 
 
 The same attention to minute details is seen in the Industrial 
 4 School at Lyons, France, to which the preeminence of that city 
 in the manufacture of silk is largely due. It has twelve pro- 
 fessors, and the course of study occupies, three years. Here, 
 as in all Industrial Schools, a prominent study is drawing, 
 drawing ornaments, tinted drawings, and sketching plans of 
 machines from memory. Thorough instruction is given in 
 every detail relating to the manufacture of textile fabrics, espe- 
 cially of silks, the natural history of silk, treatment of the 
 silk worm and cocoons, spinning, throwing, weaving and testing 1 
 of silks ; sorting and cleaning ; winding, warping -and beam- 
 ing ; changing of looms for weaving different styles ;' defects 
 in operations and their remedies ; decomposition of tissues ; 
 
51 
 
 chemistry, especially- as applied to dyeing and printing; 
 physics with its applications to heating, steam-boilers, drying 
 and ventilation ; mechanics, embracing prime motors, materials 
 and construction ; hygiene, including physiology, noxious and 
 useful animals, dangerous and unhealthy occupations, conta- 
 gious diseases and how to avoid taking them ; rural economy 
 and "industrial plants." Manual exercises are conducted in 
 the workshops in making, mending, putting up and shipping 
 looms, in turning, filing, forging, fitting and various joiner's and 
 machinist work. Frequent visits are made to the various 
 factories in Lyons, under the lead of an instructor, where every 
 part and process is fully explained. The students afterwards 
 draw from memory plans of patterns and of machines. 
 
 About one hundred pupils on an average are in attendance. 
 The regular charge for tuition, use of laboratories and work- 
 shops, is $140 a year. Indigent students are aided by the 
 Chamber of Commerce- and Municipal Council of Lyons, so 
 that a portion only pay the full tuition. That this school, 
 conducted without aid from the government of France, should 
 be so liberally supported by the citizens of Lyons, and continue 
 to flourish for so long a period, is ample evidence of its great 
 usefulness in the opinion of the most competent judges. 
 
 More than sixty years ago France started special schools in 
 the arts of designing, engraving and dyeing ; in silk and ribbon 
 weaving and lace making ;' in carving, stone-cutting and dia- 
 mond-cutting (hence the diamond-cutting for the world is still 
 carried on mainly in Paris) ; in porcelain and various ceramic 
 productions, and the preeminence thus gained is still retained. 
 The artistic manufactures of France command the markets of 
 the world.. The Industrial Schools more recently organized in 
 Germany, Switzerland, Belgium, Austria, Italy and England, 
 which in the aggregate are numbered by thousands, make these 
 nations formidable competitors in artistic work. 
 
 When invited by the Minister of Public Instruction of France 
 to visit the National Porcelain Factory at Sevres, I expressed 
 to him surprise that such an establishment should come under 
 the supervision of the Educational Department, to which he 
 replied, "It is because it is the duty of this department to 
 supervise and control the Preparatory School for Sevres, which 
 
52 
 
 you should first visit." On inspecting this School of Design in 
 Paris, I found in the lower rooms the methods and work of a 
 first-class drawing school. But in the upper rooms the classes 
 were painting on elegant goblets, cups, plates, vases and other 
 choicer wares, just brought from Sevres and to be returned there 
 for baking. After' witnessing this truly artistic work, I no 
 longer wondered that in the Sevres factory itself the artisan 
 had indeed become the artist, and that only men of princely 
 wealth could procure the products of this unrivalled estab- 
 lishment. 
 
 In Belgium the girls have shared the advantages of Indus- 
 trial Schools as well as the boys. The schools for training in 
 lace-making and embroidering, in Brussels, have long been cele- 
 brated, and kindred schools have more recently been opened in 
 Bowlers, Ghent, Ath, Deerlyk and in many other places in that 
 busy little kingdom. Tq those familiar with this fact, it was 
 no surprise that Belgian lace shown at the Philadelphia Expo- 
 sition was unrivalled. Some Industrial Schools are main- 
 tained wholly by the central government, others partially, and 
 still others are supported by endowments, and many are private 
 institutions dependent mostly on tuition for support. A large 
 number called 'apprentice schools are maintained by benevolent 
 associations. These are designed to train boys and girls b°th 
 in skilled manipulations in various trades, and in the practical 
 studies and theories most helpful in such pursuits. 
 
 <- Belgium, with about fifty industrial schools, and fifteen thou- 
 sand apprentices graduated from them, Germany with over 
 fifty-two thousand apprentices in fourteen hundred and fifty 
 industrial schools, and France with twelve thousand industrial 
 scholars, show the practical, appreciation of these institutions 
 in these countries, which distance the competition of surround- 
 ing nations in the great markets of the world. Steam and 
 the telegraph are bringing all nations into such near neighbor- 
 hood that industrial ascendancy will belong to that country 
 which provides the best industrial education. 
 
 The Artisan School established nine years ago in Rotterdam,- 
 Holland, has already two hundred pupils and commands the 
 confidence of that community. Candidates for admission must 
 pass an examination in the simpler rudiments, and are expected 
 
OS 
 
 to remain in the school three years. The institution is both a 
 school and a shop, and the time of the pupils is daily divided 
 between the two. "Drawing, Physics and Elementary Mechanics 
 are prominent among the practical studies of the school room. 
 In the shops a great variety of trades are taught, such as stone- 
 cutting, including keystones, steps, thresholds, flooring tiles 
 and placing plinths ; masonry, including plain walls, founda- 
 tions, chimneys, niches, sewers, arches, &c. ; smithery, or' mak- 
 ing cramps, hooks, hinges, nuts, locks, girders, &c. The braziers 
 are taught forging, turning, stretching and soldering, and make 
 water-cans, dust-pans, kettles^ basins, springs and various 
 kitchen utensils. The instrument-makers learn to cut screws 
 and worms, forge steel and copper and cast copper objects. 
 The carpenters make chests, desks, trestles, windows, doors and 
 the like. The painters learn to make putty, grind paint, polish 
 wood, set glass, paint letters and to grain in imitation of marble 
 or the choicer woods. In the Philadelphia Exposition the 
 admirable exhibit of the various articles made by these boys 
 proved alike their skill and the practical value of this institution. 
 In view of the great variety of the work and the need of 
 individual instruction, twenty-one masters are employed in this 
 school. Great prominence is given to drawing, as lying at the 
 foundation of skilled industry. The Director is the teacher of 
 construction and projective drawing. There are four other 
 teachers of drawing — rectilinear, architectural, ornamental and 
 model drawing, arid one or more in each of the other depart- 
 ments above named. The boys draw simple constructions from 
 wood, iron or brick work, such as window joints, doors, jambs, 
 ravelins, stair-cases, roof-constructions, brace-works, springs, 
 locks, cornices, architraves, &c. The school studies occupy 
 each morning and the practical instruction in the workshops 
 the afternoon. As soon as the boys are made familiar with 
 the tools, they are entrusted with practical and marketable 
 work, not'sham or play-work, but the making of saleable arti- 
 cles for the trade, so that they at once feel that they are engaged 
 in real business. This plan excites the ambition of the boys 
 and adds interest and dignity to their work. The workshops 
 are of the most approved kind and are supplied with the best 
 tools and appliances. In the carpenter's shop, there are benches 
 
54: 
 
 with their appliances for eighty boys ; and in the smithies are 
 all needed forges, anvils, vices, benches, &c. ; for seventy boys. 
 The directors, on whose authority the above statements are 
 given, say, that on successfully completing their three years 
 course, these boys receive considerably higher pay than those 
 who have not enjoyed the advantages of the school. 
 
 Nee,dle work forms a part of the course of instruction for 
 girls in a large part of the elementary schools of Europe, In 
 Switzerland four thousand three hundred and seventy-three 
 females are employed in schools teaching needle work In 
 some schools I saw these teachers training their scholars in the 
 use of the American sewing machine. 
 
 When one has inspected her technical schools and her 
 twenty-nine industrial schools, he is no longer surprised that 
 Switzerland is especially the home of industry, for her mechanics 
 are educated and skillful. Though hemmed in by mountains, 
 without a seaport, with few minerals and no coal, with costly 
 transportation, all freight from the sea board coming over for- 
 eign territory, she threatens the ribbon trade of Coventry, rivals 
 the English in muslin and delaine; and the world in watches 
 and wood-carving. More than one million watches are made 
 annually in Geneva and Neuchatel alone. The Swiss are an 
 ingenious and industrious people, They believe in the dignity 
 of labor and in the thorough mastery of some trade. In their 
 industrial schools, prominence is given to drawing, designing 
 and moulding, as well as to practice in the trades. Hence the 
 world pays substantial tribute to Switzerland for the exquisite 
 taste displayed in the decorative arts, their unequaled carvings, 
 their beautiful chasings in gold and silver, their silk ribbons, 
 their watches and music boxes. 
 
 The Earl of Eosebury says that the cause of this rapid pro- 
 gress of Swiss manufacture is plainly " the complete and special 
 education which she gives in primary schools and practical 
 schools, and trade schools, and secondary schools, and cantonal 
 schools, all topped up by the great Polytechnic Institute at 
 Zurich. The Swiss manufacturer is master of his business, and 
 his workmen with whom he is in perpetual contact, respect him 
 for this. Master and servant have been at the same school learn- 
 ing their craft, and they know it thoroughly." 
 
55 
 
 Public Softools, industrial schools and, the Polytechnic' Insth 
 tute have in a remarkable manner unified and fraternized the 
 people of these twenty -five cantons. Though separate in race, 
 religion and language, they are one in national- sympathy and 
 interest, proud of their history, and prouder still of their recent 
 progress and manufacturing prosperity. "While beggars are 
 found everywhere in Europe, there is less pauperism in Switzer- 
 land than in any other nation on the continent. With no 
 communism, there is still a general diffusion of property, and 
 almost every one is a land-owner. 
 
 In our country by reason of the restrictions imposed by our 
 Trades Unions, apprenticeships are so much lessened that it is 
 now difficult for boys to learn a trade. Hence inqreasing num- 
 bers are growing up to manhood in idleness, without any regular 
 calling, or seeking to earn a livelihood without manual labor. 
 This limitation of apprenticeships is a short-sighted and suicidal 
 v plan, sure to cripple our future mechanics. It seeks a temporary 
 gain at the sacrifice of a permanent prosperity, and is depriving 
 many boys of that thorough training in the several trades which 
 is essential to their skill and success. The system of apprentice- 
 ship ought to be encouraged as an indispensable part of the 
 practical education of our future artizans. Otherwise our 
 youth must surrender the most lucrative positions to skilled 
 mechanics imported from abroad. This waning of apprentice- 
 ships, which cannot easily be remedied, creates the greater 
 necessity for industrial education. 
 
 In speaking of the substitution of steam power for hand 
 labor, J. Scott Eussell says : " Occupations which require no 
 skill, but only brute force, will necessarily be vacated by human 
 hands. Society, in the march of improvement, is as certain to 
 do without the unskilled, unintelligent and uneducated as 
 it is to do without wild plants and animals." Certainly any 
 system of public instruction which leaves industrial education 
 out of the account is radically defective. Fortunately this 
 was the theory and practice of the early settlers of Connecti- 
 cut. The founders of this State valued and honored industry. 
 The code of 1650 which stood in this respect unchanged for over 
 one hundred and fifty years required, " That all parents and 
 masters do breed and bring up their children and apprentices in 
 
56 
 
 some, honest lawful calling, labor or employment, either in hus- 
 bandry or some other trade, profitable to themselves and the 
 Commonwealth, if they will not or cannot train them up in 
 learning to fit them for higher employments." In 1683, Penn 
 proposed the following resolution, which was adopted by the 
 Provincial Council, " That all children within this province of 
 the age of twelve years shall be taught some useful trade or 
 skill, to the end that none may be idle, but that the poor may 
 work to live, and the rich, if they become poor, may not want." 
 How different would have 'been the history of Virginia and 
 South Carolina, with their sunny climate and greater natural 
 resources, had the founders of those States preached and prac- 
 ticed these sentiments which have been the source of the thrift, 
 growth and prosperity of the North. Elizabeth Thompson 
 well says : " Honest labor is the need of the hour, alike 
 demanded by the physical, mental, moral and financial condi- 
 tion of the nation. Industrial education alone can bring about 
 this . reformation by joining with labor skill, dignity and 
 honor." Industrial schools are now more needed than new 
 colleges. " The danger is not of over education, with earnest 
 aims and in the right channels) but of a genteel and lazy dilet- 
 tanteism." 
 
 I have discussed this subject partly in order to invite the 
 attention of wealthy men to its importance, and ultimately secure 
 liberal endowments for industrial education. The extract from 
 the will of David "Watkinson, given below, and the liberal offer 
 of one hundred thousand dollars by Hon. T. M. Allyn for the 
 support of an industrial school in Hartford, show that this need 
 has long been felt. If the Loomis Institute with its large 
 endowment shall be devoted to the purpose of industrial educa- 
 tion, it will meet a great and growing want, which no existing 
 institution in the State attempts to supply. If the liberal offer 
 of Mr. Allyn should be continued and accepted, it would be a 
 nucleus around which other gifts would gather till the school 
 should prove a great benefaction to the State. Such, at least, 
 was the result of the donation of Mr. Boynton in Massachusetts. 
 
 The Worcester Free Institute was started by the gift of 
 $127,000 by John Boynton. This beginning led Ichabod 
 Washburne to consider the pressing demand for industrial 
 
57 
 
 training, and he gave $130,000 to enlarge the resources of the 
 Institute. Further endowments were made by Stephen Salis- 
 bury of $250,000, and by the State of Massachusetts of 
 $50,000 giving a total endowment of $557,000. If the surviv- 
 ing members of the Loomis family carry out their present plan, 
 the "Loomis Institute" will have double this endowment 
 Without even the semblance of dictation in the plans which 
 they alone have the right to form, and with a grateful apprecia- 
 tion of the beneficent spirit they evince, I most respectfully 
 suggest to them, and to other wealthy men who desire to become 
 benefactors of the State, this means of meeting a great public 
 need and erecting a lasting monument to their memory. 
 
 The following is the plan of the proposed gift of Mr. Allyn 
 to the, city of Hartford, some five years ago. 
 
 To the Mayor, Aldermen and Common Council of the City of 
 1 Hartford: 
 
 The undersigned hereby offers to give to the City of Hartford 
 the sum of one hundred thousand dollars, to be expended in the 
 establishment and erection of an industrial school (under such 
 rules and regulations as the authorities of the city may from 
 time to time make), for the free education of both boys and 
 girls in the business avocations of life, agriculture and the 
 mechanic arts. The school should be a model, fashioned 
 after our best ideal. It should possess ample grounds for an 
 agricultural department, botanical gardens, and workshops, 
 where all the principal trades may be learned. Every boy, 
 at the same time he is acquiring a knowledge of the arts, 
 sciences and modern languages, should become a practical 
 agriculturist, or master some useful trade. The girls should 
 be instructed in all the practical duties of the household, be- 
 come familiar with the chemistry of the kitchen, and made 
 to master the art of making any article of a lady's .wardrobe, 
 and also they may learn bookkeeping, banking, telegraphy, 
 photography or any other occupation that is within the meas- 
 ure of their strength and adapted to their tastes. In this 
 manner the education of the student would become a health- 
 ful exercise and a most fascinating amusement, instead of 
 being (like the present system) destructive to vitality, exhaust- 
 
58 
 
 ing the brain, and converting the school-room into an unat- 
 tractive place little better than a prison., 
 
 It is believed that the amount proposed to be given will 
 be sufficient for the_ purchase of the ground, erect suitable 
 buildings and supply all the topis and apparatus required for 
 the carrying out of the enterprise. The annual expense in- 
 curred of running the institution, after deducting the amount 
 it would be entitled to receive from the school fund, 'should 
 be cheerfully borne by the city; Should the proposition be 
 entertained and the city accept the gift, it may be necessary to 
 execute articles of agreement to secure the faithful perform- 
 ance of the trust assumed by the city. 
 
 T. M. Allyn. 
 
 extract from the wlll of david w atkinson, who 
 died at Habtfoed, Conn., Dec. 13, 1857. 
 
 Codicil No. 11. 
 
 Article V. " Desiring to render a public benefit to the com- 
 munity in which I live, and to the State of Connecticut gener- 
 ally, by aiding in the establishment in the town of Hartford of 
 a Juvenile Asylum and Farm School, for the family and school 
 and industrial training of a class of children not now adequately 
 provided for in any educational or humane institution : I do 
 give and bequeath to my Executors the lot of land of about, 
 ten acres, surrounded \>y four streets, known as the Pavilion 
 property, with the buildings standing thereon, and by me esti- 
 mated to be worth the sum of $40,000 and in addition to said 
 lot the sum of $20,000, said lot to be conveyed in fee simple, 
 and said money to be paid over to Henry Barnard 2d, Edmond 
 Gr. Howe, William L. Collins, William N. Matson, Henry Clay 
 Trumbull, Daniel C. Grilman, Eoland Mather, Newton Case, 
 Alfred Watkinson, John S. Butler, Henry A. Perkins, Albert 
 W. Butler, Edward Goodwin, E. A. Bulkeley, William D. 
 Shipman and Austin Dunham, or such of them as may be living 
 at the time of my decease, as Trustees for the purposes and 
 uses herein set forth, viz :— to aid in the establishment and 
 support of an institution for the relief, protection, instruction, 
 reformation and employment of children between the ages of 
 
59 
 
 six and twenty-one years who may be voluntarily entrusted to 
 it for any or all of these purposes by the parent or guardians, 
 or committed to its charge by competent authority. 
 
 Article VII The institution designed to be established and 
 aided by this bequest, is to be organized and conducted on 
 the general principles and methods recognized in the Eauhen 
 House near Hamburg in Germany, and the Agricultural Colony 
 at Mettray in France, as described in Barnard's National Educa- 
 tion in Europe (Edition of 1854), and in the Boston Asylum 
 and Farm School, incorporated in its present form in }833, 
 and the New York Juvenile Asylum, incorporated in 1851, 
 with such modifications as may be by the Trustees deemed to 
 be better adapted to the peculiar condition of the people of this 
 State, or which may be suggested by their own experience or 
 that of similar institutions." 
 
 The amount of the "Watkinson Fund is now $207,000. Of 
 this sum $162,000 is invested in productive funds and $45,000 
 in land. The last sentence of the will gives the Trustees 
 authority to make such modifications as they may deem need- 
 ful for the industrial training of the inmates of the School. 
 If industrial education becomes a prominent feature of the 
 Institution, it will, in the words of the will, be " better 
 adapted to the peculiar condition of the people of this 
 State." The principles and methods recognized in the Eauhen 
 House and Mettray School may be inferred from the follow; 
 ing statement: The "Colonie Agricole," at Mettray, near 
 Tours, in France, was founded in 1839 as an institution for the 
 reformation and training of children liable to become vicious 
 and criminal. Besides receiving instruction in the necessary 
 school studies, they are taught various useful, occupations, 
 such as farming, and the trades of the wheelwright, blacksmith, 
 joiner, carpenter, mason, shoe-maker, wooden-shoe-maker, 
 tailor, rope-maker, sail-maker, etc. 
 
 The Eeform School of the " Eauhen House," at Horn, near 
 Hamburg, was founded in 1833. Here as at Mettray, the 
 " family system " is maintained. The labor performed includes 
 house-keeping and home-work, field and garden culture, and 
 such occupations as shoe-making, making and mending clothes 
 and bedding, carpentry and wooden-shoe-making, woolen-thread 
 
60 
 
 spinning, faking, masonry and painting, house-keeping apd 
 basket-making. There are also workshops . for printing, book- 
 binding, lithographing, stereotyping and wood-engraving. The 
 girls fill the places of servants, cooks, washerwomen, ironers, 
 laundry-women and seamstresses. The younger girls help the 
 older, make and mend coarse linen, knit and mend stockings, 
 etc. 
 
 The German Government has long sought to make industrial 
 pursuits reputable and uniyersal. To this end, members of the 
 rtoyal family have practiced as well as preached the gospel of 
 honest work. In Carlsruhe, I learned of an excellent girls' 
 school in the Schloss,, in which the Grand Duchess of Baden, 
 the only daughter of the Emperor of Germany, had. recently 
 placed her young daughter, with instructions that she should 
 be excused from none of the household industries required of 
 the other pupils, that she should be trained in sewing and 
 knitting, and made as thorough a seamstress as if she were to 
 earn her livelihood by her needle. During her school life she 
 is not to be distinguished by any of the high titles which she 
 may bear in after life. In all respects she is to be on a par 
 with her young companions, receiving no favoritism in view of 
 her rank, but to WOEK and play, run and romp, give and take 
 on perfectly equal* terms with her companions, and receive 
 exactly the same punishments if remiss in study or work. 
 I £he present Crown Prince of Prussia early learned the cabinet 
 makers' trade, and at Babelsberg near Potsdam, the Summer 
 Palace of the Emperor of Germany, are shown articles of fur- 
 niture of superior workmanship made by him. His cousin, 
 Prince Frederick Charles, learned the trade of glazier, and 
 became quite artistic and enthusiastic in his craft. Fine speci- 
 mens of his work may be seen in the Potsdam Palace, consisting 
 chiefly of colored glass tastefully joined together by means of 
 lead and tin strips, like the fine colored memorial glass windows 
 so often found in churches. Such examples of honoring indus- 
 try have exerted a vast and beneficent influence throughout 
 fhe German Empire 
 
61 
 
 EDUCATION AND LABOR. 
 
 The great majority of our pupils must work for a living. 
 By the ordinance of Heaven, the necessity of labor is well- 
 nigh universal. Nature and history alike confirm the old 
 decree, "In the sweat of thy face shalt thou eat bread." 
 Teachers and school officers should carefully inquire whether 
 our schools are accomplishing all they ought to do for the 
 working classes. It is a grand result that all are trained to 
 read and write and cipher, and learn something of the other 
 common rudiments. In no part of the world, except Germany, 
 are there so few native illiterates as in New England. 
 
 The general intelligence of the people is one obvious cause of 
 our exemption from the railway strikes of last summer. The 
 sober second thought prevailed here, while madness ruled the 
 hour elsewhere. But beneficent as has been the influence of 
 the public school in New England, it has by no means done its 
 whole duty to the laboring classes. More should be said and 
 done to dignify labor and prepare our youth to become skilled 
 workmen as well as industrious and upright citizens. It is a 
 mistake to suppose that education need create any aversion to 
 labor, or that those who do the roughest work need the least 
 schooling. 
 
 Under, the system of slavery in the South, and until recently 
 with the serfs of Bussia and the equally illiterate farm hands 
 of England, it was held as an axiom that schooling would 
 make laborers discontented, . restless and unprofitable ser- 
 vants, and that universal education would render manual 
 labor distasteful and disreputable. Too much of this mis- 
 chievous legacy of slavery lingers among us still. The silly 
 and wicked notion that labor is menial ought to be refuted in 
 our schools, where our youth should be early taught -the neces- 
 sity and dignity of labor, as the primal source of all human 
 excellence and progress. Girls as well as boys should be early 
 taught both in the family and school that to learn to be useful 
 
62 
 
 is alike their duty, privilege and interest. Education should 
 thus be made the auxiliary of labor. Instead of treating it as 
 a degrading drudgery, education should elevate labor and 
 render it more skillful and productive. If the true bearing of 
 education on industry was taught in our schools, our youth 
 would grow up under the salutary conviction that education 
 is economy, and so far from degrading labor makes it more 
 inviting i and profitable, because the skilled workman so fore- 
 casts his plans that every blow tells, thus economizing his time 
 and strength and stock, and even in the humblest work, accom- 
 plishing more, in better style, and with less damage to tools or 
 machinery, than the boor who can use only brute muscle. Pride 
 in one's work leads to higher excellence both in his craft and 
 character. The skilled artizan who delights to do his best , 
 to-day, will aspire to do better still to-morrow. On the other 
 hand, the too common theory that labor is a degrading drudgery 
 will consciously demean any workman and bar improvement in 
 his trade. . 
 
 Connecticut is a busy hive of manufactories. The industrial 
 interests of no State are more vital to its prosperity. We are 
 a working people, and the cause of the workman is the cause of 
 all. The problem of our State and of our day is to elevate 
 work by educating and. thus elevating the workmen. The 
 masses are learning that mere muscle is weak, that brains help 
 the hands in all work, that knowledge multiplies the value and 
 productive power of muscular efforts. If knowledge is power, 
 ignorance is waste and weakness. What a man is, stamps an 
 impress upon what he does, even in the humblest forms of 
 industry. The character of the work depends upon the work- 
 man. Whatever elevates the laborer improves his labor. In 
 proportion as you degrade the operative even to the degree of 
 serf or slave, you. depreciate his work. , You can dignify work 
 therefore in no way so surely as by elevating the workman. 
 The wealth and welfare of individuals and States, always 
 dependent on labor, can be most fully secured only by edu- 
 cated labpr. If rightly conducted, our schools, so far from 
 breeding discontent with the humblest pursuits, will prepare 
 for success in the ordinary callings of life. 
 
 Instead of this, I find in some cases the chief aim is promo- 
 
63 
 
 tion to the next higher grade, and from that up to the highest 
 or High School, and the programme is planned for those who 
 complete the full curriculum, rather than for the majority who 
 withdraw early for work or business. It is worthy of inquiry 
 whether at each successive step the conditions of promotion 
 may not wisely include the same studies and attainments 
 which constitute the best preparation for the business of life, 
 as well as for higher grades in school. 
 
 How to secure the best results with the least cost of time as 
 well as money, is a problem not yet fully solved. Our text 
 books, now too voluminous, should comprise less of minute 
 details and more of practical methods and principles. Such 
 topics in arithmetic as the least common multiple of common 
 fractions, casting out of nines in multiplication and division, 
 alligation medial and alternate, and commutation of radix, may 
 well be omitted in a common school course, or briefly noticed 
 fn the appendix. Those and kindred topics, of no use in 
 ordinary business, fill a large space in nearly all the arithmetics. 
 They have a traditionary sanction. In continuing them the 
 authors have consulted usage more than utility. Like the 
 titled scions of rank in the old world, they have come down by 
 so long a literary descent that no one disputes their right to 
 their honored place. Worth more than all these complicated 
 processes is the thorough mastery of the ground rules. In all 
 our schools rapid mental combinations should be daily prac- 
 ticed till pupils can add, multiply and divide with the utmost 
 facility and accuracy. This'done, the rest of arithmetic will be 
 comparatively easy and pleasant 
 
 Ex-President Thomas Hill justly complains that our " Arith- 
 metics have been expanded until the unfortunate pupil is lost 
 in a wilderness of words, and does not find his way through, in 
 time to learn to cipher. The science of arithmetic receives so 
 much attention that the art is neglected. Life is not long 
 enough to spend so long a proportion of it on arithmetic as is 
 spent in the modern system of teaching it, and arithmetic is too 
 valuable an art to have our children neglect to acquire facility 
 in it, instead of being stupefied and disgusted with premature 
 attempts to understand it as a science." It is certainly a use- 
 less repetition to require children to learn, for example, explana- 
 
64 
 
 tions of the first principles of fractions,, percentage and the li 
 as they are scattered through four or five volumes, each si 
 cessive series setting forth the same subjects only with grea 
 fullness and complication. In many schools arithmetic is th 
 made a subject of study for eight or nine years, when thi 
 or four years ought to give the pupil the mastery of the ess< 
 tials, including rapid mental combinations. He should les 
 the multiplication table early and thoroughly, and acquire gr< 
 -rapidity in all practical processes. 
 
 By the condensation or omission of too extended serial boo 
 in geography, grammar and arithmetic, and in the latter stu 
 mastering thoroughly only the practical portions and postpc 
 'ing the intricacies of compound proportion, permutation a 
 the like, that not one in a thousand ever uses in the practii 
 business of life, more time can be gained for reading, spellii 
 writing, the study and use of our own language, composite 
 at least in letter writing, and elementary lessons in the practii 
 sciences, natural history, political economy, and the history 
 our own country. 
 
65 
 
 WHAT BOYS ARE READING. 
 
 A timely appeal to the public has just been made, bearing 
 the signatures of eminent citizens of New Haven who repre- 
 sent both political parties and, the Baptist, Roman Catholic, 
 Congregational and Episcopal churches. I welcome this warn- 
 ing, as I have had occasion to observe widely the pernicious 
 influence of bad books and papers. Finding ten years ago that 
 such papers as the Boston Illustrated Police News, the New 
 York National Police Gazette, and Day's Doings were freely sold 
 in the cars, I addressed a letter to the President or Superintend- 
 ent of every railway in Connecticut asking if I might announce 
 authoritatively in my next Report that "the sale of immoral 
 papers is not permitted in the cars or stations of your railway." 
 Cordial replies came promptly from the officers of every rail- 
 road of our State expressing their earnest purpose to do their 
 part in the suppression of this great evil. One reply shows the 
 spirit of all. " I fully appreciate your views and most heartily 
 concur in your wish, and will do my utmost to prevent the 
 circulation of such papers." Obscene books, papers and pictures 
 are the worst of outlaws. The most indecent of this class are 
 sold clandestinely. But there are others, sold openly, like those 
 named in the following "appeal," which though less filthy, are 
 more corrupting, if not more infamous than the most lecherous 
 issues of the Parisian press. The poison which nauseates by an 
 overdose, may be its own antidote. Professing to be illustrated 
 histories of the week, these papers are in fact chroniclers of, or 
 contributors to, the bar-room and the brothel. The safety of 
 our youth now demands the utmost effort for the exclusion of 
 such contamination. In behalf of the children of the State, -I 
 earnestly invoke the aid and cooperation of all parents, the 
 officers of justice, the public press, and of all good citizens, in 
 efficient measures for the suppression of the evil so well set 
 forth in the following appeal and extracts from the paper of 
 Professor Sumner. 
 
"We desire to call attention to the cheap, trashy literature 
 "which is demoralizing the youth of our country. In this class 
 we notice the paper named The New York Boys 1 Weekly, with a 
 reputed circulation of 40,000, and The Boys of New York, with 
 a reputed circulation of 50;000. These papers contain stories 
 of 'the most sensational and slangy character, judging by the 
 titles, of which we name the following : ' Dashing Dick, King 
 of the Highway,' ' Yankee Claude Duval, the Dashing Knight 
 of the Eoad,' ' Corkey, or the Tricks and Travels of a Supe,' 
 'Shorty, jr., or the Son of his Dad,' 'Bang TJp, or the Boy 
 Eanchero,' etc., etc. We see not one redeeming trait in these 
 or other papers olf this class. "We are informed that many of 
 the advertisements in their columns are of the most villainous 
 kind. Will you not do what you can to warn your readers 
 against the peril that besets our youth? We inclose Professor 
 Sumner's article, reprinted from Scribner's Monthly, which we 
 beg you to use according to your judgment in whole or in part 
 Our object is not to advertise any periodical in place of those 
 we deprecate, but only to warn the public of a danger suspected 
 by few and realized by fewer still. 
 
 Noah Porter, Leonard Bacon, 
 
 Theodore D. Woolsey, Francis Watland, / 
 William M. Barbour, Hugh Carmodt, 
 James E. English, Edwin Harwoo^, 
 
 Francis A. Walker." 
 
 "Few gentlemen, who, have occasion to visit news-offices, can 
 have failed to notice the periodical literature for boys, which 
 has been growing up during the last few years. The increase 
 in the number of these papers and magazines, and the appear- 
 ance, from time to time, of new ones, which, to judge by the 
 pictures, are always worse than the old, seem to indicate that 
 they find a wide market. Moreover, they appear not only 
 among the idle and vicious boys in great cities, but also among 
 school-boys whose parents are careful about the influences 
 brought to bear on their children. No student of social phe- 
 nomena can pass with neglect facts of this kind, — so practical, 
 and so important in their possible effects on society. 
 
 These periodicals contain stories, songs, mock speeches, and 
 
67 
 
 negro minstrel dialogues,-— and nothing , else. The literary 
 material is either intensely stupid, or spiced to the highest de- 
 gree with sensation. The stories are about hunting, Indian 
 warfare, California desperado life, pirates, wild sea adventure, 
 highwaymen, crimes and horrible accidents, horrors (tortures 
 and snake stories), gamblers, practical jokes, the life of vaga- 
 bond boys, and the wild behavior of dissipated boys in great 
 cities. This catalogue is exhaustive. There are no other 
 stories. The dialogue is short, sharp, and continuous. It is 
 broken by the minimum of description and by no preaching. 
 It is almost entirely in slang of the most exaggerated kind, and 
 of every variety, — that of the sea, of California, and of the 
 Bowery; of negroes, 'Dutchmen,' Yankees, Chinese, and In- 
 dians, to say nothing of that of a score of the most irregular 
 and questionable occupations ever followed by men. "When 
 the stories even nominally treat of school-life, they say nothing 
 of school-life. There is simply a succession of practical jokes, 
 mischief, outrages, heroic but impossible feats, fighting, and 
 horrors, but nothing about the business Of school, any more 
 than if the house in which the boys live were a summer board- 
 ing-house. The sensational incidents in these stories are intro- 
 duced by force, apparently for the mere purpose of producing 
 a highly spiced mixture. 
 
 One type of hero who figures largely in these stories is the 
 vagabond boy,- in the streets of a great city, in the Rocky 
 Mountains, or at sea. Sometimes he has some ' cleverness in 
 singing, or dancing, or ventriloquism, or negro acting, and he 
 gains a precarious living while roving about. This"vagabond 
 life of adventure is represented as interesting and enticing, and, 
 when the hero rises from vagabond life to flash life, that is 
 represented as success. Respectable home life, on the other 
 hand, is not depicted at all, and is only referred to as stupid 
 and below the ambition of a clever youth. Industry and econ- 
 omy in some regular pursuit, or in study, are never mentioned 
 at all Generosity does not consist in even luxurious expend- 
 iture, but in wasting money. The type seems to be that of the 
 gambler, one day ' flush ' and wasteful, another day ruined and 
 in misery. 
 
 There is a»o*her type of boy who sometimes furnishes the 
 
68 
 
 hero of a story, but who also figures more or less in all of them. 
 That is the imp of mischief, — the sort of boy who is an intoler- 
 able nuisance to the neighborhood. The stories are told from 
 the stand-point of the boy, so that he seems to be a fine fellow, 
 and all the world, which is against him, is unjust ^nd overbear- 
 ing. His father, the immediate representative of society, exe- 
 cutes its judgments with the rod, which again is an insult to 
 the high-spirited youth, and produces on his side, either open 
 war, or a dignified retreat to some distant region. 
 
 These stories are not markedly profane, and they are not 
 obscene. They are indescribably vulgar. They represent boys 
 as engaging all the time in the rowdy type of drinking. The 
 heroes are either swaggering^ vulgar swells, of the rowdy style, 
 or they are in the vagabond mass below the rowdy swejl. They 
 are continually associating with criminals, gamblers, and low 
 people who live by their wits. The theater of the stories is 
 always disreputable. The proceedings and methods of persons 
 of the criminal and disreputable classes, who appear in the sto- 
 ries, are all described in detail. The boy reader obtains a theo- 
 retical and literary acquaintance with methods of fraud and 
 crime. Sometimes drunkenness is represented in its disgrace 
 and misery, but generally drinking is represented as jolly and 
 entertaining, and there is no suggestion that boys who act as 
 the boys in these stories do ever have to pay any penalty for it 
 in after life. The persons who are held up to admiration are the 
 heroes and heroines t of bar-rooms, concert saloons, variety thea- 
 ters, and negro minstrel troupes. From the specimens which 
 we have examined we may generalize the following in regard 
 to the views of life which these stories inculcate, and the code 
 of morals and manners which they teach : 
 
 The first thing which a boy ought to acquire is physical 
 strength for fighting purposes. The feats of strength performed 
 by these youngsters in combat with men and animals are ridic- 
 ulous in the extreme. In regard to details the supposed code 
 of English brutality prevails, especially in the stories which 
 have English local color, but it is always mixed with the code 
 of the revolver, and, in many of the Stories, the latter is taught 
 in its fullness. These youngsters generally carry revolvers and 
 
use them at their good discretion. Every youth "who aspires 
 to manliness ought to get and carry a revolver. 
 
 A boy ought to cheat the penurious father who does not give 
 him as much money as he finds necessary, and ought to compel 
 him to pay. A good way to force him to pay liberally, and at 
 the same time to stop criticising his son's habits, is to find out 
 his own vices (he always has some) and then to levy black-mail 
 on him. Every boy, who does not want to be ' green ' and 
 ' soft,' ought to 'see the elephant.' All fine manly young fel- 
 lows are familiar with the actors and singers at variety theaters, 
 and the girl waiters at concert saloons. As to drinking, the 
 bar-room code is taught. The boys stop in at bar-rooms all 
 along the street, swallow drinks standing or leaning with rowdy 
 grace on the bar. They treat and are treated, and consider it 
 insulting to refuse or to be refused. The good fellows meet 
 every one on a footing of equality — above all in a bar-room. 
 
 Quiet home life is stupid and unmanly. Boys brought up 
 in it never know the world or life. They have to work hard 
 and to bow down to false doctrines which parsons and teachers 
 in league with parents, have invented against boys. To become 
 ' a true man, a boy must break with respectability and join the 
 vagabonds and the swell mob. No fine young fellow, who 
 knows life, need mind the law, still less the police. The latter 
 are all stupid louts. If a boy's father is rich and he has money, 
 he can easily find smart lawyers (advertisement gratis) who can 
 get the boy out of prison, and will dine with him at Delmonico's 
 afterward. The sympathies of a manly young fellow are with 
 criminals against the law, and he conceals crime when he can. 
 Whatever good or ill happens to a young man he should always 
 be gay. The only ills in question are physical pain or lack of 
 money. These should be borne with gayety and indifference, 
 but should not alter the philosophy of life. 
 
 As to the rod, it is not so easy to generalize. Teachers and 
 parents, in these stories, act faithfully up to Solomon's precept 
 When a father flogs his son, the true doctrine seems to be that 
 the son should run away and seek a life of adventure. When 
 he does this he has no difficulty in finding friends, or in living 
 by his wits, so that he makes money, and comes back rich and 
 glorious, to find his father in the poor-house, 
 
70 
 
 These periodicals seem to be intended for boys from twelv 
 to sixteen years of age, although they often treat of older pe: 
 sons. Probably many boys outgrow them and come to see th 
 folly and falsehood of them. It is impossible, however, that s 
 much corruption should be afloat and not exert some influenci 
 "We say nothing of the great harm which is done to boys c 
 that age, by the nervous excitement of reading harrowing an 
 sensational stories, because the literature before us only partic 
 pates in that harm with other literature of far higher preter 
 sions. But what we have said suffices to show that these pape] 
 poison boys' minds with views of life which are so base an 
 false as to destroy all manliness and all chances of true succes: 
 How far they are read by boys of good home influences we an 
 of course, unable to say. They certainly are within the reac 
 of all. They can be easily obtained, and easily concealed, an 
 it is a question for parents and teachers how far this is dom 
 Persons under those responsibilities ought certainly to kno 1 
 what the character of this literature is." 
 
r 7V 
 
 WHAT SHOULD 0"JR BOYS BEAD? 
 
 Teachers can largely determine the reading of 'their scholars' 
 out of school. It is important not only to awaken a love 
 of boots, but to guide in their selection and form a taste 
 for profitable reading. Scholars should be encouraged to 
 . have some good book always at home, in which they read 
 a little every day. In school they should be invited to 
 tell what they have read. To give an epitome of one's reading 
 is an admirable school exercise. The pupil will peruse a book 
 with ten-fold greater interest, when expecting to epitomize his 
 author before the school. As a drill of memory and in language 
 it is a most useful exercise, and is one that is sure to interest 
 as well as profit the school. Having experienced these advan- 
 tages in my own teaching, and witnessed them in many schools, 
 I strongly recommend this practice, already adopted by some, 
 to all the teachers of Connecticut. Instead of giving here a list 
 of books for all the youth of the State, I advise teachers to 
 recommend well known works, in adaptation to the age, taste 
 and advancement of individual pupils, usually those which 
 they themselves have read, that they may the better appreciate 
 and criticise the epitomes of the same by the pupils. 
 
 An eminent teacher recently asked a class of fifty-seven boys, 
 "What is the last book you have read? One answered "I 
 haven't read any lately," another, "I don't remember," "can't 
 tell " said a, third. But the great majority were able to give an 
 account of their reading, which was most creditable to their 
 teacher, evincing his wholesome influence over his pupils out- 
 side of the school room. Twenty-seven had been reading 
 works of history and biography, including Life and Times of 
 Benjamin Franklin, Life of Prescott, Higginson's History of 
 the United States, Irving's Washington, Lives of Cicero, Han- 
 nibal, Caesar, Xerxes, Alexander, Ferdinand and Isabella. 
 Three boys were reading Dickens' History of England and one 
 was enjoying Bancroft's ten volume History of the United 
 
72 
 
 .States, another had just read three volumes of Macaulay's Es- 
 says. Shakespeare, Bunyan, Bulwer, DeFoe, Jules Verne and 
 Oliver Optic had one reader each. What Career?, Avis, Mar- 
 ble Fawn, History of Propellers, Management of Horses, Seven 
 Oaks, Miss Miihlbach's Empress Josephine, Ways of the "World, 
 Half-Hour Natural Science Series, American Explorers, Little 
 Men,' Spike's Sources of the Nile, Wide Wide World, Wav- 
 erly, Fortunes of Nigel and Quentin Durward were also named. 
 
 I invite our teachers to test their scholars in the same way 
 during the present year, and to send me lists of the books read 
 by their pupils. With the cooperation of teachers and school 
 officers we may learti what the youth of Connecticut are reading. 
 This effort will enlist the attention of parents and secure their 
 aid in the selection of better, books and periodicals for their 
 children, and thus check a growing evil and accomplish great 
 good. Teachers should foster a taste for such choice literature, 
 that travels, histories and biographies, books of science, genu- 
 ine poetry, essays and choice romances shall take the place 
 of the " blood and thunder " stories and other emphatically 
 weekly novelettes of the day. 
 
 Social reading should also be encouraged. The industry 
 in many a sewing circle has been enlivened by well selected 
 reading by one of their number. The same genial influ- 
 ence should often cheer the circle around the family hearth. 
 " Reading circles " ought to be maintained in every town, where 
 selections, in prose or poetry, often a play of Shakespeare, the 
 several parts having been previously assigned, and made the 
 subject of careful private study and drill, are rehearsed together. 
 These Reading Clubs, where each thoroughly studies his part 
 or selection till he becomes so possessed of its thought and 
 spirit as to render it in the best style he can command, not only 
 cultivate thg art of elocution, but improve the taste and develop 
 a higher appreciation of the best authors. Aside from the edu- 
 cational value of this class of evening schools, their social influ- 
 ence is happy. Divided as the residents of pur rural districts 
 too often are, by party or sect, by prejudice or neighborhood 
 difficulties, every influence tending to fraternize the people 
 should be welcomed ; every association where they meet on 
 common ground for mutual improvement, and where, kindly 
 
73 
 
 feeling and social amenities are cultivated, should be en- 
 couraged. 
 
 The teacher cannot awaken love of books unless he himself 
 continues to be a student Any one who thinks he knows 
 enough to teach even the humblest class, should never profane 
 the s'chool room by his presence. One who has ceased to be a 
 learner cannot be a good teacher. The more one has discovered, 
 the more he wants to know. The truly learned man feels the 
 greatness of his ignorance and the littleness of his knowledge 
 as but a dro,p out of the boundless ocean of truth. It has 
 been well said, " the greater the circle of our knowledge, the 
 greater the horizon of ignorance that bounds it. The pride 
 of wisdom therefore, is the proof of folly." Arrogance and as- 
 surance are not the fruits of "true learning. Yet from the days 
 of Johnson to Dickens " the school master " has been character- 
 ized in our literature as magisterial, opinionated and dogmatical. 
 Associated as teachers are with beginners, or at least inferiors 
 in attainments, seldom called to the grapple of mind with mind 
 as in forensic contests with equals or superiors, there is great 
 danger of imbibing the spirit of conceit and dogmatism, even 
 when only getting deeper in the old ruts. What is dryer than 
 an old, opinionated, self-satisfied, unprogressive school master? 
 He despises ''all your new-fangled notions." He glories in the 
 "good old ways." His fluent routine feeds his complacency, 
 though it really enervates his own mind and stupefies his 
 pupils. Whoever either in the college or primary school has 
 ceased to learn, should by all means stop teaching, for children 
 need impulse even more than instruction. Any one who no 
 longer thirsts for higher knowledge, cannot fitly lead even the 
 youngest to its fountain. As a teacher, one must be progressive, 
 or cease to be at alL The mind that stagnates must soon retro- 
 grade, and such a teacher would stultify rather than stimulate 
 his class. Happily there are now many teachers worthy of 
 their work, whose ideal is high, and who are enthusiastic in the 
 life-long work of personal culture. The efficient cooperation of 
 such teachers I confidently anticipate in the efforts now making 
 to stimulate a taste for books, and aiding our youth in the 
 selection of the best books. One who early acquires a taste 
 for reading and a love of books, will realize that his education 
 
74 
 
 is only begun when his school days are ended. To complete it 
 will be the aim and ambition of his life. Let his calling be 
 what it may, with an insatiable desire for knowledge, he will 
 find leisure for self-improvement. The many instances of self- 
 educated men whose eminence and success are due to art early 
 taste for reading, should be given to the boys who are just 
 entering the active pursuits of life, aud who are so apt to think 
 that they can no longer find time for self-culture. But is $te 
 little leisure they have well improved? Should the evenings 
 be idled away, because the days must be occupied with business, 
 or labor ? The youth whose teachers have trained them to 
 always have a goo4 book at hand for odd moments, will enter 
 the practical callings of life with a habit of inestimable import- 
 ance. 
 
75 
 
 COMPULSORY EDUCATION IN ENGLAND. 
 
 My observations during the last- year, both at home and 
 abroad, refute the old objection to obligatory education, that 
 "the laboring classes won't stand it." In the County and*State 
 Conventions of the Labor Unions recently held in Connecticut, 
 resolutions have been adopted in favor of the rigid enforcement 
 of the law for the prevention of illiteracy. Mixing much with 
 the laboring classes for the purpose of promoting school attend- 
 ance, I have been greatly encouraged by their growing appre- 
 ciation of education, whether Americans, Germans, Swedes or 
 Irish. In England the various labor organizations earnestly 
 advocate compulsory education. The opposition comes from 
 the comparatively few land-holders, the politicians and large 
 farmers. In Glasgow, where the coercive regime is in full 
 vigorj but fifty -one penalties have been inflicted in three years. 
 In Birmingham^ where the proportion of illiteracy was far 
 larger than in Glasgow, greater exertions have been requisite to 
 vanquish the "apathy of parents. In Scotland, education has 
 long been well nigh universal, while the poorer classes in Eng- 
 land and Wales were sunk in ignorance. Under the existing 
 law, the regulation of -attendance is left to the local School 
 Boards. Recent interviews with prominent friends of educa- 
 tion in England and Scotland, satisfied me that public senti- 
 ment is rapidly growing in favor of making compulsion univer- 
 sal in its application. I could learn of no signs of reaction in 
 any town where it had been adopted, but was assured that in 
 the School Boards of London, Glasgow, Manchester, Birming- 
 ham, Sheffield, Leeds, and many other large towns, there is not 
 now left a single opponent to this plan. Throughout Britain 
 experience has converted many objectors to friends. 
 
 Sir Charle3 Eeed, President of the London School Board, 
 gave me last summer some statements which happily illustrate 
 the good influence of compulsbry education in that great me- 
 tropolis. The new system went into operation in 1871. The 
 
76 
 
 school census then taken enumerated 574,693 children of school 
 age, and needing elementary education. For these children 
 only 262,259 school places were at that time provided, and 
 there were 312,434 more children than places. Over two hun- 
 dred new school houses have been provided since that date, 
 and now the Board Schools and "Voluntary Schools have ac- 
 commodations for 505,323. The compulsory law has worked 
 with little friction and marked success. As a result, there has 
 already been a very considerable reduction in the cost of juve- 
 nile crime and pauperism. The magistrates of London and 
 the Commissioners of Police have all borne cordial testimony 
 to the fact that there has been a great diminution of juvenile 
 offenses, and that every gang of young thieves known to the 
 police has been broken up. The Superintendent of the Hollo- 
 way Prison says the. juvenile criminals have yearly decreased, 
 so that instead of 136 males and 21 females admitted in 1869, 
 the numbers for the last year were only 28 males and no 
 females. In 1871, Hon. W. E. Forster, the father of the new 
 educational bill, said to me, " In America you can have little 
 idea of our difficulty in dealing with these myriads of street 
 Arabs in London, who are so degraded and ignorant that they 
 and their parents alike can appreciate neither the evils of igno- 
 rance nor the advantages of education." One of the inspect- 
 ors now says, "These street Arabs sit side by side with the 
 sons of industrious citizens, and so healthful is the tone of the 
 school that complaints are seldom heard. These schools are of 
 the deepest interest and first importance, receiving children 
 from indigent and neglected homes, and supplying all that per- 
 haps they will ever obtain of moral training and cultivation in 
 head and heart. No one can continue to visit these schools 
 and notice the sad state of these children at the outset without 
 observing the gradual ameliorating effects of the care bestowed 
 upon them." 
 
 By invitation of Sir Charles Eeed, I witnessed in July last, 
 the gathering of 5,000 of these children in Crystal Palace. 
 The spectacle of so many children seated in ascending tiers in a 
 semi-amphitheater near the great organ, was itself inspiring, 
 and the grand choral singing, especially considering the brief 
 period of their school attendance, was excellent. Besides the 
 
77 
 
 5*000 singers, there was an enormous crowd of other children 
 and their parents, the total number, said the President of the 
 Board, was over 30,000. The Crystal Palace Company gave 
 free admission to the children. Tom. Hughes, the President of 
 the Company, made a speech of cordial welcome to all, and 
 congratulated and commended the School Board that had 
 already,accomplished so noble a work. The main speech was 
 given by Lord Sanden, a single sentence of which indicates 
 the 'moral influence already exerted by the London schools. 
 " "When we think of the future of the children before us and 
 of the various lots in life which will become theirs, it is im- 
 possible not to be deeply affected, or to look at these children 
 without being grateful to Sir Charles Reed and his colleagues, 
 for bringing these children into school, who might otherwise 
 have been left in the streets, a plague to their parents and a 
 danger hereafter to the State." Similar facts might be given 
 as to the good influence of compulsory education in many 
 other cities of England, and especially in' Birmingham, the 
 head-quarters of the National Educational League, — an associa- 
 tion embracing such men -as George Dixon, M. P., and Dr. 
 R. W. Dale, — which has been active and influential in the 
 advocacy of educational reforms. Visiting most of the schools 
 of that city last summer, I gained ample proofs of the good 
 effects of obligatory instruction, as there rigidly applied. 
 
 A striking conversion occurred in the case of the late Canon 
 Kingsley. Though he long took a lively interest in the im- 
 provement of the working classes, an interest deepened by his 
 service as government inspector of schools, he at first opposed 
 obligatory education as un-English and offensive to the inde- 
 pendent spirit of his countrymen. On finding that the working 
 people favored compulsory attendance, his objections vanished. 
 
 A still more remarkable change has occurred in the views of 
 Mr. Forster, the father of the Educational Act of 1870. He 
 then opposed all efforts to make compulsion universal. Per- 
 mission only was given to local Boards to adopt coercion. 
 Though convinced of the justness of this measure, he argued 
 that the people are not prepared for it, and that outcries of 
 "un-English," "arbitrary," "tyrannical," "invasion of one's 
 home," "usurpation of parental rights," and all the easy clap- 
 
78 
 
 trap Of demagogues, would create a reaction, and therefore he 
 did not ask for a general compulsory law. It was said, no 
 matter what can be done in Prussia, or even in Switzerland, 
 the people of England have too much independence, 1;Oo much 
 aversion to any semblance of tyranny, ever to submit to com- 
 pulsory education. Mr. Forster now admits that he had no 
 expectation that the town population would, to so great an 
 extent, adopt the principle of compulsory education. Every 
 town in England with 20,000 inhabitants, which has a School 
 Board, has adopted it The permissive provision for local 
 compulsion was ingrafted in this bill with little faith that it 
 would be ratified and applied in any of the large towns. But 
 the people have surprised Parliament. In March last Mr. 
 Forster said in the House of Commons: "Almost the entire 
 town population of England is now under compulsory educa- 
 tion. And there is no sign of reaction. If compulsion had 
 worked with hardship on the people, nothing was so easy as 
 to revert to the former state of things. If a motion were now 
 made antagonistic to this principle of compulsion, it would not 
 have a single supporter in the School Boards of London, Manches- 
 ter, Birmingham, or any other large town. The school attend- 
 ance in those towns where it has been made compulsory, has 
 been improved 30 per cent. Leeds, for example, had almost 
 solved the problem of getting hold of all the children. The 
 attendance there has doubled by compulsion. The same has 
 been done at Sheffield. At Stockport they had increased the 
 average attendance until there were less than 2£ per cent of 
 the children between 5 and 15 who were not at school, and 
 some of them were excusable on account of mental or physical 
 inability. The right to compel a father to feed and clothe his 
 child is admitted, and we have now arrived at a point of civili- 
 zation at which we can declare that it is his duty to see that he 
 is educated. The sole meaning of compulsion is that thin is 
 the duty of every parent, and that it is the business of the 
 State to secure the performance of that duty, and if the parent 
 is disabled by poverty, then to help him from local rates or 
 imperial funds. It has been said, we must wait for public 
 opinion. Well, public opinion has declared itself, for every 
 town that by law was able to do so, has put the compulsory 
 
79 
 
 System in force. The fact is, that the arguments in favor of 
 compulsion are overwhelming, and Parliament should now 
 make compulsion universal. It is admitted, you cannot extend 
 compulsion without producing some hardship, and bringing a 
 bitter pinch to some poor widow who depended on her chil- 
 dren's labor. No great reform can be effected without cases of 
 individual hardship, but in the long run these alterations would 
 be productive of magnificent results for the whole population." 
 
 In Connecticut, the State Board of Education invite the 
 , cooperation of all parents and school officers in their efforts 
 to promote the observance of the law for obligatory educa- 
 tion. The gain in school attendance since the adoption of our 
 compulsory law shows the wisdom and value of the enactment. 
 This law has met the sanction of the people, irrespective of 
 party or sect. The Labor Unions, convinced that it is spe- 
 cially fitted to promote the interests of the working classes, have 
 repeatedly passed resolutions in favor of its rigid enforcement. 
 Many poor parents have learned that their ignorance is one 
 cause of their poverty and that, as education is essential to 
 thrift and prosperity, ignorance should not be allowed to per- 
 petuate indigence. We use the right to enforce mainly as an 
 argument to persuade — an authoritative appeal to parental 
 pride and foresight. We so press the advantages of education 
 ' that attendance may be held a privilege rather than a legal ne- 
 cessity. 
 
 But when reason and persuasion fail, coercion stands in their 
 stead. The law protects helpless childhood whose rights are 
 sacred. It recognizes the claims of the humblest child to an 
 education, as that which the State cannot neglect without dek- 
 riment to itself and harm to a human soul. Not even by 
 omission may the State doom a single child to ignorance and 
 its manifold evils. The temporary hardships to families by 
 loss of children's wages, occasionally incident to the observance 
 of this law, will be counterbalanced a thousand fold by the 
 permanent benefit of both parents and children, while its neg- 
 lect would inflict lasting evil upon them and the whole com- 
 munity. 
 
 Attendance upon an evening school merely, or irregular in- 
 struction at home does not meet the demands of the law, which 
 
given. 
 
 Our law in regard to nonrattendance applies not to manu- 
 facturers only, but to merchants, mechanics, farmers and all 
 employers of children. The manufacturers, as a rule, cheer- 
 fully comply with the law. There is need of watchfulness in 
 reference to the larger number who each employ one or more 
 children in shops, or stores, on the farm or in the family. All 
 persons who know of any instance of the employment of chil- 
 dren under fourteen years of age, who have not attended school 
 the time required by law, are requested to send information of 
 such fact to the office of the State Board of Education, giving 
 the names and - location of the employers of the children and 
 of the parents. A journey to the remotest part of the State will 
 be amply compensated, if, thereby, a single child can be brought 
 to school.- 
 
 The needs of neglected children still occupy much time in 
 public addresses and personal labors. The good results 
 already accomplished furnish ample encouragement for the vig- 
 orous prosecution of this work. During the last year the agent 
 of the Board has visited a larger number of families than in 
 any former. year. As the result of these visits to the homes 
 of neglected children, nearly three hundred such children have 
 been led to attend school. Nearly ninety-five per cent, of our 
 children are now reported as in schools of all kinds — a larger 
 percentage than in any other State in America, when the basis 
 of enumeration is taken into account. In Connecticut, the 
 enumeration includes all children between four and sixteen 
 years of age. The gift from the State Treasury and School 
 Fund of about two dollars and a half per scholar, ensures the 
 fullest returns. In Massachusetts the enumeration is from five 
 to fifteen. We discourage attendance under five, and the law 
 authorizes towns to exclude all under five. There is, therefore, 
 reason for congratulation on the efficient working of our com- 
 pulsory law. 
 
SCHOOLS AND COMMUNISM. 
 
 In 1868 a prominent plea against Free Schools was the argu- 
 ment that "the system is communistic in its principle and ten- 
 dency. Establish free schools and you encourage a demand for 
 free food, free clothes, free shoes, and free ( homes." Professor 
 Faucett, liberal, fair and progressive as he is, urged the same 
 objection in Parliament, saying, during the discussion of the 
 new "Elementary Education Act," which was passed in 1870, 
 " If the demand for free schools were not resisted, encourage- 
 ment would be given to Socialism in its most baneful form." 
 
 Time tests all theories better than arguments. In Connecti- 
 cut a decade of free schools has witnessed no new tendencies to 
 Communism. The general intelligence of New England was 
 one obvious cause of its exemption from the communistic rail- 
 way conflicts in the summer of 1877. The sober second 
 thought prevailed here, while madness ruled the hour else- 
 where. The last election in Connecticut showed plainly the 
 popular dread of the socialistic tendencies and dogmas, which 
 were repudiated by both the leading political parties. In Mas- 
 sachusetts, where free schools have been maintained for more 
 than two hundred years, there is as little Socialism as in any 
 land in the world. Indeed, throughout New England, there is 
 no tendency to Communism among the descendants of the gen- 
 uine New England stock. The minimum that exists is limited 
 to a small portion of the foreign element. Though curiosity 
 attracted crowds to hear Dennis Kearney last autumn, it is due 
 to free schools and the consequent intelligence of the people, 
 that bis communistic tirades disgusted all classes and 
 prompted the candidate who first sought his alliance to dis- 
 own his dogmas and disfellowship him. 
 
 I find among all classes, employers and employe's, in the fac- 
 tories and on the farms, a growing distrust, not to say detesta- 
 tion of Communism. The mad outcry of the Internationals, 
 "Equality, of conditions," "Capital is the enemy of labor," 
 finds no response from the intelligent laborers of Connecticut. 
 Thanks to our schools, they know that the condition of the 
 
82 
 
 operative improves with the increase of industrial capital, which 
 always befriends labor, when it multiplies the opportunities 
 of education and profitable employment. Nothing helps the 
 laborer more than that education which gives him both the 
 desire and the power to better his condition, to improve first 
 himself and then his home and household. 
 
 As a precaution against the communistic tendencies which 
 now agitate and alarm Germany and other portions of Europe, 
 and find ; here their fiercest advocates among the refugees thence 
 escaped to our shores, the general principles underlying this 
 subject should be studied by our teachers and presented in oral 
 lessons in our schools. A few simple school talks on this 
 theme might forestall much mischief in coming years. The 
 intelligent workmen who by industry and economy are enabled 
 to own their homes, however humble, or indeed to own any- 
 thing, cannot be fooled by that insane crusade against capital, 
 which really means Wages without work, or which lets the lazy 
 and profligate share equally with the industrious and frugal. 
 The equality of conditions of which they dream, would be the 
 low level of a common barbarism. Even enforced equality of 
 wages lessens the motives to industry, skill and fidelity, and 
 restrains the freedom of competition. Once applied,* these 
 notions would destroy not only capital but the motives and 
 means of its future increase and protection. Destroy capital, 
 and labor would suffer first and most. Capital and labor, there- 
 fore, are not enemies. It is only ignorance and prejudice that 
 find any necessary opposition between the two. There should 
 be kindness and sympathy between the employer and the 
 employed. There need be no alienation between the rich and 
 the poor. There should be no tyranny of capital over labor, 
 nor hostility of labor to capital. The capitalist should fully 
 understand the trials of the laborer's lot, and strive to amelio- 
 rate his condition, and the operative should know the risks, 
 anxieties and conditions of success on the part of the manufac- 
 turer. There should be liberal pay on the one side; and fair 
 profits on the other. The interests of both classes are bound 
 together. If either one is harmed, the other must, ultimately 
 suffer. Certainly the laborer cannot long suffer in heafth, edu- 
 cation or pay, without harm to the employer, and large losses 
 
83 
 
 to employers inevitably extend to the operatives. They are 
 copartners, and cannot afford to be antagonists. Capital is as 
 dependent on labor as labor is on capital, and only as both 
 work in harmony, can the highest good of each be secured. 
 Indeed, labor is both superior and prior to capital, and alone 
 originally produces capital. Many a penniless laborer, because 
 well educated, frugal and industrious, has become an independ- 
 ent capitalist. Our most successful manufacturers have toiled 
 up from penury to affluence. This aspiration may stimulate 
 , every one who is educated enough to combine skill with labor. 
 
 Communism is an exotic in this land. It does not easily 
 take root in our soil, and the climate is uncongenial. Its chief 
 advocates are homeless foreigners, even the immigrants long 
 resident here have become so schooled by public sentiment 
 and by our free institutions^ as to be well nigh, assimilated and 
 Americanized. 
 
 Schools and the diffusion of property are our safeguards 
 against Socialistic extremes. John Adams well said, " The 
 ownership of land is essential to industrial thrift and to national 
 security and strength and prosperity." Switzerland, with insti- 
 tutions as free as ours, is safe from Communism, for two rea- 
 sons; — the maintenance of free schools, and the general owner- 
 ship of land. The Internationals may meet in free Switzer- 
 land, and nobody is frightened or disturbed by their vagaries. 
 Germany has education, but not an equal distribution of land. 
 Her vast standing army, consuming without producing, with 
 its enormous expenses and exactions, has created a great revul- 
 sion of feeling among the people. The glory of conquest and 
 the untold milliards of the French indemnity mainly expended 
 on new fortifications and military equipments, do not atone for 
 the mourning and bereavement brought to so many now deso- 
 late homes, the heavy burden of taxation, the dread of con- 
 scription, the fear of new complications and wars, and the inex- 
 orable demand that every boy shall spend three weary years of 
 service in the camp. Myriads of families with boys approach- 
 ing the military age, have emigrated to other lands to escape 
 this dreaded conscription. 
 
 In France the home of Communism has always been in Paris. 
 The horrors of the Commune in 1871 proved suicidal to the sys- 
 
84 
 
 tem. Even Paris learned then a lesson not likely to be forgotten. 
 But the great body of the French people, even then, had little 
 sympathy with communistic doctrines, and to-day the French 
 nation, with her 5,000,000 of land-owners, is strongly the 
 other way. Here lie her strength and security. To illustrate 
 the happy influence of this wide diffusion of landed property, 
 Michelet describes a French peasant walking out of a Sunday, 
 in his clean linen and unsoiled blouse, surveying fondly his 
 little farm. His face is illumined as he thinks these acres are 
 his own, from the surface of the globe to its center, and that 
 the air is his own from the surface up to the seventh heaven. 
 He is.there alone — not at work, not to keep off interlopers, but 
 solely to enjoy the feeling of ownership, and to look upon him- 
 self as a member of responsible society. Thus in all lands and 
 among all peoples, " the magic of property turns sand into 
 gold." 
 
 In the United States there are nearly 3,000,000 farmers with 
 farms, averaging 153 acres each, besides a large number who 
 own their dwellings and house-lots. These form the grand 
 army of the Eepublic — each a volunteer, equipped and ready to 
 strike down Communism, wherever its hydra head may appear. 
 Let even the Socialistic leaders, whom Bismarck has banished, 
 once learn here to till their own acres, and they will be con- 
 verted to the true faith — of the sacred rights of property. 
 
SCHOOLS AND PAUPEEISM. 
 
 Ten years ago strenuous objections were made to free schools, 
 as being a charity tending to pauperize the people, a kind of 
 alms that no man could accept without impairing his manli- 
 ness and self-respect. But they are now recognized as the peo- 
 ple's schools by right, not favor, and prized as never before. 
 Instead of being a charity, tending to demean and pauperize 
 its recipients, all find themselves recognized as equal partners 
 in. the concern, having an equal voice in selecting the mana- 
 gers, in raising the funds, or in criticising the methods adopted. 
 Thus the school is no more a charity than is the free public 
 road or bridge. Help in schooling is really help towards doing 
 without help — towards self-reliance. In Europe, those who 
 express the greatest apprehension that the independence of the 
 working classes would be destroyed by free schools, evince 
 little desire to develop that genuine independence which true 
 education fosters. In lands where the insolence of office is 
 proverbial, they make it a prominent lesson to every child to 
 " order himself reverently and lowly to all his betters, and to 
 submit to the humors of my Lords." The people whose " inde- 
 pendence" is so carefully guarded, are kept under various petty 
 and vexatious restraints. Says Francis Adams, one of the 
 most earnest advocates of free schools in Great Britain, " There 
 is a large class in England, from whom we hear most about 
 preserving the independence of the poor, who have always 
 been opposed to measures intended to enlarge popular freedom. 
 They find a personal gratification in the exercise of petty char- 
 ity and the power to deal out to the working-classes little doles 
 such as are provided for the remission and payment of school 
 feef Notwithstanding their homilies about parental independ- 
 ence and responsibility, they possess the spirit of patronage so 
 long fostered by the social conditions of the country, which 
 has done much to keep so many of our people in a state of 
 miserable dependence and subjection. When their system of 
 alms-giving can be carried on at the public expense, their zest 
 is no doubt greater and they will not willingly surrender any 
 
power which still has force to pluck ' the slavish hat from the 
 villager's head.' This class now stands in the" way of the com- 
 plete realization of the free school system in England." 
 
 The vast pauperism of England, especially among the farm 
 laborers, is largely due to the want of free schools. The facts 
 and' figures, both in regard to illiteracy and pauperism are 
 appalling. The saddest sight to me in England strangely con- 
 trasted with her glories and beauties many and great, of which 
 every Englishman is justly proud, was the low and wretched 
 condition of her illiterate masses. Lest any just statement 
 from an alien may seem exaggerated, I will quote from those 
 to the manor born, for these facts from the lips of Englishmen, 
 prove the evils of ignorance, if not the value of universal edu- 
 cation. Eev. Dr. J. H. Riggs of London, who, in his zeal to 
 prove our free schools a failure, quotes my description* of a few 
 of our, worst school-houses and poorest district schools, as if 
 they were of general significance, and proclaims that ten weeks 
 serves for the training of teachers in the Normal School of 
 Connecticut, and that some of the schools of Maine are kept 
 open but three or four weeks in the year, with kindred exag- 
 gerations and caricatures, unworthy of reply, and who finds 
 almost everything English superior to anything American, is 
 compelled to say, "English pauperism is a problem and a por- 
 tent which seldom makes a due impression on an Englishman. 
 Its monstrous character and dimensions are so familiar to us 
 .that they seldom strike us as monstrous. This vast and com- 
 plex evil, this ulcer in the body politic, in its character and 
 extent in this country, is absolutely a unique fact, because 
 there is nothing comparable with it in the world besides. The 
 number of persons annually in receipt of pauper relief is 
 upwards of a million. The annual cost of poor relief is 
 £7,886,724 (nearly $40,000,000). Abjectness and reckless- 
 ness form the main element of the pauper's home. His cot- 
 tage may consist of three rooms — the common room filled with 
 litter and discomfort, and two bed rooms for all the inmates, 
 parents and children, lads and lasses and oft^n a male lodger, 
 so that neatness and decency are precluded. Too often the 
 cottage is even worse, a wretched double cell, where penury 
 * As found in several Reports of the Board of Education. 
 
87 
 
 cowers, chastity can hardly survive, and female delicacy must 
 be unknown, the house ODly a shelter, full of cumber and litter. 
 Such are the homes of the majority of our English peasantry 
 in the southern, western and south middle districts, and of 
 many in most parts of England and in wide districts of Scot- 
 land and Wales. Such is the condition of the pauperized peas- 
 ants, not as poets have > painted,. England's glory, but her 
 reproach." Eev. James Martineau says : " The social discrep- 
 ancies which disfigure and affect society have here assumed a 
 monstrous and fearful character. Our country is a vast conge- 
 ries of exaggerations. Enormous wealth and saddest poverty, 
 sumptuous idleness and unrewarded toil, princely provision for 
 learning and the most degrading ignorance, a large amount of 
 • laborious philanthropy but a larger of unconquered misery and 
 sin terrify us with their dreadful contrasts of light and shade. 
 It is appalling to think pf the moral cost by which England has 
 become materially great Where is the laborer by whose 
 hand the soil has been tilled? In a cabin, with his children, 
 where the domestic decencies cannot be. I know not which is 
 the most heathenish, the guilty negligence of our lofty men, or 
 the fearful degradation of the low." 
 
 John Bright says : " Fearful suffering exists among the rural 
 laborers in almost every part of this kingdom. What wretched, 
 uncaredfor, untaught brutes, in helpless stolid ignorance, are 
 the people who raise the crops on which we live, and what dirt, 
 vice and misery in the houses where seven or eight persons of 
 both sexes are penned up together in one rickety, foul, vermin- 
 haunted bed-room — their wages reduced to the very lowest 
 point at which their lives can be kept in them ! They are 
 heart-broken, spirit-broken, despairing men — reduced to such 
 brutality, recklessness, audacity of vice and extreme helpless- 
 ness that they have no aspirations to better their condition. 
 Accustomed to. this, from their youth, they can see nothing in 
 the future which can afford them a single ray of hope. As 
 the rural laborer looks longingly up the social ladder of ranks, 
 the first six or eight steps are broken out, and there seems to 
 him no chance to span the chasm." 
 
 J. Scott Eussell said ten years ago, " Something must be done, 
 or our working classes will be grievously wronged and the 
 
88 
 
 whole nation suffer. Poor England, standing by idle, is too 
 late. Her workingmen, grown up uneducated, cannot now be 
 educated, are too old to learn. They have lost a generation. 
 Where was the fault? where the blame?. Why did notour 
 statesmen and aristocracy, already provided with special uni- 
 versities and schools for their own training, foresee that our 
 trade was going away to more skilled nations, and warn us in 
 time? The contrast between England and Switzerland is this; 
 England spends more than five times as much on pauperism 
 and crime as she does on education, and Switzerland spends 
 seven times as much on education as she does on pauperism 
 and crime." 
 
 It was in view of startling facts and statements like these 
 from her own countrymen that England organized in 1870 an 
 efficient system of public education. It is a striking fact that 
 the latest statistics show a great diminution of both pauperism 
 and crime. Instead of a million of paupers in 1870, the num- 
 ber returned January, 1878, was 726,000.* The cost of juvenile 
 crime aod pauperism has been remarkably reduced. The 
 London Police Commissioners testify to a great diminution of 
 juvenile offences and affirm that every gang of juvenile thieves 
 known to them has been broken up. Even the adult popula- 
 tion has been reached and elevated in some degree through 
 their children. New hope and ambition have come to many 
 an illiterate farm laborer, himself born to despair, by reason of 
 ignorance born to helplessness and hopelessness, as he finds, 
 though a thing unknown and undreamed of before, his children 
 at school, and hence sees dawning upon them better prospects 
 and possibilities than ever fell to his hard lot. The hopes cher- 
 ished for children have thus cheered many a bumble cottage. 
 
 In striking contrast to the depressed condition of the farm 
 laborer in his own land it is interesting to see the picture of the 
 New England farmer drawn by Eev. Dr. R W. Dale, of 
 Birmingham, in an address at Canonbury, England, January 
 17, 1879. When traveling in this country, he frequently ex- 
 pressed his surprise and admiration in view of the intelligence 
 and independence of the farmers of New England. 
 
 * The unprecedented financial embarrassments now experienced in England 
 will no doubt swell the next returns. 
 
89 
 
 After remarking . that for a century and a half the Puritan 
 colonists had been left practically undisturbed by any foreign 
 element, Mr. Dale proceeded to speak of the type of character 
 which had been developed in New England and of the present 
 social condition of the people. " Prom the 21,000 persons who, 
 after five generations, were found in those States, descendants 
 numbering at least four millions might be reckoned. At the 
 present moment no population on the face of the earth enjoyed 
 equal prosperity. Wealth was more equally distributed than in 
 any other community ; and the real and personal estate, liable to 
 assessment, now averaged nearly £240 per head for the inhab- 
 itants, or £1,150 for each family, reckoning the family at five 
 persons. The New England farmer had from the first adopted 
 the belief that the icay to fight the devil was by the school and the 
 church, and that belief had been thoroughly and consistently 
 acted upon. The influence of this vigorous race upon the 
 United States, as a whole, had been immense. It was they 
 who had been the great pioneers in the development of the 
 resources of the country. It was they, chiefly, who had built 
 Chicago, and who rebuilt it, after it had been destroyed by fire, 
 with a quickness and splendor which rivalled the achievements 
 described in the pages of romance. Prom the farm houses of 
 New England had sprung many of America's noblest orators, 
 most learned theologians, and greatest statesmen and philan- 
 thropists, and in the future the same people would contribute 
 largely to the stability and greatness of their country. The 
 history of these colonies, as contrasted with the history of other 
 colonies, was an illustration of the true path of national great- 
 ness." 
 
 This remarkable contrast between the farm laborers of En- 
 gland and New England as described by English writers 
 furnishes a demonstration of the economy and value of the 
 school system so long neglected there and maintained here. 
 The earnest appeals of Joseph Arch, John Bright, Dr. Dale 
 and others in behalf of the farm laborers of England, have 
 awakened general sympathy, advanced their wages, and amel- 
 iorated their condition. 
 
NATIONAL SCHOOLS. 
 
 " Americans have no National System of Education," is the 
 slur one often hears in Europe. To this criticism, my ready 
 answer was, we need none and are fully determined, to have 
 none. The maintenance and control of schools, has never been 
 the aim of our National Government. 
 
 Our local independence and repugnance to federal interfer- 
 ence and our complete State sovereignty in educational mat- 
 ters, is an enigma to Europeans, being in marked contrast to 
 their traditions and usages. In England, for example, the 
 School Board of any town or city may not select a site,, 
 build a school house, or prescribe the amount of a, school fee 
 without the sanction of the National Educational Department. 
 But the complete decentralization of the American school 
 system, though a point of weakness in European eyes, is, in 
 fact, a prime source of its strength. The, fact that our Schools 
 are wholly in the hands of the people, supported by the funds 
 they raise, controlled by officers chosen by them and responsi- 
 ble' to them, is a leading element of their prosperity. Though 
 certain billslately introduced into Congress indicate that a 
 few would welcome European centralization and control, the 
 general public sentiment of the country has so long been 
 growing in favor of the unfettered working of State, systems, 
 that this has now become our settled policy, which no lobby in 
 Washington can change if it would, and should not if it could. 
 
 If a strong central government be essential for an ignorant 
 nation, an intelligent people can govern themselves. In Amer- 
 ica, the success of schools in each State will depend upon the 
 intelligence and consequent appreciation of its people. One of 
 the worst legacies left by slavery is that of ignorance, and con- 
 sequent indifference to schools, or rather of insensibility to the 
 evils of illiteracy or to the advantages of education. Shall the 
 admitted school destitution of the South, or of some new 
 Western States, be promptly removed by federal agency, or 
 more gradually supplanted by developing a proper local public 
 sentiment. In the past, states and nations have been slow in 
 
91 
 
 learning the lesson that alike to individuals and peoples, igno- 
 rance means waste and weakness, if not pauperism and crime, 
 and that education tends to economy, thrift and virtue. 
 
 But there is a great acceleration in the working of moral 
 and intellectual forces so that now in a decade, sometimes in a 
 single year, are accomplished broader results than formerly in a 
 century. The day for coercion and dictation is passing. The 
 growing assimilation and power of public sentiment is felt the 
 world over. It has broken down the walls of China, the isola- 
 tion of Japan, the serfdom of Eussia, the slavery of America, 
 and is now rapidly relaxing the grasp of tyranny even in that 
 center of oriental despotism, Turkey. But nowhere else is 
 public sentiment so supreme in its influence as in America, 
 and never before has that sentiment been so strong in favor of 
 the support of free public schools as to-day. 
 
 A striking illustration, both of the difference and power of 
 public sentiment, was furnished more than a century ago by 
 the replies sent by two American colonies to questions put by 
 the English Commissioners for Foreign Plantations. The Gov- 
 ernor of Virginia replied, " 1 thank God we have no free 
 schools or printing presses!, and I hope we shall not have these 
 hundred years." The Governor of Connecticut answered, 
 " One-fourth the annual revenues of the Colony is laid out in 
 maintaining free schools for the education of our children." 
 Accordingly, till after the late civil war, Virginia had no gen- 
 eral public school system. Thomas Jefferson prepared with 
 his own hand a bill for a free school system, of which he said, 
 " By this bill, the people will be qualified to understand their 
 rights and to maintain them, and to exercise with intelligence 
 their parts in self-government. Provided for all children 
 alike, rich and poor, the expenses of these schools will be 
 borne by the inhabitants of each county, in, proportion to 
 their general tax-rates, and all this will be effected without the 
 violation of a single natural right of any individual citizen." 
 Jefferson caused the words, " Founder of the University" to 
 be inscribed on his tombstone, but he placed a far higher esti- 
 mate on free schools than on "superior education." Though 
 defeated in this cherished plan, he defended it to the last, and 
 said shortly before his death, " Were it necessary to give up 
 
92 
 
 either the Primaries, or the University, I would rather abandon 
 the last, because it is safer to have a whole people respectably 
 enlightened, than a few in a high state, of science, and the 
 many in ignorance. The advantages of popular education are 
 above all estimate. The objects should be to give every citi- 
 zen the information he needs for the transaction of his own 
 business, enabling him to calculate for himself and express and 
 preserve his ideas, his contracts and accounts in writing ; to 
 improve by reading, his morals and his faculties ; to under- 
 stand his duties to his neighbor and country, and to discharge 
 with competence the functions confided to him by either ; to 
 know his rights and exercise with order and justice those he 
 retains ; to choose with discretion the fiduciary of those he 
 delegates, and to notice their conduct with diligence, candor 
 and judgment, and, in general, to observe with intelligence and 
 faithfulness all his social relations. All the States but our own 
 are sensible that knowledge is power. We are sinking into the 
 barbarism of our Indian aborigines, and expect, like them, to 
 oppose by ignorance the overwhelming mass of light and science 
 by which we shall be surrounded. Surely Governor Clinton's 
 display of the gigantic efforts of New York in education, will 
 stimulate the pride as well as the patriotism of our Legislature 
 to look to the reputation and safety of their own State, to res- 
 cue it from the degradation of becoming the Barbary of the 
 Union and of falling into the ranks of our own negroes. To 
 that condition it is fast sinking." How different would have 
 been the history of Virginia had she heeded the wise counsel 
 of this, her most eminent and far-seeing statesman? To the 
 lasting harm of that State a different sentiment prevailed, so 
 that as late as I860, a leading Virginia paper said, " We have 
 got to hating everything with the prefix free, from free negroes 
 down and up through the whole catalogue, free farms, free 
 labor, free society, free will, free thinking, free children and 
 free sOHOOLS-r-all belonging to the same brood of damnable 
 sins. But the worst of all these abominations is the modern 
 system of free schools. The New England system of free 
 schools has been the prolific source of the infidelities and trea- 
 sons that have turned her cities into Sodoms and Gomorrahs, 
 and her land into the common nestling place of howling Bed- 
 
93 
 
 lamites. We abominate the system, because the schools are 
 free." The long neglect of public schools so manifestly checked 
 the growth and prosperity of the Old Dominion, notwith- 
 standing her vast natural resources, and created so marked a 
 contrast between her and other States far less favored in all the 
 elements of material prosperity, that the logic of events has at 
 last swept away these objections and converted old opponents 
 to friends and supporters of free schools. At length Virginia 
 rejoices in a free public school system. The progress of her 
 public schools since the war is remarkable, accomplished in the 
 face of prejudice, ignorance, and great financial embarrass- 
 ments, for Virginia had her full share in the loss of over 
 "three thousand millions of dollars sunk by the Southern 
 States by the war," an amount larger than all the property of 
 New England. To the question, How can schools be organized 
 for the Southern States, without Federal aid or interference? 
 the answer is, Look at Virginia, especially the schools of 
 Eichmond, Petersburg, Lynchburg, Staunton and Norfolk. 
 Public sentiment there has been revolutionized. The common 
 schools are growing in favor. Prejudice, opposition and penu- 
 riousness of course still exist, but are evidently waning. I in- 
 spected most of the schools of Eichmond with as much delight 
 as surprise, alike in view of the interest of the pupils, the cul- 
 ture of the teachers and the excellence of the schools. Private 
 schools have greatly diminished and the children of the 
 rich generally attend the public schools. Considered as the 
 growth of eight years, the Virginia system is a most gratifying 
 work. In the light of such facts, and in view of the rapid 
 working of intellectual 'forces in this age and'country, and the 
 growing power of public sentiment, shall the most illiterate 
 portions of our land be reached by National Schools supported 
 by National aid aud in any way controlled by a National De- 
 partment? Shall the National Bureau of Education become 
 a Federal Department, enlarged and authorized to organize and 
 maintain a National University — or, with still greater expan- 
 sion, empowered to establish schools and distribute the income 
 from the sale of public lands, whether in proportion to existing 
 illiteracy, school attendance, or the length and grade of the 
 schools maintained? 
 
94 
 
 Hitherto the National Bureau of Education has been simply 
 advisory. It has, and it was intended to have, no authority. 
 As an agency for collecting and disseminating needful informa- 
 tion, it has already done great good, and promises to be still 
 more useful in the future. But the attempt to organize a 
 National University, support and direct local schools, or in 
 any way interfere with State systems, would end its useful- 
 ness, if not end itself. Every true friend of this Bureau 
 should protest against any such " enlargement of the field of 
 its operations." The principle of State independence is too 
 firmly fixed in the faith of all classes to brook any federal 
 interference in school matters, even in the States or Terri* 
 tories most destitute and backward in education. In an ill- 
 conditioned community like that in New Mexico for example, 
 still Mexican in their traditions, sentiments and peoples, juxta,- 
 posed, but not blended with the heterogeneous elements of a 
 swarming immigration from all parts of the country, not to say 
 of the world, American ideas and institutions are yet in their 
 rudimentary forms and earlier stages of development. Shall a 
 Federal Bureau, at once in European style, enforce there its best 
 plans of public schools, or leave them by a slower, surer, and 
 more healthful process, to work out their own salvation ? As 
 the schools of every community answer to local public opin- 
 ion, their success must depend on the sympathy and.apprecia- 
 tion of the people. Public sentiment is a growth, not the 
 creature of power made to order of any sort or size, as some 
 have talked of " fiat money." 
 
DECENNARY OF FREE SCHOOLS. 
 
 The free school system of Connecticut has now had a trial 
 of ten years and is no longer an experiment. This " new 
 law " was so radical in its character as to meet general opposi- 
 tion when first proposed in 1567. During the next year there 
 was so great a change in public sentiment that it was enacted 
 with great unanimity by the General Assembly of 1868. The 
 struggle which this system had to wage for its existence is 
 over, for it has been amply ratified by the people. The 
 gauge of public interest is the increased burden of taxation 
 which the people of Connecticut have chosen to bear, for 
 school taxes are self-imposed. The amount raised by taxa- 
 tion for schools ten years ago was $628,152.12. The amount 
 raised by State, town and district taxation last year was 
 $1,252,248.63, or about double the amount reported in 1868. 
 
 The enemies of free schools have either been converted or 
 learned the futility of open opposition. Dissentients are still 
 found whose sympathy is needed to give the highest efficiency 
 to the system. As the condition of the schools in each dis- 
 trict answers largely to local public sentiment, the cooperation 
 of every parent and citizen is essential to the fullest success. 
 
 A brief review of the history and results of the free school 
 system furnishes encouragement to its friends, and presents 
 facts fitted to satisfy the minds of all honest doubters. Con- 
 vinced that the rate-bill was wrong in principle and harmful in 
 practice I directed my earliest efforts, on entering the service 
 of the State, to secure its repeal. During the session of the 
 Legislature for 1867, the Joint Standing Committee on Edu- 
 cation finally consented to recommend a bill for free schools, 
 though with little faith in the measure and no expectation of 
 carrying it. As the bill met no favor in either House, out of 
 courtesy to its author, it was referred to the next General 
 Assembly. During the next year the subject was fully dis- 
 cussed in numerous meetings in all parts of the State, the 
 Secretary giving two hundred and six lectures on this and 
 kindred topics. 
 
Many sincere friends of education, deprecating these efforts, 
 gave faithful warning as to their certain failure. The subject 
 was freely discussed also in the press, and brought very promi- 
 nently before the people. The sentiment was widely pro- 
 claimed that it is the duty and interest of the State to furnish 
 substantially equal common school privileges to the children 
 of all classes. Self-protection was claimed to be the right of 
 the government. For this purpose it maintains armies and 
 navies. But safer and better every way than forts and fleets, 
 indispensable as they may be, better for its peace and securit} 7 , 
 its prosperity and protection, is universal education. 
 
 Comparatively few now press the objection which was 
 widely urged ten years ago, viz: "It is unjust to tax me for 
 the education of other people's children. I have none. Let 
 those who have, pay the cost of their schooling." This objec- 
 tion is founded on a false theory of government. The State 
 justly claims a right to its citizens for its defense, a right to 
 lay its equal and needful claim on their property, time and 
 service. For the achievement of our independence, and more 
 recently for the preservation of our institutions, how many were 
 called to endure toil, hardship and death. This claim of the 
 State involves the correlative truth that the State has duties as 
 well as rights, and foremost among them is the duty of secur- 
 ing a good common school education to the children of all 
 classes. 
 
 The right of a State to support free schools is little else than 
 its right to defend itself by a humanizing and civilizing edu- 
 cation against what otherwise would become a degraded and 
 dangerous class in society. The right of a free State to self- 
 existence implies the right to maintain free schools, essential as 
 they are to its preservation and prosperity. Education is the 
 cheapest police agency a State can employ. In a wisely admin- 
 istered government, educational taxes are the fares which we 
 pay on railroad cars, the price for being safely carried and well 
 provided for, through the journey of life. These taxes are 
 founded primarily not on the idea of benefiting parents and 
 children, but the broader view, that the State has a proprietary 
 interest in all persons and property within its bounds and espe- 
 cially has a stake in her youth that they may be well qualified 
 
97 
 
 for her service, whether that shall be on the farm, in the fac- 
 tory, in the counting room or in the field of arms. It was really 
 the better education of the North that saved the Union during 
 the late civil war, as it was the ignorance of the "poor white 
 trash" masking them the dupes of demagogues that rendered the 
 rebellion possible in the South. 
 
 In 1868 Governor English exerted his influence strongly in 
 favor of free schools." In his annual message to the Legisla- 
 ture he said : " The rate-bill should be abolished and the 
 schools sustained at the common expense." In his parting 
 address to the General Assembly of that year he said : " The 
 measures which you'have adopted to promote the interests of 
 the people will meet with a generous approval at their hands. 
 Especially will they thank you for the interest you have 
 taken in the common schools. In adopting the free school 
 system recommended in my annual message, I am confident 
 you have taken an important step forward in the cause of edu- 
 cation, and that your action in this regard will prove as bene- 
 ficial in results as the motives which prompted it were free 
 from political influence or bias." 
 
 As Governor English intimates, this new law was not in any 
 wise a party measure.' That a measure so radical should pass 
 unanimously in the Senate and with only four nays in the 
 House was more than its most sanguine friends expected. The 
 press of the State was a unit in its favor. The leading men of 
 both parties were its advocates. It is fortunate that on educa- 
 tional' questions^ men of all parties and all religious denomina- 
 tions meet on common ground and cordially cooperate for the 
 common good. The platforms and creeds, which divide men 
 outside, should never enter the common school — common be- 
 cause open to all, free to all ; where no class distinctions are 
 recognized and no favoritism is shown. 
 
 The law has received an emphatic ratification from the peo- 
 ple. Two years later, when its influence in increasing taxa- 
 tion bad been fully felt, an earfiest effort was made in the 
 Legislature for its repeal, which signally failed. Opposition 
 and discussion helped this measure, as they always do any 
 other which can bear close scrutiny and stand the test of ex- 
 perience. When the proof was placed before the people that 
 
98 
 
 thousands of children had been barred from school by the rate- 
 bill, it was generally admitted that tbe results already attained 
 proved the wisdom and necessity of the free system. 
 
 The Democratic State Convention, held in Hartford, January 
 17, 1871, unanimously adopted the following comprehensive 
 resolution : . 
 
 "Resolved, That the source of power being in the people, Free Schools and 
 general education are essential to ■ good government and the perpetuation of 
 free Institutions." 
 
 The Republican State Convention, held in New Haven one 
 week later, adopted a resolution equally strong in favor of free 
 schools. Since that date, no opposition to the measure has 
 been made or intimated in the Legislature. The subject of 
 free schools was ably discussed by School Visitors in their 
 Reports to their several towns. To give a single illustration of 
 the strong and practical way this subject was brought home to 
 the people in local reports in 1873, the able Report for Litch- 
 field, written by Governor Andrews, then Secretary of the 
 Board of School Visitors, said : " The argument in favor of 
 free schools is short and decisive. Every person recognizes 
 the duty of society to protect the lives of children. Our law 
 protects the lives even of children unborn, for the reason that 
 it is for the benefit of society that children should be born and 
 reared. If, then, society may for its own benefit preserve the 
 mere animal existence of a chiM, the obligation irresistibly 
 follows that society must see to it that the life so preserved 
 shall develop into a useful, intelligent and moral citizen, and 
 not into a ruffian and a curse. The logic is impregnable ; 
 society should either destroy all children, or guide, protect and 
 train them up to careful citizenship. Establish infanticide, or 
 some system of free instruction. But the time for argument 
 on the abstract question of free schools in our State is passed. 
 As good citizens, we ought to use every effort that the system 
 so inaugurated shall be successful." 
 
 In 1868, a leading objection to the system was its alleged 
 tendency to lessen the interest and responsibility of parents. 
 The natural argument was that men never value what costs 
 them nothing. But the fact is, parents do pay, and all pay 
 their fair and equal portion for the support of this central, 
 
99 
 
 public interest. The poor man who only pays a poll tax 
 gives his share as truly as does the millionaire. The system 
 has manifestly dignified the school in the esteem of both pa- 
 rents and pupils, and quickened the educational spirit of the 
 whole people.. Every tax-payer, having contributed his part 
 to the support^of the schools, feels that he has a right to look 
 after his investment. The details of our public schools are 
 better known to parents than are the plans of private schools 
 to their patrons. As a result of free schools, the great majority 
 of the town reports concur in saying : " There has been a de- 
 cided advance in the number at school, in regularity of attend- 
 ance, and in the manifest interest of the people." More than 
 ever it is felt that the schools belong to the people. In patron- 
 izing them the poorest parent is proudly conscious he has no 
 leave to ask, no patron to conciliate, and no alms to beg. Every 
 body pays something and feels that it is a good investment, 
 and one which justly entitles him to its advantages. 
 
 In the past ten years the increase in enumeration has been 
 14,757, while the increase in the number registered in public 
 schools has been' 20,438. The number in private schools was 
 first reported nine years ago, and the increase in that time has 
 been 1,526. If it be assumed that the number ten years since 
 was the same as nine years ago, — which is very nearly correct, — 
 then the increase in attendance in both public and private 
 schools in the last ten years is 21,964, which exceeds the 
 increase in enumeration by 7,207. 
 
NEGLECTED CHILDREN. 
 
 This subject continues to claim attention. As the trend of 
 the tide is here against us, to stem it requires constant watch- 
 fulness. Without effort, a backset would cover ground well 
 nigh reclaimed. Eor, however well done, this is a work like 
 that of a physician, that never stays done. Old cures will not 
 stop the breaking out of new cases. In dealing with negligent 
 parents our main reliance has still been.' kindness and persua- 
 sion, appeals to their parental- love and pride, their sense of 
 duty and their personal interest in view of the great importance 
 of education to their, children, and the rich privileges, freely 
 proffered them in the public schools. The same arguments 
 have often reached the children, and thus they have gained a 
 higher appreciation of the influence of the school upon their 
 happiness, thrift and prosperity through life. Teachers as well 
 as school officers may greatly help in this good work. ItTis the 
 teachers duty, or rather his privilege, to visit the parents of 
 truant or neglected children, learn the causes of delinquency 
 and secure parental cooperation. As I have urged this duty, 
 a few teachers have asked substantially — " Is that in the bond," 
 ( 'what doesthelaw demand?" as if the one ruling thought was — '■ 
 " what js the minimum work I must do; but fortunately there 
 are but few teachers whose theory and practice limit their 
 duties and sympathies to the school house and school hours. 
 On the other hand, a large proportion of our teachers, bent on 
 doing the utmost good to their pupils, inquire into causes of 
 absence from school, visit pupils in sickness, and thus often win 
 the confidence and cooperation of parents otherwise captious or 
 indifferent. 
 
 Among the causes of absenteeism is the want of proper 
 clothing. In these hard times, while many willing hands are 
 unable to find employment, this plea is by no means limited to 
 the huts or haunts of indolence, intemperence and profligacy. 
 Where parents are really too poor to provide comfortable 
 clothing, the pressing needs of their children should enlist the 
 sympathies of the benevolent. Here true charity may do as 
 
101 
 
 truly Christian work as by any gifts for missions in pagan- 
 lands. That charity which really beghu at home is at once 
 most comprehensive and diffusive. Poor children have often 
 been thus provided that they might attend the Sabbath school, 
 and this effort is worthy of all praise, but even for morality 
 and piety, thirty hours a week in the public school is worth 
 far more than one hour in the Sabbath school. In some towns 
 the Selectmen have , met this exigency. While great caution 
 should be used not to encourage indolence and improvidence, 
 there are cases of destitution where town aid may be used as 
 wisely to prevent starving the mind as famishing the body. 
 
 The fact that nearly ninety-five per cept of our children are 
 reported as in schools of all kindsj shows that the law for the 
 prevention of illiteracy has worked beneficently and opened to 
 hundreds the door of the school house otherwise closed to them 
 forever. The influx of the foreign element suggests the lead- 
 ing cause of absenteeism. Those who need the most watching 
 are of alien parentage, as yet novices in the English language, 
 speaking chiefly a foreign tongue. There is also a large class 
 of native children, whose parents, being illiterate immigrants, 
 do not yet appreciate the advantages of education. 
 
 But four parents have been prosecuted and fined during the 
 year. Instead of brandishing the penalties of the law, we have 
 kept them in the background, and urged mainly the great 
 advantages of education. These persuasions are, however, 
 sometimes enforced by the delicate hint that we desire to avoid 
 the painful duty of prosecution which must follow any and 
 every case of willful and open defiance of the law. As will be 
 seen by the following report, the prosecution of the employer 
 and three parents in one town, resulted in promptly bringing 
 seventy children to school. 
 
 It was a very gratifying. fact that the superintendent of one 
 of the largest factories in the State, after being prosecuted for 
 the employment of children who. had not received the required 
 schooling, and being bound over to the Superior Court, should 
 have the manliness to write to the Agent of the Board : " The 
 legal measures you took were right and proper, as you used 
 every other means in your power, and the law as the last 
 resort From this time, you may be assured, I shall use my 
 
102 
 
 best efforts to comply with the law — and without the law, I 
 think the parents would have defeated me in getting their 
 children to school, but they now find that they are liable as 
 well as myself, and I shall have their cooperation in bringing 
 about the desired result. I shall be pleased to see you at any 
 time, and have your advice and suggestions in regard to 
 educating the children." The sincerity of this declaration was 
 evinced by the order promptly given to the overseers, " enforce 
 the law for the schooling of children, even if its observance 
 should stop the mill." If this superintendent was the greatest 
 sinner, he now bids fair to be the best saint in our " canon" of 
 employers of children. 
 
 Whatever may be true in monarchical governments, in our 
 country there is every motive to kindness and conciliation in 
 the execution of this law. Our plan is truly democratic, for 
 its entire management is by the people and for the people, 
 through school officers chosen by the people and responsible 
 to the people, and hence commands popular sympathy. It is 
 not pressed upon the people by some higher power, but is their 
 own work, embodying their judgment and preferences. The 
 old form of compulsory education which existed in Connecticut 
 for more than a hundred and fifty years was not forced upon 
 the people as "subjects." It was rather a living organism, of 
 which they as "sovereigns" proudly claimed the paternity, 
 growing up with their growth and recognized as the source of 
 their strength and prosperity. After the utmost use of kind- 
 ness, tact, and persuasion, and every effort to awaken a dor- 
 mant parental pride, and showing that education will promote 
 their children's thrift and happiness through life, we find that 
 such persuasions are the more effective when it is understood 
 that the sanctions of the law might be employed. We have 
 used the right to enforce mainly as an argument to persuade. 
 As thus used, we know in Connecticut that our law has been 
 a moral force. It is itself an effective advocate of education to 
 the very class who need it most. It has already accomplished 
 great good and brought into the schools many children who 
 would otherwise have been absentees. 
 
FRENCH VIEWS OF AMERICAN SCHOOLb. 
 
 In 1876, the French Government appointed F. Buisson with 
 six assistants, to examine and report upon the American school 
 system. The Commissioners were all educational experts, con- 
 nected with the Department of Public Instruction. They 
 made a careful inspection of the school exhibits at our Cen- 
 tennial Exposition, and visited schools in various states from 
 Massachusetts to Missouri. Repeated interviews with Monsieur 
 Buisson led me to expect a most valuable Report from an 
 observer of such culture, breadth and judgment, aided as he 
 was by such eminent associates. This expectation has been 
 amply met. Professor Swinton,. who has translated a sum- 
 mary of this Report, fitly says : " We owe to a Frenchman 
 the best statement of the philosophy of American politics. 
 And now we shall have to credit to another Frenchman the 
 best statement of the philosophy of American education. If 
 this Report has not the monumental character of De Tocque- 
 ville's Democracy, it is by far the most comprehensive and the 
 most valuable analysis thus far made of public instruction in 
 the United States. It is our whole free school system, its 
 organization, working, methods and results, set forth in its 
 glories and in its faults, in its strength and in its weakness, by 
 a critic as sympathetic as he is acute. By those who personally 
 met the Commissioners, the Report of what they saw and what 
 they thought of what they saw, has been awaited with lively 
 interest. Well, we have at last after two years the Compte 
 rendu of their mission embodied in a great octavo of some 700 
 pages, published in Paris under the auspices of the French 
 Ministry of Public Instruction. The mere outlay that must 
 have attended the mission and the publication of so costly a 
 volume, enriched with plates, plans, etc., is a marked compli- 
 ment to American education." 
 
 In condensing the following statements so as to read freely, 
 I have modified the language of the writer for the sake of brev- 
 ity. If the rhetoric has suffered, the thought is retained. 
 
 A republican government needs the whole power of educa- 
 tion, said Montesquieu. This sentiment never found a fitter 
 
104 
 
 illustration than in the United States. If any people ever used 
 this " power of education," or united its. destinies to tlje-develop- 
 ment of its schools, or made public instruction the supreme 
 guarantee of its liberties, the condition, of its prosperityjihe 
 safeguard of its institutions^ that is most assuredly the people of 
 the United States. This role assigned to the school in social 
 life has long been the. most characteristic feature which foreign- 
 ers have observed in American customs. , This solicitude for 
 the education of youth grows with the growth of the. country, 
 enters more and more, into public opinion, and is incorporated 
 in more decisive acts. ..What in the beginning might seem a 
 burst of enthusiasm has gradually assumed the. force of a pro- 
 found conviction. No, longer, . the work of philanthropists^ or 
 of religious societies, it has. become a public service for which 
 states, cities and towns inclade in their ordinary taxes sums 
 which no, country in the world had: hitherto thought of conse- 
 crating,, to education.. So far from restricting itself to ele- 
 mentary education, this . generosity extends so as to provide 
 free institutions of superior secondary instruction. Public 
 ppinion approves, nay, enacts these sacrifices, so clear has it 
 become to all eyes that the future of the American people will 
 be what its schools make it. 
 
 Many causes conspire to give /the American .school this 
 unique importance. At, first it was the influence of the Pro- 
 testant element. The early settlers of New England knew of 
 no grander duty, or, more precious privilege than reading the 
 Bible. Holding ignorance to be barbarism, they early enacted 
 that each town shall have a school and that each family shall 
 instruct its children. In proportion as their government be? 
 came democratic, that which at first was only a religious duty 
 became also a political necessity. . Where everything depends 
 on the will of the people, that will must.be enlightened, at the 
 risk of utter' ruin. Education, useful elsewhere, is here 
 essential. Universal suffrage means universal education or 
 demagogy. 
 
 This.country is, peopled by the constant immigration of, men 
 of every race, class, and religion, who have little in common 
 but the desire to better their condition. The mixed and ignor- 
 ant crowds who form the bulk. of. this immigration tend to 
 
105 
 
 group themselves according to their nationality. Hence they 
 need to be Americanized as soon as possible. The Irish, Ger- 
 man, French, Scandinavians and Spaniards must not desire to 
 constitute themselves a nation in the nation, but these immi- 
 grants must themselves be the American nation and make their 
 boast of it. What is the instrument of this marvellous trans- 
 formation ? What institution has so infused the American 
 blood into these thousands of colonists, -who have. hardly had 
 time to forget Europe ? It is the public school, and its useful- 
 ness in this direction alone justifies, its cost. Suppose that 
 instead of these: public institutions, the new immigrants could 
 find only private schools, all would be changed. Each would 
 follow his own ideas and customs, each group would constitute 
 itself apart, perpetuating its language, traditions, creed, its 
 ancient national spirit and also its own prejudices. Instead of 
 accustoming the child to a healthful contact with conflicting 
 opinions, the school would be a confessional, the distinction of 
 rich and poor, of the child that pays and the charity pupil 
 would perpetuate and pronounce itself. It is a capital fact for 
 America, thanks to daily contact in the public schools, that 
 the antipathy of the white to the colored child has begun to 
 yield. And the United States without this fusion of races, 
 without unity of language, without the equality of social 
 classes, without the mutual tolerance of all the sects, above all, 
 without the ardent love of their new country and its institu- 
 tions, would that be the United States at all ? All that this 
 country has become and is now, is literally due to the public 
 school. 
 
 In proportion as a nation advances, the dangers which the 
 school is to avert go on increasing. For this reason they 
 redouble their efforts and liberality for schools. As the native 
 population does not increase as fast as the foreign or mixed 
 population, the time may come when the American element, 
 the native Yankee, will be in the minority. Hence the United 
 States omit no measure fitted to imbue the new population 
 with the American spirit and so assimilate them that they shall 
 seize and make the national traditions their own; 
 
 The Profession of Teaching in the United States. — In France a 
 person enters the career of teaching with the view of creating 
 
106 
 
 for himself a stable and permanent position. Those who 
 abandon it before obtaining their retiring pension form the 
 exception. The young beginner expects to live and die a 
 teacher, and as each year adds to his previous experience, the 
 time comes when, possessed of adequate theoretical and prac- 
 tical knowledge, he is able to discipline his class methodically 
 and successfully. 
 
 Not at all thus is it in the United States. The profession of 
 teacher seems to be a sort of intermediate stage in one's career 
 — a stage at which the young woman awaits an establishment 
 suited to her tastes, and the young man a more lucrative posi- 
 tion. For many young people, this transitory profession simply 
 furnishes the means of continuing their studies. Few male 
 teachers remain more than five years in the service ; and, if 
 the lady teachers show a longer term, it is not to be forgotten 
 that marriage is usually the end of their desires, and that, once 
 married, they almost always resign their positions. It has 
 thus come to pass, by the mere force of circumstances, that 
 the school authorities have been led not only to establish 
 various regulations for the application of school laws, but also 
 to lay down detailed courses of study containing the subjects 
 to be taught in each kind of school, in each class, often in each 
 division, and this for each term, if not for each month in the 
 year. The time-tables in schools that are at all regularly 
 attended are fixed in advance, the text-books are chosen by 
 the school board ; and finally, school manuals, often of great 
 value, are furnished as a vade mecum, from which teachers 
 may derive information as to methods and the various details 
 of daily work. 
 
 Time-Tables. — A class in an American public school, even in 
 the cities, comprises at least three divisions or sections, and in 
 some classes with not more than forty-five pupils, five sections 
 are found. But while in France it is a principle not to go 
 beyond three divisions, and to bring these together as frequently 
 as possible in collective lessons, such as reading, writing, history, 
 geography, object lessons, and dictation — whereby these exer- 
 cises receive the amount of time required for some degree of 
 fullness in the development of the subject,-— the American 
 system rarely admits a combination of this kind. Each divi- 
 
107 
 
 sion has its own separate lessons in the different branches, with 
 an occasional exception in the case of oral spelling and object 
 lessons. Thus in a session of two and one-half hours of actual 
 work, we have counted in the primary schools and in the 
 country schools as many as fourteen distinct exercises — a 
 number reduced, to seven in the grammar schools; but there 
 is always one-half at least of the pupils that remain unem- 
 ployed, while the others receive their lessons or go through 
 their "recitation," as it is called in the United States. This 
 everlasting coming and going of study and of recitation gives 
 rise to a perpetual movement in the class-room. 
 
 Moreover, as monitors are never employed, it conies to pass 
 that a very limited period of time can be given to the lessons, 
 and even this time is diminished by the frequent changes of 
 place, for generally, in recitation, the pupils leave their seats 
 and arrange themselves standing, along the class-room wall, 
 and then return to their seats during the fifteen minutes or 
 half hour of "study," their place in the meantime being taken 
 by others. In many a time-table we have seen lessons in 
 reading, arithmetic and history reduced to ten and even to 
 five minutes, and, in like manner, general lessons in botany 
 and physiology cut down to five minutes in the first grade of 
 a grammar school. 
 
 "What is to be expected from such a procedure? It is in 
 vain that the best arranged programmes are put into the hands 
 of teachers, or that the most valuable pedagogic directions are 
 laid down for their guidance — their intelligence and their devo- 
 tion must both be foiled by the vices of such a system. 
 
 The time-tables — rarer, by the way, than any other docu- 
 ments — appear to us the weak part in the organization of 
 American schools. There is nothing to indicate that most 
 important matter, to wit, the work of those divisions which 
 the teacher has not immediately in hand. The pupils are 
 "studying," they told us, but what are they studying? Undi- 
 rected and unwatched, we have our fears as to this "studying." 
 Of course, there must be a great abuse of copying work, that 
 mechanical task so justly proscribed in France ; and worse 
 still, it cannot be possible, owing to the lack of time, to develop 
 the reasoning and observing powers of the children. Instruc- 
 
108 
 
 tion, reduced as it is, per force, to dry recitations or mechanical 
 exercises, is barren in the lower grades, where this evil is the 
 worst, while in the higher grades it cannot but be fettered, and 
 must iproduce results below, what might ibe expected from so 
 choice a. body of teachers, and so excellent an organization. 
 
 ■ i School Manuals. — Every one of the various courses of study 
 that we examined has joined to it, byway of complement, 
 pedagogic directions for the use of teachers. Prepared, as 
 these are, by competent persons, they bring the attention of 
 teachers to the carrying out of the courses of study, the mode 
 of conducting recitations and the nature and aim of practical 
 exercises ; in a word, they give the school system a unity that 
 secures the regular progress of instruction; while it renders 
 inspection more effective. 
 
 . Country Schools* — Owing to the representations of certain 
 enthusiastic travelers, a most lovely idea of the American 
 rural school-house is common in France: it is pictured, as a 
 nest among flowers. Thither resort,<each morning, on prancing 
 ponies, redTcheeked lassies and lads, grave and proud and 
 respectful to their young mates as our cavaliers of the good 
 old times. The mistress — herself youngr-^-smilingly receives 
 them at the entrance, o'ershadowed by great trees. How 
 remote is the reality from this picture, this charming exception 
 to a state of things still in its rude beginnings ! We traversed 
 the vast plains whtere the : husbandman struggles against an 
 unconquerable vegetation, and the still half-wild valleys in the 
 regions of iron, coal and oil, — and it was not our lot to find 
 any such school idyl. 
 
 In the country, stone or brick school-houses form the excep- 
 tion ; frame buildings, so cold in winter and so scorching in 
 summer, are much more numerous, and the log-house has not 
 yet. disappeared. In the most flourishing States, what com- 
 plaints are made. against defective school accommodations! 
 Let it not be said that, in describing the rural schools of the 
 United States, we have sought out exceptional cases ; we have 
 tried our best to do justice to that great country, but we cannot 
 conceal the fact that in the rural districts the school^houses are 
 poor affairs and poorly equipped. Thus in Pennsylvania and 
 New Hampshire, out. of twenty-two teachers' reports; fourteen 
 
109 
 
 stated that the class-rooms were absolutely destitute of every- 
 thing in the way of means for visual instruction, that is, there 
 were neither maps nor blackboards ; two schools had one map 
 each ; one school possessed an old globe ; other schools no 
 blackboards and no > reading books ; a single school was fur- 
 nished with suitable apparatus. 
 
 -■The Courses of Study in Ungraded' Schools are still in the tenta- 
 tive period, not to say in a state of chaos. Some are too suc- 
 cinct and barely outlined; others reflect the personal predilec- 
 tions of the teacher and show that ingenuous pedantry so often 
 found associated with total inexperience. Sometimes a good 
 deal less than the,; required course is done; sometimes it is 
 greatly exceeded ; such studies as history, music, composition, 
 drawing and book-keeping being taken up, and in some cases 
 algebra, physiology, geology, natural philosophy, and rhetoric 
 even. 
 
 The worst evil from which rural schools suffer is irregularity 
 of attendance. Teachers and superintendents bitterly complain 
 of this. As a partial remedy,, and as a means of allowing chil- 
 dren to attend school without wholly depriving parents of their 
 help, some States have lately established a number of " half- 
 time" classes, in which attendance is reduced to a single session 
 per day; This measure has everywhere been followed by good 
 results, and it would perhaps be advantageous to introduce it 
 into our French system^ for the summer term at least, and in 
 the case of the older pupils. 
 
 The Country School-houses are still in many instances built of 
 wood, as are many of the finest dwellings, but they are frame 
 buildings well put together, painted, and conveniently lighted. 
 More frequently the constructions are of pressed brick with 
 stone trimmings and slate roofs. You have only to see these 
 coquettish school-houses, in the midst of vast lawns, shaded 
 with .fine trees and surrounded by palings, to judge of the place 
 which the school holds in public opinion. It is indeed a 
 national institution, devoted to the education of. "boys whose 
 votes will decide the fate of the Republic, and of girls, one of 
 whom may be the mother of the president of the United States." 
 
 What specially distinguishes the country school-house of the 
 United States from that of Europe is the absence of lodgings 
 
110 
 
 for master or mistress. Nowhere in the United States is this 
 arrangement found. It is an evidence of a state of things not 
 without its unfortunate side : the teacher is engaged for a year 
 simply ; he is paid by the month, and most frequently his 
 certificate has but a limited duration. Under these circum- 
 stances he but comes and goes ; when he is not a resident of 
 the locality, he takes board for the school term and has nothing 
 but a study or office in the school-house. 
 
 School-houses of New York Oily. — In the school buildings in 
 New York City everything is sacrificed to the reception hall 
 with its vast platform, fitted to hold a desk, several arm-chairs 
 and a piano. In the hall it is that the stranger visiting the 
 school is received. The movement of five or six hundred chil- 
 dren entering in good order, to the sound of the piano, from 
 six or eight adjoining rooms, while the folding doors opening 
 below, show the smallest scholars ranked on steps — all this 
 makes a fine show ; but it is purchased too dearly, if the studies 
 and the health of the children are to suffer thereby, as we can- 
 not but tfaink that they must. 
 
 The Kindergarten. — Infant Schools, which in France precede 
 the primary school, form no part of the public school system 
 of the United States. The few infant schools which exist are 
 private establishments, or else free institutions, without legal 
 recognition. Nevertheless, since 1871, Kindergartens on the 
 Froebel plan have been attached to some of the public schools 
 of Boston and St. Louis, and these establishments are every 
 year gaining ground in a quite marked manner in all the States. 
 The obstacles still encountered by the Kindergarten arise partly 
 from American domestic manners, and partly from the prejudice 
 which this German importation arouses in the minds of certain 
 superintendents. 
 
 Woman in America is much less employed than she is in 
 France, Belgium, and England, in industrial employments that 
 take her from her household. "Home, Sweet Home" is for 
 the Anglo-Saxon a species of worship, and in this sphere the 
 wife is to maintain order, peace and happiness, by attending 
 to her husband and children. It is not to be thought of that 
 she should go to a place of employment in the morning and 
 stay there till evening. The hearth must not be cold nor the 
 
Ill 
 
 house forsaken. And this is the motive that withdraws married 
 women from public school-teaching. For what would become 
 of her "home," and who would take care of her husband and 
 children, when she was at school — generally considerably 
 removed from her abode ? In America the mother is the first 
 instructor of her children, and generally she teaches them to 
 read before sending them to public school. 
 
 In the Kindergarten exhibits at Philadelphia we noticed 
 everywhere the application of Froebel's ideas, designed to 
 interest children while amusing them, to excite and direct their 
 attention, to accustom them to represent or put together objects 
 of their own devising. 
 
 But with Americans the practical spirit is too strong for 
 them readily to accept what does not offer an immediate result. 
 One of the objections they urge against the Kindergarten is 
 that it does not teach reading, writing and arithmetic (the three' 
 R's). Indeed, these institutions are not likely to meet full 
 acceptance in the United States until it shall be shown that 
 the general training they give to very young children will 
 induce rapid school-progress, until it shall be shown that chil- 
 dren bring from the Kindergarten a certain stock of practical 
 notions. Besides, there is the question of expense, and how 
 can $16 be gotten for the education of a child of from 3 to 7 
 years, of age, when this costs only $10 or $12 for a pupil of 
 from 7 to 10 years of age? If the Kindergarten has made its 
 way at but a few points in the United States, it is the object of 
 an active advocacy and has the sympathy of eminent educators. 
 The application it has already received tends to free the Froebel 
 system of any too exclusive form, and to adapt it to the wants 
 and the genius of the country. This same result we should 
 seek to attain in France, with the view of infusing life into our 
 infant schools, and awakening the faculties of the child, instead 
 of putting them to sleep by merely mechanical modes of pro- 
 cedure. 
 
 Beading. — The reading of the French language certainly 
 presents sufficient difficulty ; but the extreme complication 
 and the numerous anomalies of English pronunciation render 
 the teaching of reading in that tongue a still more delicate 
 
112 
 
 problem. Hence, in the United Stated, great ingenuity has 
 been expended in the discovery of practical and' speedy meth* 
 ods. Germany has furnished many plans which have been 
 ingeniously modified and applied. 
 
 The ancient alphabetic method is now. scarcely used at all in 
 good schools. It is the longest and most monotonous method 
 — and it is the method' best known in France. This method 
 was npt represented at the Exposition. Even in the country 
 schools in the United States, there are not on the average 
 twenty in a hundred that use the old spelling plan, and. in 
 many States it is not' employed at all. Manifestly public 
 opinion has pronounced for the new methods, i 
 ■. In the phonic method, imported from Germany, the teacher 
 drills the child first in the pronunciation of the. sounds of the 
 language, then in distinguishing the signs by whicb these are 
 represented. He thus proceeds from the sound to the symbol, 
 from the letter 1 uttered to the letter figured; in place of passing 
 from the name of the letter to its phonic value, which is often 
 very difficult. However, this method, applied strictly and in 
 its whole scope, assumes. that,, as is the case of German, a given 
 letter always corresponds with a given sound, and this is not 
 the' case with the English language* Hence many objections 
 have been raised to the. purely phonic method, which indeed> 
 had- to be modified into the word method or the phonetic 
 
 method. , : 
 
 The phonic method, even when aided by all the American 
 improvements of the. word method, will always meet with grave: 
 objections. Excellent for German and Spanish, in which a 
 letter has rarely more than a single power, it encounters in 
 French, and still more so in English, anomalies resulting, from 
 the constant use of the same sign for different sounds, or of two 
 different signs for the same sound^ not to speak of useless 
 double consonants, silent letters, etc. This consideration has 
 led to the invention, by Dr. Edwin Leigh, of a method based 
 on the same principle, but which in its application has recourse 
 to typographical innovations. In many schools the teachers 
 make use of the Leigh method in connection with the word 
 method, and this is called the eclectic method, for in America 
 every new device assumes a pretentious name. 
 
113 
 
 In most of the schools visited by us, special importance is 
 attached to class exercises in pronunciation. The lady teachers 
 throw a certain ardor into the work of articulation, and, if need 
 be, they show the play of the vocal organs in the production 
 of a given sound or element, as for instance th hard, or guttural 
 r, etc. It is to be desired that this were done in France, and 
 that our teachers appreciated the utility of this vocal gym- 
 nastic, as bearing on reading or even on spelling. No pains 
 are spared to give the pupils a correct pronunciation, not only 
 in the primary but also in the most advanced classes. The 
 master reads in a loud intelligible voice a passage from the 
 Eeader suited to the grade. The pupils repeat it in the same 
 tone and with the same inflections. This is one of the liveliest 
 and most curious exercises in an American school, and one 
 which we have often witnessed with the keenest interest. The 
 preceding account proves what importance is attached to read- 
 ing in the United States. The method employed, very gener- 
 ally a rational one, secures the speedy acquisition of reading, 
 and inspires pupils with the love of reading ; this is, doubtless, 
 one of the reasons why there is no other country where people 
 read better or read more. 
 
 (The two following recommendations to French teachers, 
 drawn from the Commissioners' observations of American meth- 
 ods of teaching reading, merit the special attention of school 
 officers and teachers of Connecticut). 1. To render primary 
 instruction in reading not only more attractive, but more profitable, 
 by enlivening it by means of object lessons, and carrying itforvmrd 
 in connection with writing and rudimentary drawing. 2. To give 
 more attention to pronunciation, delivery, emphasis, and expressive 
 reading. 
 
 The Mother Tongue. — The courses of study and the directions 
 for teaching the English language reveal everywhere a truly 
 practical spirit, and are full of judicious considerations. It is 
 with entire justice that distinction is made between language 
 training and grammatical study. It is readily understood that 
 the English language, in which the laws of concord amount to 
 scarcely anything, may content itself with this practical study. 
 French, which deals more in rules and orthographic details, 
 requires more attention to grammar, 
 c 
 
114 
 
 Two abuses strike us in the numerous papers on grammar 
 and analysis that came under our eye. 1. The complication of 
 parsing and analysis. In France also we carry written parsing 
 too far, for everywhere routine acts in the same way and trans- 
 forms into a mechanical exercise what, within proper limits, 
 ought to be a valuable intellectual discipline. 2. Subtlety of 
 distinction and complicated terminology. In grammatical in- 
 struction it seems to the Americans that the simplicity of Engr 
 lish syntax ought to be made up for by a lavish use of scholastic 
 distinctions, which, unfortunately, correspond to nothing in the 
 construction of language. Dictation exercises which occupy 
 so prominent a place in our French schools, are rare in the 
 United States. 
 
 A feature that deserves unreserved praise, and which we 
 found in the better schools in the United States, is the develop- 
 ment of the inventive faculty of the pupil by means of compo- 
 sition-exercises outlined in the most general manner. Even in 
 the primary schools the teachers are beginning to require the 
 pupils to write out an account of what is represented in a 
 picture in the text-book or in a chromo placed before them. 
 This is a capital exercise, and one that we cannot too strongly 
 recommend for adoption in our French schools. The task con- 
 sists simply in practicing the scholar in observing attentively, 
 in telling what he sees, and in telling this in an orderly manner. 
 
 Geography has long been a favorite study in American 
 schools. It could not be otherwise in a country that has so 
 many reasons for devoting itself to this science, — the immense 
 extent of its territory, the great diversity in its phyiscal con- 
 ditions, resources and population, the importance of its com- 
 mercial relations with the whole world, not to mention the 
 circumstances of its origin, whence it results that no land is 
 absolutely foreign to it. 
 
 In response to a well understood want, geographical instruc- 
 tion early assumed a methodical form : this form, without being 
 original, has still an American character, something national 
 and sui generis. The old mode of instruction, bristling with 
 repulsive nomenclatures which in nowise spoke to the mind or 
 the imagination, and which merely loaded the memory, is still 
 doubtless found in a multitude of rural schools ; for in speak- 
 
115" 
 
 ing of the United States in general, it must never be forgotten 
 that there is a distance of nearly half a century between the 
 country school, properly so-called, and the town or city school. 
 
 One of the happiest symptoms that strike the attention at the 
 slightest examination is that geographical study now almost 
 always begins where it ought to begin — by making the child 
 acquainted with the neighborhood, by a plan of the class room, the 
 school-house, the street, the village ; in a word, a knowledge of the 
 points of the compass, not merely on the map and as a matter 
 of definition, but in nature, in a given locality. This very fact 
 is an indication justifying the belief that geographical reform 
 has penetrated deeply into educational practice, for it is gener- 
 ally by such beginnings that this reform ends. It is more 
 difficult to bring about a rectification in the manner of teaching 
 these rudiments than it is to perfect subsequent instruction. 
 And that this progress has been made in the United States is 
 manifest in every way, — by the text-books, the courses of study, 
 and the numberless specimens of work done by the scholars. 
 The strong point in all this new geographical training is that it 
 is really a series of object lessons, that it begins with the child's 
 own stock of knowledge , instead of overwhelming him with 
 abstractions and definitions. 
 
 Without overlooking the progress already made, we received 
 the general impression that the new methods have not yet pen- 
 etrated into the heart of primary teaching ; they are known 
 and applied sometimes in an admirable manner in the larger 
 cities and in elite schools, but they are still unknown in most 
 country schools, and between these two extremes are thou- 
 sands of schools which as yet have hardly begun to feel the 
 influence of the new ideas, and thousands that have the letter 
 without the spirit thereof. The following features of Ameri- 
 can geographical teaching are recommended as worthy of imi- 
 tation : — 
 
 I. To begin with the synthetic method, which, starting with local 
 geography, progressively 'enlarges the horizon of study, but not to 
 dwell too long on heal geography ; to give pupils notions of general 
 geography and cosmography as soon as they are able to receive them. 
 
 II. To practice pupils early in map drawing from memory and 
 in reproducing on the blackboards the proximate forms of countries. 
 
116 
 
 III. To insist on the descriptive part, without going out of the 
 way to seek the picturesque, and paying particular attention to 
 imparting correct ideas on the relief of countries, their general fea- 
 tures, the nature of the soil, climate, production, etc., above all, great 
 attention to what the English call "physiography." 
 
 Arithmetic. — In American schools nothing is equal to the care 
 with which the child is trained in the intelligent application 
 of the four ground rules. No sooner does the pupil know the 
 simplest numbers, 1, 2, 3, that is the a b c of calculation, than 
 means are found for setting him to work in combining them 
 by addition, subtraction, multiplication and division, in such a 
 way as to bring into play all the faculties of attention, reflec- 
 tion and judgment. Beyond this first stage, the teaching of 
 arithmetic generally quits the good way we have indicated, 
 and ceases to be the supreme agency of intellectual culture. 
 It seems as though the sole aim now were to impart hastily 
 the practical means of resolving this or that kind of operation. 
 
 The principles that might light up the progress of the pupil 
 and exercise his wits are almost voluntarily left aside. He 
 commits to memory how, in a given case, he should state a 
 proposition, what rule he should follow — whether or not he has 
 learnt the why^- -and he applies the rule, with confidence and 
 in a routine manner to exercises similar to that which served 
 as an example. Practice before theory — such is the idea that 
 generally prevails. And the method of proceeding is gener- 
 ally as follows : The teacher, or one of the most advanced 
 pupils, sets forth on the blackboard each point in an operation 
 to be learned, while the pupils follow, verifying in their book 
 the course indicated ; then the latter reproduce on their slates 
 the same work, retain the rule by heart and apply it, point by 
 point, to new examples. The rationale of the procedure is 
 given only in case the curiosity or good sense of the scholar 
 calls it out. 
 
 Great efforts are now making to bring back arithmetical 
 teaching to a more rational way, to ally in just measure theory 
 and practice, by a recurrence to the principles of analysis as 
 well as of synthesis. By the solution of a good many prob- 
 lems of the same kind, dealing with quite small numbers the 
 pupil is led to formulate for himself the method to be pursued 
 
117 
 
 in the exercises assigned to him. His memory is then not the 
 only faculty brought into play ; he reasons and draws conclus- 
 ions ; his good sense develops, he acquires correct language, 
 acquires a taste for what he does, and gains strength for greater 
 difficulties. Arithmetic has its principles and its axioms, just 
 as geometry has, and it is by setting them forth, by develop- 
 ing them logically that the pupil's intellect is sharpened and 
 his judgment exercised and himself fitted for the intelligent 
 practice of calculation. [The following American methods 
 recommended to French educators, need to be more generally 
 applied by our teachers. 
 
 I. To prepare children 'for the study of arithmetic by the use of 
 the abacus, without prolonging this exercise too much. 
 
 II. To extend the use of mental calculation, as well in the form 
 of operations carried on in the head as in that of the rapid solution 
 of such problems. 
 
 III. Not to be afraid of practicing children from an early age in 
 mental calculation, fractions, complex numbers, the metric system — 
 the whole presented not in the rigorous and definitive order of ulterior 
 instruction, but under the common, elementary, analogical, and, so 
 to speak, provisional form suited to a first survey of the subject. 
 
 Drawing in the Public Schools. — Six years ago drawing was 
 taught only in certain special schools, and that in a very imper- 
 fect manner: there were no models, no methods, no materials, 
 no masters. A committee was formed, and in a few years a 
 whole system of instruction was devised. In some states, Draw- 
 ing has been made obligatory ; four methods, strictly graded 
 and completing one another, bring the arts of designing within 
 the reach of pupils of all ages ; public expositions are increas- 
 ing ; all regular teachers are put in the way of teaching this 
 branch of education; a normal school of art, to which flock 
 pupils from all parts, has been founded and a fruitful emulation 
 has arisen among various cities. If we take into account that 
 these are the fruits of a few years of trial, it must be acknowl- 
 edged that such remarkable results were never before obtained 
 in so short a time. The following are the recommendations 
 made on the subject of drawing : 
 
 I. To commence drawing as soon as the child enters school, by 
 slate or blackboard exercises, using the aid of squares or better style 
 
118 
 
 of points regularly placed in such a way as to leave to the pupil the 
 drawing of the lines. 
 
 IT. To advance gradually from the straight line to elementary 
 geometrical figures, then to more complex combinations, and so to 
 industrial and ornamental drawing. 
 
 ILL Especially to practice the eye by elementary studies in per- 
 spective, by the recognition of distances by sight, and by the observa- 
 tion and comparison of forms. 
 
 IV. To proscribe drawing by mere fancy or chance, which falsi- 
 fies the taste. 
 
 V. To organize for pupil-teachers methodical courses of drawing 
 suited to their future wants. 
 
 High Schools: — Everywhere High Schools are the special 
 object of attention on the part of School Boards and towns 
 having over 500 families — say from 2,000 to 2,500 inhabitants, 
 do not shrink from taxing themselves for their suitable accom- 
 modation. In most cases, these schools are for both sexes. 
 No part of the American school system is more essentially 
 national than are the High Schools, no part of the system pre- 
 sents features that are more original, or, in some respects, 
 further removed from European ideas, no part of the system is 
 worthy of more profound study. Peruse the course of study 
 in these High Schools ; think of those children of workmen and 
 work- women passing four or five years in adorning, strength- 
 ening and cultivating their minds by studies that everywhere 
 else are reserved for the well-to-do classes, and tell us if these 
 institutions do not bear the very seal and impress of American 
 civilization. Need one be astonished, then, at the frank pride 
 /with which the American citizen speaks of these schools? Has 
 he not a right to be proud when, by sure documentary evi- 
 dence, he shows us the son and the daughter of the humblest 
 artisan so mentally elevated that between them and the privi- 
 leged of fortune no difference of culture, no trace of intellect- 
 ual inferiority, is to be discovered ? If it is glorious to see 
 society freely giving to the poor the benefit of a public school 
 education, is it not a still more extraordinary spectacle to 
 behold a nation that deems it would wrong its humblest citi- 
 zens were their children denied any opportunity for the full 
 and free expansion of their minds? Here is a country where 
 
119 
 
 there are hundreds of free High Schools, on the same footing as 
 the most primary establishments. They are of one body with 
 the common schools, are administered by the same authorities, 
 supported by the same funds, and intended for the same popu- 
 lation ; and yet, instead of being limited to the strictly essential 
 studies, to the minimum of knowledge required to take children 
 out of the official category of the illiterate, these upper schools 
 are established on the basis of what may be called the higher 
 instruction. They are not professional schools, nor are 
 they bastard imitations of the classical college, nor yet low 
 grade universities — they are in the fullest sense popular 
 schools, intended to give the people the best, purest and 
 loftiest results of liberal education. They open up no special 
 pursuit — they lead to all pursuits, without exception and with- 
 out distinction. They do not make an engineer, an architect, 
 or a physician, any more than they make an artisan or a mer- 
 chant, but they form bright, intelligent youths trained to stud- 
 ies of every kind, qualified to select for themselves among the 
 various professions, and skilled to succeed therein. One grad- 
 uate will enter the university, another will go into business ; 
 there will be differences of occupation among them, but there 
 will be no inequality of education. 
 
 So far as social equality can possibly be reached on this earth, it 
 is attained by the American High School. In other countries it is 
 to be feared that the children of different classes of society, 
 though brought together for a while in the public school, must 
 soon find themselves separated by the whole distance between 
 their respective families ; indeed, it must be so, since one child 
 enters on his apprenticeship and thus stops short in his intel- 
 lectual development at the very time when the other is just 
 beginning his. In the United States every effort is made to 
 delay and to diminish this separation, to carry as far as possi- 
 ble, and a£ high as possible, that common instruction which 
 effacss the distinction of rich and poor. 
 
 If it be true that the prosperity of a republic is in the direct 
 ratio of the replenishment of its middle classes, of the abun- 
 dance and facility in the indefinite recruiting of these classes, 
 then the High School of the United States, whatever it may 
 cost, is the best investment of capital that can possibly be made. 
 
120 
 
 [Of the conclusions reached by the Commissioners, the fol- 
 lowing are the most practical and suggestive to Americans.") 
 
 Summary of Conclusions. — 1. The common schools of the 
 United States are essentially a national institution ; they are 
 dear to the people, respected by all, created, sustained and 
 enriched by a unanimous spirit of patriotism which for a cen- 
 tury has shown no falling off; in a word, they are deemed the 
 very source of public prosperity, as, par excellence, the conserv- 
 ative and protective institution in their democratic govern- 
 ment and republican manners. 
 
 2. The school organization is rigorously municipal. The 
 law simply establishes as a principle the necessity of public 
 instruction, leaving to each community to provide for its own 
 needs in its own way. 
 
 3. The higher direction and the inspection of the public 
 schools are confided to elective boards. From this peculiarity 
 arise various results, as, for instance, the frequent renewing of 
 the Boards and Superintendents, the unfortunate influence of 
 political prejudices and local interests, the liability to sudden 
 changes in the school organization, and, finally, the necessity 
 imposed on the people to keep themselves informed on school ques- 
 tions, as matters on which they have constantly to%vote. 
 
 4. The public schools are in all grades absolutely feee : the 
 abolition of fees was in every State the signal of the new birth 
 of the public schools ; it brought into these establishments the 
 children of all classes of the population, and constantly tends 
 to bring them nearer and nearer together. 
 
 5. The public schools are absolutely unsectarian. 
 
 6. Compulsory education, made matter of law in some States, 
 has doubtless aided the development of common school instruc- 
 tion. The results thus far ascertained are not very striking ; 
 and besides it is impossible either to pass or to carry out the 
 measure in the very region where its urgency is most pressing, 
 that is, in the South. In general, the most practical form that 
 compulsion has assumed is the hunting up of vagabond chil- 
 dren or the adoption of various measures to force them into 
 school; to begin with, and then, if need be, to transfer them to 
 reform schools or other special establishments. 
 
 7. Public school instruction in the United States does not 
 
121 
 
 form a course of study apart, strictly limited to a minimum or 
 completely distinct from classical instruction; it comprises 
 three degrees — the primary, the grammar school, and the high 
 school course — sometimes combined in a single school, and 
 again subdivided among three different schools, but in all cases 
 connecting with the higher education, whether literary or profes- 
 sional, so that a child of the working class has the opportunity 
 of gratuitously continuing his education as far as his tastes and 
 aptitudes permit. 
 
 8. The training of teachers is now almost universally regarded 
 as the essential condition of sound, popular education, and the 
 number of State Normal Schools is rapidly increasing. 
 
 9. As the career of teaching is often taken up merely pro- 
 visionally by young men or women who do not intend to con- 
 tinue in the field, there results a very grievous instability in 
 the teaching force — though it should be observed that there is 
 some compensation for this evil in the fact that it draws into 
 the work a large number of young schoolmasters full of ardor, 
 equipped beyond the needs of the common school course, and 
 untrammelled by the spirit of routine. 
 
 10. The coeducation of the sexes is the rule in the American 
 public school system, and except in some of the great cities is 
 becoming more and more the rule. The results of this usage 
 are generally represented as excellent in both the moral and 
 the intellectual aspect. The only or at least the chief objec- 
 tions heard, are based on the excess of labor which the system 
 imposes on young girls. 
 
 11. From these causes and from the marked taste of Amer- 
 icans for innovation and new departures,, it has come to pass 
 that the schools of the United States show a diversity of organ- 
 ization, and a multiplicity of forms, courses of study, text- 
 books, and methods, which result in much experimentation 
 and a lamentable loss of time ; but which, by leaving a great 
 deal to the free choice and responsibility of teachers and local 
 authorities, interests them directly and personally in the suc- 
 cess of the school. 
 
 12. Thence result, also, extraordinary efforts and boundless 
 liberality directed to giving the schools, both in the construc- 
 tion of the buildings and in the establishment and maintenance 
 
 D 
 
122 
 
 i 
 
 of the institutions, an air of comfort, of amplitude, and almost 
 luxury, which is not merely a satisfaction to municipal pride, 
 but is mainly the means of giving the public schools the prestige 
 necessary to bring within their fold all classes of the population 
 without distinction. 
 
 13. The great' publicity given to the Eeports of Committees 
 and Superintendents, the interest taken by the people in school 
 statistics, and the beautiful and simple organization of the 
 National Bureau of Education do more for the growth and 
 improvement of educational institutions than could possibly 
 be accomplished by the orders of any administrative authority, 
 even though clothed with the most extensive power. 
 
 14. If, with all these educational facilities, the United States 
 still show a considerable proportion of illiterate population, 
 the explanation is found, first, in the fact that the whole South 
 is yet a region to be conquered for public school instruction, 
 and secondly, because immigration is incessantly bringing in 
 a fresh contingent of illiterate adults. 
 
 15. The educational methods of the United States are in 
 general distinguished from our own by two characteristics, 
 which may by turns be either advantages or defects. On the 
 one hand they tend to become essentially objective, synthetic, 
 analogical, active. On the other hand, they are eminently 
 practical, being planned and practiced with reference to the 
 wants of life and to direct utility. 
 
 16. And so in the choice of subjects to be taught, the 
 American system is marked by the selection of the most indis- 
 pensable matters, of .the most rapid methods, of the most 
 positive successes, of those advantages which if not the most 
 important for mental improvement, have the most direct bear- 
 ing on the presenter future interest of the pupil, — an aim 
 which is very well in principle, but which, when too exclusively 
 sought, stamps study with an empirical and utilitarian impress, 
 gives a narrowness to education, and to a certain extent cramps 
 the mind itself. 
 
 17. As regards methods of teaching, the American system rec- 
 ommends itself by a frequent appeal to the pupil's own powers, 
 to his intellectual and moral spontaneity. It cares less for the 
 logical order of ideas than it does for the natural order of 
 
123 
 
 impressions ; it leaves a large independence to the teacher and 
 a still larger to the scholar, — whence an extreme diversity in 
 the modes of procedure and a not less striking inequality in 
 the results. Many and many a time one is struck with the 
 hasty, rapid, almost improvised character of a plan of educa- 
 tion which trusts implicitly to good instincts, good sense, and 
 good will, which aims ever to address the eye, the memory, the 
 imagination, which would thus gain time over the old strictly 
 didactic methods, but which by so doing, runs the risk of 
 becoming somewhat superficial, and is in danger sometimes of 
 dispensing too much with the severe but fruitful labors of 
 abstraction and reasoning. 
 
 We are not of those who, ignorant of the marvellous proofs 
 of moral and material vitality which the United States have 
 shown, think that we have discovered in this grand body the 
 germ of decomposition and prophesy its near ruin. This is 
 perhaps the people, of all the earth, which has in its immense 
 domains the grandest deposits of natural riches ; in its temper- 
 ament and character the most powerful motive to action ; in its 
 historical traditions the noblest example of energy, efficiency, 
 courage and civic honor, and in its institutions the system best 
 fitted to favor the rise of liberty, and these are some of the 
 forces which ought to resist the toughest trials. But while we 
 do not overlook these most promising signs, we do not conceal 
 the formidable problems which the country has still to solve. 
 The antagonism of races, traditions and interests which brought 
 on the bloody conflict between the North and the South, the 
 irruption of the blacks into public life, a just but terrible pun- 
 ishment of a civic wrong, the difficulty of long maintaining the 
 bonds which unite peoples so diverse, spread over a territory 
 so immense; all these are grave questions. These however are 
 thrown in the shade by a danger more immediate, and that is 
 the alteration, say rather the corruption of political morals, the 
 question of elections, and especially the election of President, 
 whether this shall be made by the intelligence and virtue of 
 the people, or whether it will veer about and become the prey 
 of intrigue and corruption. 
 
CLINTON RURAL IMPROVEMENT ASSOCIATION. 
 
 As calls are often made for a plan for Village Improvement 
 Societies, I insert that adopted in Clinton. - 
 
 1. This Association shall be called "The Rural Improvement 
 Association of Clinton." 
 
 2. The object of this Association shall be to cultivate public 
 spirit, quicken the social and intellectual life of the people, 
 promote good fellowship, and secure public health by better 
 hygienic conditions in our homes and surroundings, improve 
 our streets, roads, public grounds, side-walks, and in general 
 to build up and beautify the whole town, and thus enhance the 
 value of its real estate and render Clinton a still more inviting 
 place of residence. 
 
 3. The officers of this Association shall consist of a President, 
 a Vice-President, a Treasurer, a Secretary, and an Executive 
 Committee of fifteen, six of whom shall be ladies. 
 
 4. It shall be the duty of the Executive Committee to make 
 all contracts, employ all laborers, expend all moneys, and 
 superintend all improvements made by the Association. They 
 shall hold meetings monthly from April to October in each 
 year, and as much oftener as they may deem expedient. 
 
 5. Every person, who shall plant three trees by the road side, 
 under the direction of the Executive Committee, or pay three 
 dollars in one year or one dollar annually, and obligate himself 
 or herself to pay the same annually for three years, shall be a 
 member of this Association. 
 
 6. The payment of ten dollars annually for three years, or of 
 twenty-five dollars in one s\im, shall constitute one a life 
 member of this Association. 
 
 7. Five members of the Executive Committee present at any 
 meeting shall constitute a quorum. 
 
 8. No debt shall be contracted by the Executive Committee 
 beyond the amount of available means within their control, 
 and no member of the Association shall be liable for any debt 
 of the Association, beyond the amount of his or her subscription. 
 
 9. The Executive Committee shall call an annual meeting, 
 giving due notice of the same, for the election of officers of this 
 Association, and at said meeting, shall make a detailed report 
 of all moneys received and expended during the year, the 
 number of trees planted under their direction, and the number 
 planted by individuals, length of side-walks made or repaired, 
 and the doings of the Committee in general. 
 
 10. This constitution may be amended at any annual meet 
 ing by a two-thirds vote of the members present and voting. 
 
THE FIELD PARKS 
 
 BY 
 
 B. G. NORTHROP. 
 
 [Pbom Report of the Connecticut State Board op Education.] 
 
 NEW HAVEN: 
 
 TTJTTLB, MOREHOUSE & TAYLOR, PRINTERS. 
 
 1879. 
 
The example set in Haddam deserves to be copied in other towns. In the 
 language of Ex-Governor Hubbard, this " work of Village Improvement will not 
 fail, I trust, to awaken public attention and provoke imitation throughout our 
 State, and excite and even shame our own people into a larger public spirit and 
 better efforts to redeem from negligence our rural homes and villages." 
 
THE FIELD PAEKS.* 
 
 On the thirty-first day of last October, the four surviving 
 sons of Rev. David Dudley Field, D.D., celebrated the seventy- 
 fifth anniversary of their father's marriage, by presenting to the 
 town of Haddam two tracts of land for public parks, one 
 known as Meeting House Green, the other including Isinglass 
 Rock, west of the Brainard Academy; and comprising ten 
 acres. The grounds of the Brainard Academy are thus virtually 
 enlarged and made exceedingly attractive. The whole park, 
 finely laid out with drives and walks by F. L. Olmsted of New 
 York, the landscape gardener, and adorned with the choicest 
 ornamental trees indigenous and imported, is a grand contribu- 
 tion to the taste, sociality, good fellowship^ education, growth 
 and prosperity of the town. The high bluff, "Isinglass Hill," 
 commands for many miles a magnificent view of the river and 
 its valley, with the long range of hills beyond. This valuable 
 addition to the grounds of the Brainard Academy suggests and 
 
 * The following is the circular issued for the Park Presentation. 
 
 FIELD MEMORIAL. 
 
 Haddam, Conn., October 24th, 1878. 
 
 Dear Sie: 
 
 Messrs. David Dudley Field, Stephen J., Field, Cyrus W. Field, 
 and Henry M. Field, surviving sons of Rev. David D. Field, D.D., having pur- 
 chased and laid out two plots of ground in the centre village of Haddam, will on 
 the 3\st inst, at two o'clock, make a formal presentation of the same in trust to the 
 town as a public park, and as a memorial of their parents who spent a consider- 
 able portion of their lives here. The undersigned, representing the town in this ' 
 regard, beg most cordially to invite you to be present at the centre village of 
 Haddam, when such presentation is made, and there to meet the Messrs. Field. 
 It is believed that this is the first instance in which a gift with such an object has 
 been made, and it is thought that some public notice should be taken of it ; the 
 ' gift to the town is generous, and it is reasonable to hope that others may be led 
 to imitate an example so worthy, and so timely in view of the growing interest in 
 rural adornment throughout our State. 
 
 Respectfully Tours, Miner 0. Hazen, A. H. Hatden, Geo. W. Arnold, Cyrus 
 A. Hubbard, 0. F. Parker, Committee of Arrangements. 
 
 f It is already decided to hold in this park an annual festival to cultivate public 
 spirit and stimulate an interest in further village improvements. 
 
invites a corresponding enlargement of its funds. Brainard 
 Academy, useful as it was in Dr. Field's day, is now crippled 
 for want of an endowment. 
 
 Dr. Field was long tbe most prominent and pronounced friend 
 of popular education in this town and county. He took great 
 interest in the common schools and especially in the Brainard 
 Academy. Says A. B. Cook of Chicago, " I well recollect how we 
 boys in Haddam liked to have Dr. Field visit our school, -with 
 his genial, kind face and benevolent smile of recognition for us all, 
 and how he cheered us in the Academy when we began the 
 higher branches." Hon. D. N". Camp speaks in strong terms of 
 the pleasure and profit with which, more than thirty-five years 
 ago, he " listened to his timely lectures on public schools, ably 
 setting forth broad and earnest convictions of the importance 
 of educational progress." The history of the Brainard Acad- 
 emy and its early association with Dr. Field, its beautiful and 
 healthful location, its surroundings in an orderly, intelligent and 
 moral community, and this grand park in the rear, practically a 
 part of its. own grounds, render this a most eligible site for a 
 first class institution of learning. A 'large group of towns sur- 
 rounding Haddam are unfavorably situated for the maintenance 
 of separate High Schools, from which a well endowed Academy 
 in this central position, easily accessible, both by railroad and 
 river, would draw a liberal patronage. There is a hope, not to 
 say expectation, that some generous benefactions will place this 
 institution on such a basis of wide and permanent usefulness as 
 shall realize the desires and anticipations of Dr. Field. What 
 worthier monument could be erected to his memory than the 
 liberal endowment of this school, for the upbuilding and im- 
 provement of which he labored with such well directed zeal. 
 
 The Field Memorial Park is here noticed for the double pur- 
 pose of calling attention to the pressing needs of Brainard 
 Academy and giving a cordial acknowledgment of the dona- 
 tion of the Field brothers. In behalf of the friends of educa- 
 tion so far as I may represent them, I desire to express a high 
 appreciation of their grand gift to Haddam and thus to Con- 
 necticut, for our State takes a lively interest in the growth and 
 prosperity of each of her towns. This worthy example ought 
 to make many pthers, opportune as it is. in view of the growing 
 
interest in rural adornment throughout our State. There is 
 hardly one of our towns that has not at home or abroad some 
 favored sons who, by forming parks or founding schools or 
 libraries, could easily render this most fitting tribute to their 
 mother soil. 
 
 The sentiment that honors and cherishes one's birth-place 
 is noble and ennobling. I am aware that a popular prejudice 
 associates weakness and effeminacy with such taste, refinement 
 and liberality. But this sentiment has ever characterized the 
 greatest and best of men and is a prime element of true man- 
 hood. The cold and selfish soul is sterile in heroic virtues. 
 There is a New England railway king, now a millionaire, who 
 seldom visits his native town, takes no interest in it, does noth- 
 ing for it, and leaves even the old homestead and grounds, 
 though still owned by him, neglected and forlorn. Indeed such 
 examples are too common. On the other hand, the greatest 
 grandeur of intellect accords with fervor of filial feeling, with 
 fondest home attachments and with refinement and i delicacy of 
 taste. It is perfectly in keeping with the intellectual greatness 
 of Daniel Webster to find him fondly cherishing and beautify- 
 ing the old homestead, enriching and improving the paternal 
 acres and eloquently discoursing on the sacred associations of 
 home, the transcendent sweets of domestic life, the happiness of 
 kindred and parents and children. Washington was as delicate, 
 courteous and affectionate in his domestic relations and attach- 
 ments as he was wise in council and courageous in war. A 
 beautiful trait in Bryant's character was evinced by his devotion 
 to the old homestead and the little secluded town of Cumming- 
 ton among the Hampshire hills, hallowed to him by the memo- 
 ries of father and mother, and the sacred association of child- 
 hood. To that little town which he did so much to adorn and 
 enrich and educate, he ever deemed it a privilege to make an 
 annual visit — a summer visit with his household, often pro- 
 longed for weeks and months. That the old early associations 
 might remain, raising the old house, he built beneath and 
 around it a stately mansion, so that the paternal rooms remained 
 intact. 
 
 It is a good omen that public interest in the embellishments 
 of rural homes and villages is widely extending, and that the 
 
6 
 
 varied charms of the country with its superior advantages for 
 the physical and moral training of children are attracting many 
 thoughtful men to the simpler enjoyments and employments of 
 rural life. 
 
 Dr. Bushnell, with his keen observation and intense love of 
 rural scenery was Wont to say, " No part of our country between 
 the two oceans is susceptible of greater external beauty than 
 Connecticut. It is not in the great cities nor in the confined 
 .shops of trade, but principally in agriculture that the best 
 stock or staple of men is grown. It is in the open air, in 
 communion with the sky, the earth, and all living things, that 
 the largest inspiration is drunk in and the vital energies of a 
 real man are constructed." ' A taste for rural adornment is a 
 source of physical, mental and moral health as well as enjoy- 
 ment. The parentage of parks, lawns, trees, flowers, vines and 
 shrubs becomes a matter of just pride and binds one to the 
 spot he has adorned. 
 
 Nature is the great educator. Birds, flowers, insects, and 
 all animals are our practical primary teachers. In God's plan, 
 facts and objects as best seen in the country are the earliest 
 and the leading instruments of developing the faculties of the 
 juvenile mind. They cannot be fully trained when cooped up 
 within brick walls, witnessing only city scenes. 
 
 The excessive passion for city attractions and ambition for 
 easier lives and more genteel employments have brought ruin 
 to multitudes and financial disaster to the nation. A great 
 peril to the land to-day comes from the swelling throngs, rang- 
 ing from the reckless tramp to the fashionable idler, who are 
 ever devising expedients alike foul or fair, to get a living with* 
 out work. The disparagement of country life has been one of 
 the worst tendencies of the times. The country has ever 
 been the great school of mind, and has sent forth far more 
 than its proportion of gifted men to the centers of influence. 
 
 Every influence should therefore be combined to foster these 
 home attachments, for there is protection as well as education 
 in the fervent love of home with its sacred associations. Patri- 
 otism itself hinges on the domestic sentiments. When one's 
 home becomes the Eden of taste and interest and joy, those 
 healthful local ties are formed which bind him first and most to 
 
the spot he has embellished, and then to his town, his State 
 and country. Whatever adorns one's home and ennobles his 
 domestic life, strengthens .his love of country and nurtures all 
 the better elements of his nature. On the other hand, any man 
 without local attachments can have no genuine patriotism. As 
 happy in one place as in another, he is like a tree planted in a 
 tub, portable indeed, but at the expense of growth and strength. 
 Said Monsieur Lariaux, the French Deputy to the American 
 Evangelical Alliance, in his farewell address, " your homes, 
 homes, sweet homes — these are the safeguards of your freedom. 
 Oh pray, as you gather at your family altars, that my poor 
 France may have such homes." 
 
 Dr. Field really was the father of the Brainard Academy. He 
 started the project, selected the site, planned the building and 
 prompted the Brainard brothers to build and endow the school. 
 He was chairman of the Board of Trustees and the chief man- 
 ager of the school. He laid the corner stone and gave an able 
 address on that occasion, June 3, 1839, which was published 
 entire in the Middletown Constitution, a copy of which is furn- 
 ished me by the kindness of a citizen of Haddam who heard it. 
 A few extracts from this address are here pertinent. ' " The 
 corner stone of Brainard Academy on this beautiful site is now 
 laid. The institution owes its existence to the liberality of the 
 two brothers N. and G. Brainard. May they live to see the 
 good effects of their bounty in the growing intelligence, virtue, 
 and good order of this community. The Academy is designed 
 particularly for intellectual education, but knowledge should 
 be inculcated in connection with those principles and motives 
 which are most likely with the Divine blessing to lead youth 
 to virtue and piety. Our capacity for knowledge suggests the 
 importance of education. Endowed with understanding, we 
 are criminal if we do not cultivate our intellects. "What is so 
 plainly a duty is also essential to our happiness. Ignorance 
 instead of being " the mother of devotion" is the mother of 
 errors, crimes, and abominations innumerable. Penitentiaries 
 and prisons confirm this declaration. Ignorance is the mother 
 of nothing good. The animal gratifications which may be 
 enjoyed without education are the lowest allotted to man, and 
 even these education regulates and refines. Knowledge every- 
 
where is power, but associated with virtue, it is power for doing 
 good, power to get property, without which the great ends of 
 civilized society cannot be attained. . The arts involved in hus- 
 bandry, manufactures and commerce are based upon science. 
 "Were education more extended and elevated, more inventors 
 like Fulton and Whitney would arise to bless mankind. For 
 the want of education, how few things have savages to make 
 life comfortable. The attachments of husbands and. wives, of 
 parents and children, and of members of their tribes, are more 
 like the attachments of bears and tigers to their mates, their 
 young and company. There is nothing of the taste and refine- 
 ment needful to make home wholly sweet home. But some, 
 admitting the importance of a common school education, affirm 
 that the higher branches are not needed. This is a mistake. 
 Both are essential to important purposes in society. Both need 
 to be more cultivated and elevated than they have ever yet 
 been anywhere in the world. Besides, the common branches 
 of education will not be cherished without the higher. The 
 common schools of our country were introduced by the best 
 educated men of the times. None know the value of education 
 so well as those who have enjoyed its benefits the most. These 
 are the most efficient and able advocates of education in all its 
 branches. All the light possessed and reflected by the inferior 
 orbs comes down from the sun. In view of these principles, 
 with what emotion should we regard the commencement of an 
 institution like this — an institution long needed here, long 
 hoped for, and now about to be realized. Such an institution 
 duly managed promises unspeakable good. And who are inte- 
 rested in this ? Primarily the youth whom I see around me 
 and who will soon experience its blessings. Many will attend 
 this Academy who could not command the means of going out 
 of town for their education. All may here gain a superior 
 education and enjoy at the same time the guardianship of parents 
 and the kind offices of friends. Parents are interested for they 
 live in their children. The patriot, the . philanthropist, the 
 Christian is interested. Who then is there that loves the young, 
 that loves society, that loves the church, that loves the soul, 
 who will not pray that our sons may be as plants grown up in 
 their youth, that our daughters may be as corner stones polished 
 
after the similitude of a palace. Pray we must for except the Lord 
 build this house they will labor in vain who build it. Except He 
 prosper us, our fond anticipations for this institution will not be 
 realized." The dedicatory prayer which Dr. Field then offered 
 is remembered to this day by the older citizens of Haddam as 
 an earnest and almost aD inspired production. 
 
 It is fitting to follow this address of Dr. Field by that of his 
 eldest son givep at the dedication of the Field Park. 
 
 " Ladies and Gentlemen : — ?ou know that we are here to 
 deliver into your hands the parcel of ground on which we are 
 standing, and that other which lies in view before us, to be kept 
 as pleasure grounds for the people of Haddam in all time to 
 come. We give them in memory of our father and mother, 
 who were married seventy-five years ago to-day, and came 
 immediately afterward to make their abode on this river-side, 
 where he was soon to become the pastor of the church and con- 
 gregation. Here they lived active and useful lives, in the fear 
 of God and love of man, doing faithfully their several duties, he 
 in public ministrations from pulpit and altar, at bridal, baptism, 
 and burial, and she in the quiet tasks of her well-ordered house- 
 hold. Though now, after more than fifty years of wedded life, 
 they sleep side by side in the pleasant valley beyond the Con- 
 necticut hills, where their last days passed serenely away, they 
 were faithful until death to the love of their early home. 
 Natural indeed it was, for here they passed their first years 
 together ; here they raised their first domestic altar, and here 
 most of their children were born. For this cause, and in grate- 
 ful remembrance of their love and sacrifices for us, we, their 
 surviving children, four of us only out of ten, present these 
 memorials, not ' of cold stone, though the hills about us teem 
 with everlasting granite, but of shaded walks, green lawns, and 
 spreading trees, where this people may find pleasure and refresh- 
 ment, generation after generation, go long as these fertile 
 meadows, these rugged hills, and this winding river shall 
 endure. And remembering that "beauty is truth, truth beauty," 
 we hope that they will cultivate here that love of nature, which 
 is a joy in youth and a solace in age ; which nourishes the 
 affections, and refines while it exalts; which rejoices in the 
 seasons and the months as they pass, with their varying beau- 
 
10 
 
 ties; catches the gladness of June and the radiance of the 
 October woods ; and in every waking moment, sees, hears, or 
 feels, something of the world around to take pleasure in and be 
 grateful for. We trust that they will come, not in this year 
 only or this century, but in future years and centuries, the fair 
 young girl, the matron in the glory of womanhood, the boy and 
 the man, grandson and grandsire, in whatever condition or cir- 
 cumstance, poverty or riches, joy or sorrow, to find here a new 
 joy or a respite from sorrow ; to drink in the light of sun and 
 moon, listen to the music of birds aud winds, feel the fresh 
 breath of life-sustaining air, thank God and take courage. 
 
 Reverently then we dedicate these memorials of our parents, 
 to the enjoyment forever hereafter of those, and the descendants 
 of those, whom they loved, and among whom they dwelt." 
 
 The following letter of Governor Hubbard will be read with 
 interest. ' 
 
 Executive Department, State of Conn., ) 
 Hartford, October 29, 1878. j 
 
 I have the honor to acknowledge the receipt of your invita- 
 tion to be present at a memorial presentation by Yhe Messrs. 
 Field, of a public park to the town of Haddam. Engagements 
 which I cannot control will oblige me to be absent. I regret 
 this necessity; for, in the first place, I should be glad of an 
 opportunity to present my respects to the very distinguished 
 gentlemen to whom you are so much indebted for this endow- 
 ment, and whose generosity and filial piety will cause the names 
 of both father and sons to be remembered by your townsmen 
 from generation to generation. 
 
 In the next place, I should be glad to mark my interest in a 
 work of Village Improvement, which will not fail, I trust, to 
 awaken public attention and provoke imitation throughout our 
 whole State ; and I shall not regret it, but hail it rather, if this 
 addition to the attractions of your picturesque and historical 
 old town, furnished by gentlemen from without the State, one 
 of them from the other side of the continent even, shall excite 
 and even shame our own people into a larger public spirit and 
 better efforts to redeem from negligence our rural homes and 
 villages. 
 
11 
 
 Nearly all our towns are full of objects of natural beauty 
 easy of development, and very many of them rich in legendary 
 and historical associations. What is greatly wanted is some- 
 thing more of rural art and adornment. Something which shall 
 beautify our country villages, educate public taste, make the 
 homes of the fathers dearer to their sons and the local associ- 
 ations of childhood dearer to old age, and thus turn back, in 
 part at least, the tide of migration from the rural towns, and 
 make the city seek the country life and make it what it used 
 to be in our own State, and what it still is in the oldest and 
 most cultivated nations of the world." 
 
 I beg to remain with the highest respect, 
 
 Your obedient servant, 
 
 E. D. HUBBAKD. 
 
 Letters were also received from President Porter, Ex-Presi- 
 dent Woolsey and General "Walker, of Yale College, and from 
 many other prominent gentlemen, and other able speeches were 
 made before a large throng of people gathered from far and 
 near. We regret that our limits do not permit the printing of 
 these interesting letters and addresses in full. The citizens of 
 Haddam provided a bountiful collation on the grounds. The 
 large attendance, the admirable programme of the Committee 
 of Arrangements, the fine music of the band, the excellent 
 addresses given, the generous tables', ample for all, spread on 
 these beautiful grounds, combined to make this an occasion of 
 rare interest. 
 
HIGH SCHOOLS. 
 
 BT 
 
 B. G. NORTHROP, 
 
 Secretary op Connecticut Board of Education. 
 
HIGH SCHOOLS. 
 
 The late financial depression furnished an occasion for a 
 general attack upon High Schools "along the whole line." 
 Stern necessity demanded the closest scrutiny of all public ex- 
 penses, the lopping off of all superfluities, and the practice of 
 rigid economy. Hence the question of Free Schools and High 
 Schools has been discussed of late by the Press more fre- 
 quently and earnestly than ever before. Public Schools con- 
 cern everybody, for as scholar, teacher, school-officer, parent, 
 friend, or tax-payer, every one has some connection with them 
 and feels prepared to pass judgment upon them. It is for- 
 tunate that they must bear the keen sunlight of publicity. In 
 our country, where public sentiment is the ruling power 
 that creates law and repeals it, no institutions can stand which 
 cannot bear the closest scrutiny, while those which do stand 
 the test of time and command the confidence of the people 
 are sure to endure. "Within narrow limits, passion or faction 
 or party may rule the hour. But with intelligent people the 
 sober second thought brings reaction, and. the right prevails. 
 The sharpest criticism, unjust though it may be, is more whole- 
 some than indiscriminate praise. The blows which our schools 
 get, like the hammer of the car-wheel inspector, serve by the 
 ring of the metal to prove their strength and not to destroy 
 them. These discussions, though often hostile, have awakened 
 new interest and led to a better understanding of the aims and 
 results of High Schools. The recent opposition to them seems 
 to be prompted by no political or sectarian aim. Thus, while 
 Governor Hubbard ably defended High Schools, Governor 
 Eobinson, of New York, and Governor Garcelon, of Maine, 
 strenuously opposed them. The earnest blows of ex-Governor 
 Robinson for a time threatened disaster to the system in New 
 York, and the High School in one of her cities was abolished, 
 bu,t only to be reestablished the following year on a more lib- 
 eral basis ; while the opposition in Maine succeeded in securing 
 a suspension of the High School law for one year, but under 
 such circumstances as to neutralize the influence of their action 
 as an example. 
 
 The leading objections urged against Secondary Education 
 are the following : 
 02 
 
1. The High School is an excrescence on our school system, 
 which has thus been extended beyond the original design of ita 
 founders, hence it should be cut off. 
 
 2. It is unjust to support the High School by a general tax, 
 because it is patronized by few, and the majority receive no 
 benefit from it. 
 
 3. The State has the right to educate its children only so 
 far as will enable them to understand and perform their 
 duties as citizens. 
 
 4. The High School tends to create a distaste for labor, and 
 to make the children of the masses discontented with their lot. 
 
 5. The support of the High School is communistic in its 
 principle and tendency. 
 
 6. The High School tends to disparage the common school 
 studies and promotes superficiality in these fundamental 
 branches. 
 
 7. It tends to pauperize the people" by a sort of alms-taking 
 that impairs their manliness and self-respect. 
 
 8. High Schools prepare few graduates for College. 
 
 Having aided in 'organizing many High Schools in Massa- 
 chusetts and Connecticut, I have carefully watched their prog- 
 ress and results. On this subject the lessons of experience 
 outweigh the speculations of theorists. - Free high schools 
 have been maintained in Massachusetts for a longer time and 
 on a broader scale than in any other State or country of the 
 world. The devotion of that State to high schools is not a 
 sudden or transient outburst of enthusiasm due to any educa- 
 tional reformer. It is the growth of more than two centuries. 
 The basis of the present High School law was laid in 1647, 
 when the General Court made education universal and free, 
 and required that every town containing one hundred families, 
 should set up a Grbmmar School, which was substantially, the 
 modern High School, the master whereof " should be able to 
 instruct youth so far as they may be fitted for the University." 
 In 1789 this law was made binding only upon towns having 
 two hundred families. In 1826 all towns containing five hun- 
 dred families were required to maintain a High School of the 
 second grade, and every town containing 4,000 inhabitants was 
 required to maintain a school of the first grade, in which the 
 Latin and Greek languages should be taught; 
 
To further meet the assertion that "the High Schpol has 
 been ingrafted upon the system, contrary to the original de- 
 sign," I condense the following from an address of Hon. P. 
 Emory Aldrich, of Worcester, Massachusetts : 
 
 " It has been the settled and prevalent policy of these States, 
 as well as of the General Government, to grant State and Gov- 
 ernmental support to schools of every grade, from the primary 
 up to and including the university, and this was the 
 accepted theory and practice of the Colonies before the 
 States were organized as they now exist. Sagacious and far- 
 reaching views as to the necessity and extent of popular edu- 
 cation were deliberately expressed by the men by whose wis- 
 dom and foresight States were formed and a nation created. 
 The founders of our Republic clearly perceived that knowl- 
 edge, and not merely the rudiments of' it, generally disseminated 
 among the people, is essential to that form of government 
 which depends for its existence on the will of the governed. 
 Nor were these views first expressed by the founders of our 
 Eepublic. They were among the rich inheritances of civil 
 wisdom derived from the Colonial period of our history, as 
 shown by the celebrated ordinance of 1647, passed by the Gen- 
 eral Court of Massachusetts Colony. These are not the views 
 of an accidental majority, of a sect or party, but the long- 
 cherished principles of a whole people, who placed the duty 
 of promoting education on the same footing as that of pro- 
 moting trade, commerce and manufactures. It is too late to 
 deny that superior education is necessary to the State, and it 
 is precisely on this ground of State necessity that the public 
 support of schools should be made, and not on the ground 
 that they are mere benefactions. This policy should not now 
 be abandoned, but, on the contrary, should be continued and 
 extended to meet the growing necessities of the greatly en- 
 larged and ever- expanding field of human knowledge and 
 acquisition." 
 
 Judge Aldrich substantiates these views by the following 
 quotations from the fathers of the Republic : 
 
 Laws for the liberal education of youth, especially of the 
 lower class, are so extremely wise and useful, that to a humane 
 and generous mind no expense for this purpose would be 
 thought extravagant. — John Adams. 
 
Knowledge will forever govern ignorance, and a people who 
 mean to be their own governors must arm themselves with 
 the power which knowledge gives. Every class is interested 
 in establishments which give to the human mind its highest 
 improvement. Learned institutions ought to be favorite objects 
 with every free people. They throw that light over the public 
 mind which is the best security against crafty and dangerous 
 encroachments on the public liberty. — James Madison. 
 
 John Adams, the second President of the United States, 
 after -graduating at Harvard College, taught for two years the 
 Grammar School of Worcester, and his cousin, Samuel Adams, 
 in his message to the Legislature deprecating the increase of 
 Academies supported by tuition, advocated the ancient and 
 beneficial Grammar schools, in which he says " the poor and 
 the rich may derive equal benefit, while none except the 
 wealthy can avail themselves of the Academies." As Governor 
 Adams feared, the High School law in many towns remained 
 a dead letter. In 1838 only fourteen high schools were main- 
 tained in that State. When I entered the service of Massachu- 
 setts in 1857, the number had risen to eighty. At the present 
 time Massachusetts sustains 216 High Schools with nearly 600 
 (595) teachers, and nearly 20,000 pupils. Ninety per cent, 
 of her population is in cities and towns supporting High Schools. 
 
 In reviewing ten years of hard work, while officially visiting 
 every town of that State, my thoughts recur to the High Schools 
 then organized with lively interest. The struggle which they 
 had to wage for existence is over. They have stood the test 
 of time. No town within my knowledge, after fairly trying its 
 working, has abolished its High School. Nulla vestigia retror- 
 sum is their motto. Experience has vindicated the wisdom of 
 their founders. Their results in many towns have disarmed 
 opposition and converted doubters and foes to believers and 
 friends. Their graduates especially are everywhere their advo- 
 cates. In Massachusetts, as well as elsewhere, a few able and 
 earnest opponents have recently appeared. But they have 
 made little impression upon the popular mind. Opposition 
 and discussion will ultimately help our High Schools, as.they 
 do any measure which can bear discussion and stand the ordeal 
 of experience. 
 
 As the whole school system naturally culminates in the High 
 
School, it furnishes the best and cheapest leverage for uplifting 
 all the lower grades. As a center of interest and influence, 
 it stimulates in them a healthful ambition for thoroughness 
 as the condition of admission and promotion — a better tonic 
 than the false hope held out by the stupid flatterer, who 
 says in all schools and to all scholars, " if you try and aim 
 high, you may each become President or Senator of the United 
 States." It is ridiculous and harmful thus to encourage ambi- 
 tions impossible of attainment, or awaken aspirations to posi- 
 tions for which nature has given no qualifications. To turn 
 those fitted to be gobd mechanics, or farmers, into poor doctors, 
 lawyers or ministers, is a wrong both to themselves and the 
 community. The High School, by its sterner tests and harder 
 competitions and rigid examinations tends to dissipate such 
 dreams. It works like a sieve through which the little and 
 heavy minds drop, or rather on the plan of the survival of the 
 fittest, it helps the ablest to go on and up. 
 
 It is the testimony of the most competent observers that 
 the High School gives increased efficiency to the elementary 
 schools by its standard of admission, thus presenting in them a 
 strong stimulus to studiousness and fidelity. Francis Adams, 
 long the secretary of the National Educational League of 
 England, says : " Experience has proved that elementary edu- 
 cation flourishes most where the provision for higher education 
 is most ample. -If the elementary schools of Germany* are the 
 best in the world, it is owing in a great measure to the fact that 
 the higher schools are accessible to all classes. In England not 
 only have the aims of the elementary schools been low and 
 narrow, but an impassable gulf has separated the people's 
 schools from the higher schools of the country. In the United 
 States, the common schools have always produced the best 
 results where the means of higher education have been most 
 plentiful." It has been often remarked that "educational im- 
 provement works from the top downward and not from the 
 bottom upward, and that the common school is always feeble 
 where High Schools, Academies and Colleges are wanting." 
 It is unquestionably due to the influence of Yale College that 
 n her early history the public schools of Connecticut were, by 
 
 * The elementary schools of Holland and Switzerland seem to me not to be sur- 
 passed by those of Germany. Mr. Adams' Remarks fully apply to those countries. 
 
8 
 
 common consent, the best in this country, and so pronounced 
 in all the geographies of those days. 
 
 The High School benefits the common schools by improving 
 the grading of all the district or lower schools of a town, and 
 thus increases both the economy and efficiency of the system. 
 In many towns containing from eight to eighteen districts, 
 where all were formerly taught by male teachers in the winter 
 and females in the summer, on the establishment of a High 
 School, permanent female teachers have been placed in all 
 the others, obviating the evils of a semi-annual change of 
 teachers, while the most advanced pupils from the whole town 
 have been brought together in a central High School especially 
 adapted to their wants, and all this with little or no increase of 
 cost and sometimes with an actual saving of money. Such, for 
 example, has been the case in Bridgeport, Connecticut, where 
 during the first year after the establishment of an efficient High 
 School with the union of the districts and better system of 
 gradation, there was a saving of more than ten thousand dollars 
 in the educational expenses of the city. The conviction be-i 
 came well nigh universal among the people of that city that the 
 new system promoted the efficiency of all the schools as much 
 as it did the economy of their management. In the Report of 
 the State Board of Education for 1877, it is said, " no town in 
 Connecticut has witnessed so great and general improvement 
 of its schools during the last year as Bridgeport." In the city 
 of New Haven, Connecticut, what was formerly the upper grade 
 in the Grammar schools, is now transferred to the High School, 
 where, to say nothing of the classics and higher mathematics, 
 such studies as book-keeping and the practical sciences and 
 even the finishing lessons in drawing and writing, are taught 
 better and oheapeb than they could be in the separate Gram- 
 mar schools, and the efficiency and usefulness of all the other 
 schools is thus increased. Nearly all the teachers of that city 
 are now graduates of this High School. ' Its cost, therefore, 
 is fully justified on the ground of economy and the improve- 
 ment of the other grades, and the same is true generally. The 
 School Board of another Connecticut town, after two year's trial, 
 say : " The advantages of the High School to all the other 
 schools is surprising. Never before has such a spirit of study 
 prevailed among them. All, even the remotest districts, are 
 
represented in the High School where the more advanced pupils 
 are brought into one school, graded according to their acquire- 
 ments, so that on the principle of the division of labor, the 
 effectiveness of one teacher is multiplied many times. Here 
 our promising and ambitious scholars, even from the remotest 
 sections of the town, are enjoying advantages never offered in 
 the several district schools, made up of all ages and over-bur- 
 dened with classes and studies." 
 
 High Schools are essential for the training of teachers. The 
 Normal Schools can supply but a fraction of the great army of 
 teachers in our land. The High School course constitutes the 
 best preparation for that of a Normal School. The normal 
 graduates who have achieved the highest success are those who 
 had previously completed the High School course. All experi- 
 ence verifies the motto of Guizot, that " every teacher should 
 know far more than he will be called upon to teach, for the 
 more he knows of everything, the better he can teach any- 
 thing." .As a matter of fact, those who have had the fullest 
 previous instruction most highly appreciate the advantages of 
 the Normal School, while the greatest hindrance to its most 
 complete success is the want of proper preparation of candi- 
 dates. There is a wide and growing demand for a higher grade 
 of teachers than the district schools can supply. 
 
 When High Schools are disparaged on the ground of the 
 limited number going directly from them to college, the fact is 
 overlooked that a large proportion of college students receive 
 their first start college- ward in their local High School. The great 
 advance in the requirements for admission to our colleges has 
 increased the demand for sub-collegiate schools like the Hop- 
 kins Grammar* School of New Haven, the Free Academy of 
 Norwich, the Suffield, Andover, Exeter, and Easthampton Sem- 
 inaries, which make a specialty of preparing for college. There 
 is here a great gain in the stimulus and rivalry of large classes, 
 unattainable with the smaller classical classes in local high 
 schools. Those who merely " finish off" for the last one or two 
 years of preparation in some favorite academy, naturally report 
 themselves to the college examiners from the school where they 
 graduated rather than, from the humbler High School where 
 their main preparation was really made. Thus, in college sta- 
 tistics the High School fails to get the recognition it deserves. 
 
10 
 
 But it does accomplish a most important work in discovering 
 and developing what otherwise would continue latent talent. 4- 
 scholar does not really know what is in him, what he can be, 
 till he reaches the harder studies and sharper rivalry of the 
 High School. Many a bright but modest and discouraged boy 
 has here been made conscious of his powers, and the assurance 
 that he can do, has become the parent of the purpose that he 
 will do. Many gifted minds thus roused to higher life ultimately 
 fill positions of great usefulness whose talents would other- 
 wise have been buried in obscurity. Those who have risen 
 to be the benefactors of the race have come as often from 
 humble cottages as from princely palaces. Indeed, history 
 proves that from v the industrious classes have arisen by far the 
 greatest part of the energy, talent and genius that has enriched 
 the world. Says Dr. Leonard Bacon, " It is for the interest of 
 the State that no talent which God gives to any child should be 
 lost. If a poor boy, the child of a dependent widow, or an un- 
 fortunate immigrant, has any extraordinary talent which being 
 developed would add to the wealth and welfare of the State, 
 and if that talent, for want of opportunity to discover itself ; is 
 lost, like a gem in the unfathomed caves of ocean, the State is 
 the loser." ' 
 
 The wealth of a State consists in its men, in its treasures of 
 mind. True men are worth more to it than money. The man 
 who rears a large family of well trained children renders a greater 
 service to the State than the millionaire who leaves untold wealth 
 to unknown heirs. No town, city or State can afford to abolish 
 its High School. Liberal and wise expenditures for education 
 always prove profitable investments. It has been well said, 
 " taxes raised for purposes of education are like vapors which 
 rise, only to descend again in fertilizing showers, to bless and 
 beautify the land." Though apparently the work of to-day, 
 the High School is really laying the foundations of the social 
 fabric for coming generations. 
 
 If New England is to maintain her influence, certainly the 
 opportunity for a High School education should here be held as. 
 the heritage„of the people, alike their interest and their right, 
 the source of private thrift and success, and of public safety and 
 prosperity. While the center of population and power is rapidly 
 
11 
 
 drifting toward the far West, New England can maintain her 
 influence only " by better education of the people, better intel- 
 ligence, better skill in the arts of invention and discovery, and 
 in the processes and economies of production," and all these 
 are dependent on our schools. 
 
 The education which was ample for our fathers is insufficient 
 for their sons, who must be better equipped for the sharper con- 
 flicts and rivalries of modern life, or failure awaits them. Men 
 who were relatively prominent fifty or seventy years ago could 
 win no success to-day. The business and industries of the 
 country and of the world involve far more application of sci- 
 ence and skill than was demanded then. Our modern civiliz- 
 ation requires enlarged opportunities of education for the whole 
 people. The rivalry of States and nations hereafter is to be in 
 inventions, in technical skill and in the dignity and efficiency of 
 labor. The great international expositions of industry during 
 the last twenty years, especially the Centennial at Philadelphia, 
 an,d the last Paris Exposition, are bringing the nations of 
 the world into sharper rivalry, and yet fraternizing their 
 diverse peoples, broadening their views, and inspiring them 
 with new ideas of modern civilization. The proudest exhibit at 
 Philadelphia, and the grandest product of American Education 
 was the people themselves. This product was as directly trace- 
 able to our schools, as were the fabrics there shown to the mills 
 that made them; That so many millions of people attended 
 our exposition (over 260,000 in a single day), not only without 
 violence, but showing proofs of self-command, decorum, and 
 education, reflected more honor upon our nation than did all 
 the works of art and inventive talent there displayed. Visitors 
 from abroad were struck by the self-poise and orderly bear- 
 ing of our people, and by the absence of the gendarmes so 
 conspicuous everwhere in the old world. Nowhere in Europe 
 would so large a throng be allowed to assemble without the 
 presence of the military which ever masks the necessity of thus 
 guarding the State under the semblance of giving eclat to all 
 public occasions. The public school was a leading factor in the 
 results seen in all our broad displays of inventive genius. But 
 for the work which the American High School has done, 
 Machinery Hall would have been meagre in size and mean in its 
 
 03 
 
12 
 
 exhibit. Our country has been already enriched by its High 
 Schools. The.money expended for their support has proved a 
 wise and profitable investment. Their results show that they 
 are demanded by a true and intelligent regard for the material 
 interests of the country. 
 
 A Pittsburgh writer, with no Puritan proclivities, says: 
 " New England early adopted the theory that it. is the duty of 
 the State to support both common and High Schools, and as a 
 result of that education she presents to-day the most prosper- 
 ous, intelligent and the freest people on the face of the globe. 
 Can her prosperity be justly attributed to any other cause? 
 Her climate is cold, her soil barren and stony, and she possesses 
 but few of the natural advantages which are the pride of other 
 States. Compare this section with the two Virginias, States 
 possessing as many natural advantages as any others, and see 
 if the great difference in their prosperity can be attributed to any 
 other cause than their difference in education. The area of New 
 England is about the same as that of Virginia — a little over 
 60,000 square miles. The population of New England is over 
 3,000,000, while that of Virginia is but one and a half million." 
 A striking illustration both of the difference and power of 
 public sentiment on education was furnished nearly two cen- 
 turies ago by the replies given by two American colonies to 
 the English Commissioners of Foreign Plantations. The Gov- 
 ernor of Virginia replied, " I thank God we have no free schools 
 or printing presses, and I hope we shall not have these hundred 
 years." The Governor of Connecticut answered : " One fourth 
 the annual revenues of the colony is laid out in maintaining 
 free schools for the education of our children." 
 
 • The main argument urged by the ablest opponent of our 
 High School system is that it is communistic in its principle 
 and tendencies. When I advocated the passage of a Free 
 School Law in Connecticut a dozen years ago, the bugbear 
 of Communism was the main reliance for the defence of the 
 old and odious rate-bill. Free schools would surely encourage 
 socialism in its most baneful form. Time tests all theories bet- 
 ter than arguments. In Connecticut a decade of free schools 
 has witnessed no new tendencies to communism. Recent 
 elections in our State showed plainly the popular dread of all 
 
13 
 
 socialistic dogmas, which were repudiated alike by both polit- 
 ical parties. In Massachusetts, where free High Schools have 
 been maintained for more than two hundred years, there is as 
 little socialism as in any land in the world. Throughout the 
 Eastern States there is no tendency to communism among the 
 descendants of the genuine New England stock. The mini- 
 mum that exists, is limited to a small fraction of the foreign 
 element. Though curiosity attracted crowds to hear Dennis 
 Kearney in the autumn of 1878, it is due to the intelligence of 
 the people, that his communistic tirades disgusted all classes, 
 and prompted the candidate who first sought his alliance 
 to disown his dogmas and disfellowship him. 
 
 Communism is an exotic in this land. It does not easily 
 take root in our soil, and our climate is uncongenial. Its chief 
 advocates are homeless foreigners. Even the immigrants long 
 domiciled here have become so schooled by public sentiment, 
 and by our free institutions, as to be well nigh assimilated and 
 Americanized. Schools and the diffusion of property are our 
 safeguard against socialistie extremes. In like manner, Swit- 
 zerland, with institutions free as ours, is safe from communism, 
 for she has free schools and the general ownership of land. 
 Her common schools are absolutely free and her High Schools 
 charge a merely nominal tuition. Twenty dollars a year admits 
 a Swiss even to the National University. The Internationals 
 may meet in free Switzerland and nobody is frightened or dis- 
 turbed by their vagaries. The communism now rampant in 
 Germany certainly cannot be due to free High Schools, for her 
 gymnasia and all higher schools charge tuition, and only the 
 lowest grade of schools is free. Her vast standing army, with 
 its enormous expenses and exactions, repressing the liberties 
 of the people, crushing their industries, embittering their 
 social life with sharp class distinctions, and transforming the 
 whole population into a camp, has created a great revulsion of 
 feeling. The glory of conquest, and the untold milliards of 
 the .French Indemnity, mainly expended on new fortifications 
 now bristling with cannon, do not atone for the mourning and 
 bereavement brought to so many desolate homes. The heavy 
 burden of taxation, the dread of conscription, the fear of new 
 wars, and the inexorable law, that every boy shall spend three 
 
14 
 
 weary years in the camp, and the countless and constant other 
 reminders that the* empire rests solely upon force, naturally 
 exasperates the people because it looks to force alone for its 
 supremacy. 
 
 It is objected that High Schools tend to pauperize the peo- 
 ple, providing a kind of alms that no one can accept without 
 impairing his manliness and self-respect. But the High School 
 is no more a chaiity than is the free public road or bridge. It 
 is the interest of the State to adopt those plans which will pro- 
 mote the greatest good for the greatest number, and especially 
 to furnish substantially equal school privileges to the children 
 of all classes. If I never use the mails, I may not oppose the 
 support of the postal department by the general government, 
 since it contributes to the highest good of the nation. 
 
 The right of a State to self-existence implies its right to sustain 
 such schools as are essential to its preservation and prosperity. 
 States and towns have the same right to support High Schools 
 as common schools, for the former provide the best and cheap- 
 est means of increasing the efficiency of the latter. The State 
 need not and should not interfere with those enterprises and 
 institutions which are likely to be amply supported from the 
 expectation of gain, but all history shows that both high and 
 common schools are not of this class. Of physicians, lawyers 
 and ministers, the demand will create a supply, but this is not 
 so in regard to schools and teachers, for the need is least felt 
 where that need is really greatest. One of the baneful and 
 blinding effects of ignorance is insensibility to the evils it 
 induces. 
 
 Educational taxes are founded primarily, not on the idea of 
 benefiting parents and children, but the broader view that the 
 State has a proprietary interest in all persons and property 
 within its bounds, and especially has a stake in her youth that 
 they may be well qualified for her service, whether that shall 
 be civil or military — on the farm, in the factory or counting 
 room. It was the better education of the masses in the North 
 that saved the Union during the late civil war, as it was the 
 ignorance of the " poor white trash," making them the dupes 
 of ambitious leaders, that rendered the rebellion possible in 
 the South. 
 
15 
 
 An eminent opponent of High Schools, discarding the idea 
 that the republic can be saved by the general diffusion of pri- 
 mary education, advocates the special training of the wealthier 
 and higher classes to become leaders of society, as " there is 
 power in the , spread of higher education and the sentiment of 
 honor associated with culture." But invaluable as is the high- 
 est culture, the general diffusion and equalization of intelligence 
 is far more essential to the public welfare than the highest 
 culture of a few aspiring to be leaders. Disseminate general 
 intelligence, and men of special gifts will arise, called out by 
 special emergencies. Thus you avoid the tendency character- 
 istic of all past history, to separate society into diverse strata, 
 "in which a favored few and the masses figure as extremes of 
 intellect and ignorance, leadership and vassalage." In America, 
 experience has proved that it is safer to trust the people than 
 the politicians. Our intelligent yeomanry are, as a rule, j ust in 
 their sentiments, and their honest judgment must in the end 
 govern those who aspire to be leaders. Some, boasting of rank 
 or fortune, proud of their aloofness from the masses, deprecate 
 this equalizing of conditions which is the glory of the Amer- 
 ican High School. But in this democratic country such snob- 
 bishness is beneath argument or notice. 
 
 It benefits all classes thus to mingle together. Those whose 
 temptation and weakness come from undue reliance on rank or 
 riches, may learn a needed lesson of humility and energy, as 
 they wrestle with some bright and studious sons of penury. 
 On the other hand, the boy all his life, pinched by poverty, 
 dispirited by his hard lot, his humble parentage, his plain 
 home and plainer garb, gets a beneficent lesson of hope and 
 encouragement, as he wins the prizes for scholarship. The 
 High School is truly democratic, it is a great leveler, and the 
 best of it is, it always levels up. Money and station no where 
 count for less than in the recitation room. Here caste is 
 unknown. The children of the rich and poor sit side by side, 
 and work hand in hand, forgetful of all social distinctions. 
 That privilege, to my certain knowledge, has gladdened many 
 an obscure household. The richest prizes I have often seen 
 carried to the humblest homes. For in my official work it has 
 
16 
 
 been my duty — or rather privilege — (and I ought not to think 
 myself a disciple of him who ever went about doing good, 
 unless I deemed it a privilege), to mingle much with the 
 masses, — with plain people. My sympathies have been deeply 
 enlisted as T have often found among their children earnest 
 scholars, gifted by nature, eager for improvement, hungering 
 and thirsting for knowledge, against whom, if you close the 
 High Schools, you bar the way to further progress. 
 
 It should be frankly admitted that some errors of School 
 Boards have given occasion, if not good reason, for dissatisfac- 
 tion and complaint. In some High Schools the curriculum has 
 made them seem to be mainly feeders for the colleges, merely 
 preparatory departments for higher institutions, prescribing 
 studies of little practical use except to those who complete the 
 course.. However close the sympathies of -High Schools may 
 be with colleges, their sympathies should be still closer with 
 the general public, for the great majority of their scholars are 
 preparing, not for college, but practical callings upon which 
 they will enter on leaving the High School. There should 
 therefore be provided two courses of study — one full and com- 
 plete for those who evince the fit taste and talent therefor, and 
 another designed for those who can take but a partial course. 
 
 It is a serious mistake to encourage all in these schools to study 
 Latin or Greek. So far from disparaging classical culture, I 
 hold that there is no substitute for it in a full course of study. 
 But with the certainty of premature graduation of the majority 
 who enter High Schools, I strongly condemn the practice of 
 merely beginning the ancient classics or any modern language, 
 when the pupils' circumstances and settled plans permit only so 
 brief continuance in school that this smattering of a new lan- 
 guage is gained/ at the expense of more essential and practical 
 learning. This common error is due to the ambition both of 
 scholars and teachers, the one aspiring prematurely to pursue 
 high sounding studies, and the other eager to swell their 
 classes in the plassics, as if the reputation of their schools was 
 to be measured by the number of their students in Latin and 
 Greek. Sometimes a graduate fresh from college, well up in 
 the classics, eloquent on the advantages of their study and 
 ambitious to be a classical teacher, makes a whole school 
 
17 
 
 giddy with dreams of Latin lore. To guard against such mis- 
 takes and test the adaptations of pupils, I recommend that the 
 first two or three months in the High School be devoted to a 
 review of English branches, and that none begin the classical 
 course without a written request from th^eir parents or guar- 
 dians, and without showing aptitude for such studies. 
 
 A little preliminary drudgery over the Latin Grammar and 
 First Lessons, with no such facility in translation, or insight 
 into the forms and philosophy of the language as to make it 
 valuable as a discipline, or suggestive in other studies, to be 
 dropped forever when school days end, will poorly compensate 
 for the practical sciences thus displaced, or for that study of 
 our own language and unequalled English classics which would 
 foster a love of literature, healthful and lasting as life. It 
 should always be kept in mind by both scholar and teacher, 
 that the object of the High School is not to finish the edu- 
 cation of any one, whether his course is partial or complete, 
 but to lay the foundation for future and higher attainments, 
 to teach the pupil how to study and inspire him with love 
 of learning. If this be done, he will for the rest, educate 
 himself, fully realizing that his education is only begun when 
 his school days are ended. To complete it, will be the 
 ambition and pleasure of his life. Place him where you will, 
 let his calling be what it may, he will find leisure for study, 
 and occupy the intervals of labor or business engagements in 
 the cherished work of mental improvement. 
 
 While the study of ancient or modern languages is to be dis- 
 couraged where school privileges are to be limited, a taste for 
 English literature and the natural sciences can be awakened 
 with a reasonable prospect of continuing the study in Etfter life. 
 
 The most plausible objection to High Schools is that they 
 tend to make the children of the masses discontented and 
 averse to manual labor. So universal is the necessity of labor, 
 that this charge — were it true, should everywhere condemn 
 these schools. Nature and history alike confirm the old decree, 
 "in the sweat of thy face, shalt thou eat bread." But it is 
 a great mistake to suppose that education need create any aver- 
 sion to labor. 
 
 Under the old system of slavery in the South and serf- 
 
18 
 
 dom in Russia, and in relation to the equally illiterate farm 
 hands of England, it was held as an axiom that schooling 
 would make laborers discontented, restless and unprofitable 
 servants. But education may be the auxiliary -of labor. In 
 room of the silly and baneful notion that labor is menial, or a 
 degrading drudgery, education may render it more productive, 
 profitable and inviting. More should be said and done in 
 our schools to dignify labor, and train our youth to become 
 cunning craftsmen. Pride in one's work leads to higher ex- 
 cellence, both in his craft and character. The artizan who 
 delights to do his best to-day, will aspire to do still better 
 to-morrow. On the other hand, the theory that labor is a 
 degrading drudgery will demean any artizan and bar improve- 
 ment in his trade; 
 
 Thus Germany, where education is carried to the highest 
 degree, honors and encourages industry. In like manner in 
 America the great problem of our day is to elevate work by first 
 educating and elevating the workman. We are, or certainly 
 should be, a Working people, and the cause of the workman is 
 the cause of all. The masses are learning that mere muscle is 
 weak, that brains help the hands in all work, that knowledge 
 multiplies the productive power of labor. If knowledge is 
 power, ignorance is weakness and waste. What a man is, 
 stamps an impress upon what he does, even in the humblest 
 work. Whatever elevates the laborer, improves his labor. 
 You can dignify labor therefore in no way so surely as by edu- 
 cating and elevating the workman." The wealth and welfare 
 of individuals and states, always dependent on labor, can be 
 most fully secured only by educated labor. If rightly con- 
 ducted, therefore, our High Schools, so far from breeding dis- 
 content with the humblest pursuits, will prepare for success in 
 the ordinary callings pf life. 
 
 To intelligent foreigners, our High Schools present a most 
 striking feature of our educational system. The recent report 
 of F. Buisson, of the French Commission appointed to examine 
 the American School System, comprising the fullest and ablest 
 investigation of this subject ever made by any European, gives 
 an interesting description of our High Schools, a single para- 
 graph from which deserves reprinting in this connection. 
 
19 
 
 " No part of the American School System is more essentially 
 national than are the High Schools. No part of the system 
 presents features that are more original, or in some respects 
 further removed from European ideas, no part of the system is 
 worthy of more profound study. Peruse the course of study 
 in these High Schools, think of those_ children of workmen 
 passing four or five years in adorning, strengthening and cul- 
 tivating their minds by studies that everywhere else are reserved 
 for the well-to-do classes, and tell us, if these institutions do 
 not bear the seal and impress of American civilization. Has 
 not the American a right to be proud when he shows us the 
 son and the daughter of the humblest artizan so mentally 
 elevated that between them and the privileged of fortune, no 
 difference: of culture is to be discovered ? If it is glorious to 
 see society freely giving to the poor the benefits of a public 
 school education, is it not a still more extraordinary spectacle 
 to behold a nation that deems it would wrong its humblest citi- 
 zens, were their children denied any opportunity for the full and 
 free expansion of their minds. Here is a country where there 
 are hundreds of free High Schools on the same footing as the 
 most primary establishments. They are not professional 
 schools, but in the fullest sense popular schools, intended to 
 give the people the best and loftiest results of liberal education. 
 They open up no special pursuits, they lead to all pursuits, 
 without distinction, forming bright, intelligent youths trained 
 to studies of every kind, qualified to select for themselves 
 among the various callings and skilled to succeed therein. So 
 far as social equality can be reached on this earth, it is attained 
 by the American High School. In other countries, the chil- 
 dren of different classes of society, though brought together 
 for a while in the public school, must soon be separated by the 
 whole distance between their respective families. In the 
 United States every effort is made to diminish this separation 
 and to carry as far as possible that common instruction which 
 effaces the distinction of rich and poor. If it be true that the 
 prosperity of a republic is proportioned to the replenishment 
 of its middle classes, then the High School of the United States, 
 whatever it may cost, is the best investment of capital that can 
 possibly be made." 
 
20 
 
 Professor Huxley strongly puts a kindred thought. " No 
 system of public education is worthy of the name unless it 
 creates a great educational ladder, with one end in the gutter 
 and the other in the university." 
 
 A paragraph from an address of Ex-Governor Hubbard is 
 . worth repeating here : " I want to see labor which is the 
 first interest of society, the government, of the world, made to 
 think as well as work — to think first for political uses, that it 
 may learn to govern itself ; next for industrial uses that the 
 working brain may lend cunning to the working hand, to think 
 at the plough, at the anvil, at the forge, at the loom, as 
 Blanchard thought out the turning-lathe, McOormick tbe 
 reaper, Howe the sewing-machine, Hoe the printing press, 
 Bigelow the power-loom, Goodyear the vulcanization of India 
 rubber, and Edison's thinking out from day to day inventions 
 and discoveries which almost outrun the dreams of professional 
 scientists. These sons of the common schools are the true 
 artists, and their works the true fine arts of the world, compared 
 with which the so-called artists and fine arts of painting, statu- 
 ary and music are barren and secondary creations. So then I 
 stand for the common schools as the life of free government, 
 the friend, educator and uplifter of the laboring classes, the 
 defence of the people against themselves, and so in a large 
 sense, a substitute for standing armies, and the best possible 
 solution of the much vexed labor question. Abolish free 
 schools, or starve and cripple them, and free institutions will 
 go down with them. On the other hand, increase the number 
 of High Schools, multiply free libraries, make education not 
 only gratuitous but universal, and you shall have more school 
 houses to build, to be sure, but fewer jails, more Benjamin 
 Franklins, but fewer Dennis Kearneys, more honest voterg, 
 but fewer repeaters and ballot-box stuffers, better laws, better 
 administration, and with these, better liberties, better justice 
 and a better social and intellectual life." 
 
 High Schools, benefit not their graduates only but the whole 
 community. They are essential to 'the efficiency of the com- 
 mon schools. They promote the greatest good of the greatest 
 number. They are far more useful even than military, naval 
 and agricultural schools. The latter are properly supported at 
 
21 
 
 public expense, though attended by very few. The benefit 
 they confer on the whole community, not the number of their 
 graduates, is just ground for their support by general tax. The 
 opportunity of free and full education is the corner stone of 
 American civilization and progress. The present remarkable 
 demand for American inventions, machines and fabrics in 
 nearly all the markets of the world should stimulate increased 
 interest in secondary education, and commend our High 
 Schools more than ever to the hearts of the American people. 
 
 On this subject the lessons of experience should be heeded. 
 I give, therefore, in a condensed form the following testimony 
 from gentlemen who have had the widest opportunities of ob- 
 servation in regard to the results of High Schools — 
 
 More than all, High Schools are important because they 
 constitute the only trustworthy agency to bring worthy 
 representatives of the lower classes into the councils of 
 the State and the organism of society. Abolish the High 
 Schools and at once you draw a broad line of separation be- 
 tween the rich and the poor. You limit the higher education 
 to the well-to-do, who only have the means to pay for it, 
 and this would prove a damaging venture for the State. 
 Mainly the cultured classes are found to be the governing 
 classes, and among its governing classes society needs the 
 representatives of the poor. It needs them that there may al- 
 ways be strong men coming to the front, with powers so tem- 
 pered by culture as to make them wise, to represent the humble 
 class from which they sprung, and demand the consideration 
 due to their needs and their rights. These are the men, too, 
 in the social exigencies which sometimes occur, when passion 
 becomes rampant among the masses, and the restraints of law 
 are defied, to throw themselves into the track of the storm and 
 allay its violence. Far better this than the alternative, if 
 you do not bestow the culture ; for those who are born to be 
 the leaders of men, will assert their prerogatives, whether or 
 no, and the born leaders from among the poor, if they be not 
 tempered by culture, become the ignorant demagogues, whose 
 leadership is anarchy. — H. F. Harrington, Supt. of. Schools, New 
 Bedford. 
 
 If the High School is open to all, that, in connection with 
 the lower schools, 'will have a tendency to preserve a repub- 
 lican equality, which is always disturbed when the advantages 
 of a higher education are limited to a few. It is true that not 
 all the pupils of the elementary schools will attend the High 
 Schools, but the latter are open alike to all who choose to 
 
22 
 
 avail themselves of their advantages. There will be more 
 educated people in every town maintaining a High School 
 than there would be without it; and theteore educated people 
 there are, the greater will be the development of material re- 
 sources, the more perfect the security of property and of per- 
 sons, the higher the civilization and the more complete the 
 facilities for the unmolested enjoyment of all the objects of our 
 natural rights. 
 
 High schools in our public-school system hold the relation of 
 a part to the 'whole. Without them the pupils of the element- 
 ary schools would be sent out into public life without a 
 proper training of their reflective faculties, and there would no 
 longer be open to ail, the means of obtaining that knowledge 
 which directs to a successful life. Free instruction in the 
 higher branches of learning is necessary to prevent those class 
 distinctions, that are sure to spring up, if such instruction can 
 be obtained only by a favored few. A republican state and 
 republican society are both impossible unless the children of 
 the state are educated together in the same schools. , Bank in 
 human society has nothing to do with the right or the import- 
 ance of human culture. Wherever there is a human being, 
 there should be furnished an opportunity for the highest cul- 
 ture, and in this country, at least, we should not for a moment 
 admit that the advantages of birth have anything to do in 
 determining what are our natural rights. The laboring classes 
 of the country should be especially interested in supporting 
 the secondary schools, for unless higher instruction is free 
 alike to all, their children may be deprived of it, and with its 
 loss will be taken away the possibility of their holding equal 
 rank with the more fortunate, even in our American society. 
 Give a boy a good education, and, th6ugh wanting in wealth or 
 ancestral renown, he will take his place among his fellows, the 
 peer of the richest and the noblest. Hostility to High schools 
 is therefore hostility to the best interests of all classes, but it 
 is dangerous to the vital interests of that large class that must 
 depend on free public schools for their education. 
 , The opulent should be interested in these schools, for, by 
 their influence on the education of the masses, the civilization 
 of the state is exalted, life, and property are more secure, and 
 all the good ends for which human society was instituted will 
 be more fully secured. Neither private interest nor political 
 ambition, nor sectarian zeal should move us to waver for an 
 instant in the full and cordial support of these educational insti- 
 tutions established by the fathers and which in time of peace 
 and war, in times of plenty and want, have been thus far so 
 nobly maintained by their children.— Hon. J. W. Dickinson, 
 Sec. State Bd. Ed., Mass. 
 
23 
 
 The demand for educated directive power is on the increase, 
 by reason of the fact that machinery is taking the place of 
 mere hand-labor ; and as a result, a grade of intelligence is 
 necessary that can understand and manage complicated labor- 
 saving contrivances. 
 
 If a town sends its own native-born youth into the sub- 
 ordinate positions, and hires at a higher rate of wages the 
 directive skill which is needed to lay out and supervise their 
 work, it will find itself obliged to pay a much higher sum for 
 the supervisory work than would suffice to train its own pop- 
 ulation for the purpose. 
 
 The protection of the community as a social body — i(s 
 common weal — is now generally recognized as a duty of gov- 
 ernment as important as the political necessity for diplomacy 
 and military defense. A State that allows its population to 
 be starved into the necessity of migrating to another land, 
 while it could prevent this by founding industries and a sys- 
 tem of popular education, violates to its own cost the plain 
 principles of political economy and social science. A State 
 that allows itself to go to decay socially will perish as certainly 
 as if it allowed a foreign State to overrun it. 
 
 The necessity of free primary education for social prosper- 
 ity is well enough understood in the United States, but the 
 justification of free higher education is not understood, al- 
 though widely conceded. The psychological relation of a 
 knowledge of reading, writing, and arithmetic to the practical 
 success of a common laborer is easily seen by an average mind ; 
 but the relation of higher studies to success in directing the 
 labor and in controlling the political policy of the entire com- 
 munity, is not seen except by those minds that can take in 
 and comprehend the spope of the general process which the 
 community as a whole is involved in. 
 
 We have heard it said that education unfits the common 
 people for their vocations — that it makes them seek a livelihood 
 in the professions, 1 and causes them to aspire above and be- 
 yond their sphere. Nothing could intimate a more profound 
 ignorance of the revolution that is in progress in the realm of 
 productive industry, than this utterance of the opponents to 
 popular education. The progressive change in society involves 
 a process of substituting machinery for hand-labor ; hence the 
 change of vocations constantly occurs. The man not able to 
 understand and direct machines cannot gain as a common 
 laborer a decent subsistence. More ' than this, if he cannot 
 learn readily the direction of a new machine — cannot change 
 the minor details of his vocation — he is liable at a moment's 
 warning to be thrown out of employment by the invention of 
 a new labor-saving machine that will render useless his already 
 acquired skill. 
 
24 
 
 The distress of the laboring population is well known to 
 the students of sqcial science; its chief source is this one of 
 the change of vocation rendered necessary by the progress of 
 invention. Science and the useful arts are making sure ad- 
 vance at an accelerated speed ; the emancipation Of the race 
 from drudgery, on the whole, is rapidly going forward ; but 
 the uneducated laborer^ — that is to say, the laborer whose 
 education is only special, and includes only a form of skill 
 or "of manual dexterity, instead of a general intellectual train- 
 ing — is continually thrown aside, just as antiquated out-of- 
 date machines are thrown into the lumber-room. Ability to 
 readjust one's vocation belongs only to those who have gen- 
 eral intelligence — such intelligence as school-training gives, or 
 rather such as the insights of science give, whether acquired at 
 school or elsewhere. 
 
 This general consciousness of the possibility of rising above 
 the stations into which they were born is the heritage of all 
 people who know the meaning of the new industrial evangel 
 that Providence has sent to this age. The conquest of nature, 
 the subjugation of the forces of nature and their employment , 
 to provide the means for food, clothing and shelter — the 
 three material wants of man — keep equal step with the march 
 of science. The individual laborer is continually pushed up- 
 ward to vocations that are ministrative to the spiritual wants 
 of man — those of amusement and culture — and to such mate- 
 rial vocations as require more intellectual versatility and alert- 
 ness of mind. 
 
 Our systems of education not only do not over-educate the 
 children of the people, but they scarcely equal the most urgent 
 demands of society. Every day it happens that society suffers 
 by the incompetence of persons in places of directive power ; 
 every day it suffers by reason of the inability of the human 
 laborer to readjust himself to the rapidly-moving tide of pro- 
 ductive industry that makes his vocation no longer needed. 
 More general culture — 'the elevation of all minds to the plane 
 of generalization, of thinking-activity instead of mere imagina- 
 tion and conventional opining — is what is required. — W. T. 
 Harris, Supt. of Schools, St. Louis. 
 
 It has been objected that " the High School provides facili- 
 ties for education which the common people do not need and 
 ought not to have. Too much education makes a man restless 
 and discontented with his inevitable lot, ,and makes him disin- 
 clined to labor. Man was born to obey, too much education 
 makes him self-important, ambitious, unwilling to obey, but 
 desirous to command.*' Most of those who thus say there is 
 too much education for the masses are, in principle, monar- 
 chists or oligarchists who believe in the divine right 'of the few 
 to rule the many and who hold that " the minimum amount of 
 
25 
 
 education that will make good citizens is the maximum amount 
 which the State may give, and the knowledge of the primary 
 branches being all that is essential to good citizenship, the State 
 may furnish this and nothing more." The grand purpose of life 
 is not that we may be governed, not that we may govern, but that 
 we may become /happier, wiser and better, and all associational 
 enterprises should have this end in view. But how much in- 
 telligence is necessary to enable a man to perform the functions 
 of citizenship? The intelligence that manifests itself in a wise 
 system of laws must necessarily reside in the people. Good 
 citizenship requires intelligence enough to make good laws and 
 patriotism enough to obey and defend them. To obey is the 
 duty of the subject, neither great wisdom nor a high degree of 
 civilization is necessary to perform this duty. An ignorant 
 man can be a good subject, thinking the opinions and executing 
 the will of others, but he cannot properly execute the functions 
 of good citizenship. The highest form of citizenship necessi- 
 tates the highest form of intelligence. A limitation of intel- 
 ligence is necessarily an abridgment of citizenship. Every 
 voter of the State is a lawmaker. He expresses his thought 
 through the ballot, and thus his intelligence manifests itself in 
 the laws of the commonwealth. The more intelligence we put 
 behind the ballot, the more stable will our institutions become, 
 and the more ignorance we suffer behind the ballot, the sooner 
 will they show signs of weakness and decay. 
 
 It is objected that only the rich few enjoy the advantages of 
 the High School. But the claim that it is patronized by the 
 wealthy and not by the poor, is wholly without foundation; in fact 
 the majority of its patrons are of the poorer classes. It may be 
 said that this is an argument which the large taxpayers may turn 
 against the High School. But it is one of the best agencies by 
 which propertyis protected. Every poor man knows that his boy 
 has an opportunity to occupy a higher position in life than he oc- 
 cupies himself, he knows that means are provided by which his 
 son may have an equal chance in the race of life with the son 
 of his wealthy neighbor. This is the chief glory of our coun- 
 try, and this feeling, more than anything else, makes him a 
 good citizen, contented with his lot. He feels that the govern- 
 ment does something for him and more for his children. This 
 makes him obedient to the laws and a patriotic defender of 
 them when they are assailed. Take away the hope of the poor 
 man that his child may occupy a higher position than his own, 
 and the rights of property will not be as secure as they are to- 
 day. The High School is one of the means by which the sons 
 of the poor may climb up in the world. If the wealthy pay 
 for the High School, it is a good investment for them, for it is* 
 a better protection to property than a thousand policemen. — 
 James H. Smart, Supt. of Schools, Indiana. 
 
26 
 
 The High School may educate a small percentage of our 
 youth and still be a necessary agent in the system, reflex in, its 
 influence on the schools below it, elevating their scholarship, 
 inciting their pupils to high endeavors, and furnishing to the 
 aspiring and energetic a culture, without which their intellectual 
 progress would be arrested at a very early stage. — Mori. D. 
 Burt, Slate School Supt, Minn. 
 
 The usefulness of the High School is beyond expression, 
 wielding an influence for good oyer the district schools of the 
 town — an influence which would not be seen except for its 
 presence. There would be, of course, excellent district schools 
 without it, but not as excellent or as perfect in their usefulness 
 and work. The High School beyond them of necessity makes 
 their undertakings more active and more substantial. Their 
 scholars look forward to the High School as a goal to be ob- 
 tained, and their teachers give them all aids within their power 
 to render them successful in reaching it. If there were no other 
 influences which it exercised but this alone, the High School 
 would be worth unmeasured values for the cost at which it is 
 maintained. — J. H. Brocklesby, Acting Visitor, Hartford. 
 
 The wisdom of the establishment of the High School becomes 
 more and more apparent. If argument were needed for its 
 continuance and liberal support, this is found in the stimulus 
 it presents to the pupils of the Grammar Schools for faithful 
 work, in order io get the benefit of the higher training. The 
 graduates of the school will furnish the other schools with 
 teachers as vacancies occur, so that we shall not need to look 
 to other places for-a supply, as has been necessary in the past. 
 — H. M. Harrington, Supt. of Schools, Bridgeport. 
 
 The members of our High School are largely composed of the 
 children of the poor, and in scholarship they are equal to the 
 children of the rich. Many of those who are now pursuing 
 their studies in our schools are fitting themselves for positions 
 of usefulness which would have been entirely beyond their 
 reach if it had not been for these beneficent provisions. — -Q-eo. 
 W. Pike, Acting Visitor, Killingly. 
 
 The Legislature of Rhode Island not long since instructed its 
 committee on education to inquire and report whether the public 
 money now expended on High Schools might not be used oth- 
 erwise more to the public advantage. The report of the com- 
 mittee in response to this inquiry stated that " The higher ed. 
 ucation is the fountain of popular education. In all countries 
 where great success has attended the efforts to instruct the 
 masses, it has been due to influences emanating from higher 
 seminaries of learning. Whatever influences operate detri- 
 mentally to the High Schools, in the same degree militate against 
 the real efficiency of the elementary schools." , 
 
The 
 
 ORGANIZED 
 
 OCT. 
 
 1878. 
 
 West Ewing 
 
 Improvement 
 
 Proceedings of Anni- 
 versary Meeting, held in 
 Ewing Church, Sept. 2d, 
 1880, and other valuable 
 matter. 
 
 Association. 
 
 TRENTON, N. J.! 
 HAC CBELLISH ft QUIGLEY, STEAM POWER PRINTERS. 
 
 1880. 
 1? 
 
Entered, according to act of Congress, in the year 1880, by the 
 
 ♦WEST EWING IMPROVEMENT ASSOCIATION, 
 
 P. O. Address, Greensburg, Mercer Co., N. J., 
 
 in the office of the Librarian of Congress, at Washington, D. C. 
 
TABLE' OF CONTENTS. 
 
 Proceedings of the Second Annual Meeting. 
 Address of the President. 
 
 Address of Hon. B. G. Northrop, of Connecticut. 
 Address of Col. George E. Waring, Jr., of Rhode Island. 
 
 Report on the Sanitary Condition of the Western Part of Ewinu 
 Township, bt Cof. George E. Waring, Jr., of Newport, Rhode 
 Island. 
 
 Synopsis of Such Laws of the State of New Jersey as Concern . 
 a Rural Community. 
 
 Constitution and By-Laws. 
 
 Index. 
 
 _ — _ . . - 
 
 Communications, in regard to 
 
 THE WORK OF THE ASSOCIATION, 
 
 MAT BE ADDRESSED TO 
 
 Harvey Bdw. Fisk, 
 
 Grebnsburo, 
 
 Mercer Co., N. J., 
 
 Or, P. 0. Box 235, 
 
 New York, N. Y. 
 
OUR MOTTO. 
 "One for All and All for One.' 
 
 OUR PRIZES. . 
 
 I. This Association offers to the resident of Ewing Town- 
 ship who shall set out and maintain the longest and best 
 row of trees along the public highway, in conformity with 
 By-Law II, or the recommendations of Mr. Northrop's 
 address, a PRIZE OF TWENTY-FIVE DOLLARS, pay- 
 able September 1st, 1881. 
 
 II. This Association offers to the Board of School Trustees 
 of either the Scudder's Falls, Birmingham or Brookville 
 District, which shall effect the greatest material improve- 
 ment in or about the school-house of their district, before 
 July 1st, 1881, a PRIZE OF TWENTY-FIVE DOLLARS, 
 payable on that date, and to be used by the Trustees receiv- 
 ing it for further improvements of an aesthetic nature. 
 
 See, also, By-Law I. 
 
THE 
 
 West Ewing Improvement Association. 
 
 ANNIVERSARY MEETING. 
 
 PHONOGRAPHICALLY REPORTED BY GEORGE E. MILES. 
 
 The proceedings were opened with prayer by the Rev. S. T. 
 Lowrie, D.D., after which it was moved that the reading of the 
 minutes of the last meeting be dispensed with. The motion 
 was adopted. 
 
 The Treasurer, Mr. Charles J. Fisk, then presented his report, 
 which was adopted. 
 
 The Committee on Election of Officers then reported, through 
 its chairman, the following names for officers of the Association 
 for the ensuing year : 
 
 President — A. B. Green. 
 
 Vice-Presidents — Wm. A. Hough, John H. Scuddee. 
 
 Secretary — John V. Gkeen. 
 
 Treasurer — Chas. J. Fisk. 
 
 The report was accepted and the officers named were declared 
 elected. 
 
 The President, Mr. A. B. Green, in introducing the first 
 speaker, spoke as follows : 
 
 It may be well to state that the object of this meeting is to 
 further the cause we are engaged in as an association. The 
 object for which the Association was established two years ago 
 is well known, probably, to all. It is to beautify our homes in 
 
6 
 
 the neighborhood, and make this township a more pleasant and 
 desirable place to live in. We have accomplished something in 
 these last two years. Through our direct influence about two 
 hundred shade trees have been set out along the roads and side- 
 walks. We have made a piece of road which we think is a 
 pattern for the whole county — a road which formerly bore the 
 reputation of being the worst in the place. We have found, in 
 conferring together, that much yet remains to be done, but we 
 are assured that, by co-operation, we can do still more. The 
 setting out of these two hundred trees has been done with great 
 cheerfulness, mostly by people owning the property on which 
 the trees are planted, and as the work proceeds I suppose 
 greater interest will be excited. The road I mentioned a 
 moment ago has cost the township nothing, having been made 
 by voluntary labor and subscription. It is true that prejudices 
 have existed in our community, as I suppose they exist in all. 
 These are a great hindrance to our progress ; but we can over- 
 come them by union among ourselves and interchange of views 
 and plans. We are, of course, very tenacious of our own opin- 
 ions, and think we know a great deal about how this, that and 
 the other thing ought to be done; but, after all, we must admit 
 that our own wisdom cannot be compared to the long experi- 
 ence of those who have carefully studied and scientifically 
 investigated the matter. We find ourselves, by frequent com- 
 parison of views, more and more of a like opinion ; we establish 
 and improve our social intercourse. One gentleman will be 
 found to know better jfchan another how to plant a tree, or how 
 to trim one; another knows better how to plant or trim a 
 hedge ; some lady possesses a rare flower, or knows precisely 
 how to raise one, and through our monthly meetings we gain 
 this varied knowledge and profit by it. 
 
 We could name instances where the conditions of health 
 have been improved, but, inasmuch as we have others with us 
 who can instruct us on these important topics, we will listen to 
 them, and we hope, through the dissemination of such ideas, to 
 see more unite with us, until it becomes the interest and busi- 
 ness of the entire neighborhood. 
 
 I have the honor to introduce to you the, Hon. B. G. Nor- 
 throp, Secretary of the Connecticut State Board of Education. 
 
Address of Hon. B. G. Northrop. 
 
 Me. President, Ladies and Gentlemen — It seems to me very- 
 fitting that the gentlemen who served so successfully during 
 the past year should be unanimously re-elected ; and if you 
 will only tell us how it is that such nicely-made roads as those 
 you have been completing the past year could be made for four 
 dollars out of the treasury, we would like to carry the art into 
 Connecticut, for it certainly costs us a great deal more. I have 
 been delighted — first, in seeing what the plan is, as stated in 
 the village improvement paper, and then in driving about the 
 town this afternoon and observing what has actually been 
 accomplished. I congratulate you on your complete success in 
 driving out of Ewing the " placard " nuisance, or advertising 
 fiend ; for I have not seen a single one of those abominations 
 — which in Connecticut are prohibited by law under severe 
 penalties — on any fence, or barn, or board, anywhere in the drive 
 which it has been my privilege to take. I am very glad to see 
 that already you have planted so extensively the fine Osage 
 orange hedge [See Note] — perhaps, for this climate, one of the 
 very best, and one which in future will be a great adornment to 
 the place ; and that you are starting so grandly in the planting of 
 trees ; and I am pleased, also, with the statement just made that 
 nearly all the trees planted have been set out by the farmers who 
 owned the adjoining land. You are indeed to be congratulated 
 that such a forward step has been taken in the very important 
 matter of roads. [See Note.J The road has been, in all ages, the 
 index of the civilization of any country or community. If we had 
 no other remains of the civilization and intelligence of the ancient 
 Roman Empire, its grand, old roads, as they still stand, would 
 tell us the story; for they show the highest of all ancient 
 civilization. If there is progress in any community, the roads 
 will indicate the fact. I have been glad to see, as at Scudder's 
 Falls, so much improvement made around the school-house by 
 the introduction of that neat hedge of American arbor vitae. It 
 was cheering to notice that on the lawn at the left side as you 
 come out (which the children had been requested not to tread 
 upon), not a foot-fall, or a trace of one, was impressed on that 
 ground reserved for turf. 
 
 I noticed, on the way up from New York City, very beautiful 
 adornments around many of the railway stations on the line of 
 
8 
 
 the Jersey Central. That is one of the improvements which, I 
 have no doubt, you will incite the railway managers to apply 
 here. You are doing so much for yourselves that it will be a 
 very little thing for you to ask the corporation to appropriate 
 a section of land here and there, at a station which is to become 
 so important in the future, for the purpose of a park. I was 
 delighted the other day, traveling along on the Shore line, to 
 find a beautiful little park at the railway station of Brockton, 
 New York, on the Lake Shore & Michigan Southern Road. I 
 said to the depot agent, "How is this?" He replied, "The 
 superintendent desires us to improve our grounds." "How 
 does he communicate that desire to you?" "Well," said the 
 depot agent, "he sends out a printed circular." I afterward 
 secured one of these circulars, and it read as follows : " The 
 depot master is required to occupy his leisure, and the leisure 
 of the hands, in adorning the grounds, and to see that there is 
 no rubbish or disfigurement anywhere around the railway 
 station." As a result, this depot agent had developed that beau- 
 tiful little park. I counted there two hundred and forty-six 
 flowers of different kinds, besides some thirty different varieties 
 of trees. It was a gem. Other railways are beginning to do the 
 same thing. North Conway and Plymouth, in New Hampshire ; 
 Stonington and Pomfret, in Connecticut ; Auburn and Kingston, 
 in Rhode Island, are good illustrations. The Pennsylvania 
 Central is setting a good example all along the line for forty 
 miles west of Philadelphia ; and a little persuasion on the part 
 of this Association will carry the point with the railway mana- 
 gers at this depot. 
 
 On conference with friends here, I think it better to have 
 an off-hand talk with you, and, therefore, throw aside the 
 written lecture which I had arranged to deliver. 
 
 The question has been asked, What has been done in the way 
 of rural improvement elsewhere? and I say "rural," rather 
 than "village" improvement. I discard the word "village," 
 for in towns where I am working, I want to carry out the idea 
 that this business concerns everybody in the township, and we 
 cannot bring about the best results unless we benefit all sections 
 and all classes, and thus secure the co-operation of every 
 citizen. I want every one, however distant, to feel that he has 
 
some, however remote, concern in this rural improvement. 
 What is the history of these associations ? 
 
 1. The first rural improvement association, so far as I know, 
 was formed in New Haven, in 1799, under the lead of James 
 Hillhouse, the leading subscriber and manager. He called it 
 the Village Green Association, and secured a subscription of 
 $1,500. One man, in the generosity of his great heart, subscribed 
 five gallons of rum — as good as gold, according to the theory of 
 that day. You may be sure it was not benzine, as you cannot, 
 what you get now. What has been the result of that grand 
 enterprise? Why, all the majestic elms, nearly, of New Haven 
 were planted then; and it is due to that Association, started at 
 that time, that New Haven is known throughout the land and 
 over the world as the "Elm City," while its beauty, acquired 
 through these magnificent trees, has attracted great numbers of 
 wealthy citizens, so that the annual taxes on the property 
 there attracted by the existence of the great elms exceed by far 
 all that the elms ever cost. 
 
 As far as I can learn, the next volunteer association was 
 founded about fifty years ago, in Heidelberg. Suffice it to say, 
 the efforts of that association in rebuilding the old castle, and 
 repairing the magnificent drive-way up to it, is the secret, 
 together with the planting their beautiful avenues and parks 
 with fine trees, of the fact that you find, on an average, eight 
 hundred English residents there, to say nothing of the hundreds 
 that flock there from other sources. To name two or three other 
 European illustrations — many of you have seen how attractive 
 Baden-Baden and Wiesbaden, in Germany, and Interlaken, in 
 Switzerland, have been made by similar rural adornments. The 
 Swiss understand making their homes attractive. Out of 485,000 
 households, about 465,000 in Switzerland are householders. You 
 cannot match that in America; and there are no people on the 
 face of this globe, unless it be the Japanese, who love their 
 country more, and are more devoted to its interests, than are 
 the Swiss. 
 
 More than a century ago, a grand work was accomplished 
 (though not by a rural improvement association) in a town in 
 Connecticut, which was a subject of conversation at the dinner- 
 table to-day, and thus was brought to my mind. It was the 
 
10 
 
 town of Stratford. Dr. Samuel Johnson, once rector at Stratford 
 and afterwards president of Kings College (since the Revolution, 
 Columbia College), New York City, visiting England and the 
 estate of Alexander Pope, at Twickenham, was struck with the 
 beauty of the Syrian willow growing there. The tradition is, 
 that about a hundred and fifty years ago, an English merchant 
 doing business in Aleppo and Smyrna, brought the poet a 
 package of figs incased in a basket of unpeeled osiers. Noticing 
 that one of the scions penetrating into the moist figs was 
 budding, Pope carefully planted it. Thence grew the famous 
 Twickenham willow that became a favorite with the poet, and 
 finally with the English people. President Johnson brought 
 scions to Stratford, whence it was widely spread through New 
 England and New York. This incident intensified the interest 
 of the Johnson family in tree planting, who took the lead in 
 this grand work in Stratford. No town of its size on the Shore 
 Line/between New York and Boston, is adorned with so many 
 stately, ancient trees as this. Much as this willow was admired 
 for private grounds, with its long, drooping pendants, it was not 
 deemed best for public streets, for which the elm, maple, plane, 
 and other natives were wisely preferred. Now there is nothing 
 but its broad avenues adorned with noble trees, especially to 
 distinguish Stratford from any other of a dozen places along the 
 Shore Line; but, notwithstanding the nuisance of mosquitoes 
 (bred in the adjoining salt marshes), Stratford has. attracted 
 many wealthy men, through the exceeding beauty of its streets 
 and avenues. No one goes there without offering up a sentiment 
 of thanksgiving to old Dr. Johnson for the controlling influence 
 he exerted in the beautifying of the town. 
 
 But of more recent improvement associations, Stockbridge, 
 Massachusetts, was the pioneer, and that one was started by 
 Mary Hopkins, the niece of President Mark Hopkins, of Wil- 
 liams College. There was no general law of incorporation at 
 that time, but a special act was passed, and that has been in 
 operation some twenty-eight years, and what has been the result? 
 When the association began its work, Stockbridge was a wild, 
 rugged place. I remember it when, in my boyhood, I traveled 
 through the Housatonic valley. Now it is, by far, the most 
 beautiful town in all New England. When Miss Hopkins, now 
 
11 
 z. 
 
 Mrs. J. pf. Goodrich, inaugurated this association, (and it may be 
 a good hint to continue this plan of having an annual festival,) 
 the idea was adopted of having, on the fourth Wednesday in 
 August, a gathering of the people from all parts of the town, on 
 a common platform, without reference to party or denomination, 
 and that idea has been carried out and kept up to this day. They 
 claim that nature has always smiled upon them, as she does 
 upon you this afternoon, and that they have sunny heavens 
 above them on anniversary day. They have had poems, addresses 
 and post-prandial speeches, and the re-unions have done them 
 good, and stirred them to new enterprise and energy. 
 
 One of the grandest results of these associations, as it should 
 ever be, is the promotion of fraternal feeling. In many country 
 towns there is needless strife. Such alienations destroy the 
 charm of country homes. Everything should be done to bind 
 the people together in the ties of a common interest, and you can 
 do that in no way so well as by bringing them to work together, 
 as you are working for yourselves. The beautiful decorations 
 of this church to-day are profuse beyond what I have ever seen. 
 I perceive in each of the slips two or three bouquets, besides the 
 ferns and other flowers, and these fitting symbols of the sheaf 
 of wheat. I say this does you good. It has benefited the ladies 
 whose labors have accomplished this result. The interests, the 
 sympathies, the friendly feelings of this whole community, have 
 been drawn out, and they will be more likely to co-operate in 
 the good work for improvement; and I feel sure that this sacred 
 place, instead of being desecrated, is hallowed by its occupa- 
 tion at this time, for a purpose so entirely in unison with all the 
 sacred designs of the church. 
 
 I happened to be called upon to give the anniversary address 
 at the quarter-centennial at Stockbridge, and as the Treasurer 
 read his report, after giving certain details he said : " Every 
 acre of land and every homestead in Stockbridge has appreci- 
 ated by reason of the work of this association." As many of 
 you know, wealthy men have been attracted thither from far 
 and near. Meeting a wealthy New York merchant, known to 
 many of you, up there, one day, I said : " What brought you 
 here ?" " Well," said he, " I happened to be passing through 
 Stockbridge, one Summer, and I noticed how neat the streets 
 
12 
 
 were, and how the grounds and surroundings of the houses 
 were adorned, and I thought a home here would have increased 
 attractions and a higher value." And so he put up his elegant 
 mansion there, and the same has been done by many others, 
 and Stockbridge is full of the homes of wealthy people. 
 
 What has their improvement association done there ? They 
 first looked out for the planting of trees, and after all the streets 
 were amply supplied, they turned their attention to the side- 
 walks. Every one agreed there to look out for his own frontage. 
 I remember driving around the place on one occasion, with the 
 lady who founded the association, and if anywhere, three, four, 
 five or six miles away from the center, she found weeds growing 
 in the road-way, she jogged the memory of the farmer, and the 
 road was cleaned by those who owned the adjoining property. 
 That will be the result in Ewing. I noticed, in driving along 
 to-day, that in a number of roads where you have put out lines 
 of trees, there are some ugly weeds growing alongside the fence, 
 It will be a very easy matter to have those cut down once or 
 twice or thrice a season, and it will add greatly to the beauty of 
 the place. They look out for that at Stockbridge, and, as one 
 thing led to another, there soon came along a former son of 
 Stockbridge, and, seeing what had been done, he said: "I must 
 have a hand in this," and so he gave them $20,000 for a library. 
 Another man said, " I will join in this good work, and give them 
 a library building." So they have there a beautiful library and 
 reading-room, and keep it in operation. It all springs from the 
 interest awakened among the whole people, by a village improve- 
 ment association. I have no time for further details regarding 
 the work of this enterprising organization. I have talked at 
 their anniversaries many times. I have found them all aglow 
 with enthusiasm. 
 
 Ten years ago, visiting New Milford, Connecticut, I met there 
 two young ladies, to whom I said: "You ought to start a rural 
 improvement association here." They decided to do so, and set 
 to work. I gave them the plans. They got up a fair that netted 
 $800, and what has been the result? From a rough, rugged 
 town, New Milford has been made the most beautiful town in 
 the State of Connecticut. No town in the country, in the same 
 limits of time, has made such- a complete transformation. There 
 
13 
 
 was a wide street, but the carts, crossing in all directions, had 
 cut the road up. In wet weather a brook ran through the 
 center ; in dry times there was an unseemly line of mud. They 
 ran a sewer through the whole, leveled the ground, enclosed it, 
 made concrete sidewalks, and a little ribbon of lawn between 
 the fences and the sidewalk and between the sidewalk and 
 gutter. Then came the drive-way on each side, and a parallel- 
 ogram was formed, and adorned with flowers and trees. I was 
 in New Milford the other day, and a prominent gentleman 
 said : " Well, we spend money pretty freely, but nobody grum- 
 bles." It has not been done from taxation at all; all is volun- 
 tary ; but no one would go back to the barbaric condition that 
 existed ten years ago, even were it necessary to spend ten-fold 
 more. As at Stockbridge, they are appreciating the results in 
 the rise of real estate and the increased demand for homes and 
 lands in the town. 
 
 Many of you know of the present, beauty of Litchfield. Per- 
 haps some of you saw an article in the New York papers some 
 time ago, about the beauty of Litchfield. The place was living 
 on the laurels of the last century, and was going into decay, and 
 everything was neglected ; but seven years ago they started an 
 association of this kind. I met, while there, a wealthy gentle- 
 man from one of our cities. " What led you to come up here," 
 said I. " WelL" said he, " you would not have got me to come 
 up here if the old. fogy spirit prevailed as it did ten years ago ; 
 but I found there was a new life and interest here, and it was 
 worth while to have a Summer home here." And he erected 
 his stately mansion there, and luxuriates in his delightful home 
 every Summer. Their boarding-houses and hotels are not 
 ample enough to accommodate the parties that desire to go 
 there. Not having the advantage of such sanitary wisdom as 
 Col. Waring would have given them, the place was desolated, 
 needlessly, by a terrible fever, a few years ago, simply through 
 the neglect of drainage. It was the place of all others that 
 ought to be the healthiest ; but those very country towns, where 
 there is every opportunity of securing the purest water and best 
 air, sometimes are needlessly ravaged by diphtheria and typhoid 
 fever and other kindred troubles, which proper care and fore- 
 sight would prevent. 
 
14 
 
 I have in mind a little town in Connecticut— Middlebury — 
 with less than eight hundred population, and very scanty 
 means. I suppose that whole township has not one-tenth of 
 the valuation of Evving ; and yet, by getting everybody enlisted 
 in the cause, and thus, by co-operation, they have improved the 
 village green, and the farmers have taken hold of the matter, 
 and said, " We will have no rubbish, no weeds, nothing to dis- 
 figure our homesteads." You will sometimes go to a village 
 and find everything neat, in the main, and yet the homes of 
 some neglectful men will be disfigured by broken cart-wheels, 
 or piles of lumber or chips, or decaying rubbish of one sort or 
 another. Everything of that kind is cleared away from that 
 little village, and, with only a few farmers along the road, they 
 have agreed to keep it in good condition. I might give many 
 other details, but have not time for that. 
 
 The question asked me since coming here is, how to raise the 
 funds ? Probably you know better how to answer that question 
 than I can tell you, because you have among you liberal men 
 who have already contributed generously to these grand results, 
 and because the detailed plans must always be determined by 
 local conditions; but I say, in general — 
 
 1. Enlist the ladies. Many of our most successful associations 
 have been started by ladies, and all need their sympathy and 
 efficient co-operation. I always feel sure of success in any town 
 where two or three earnest ladies take hold of this matter. This 
 is woman's special sphere. 
 
 2. Interest the youth of the town in this good work. Give 
 the children something to do in improving the grounds and 
 surroundings of their homes, if not the road-sides. The New 
 York " Evening Post " well says : " They, more readily than 
 anybody else, become interested in such matters, and they may 
 easily be induced to bring trees from the forest, and to plant 
 them where they are needed, without cost to anybody, and 
 without other than willing and eager work. How great the 
 good is that boys and girls derive from their own active interest in 
 such things, every attentive observer of youth knows. The edu- 
 cational effect of such employments and interests, the refining 
 influence, the aesthetic improvement wrought, the enlargement 
 of heart and mind which grow, directly and indirectly, out of 
 
15 
 
 work of this kind, done by united effort by the boys and girls of 
 a town,- under the stimulus of public approval, are not to be set 
 down in words or expressed in figures. In any town, where 
 juvenile enthusiasm is awakened in public improvement, the 
 schools will accomplish better results, the library will be more 
 freely and profitably used, there will be less idleness, less 
 wrong-doing, habits will be better, aspirations higher, the tone 
 of life stronger. Every such town must improve in intelligence, 
 taste, public spirit and morality, which is decency of life reduced 
 to principle, quite as positively as it grows in external beauty. 
 
 3. Get subscriptions from the more willing or wealthy resi- 
 dents. 
 
 4. Invite the co-operation of non-resident sons of the town, 
 whom fortune has favored, who are often glad to gratefully 
 remember the mother soil that bore them, and thus build a 
 monument, each for himself, and be henceforth gratefully 
 recognized as the benefactor of his townsmen and of future 
 generations. A beautiful village of tasteful, happy homes, 
 would be a proud monument for any man. There is a rare 
 luxury in witnessing the fruits of one's benefactions, giving while 
 living and able to enjoy the rich results, rather than leaving lega- 
 cies to be lessened or lost in the wrangles of contending heirs. 
 
 5. Money may be raised by the annual payment of member- 
 ship fees, or by life memberships. 
 
 6. In some towns, fairs are held to raise money for this 
 purpose. 
 
 7. In some instances, prizes have been offered for tree planting 
 — giving, for example, $75, $50. $40 and $30 for the longest and 
 best rows of trees by any road-side. Two hundred dollars, 
 offered in this way, in one town, stimulated an extraordinary 
 interest in tree planting . 
 
 As I have intimated, one of the prime ends which we keep in 
 view in the fifty or sixty associations which we have in Con- 
 necticut, is to cultivate public spirit, and foster town pride. 
 These are sentiments of great influence and great value, and the 
 want of them is greatly to be deplored, for it indicates a serious 
 defect of character. The man who does not love to honor and 
 cherish the town that gave him birth, has no heart in his bosom. 
 I have in mind a railway king, a millionaire, who never visits 
 
16 
 
 the town where he first saw the light, but leaves his old home- 
 stead to decay, and neglect, and slight ; and his character cor- 
 responds with his actions. The cold, selfish, sinister soul is 
 sterile in heroic virtues, but the sentiment which honors one's 
 homestead and one's town, is noble and ennobling. It is a 
 prime element of true manhood, and has ever characterized the 
 greatest and best of men. 
 
 I need not say a word on the prospective influence of this 
 association in promoting public health, when you have secured 
 the services of a gentleman so thoroughly competent to discuss 
 this subject. Some of our country towns, naturally favorable 
 to health and longevity, have suffered fearfully and needlessly 
 from the ravages of diseases, evidently caused by neglect of 
 hygienic laws. In many towns, great improvement has been 
 made in the matter of drainage, removal of waste, and guarding 
 wells and water supplies from impurities. 
 
 Your association, starting so vigorously, will, I am confident, 
 accomplish grand results in improving the roads and road-sides 
 and planting trees, not only within your own limits, but in 
 creating a healthy public sentiment which will extend the good 
 work through all the approaches to the town. I would like to 
 have you give an invitation to Trenton to meet you at your 
 boundary line with a continuous line of trees on every road 
 that runs towards Trenton; and I believe that, under the 
 influence of my esteemed friend, the friend and superintendent 
 of the public schools,' Hon. E. A. Apgar, Trenton would accept 
 the challenge.. There are many pretty towns that give such 
 challenges, one to another, and carry them out, too. It is easy 
 enough to accomplish, if you can succeed once in arousing 
 ambition. 
 
 Many of the roads in England and France are made enchant- 
 ing by these continuous lines of trees. You remember the 
 story of the two men who laid a wager that each could tell the 
 prettiest region in England, and they chose an umpire, and 
 paid him the money. Then each wrote his decision, and, on 
 handing them over to the umpire, it was found that the choice 
 of one was the road from Kenilworth to Coventry, and the 
 other's selection was the road from Coventry to Kenilworth; 
 and the main attraction of this road was the magnificent trees 
 
17 
 
 hat shaded the route. Among those trees, some of you will 
 emember that grand old tree, the Cedar of Lebanon. It is not 
 if very rapid growth, but it is worth trying, and your children 
 .nd children's children will thank you for it. I have no doubt 
 t may be grown here. It thrives in Philadelphia. My friend 
 it my right was educated at East Hartford, and he remembers 
 he grand old avenues of elms there. I can hardly tell you 
 iow magnificent those triple rows of trees are. When the 
 French forces under Rochambeau were stationed at East Hart- 
 brd, for their Winter quarters, Rochambeau, according to the 
 ;raditions of that day, said : " Now, boys, let's give them a-^ 
 ipecimen of French taste." Just at that time l^B^^ had 
 seen in the habit of planting trees on the way-sides in France 
 'or hundreds of miles. So the boys set to work and planted 
 ;hose magnificent elms, which occur at short intervals from 
 Windsor down through East Hartford to Glastenbury. Grander 
 jnes it would be hard to find. Thanks to Rochambeau. 
 
 One of the aims of village improvement should be the making 
 jf sidewalks. There is room for much to be done in that direc- 
 tion here. Perhaps the gravel is not at hand. The ordinary 
 Doal ashes spread along, the coarser below and the finer on top, 
 make a very good substitute, and it can very easily and cheaply 
 be accomplished. [See Note.] 
 
 To quicken the intellectual life of the people, is one aim of these 
 associations. The founding of libraries is an important aid in 
 this direction. The supply of good books increases the demand. 
 A. taste for books has been awakened in many towns by a 
 well-selected library, where the improvement has been as 
 marked in the quality as in the quantity of the books read. 
 Such a library naturally becomes the pride and treasure of a 
 town, rendering it a more desirable place of residence and 
 idding attractions to every intelligent home within its limits. 
 
 The formation of book clubs favors the intellectual improvement 
 sf a community. A score or more associate together and agree 
 3ach to pay from one to five dollars a year for the purchase of 
 i sort of circulating library. Sometimes they meet once a 
 month to discuss and vote upon the books to be purchased, 
 thus promoting social improvement as well as mental culture. 
 The books are circulated among the members in rotation, the 
 2 
 
18 
 
 members retaining volumes each a fortnight. At the end of 
 the year, these books are sold at a low rate, and often to the 
 members, and the avails used for the purchase of other books. 
 The books usually selected are travels, histories, biographies, 
 popular treatises on science and philosophy, and sometimes 
 books of choice poetry and romance. Good fellowship, as 
 well as intellectual improvement, are sometimes promoted by 
 organizing reading circles. Selections in prose and poetry, often 
 a play of Shakespeare, the several parts having been previously 
 assigned, are the subjects of careful study and drill. The social 
 influence of these weekly circles is sometimes extended by a 
 rehearsal of a more public character. The support of a village 
 reading-room, supplied with the leading journals of the day 
 — daily, weekly, monthly or bi-monthly — is a good result 
 accomplished in many towns. A course of lyceum lectures is 
 sustained by many rural improvement associations, the profits 
 of which is their " benefit," while the social opportunities thus 
 opened are clear gain. 
 
 An annual festival under the direction of the rural improve- 
 ment association, tends to deepen public interest in this work, 
 and to fraternize the whole people of a town. In some towns, 
 literary exercises, addresses and music fill the programme, and 
 occasionally, though not commonly, a collation and post-prandial 
 speeches become another bond of union and fellowship. In the 
 rigid, and sometimes frigid, state of rural life too often found 
 among us, we need more heartily to cultivate the social amenities 
 and learn the art of " turning work into play." The supposed 
 monotony and dullness of country life drive many to the city. 
 It is wise for our farmers to multiply occasions for social 
 enjoyment. The arbor-day festival may help to counteract the 
 tendency of rural life to isolation and seclusion, lifting out of 
 the ruts of a plodding monotony, promoting neighborly feeling 
 and strengthening social ties. The rural laborers in Switzerland 
 and Germany socialize far more than American farmers. Their 
 festive spirit is a strongly-marked feature of their character. It 
 is manifested in the family, in neighborhood greetings and 
 meetings, in schools, in rifle feasts, in processions, and various 
 social gatherings. They have a passion for nature, and love to 
 frequent their beautiful groves and gardens. This genial spirit 
 
19 
 
 is everywhere fostered by music, both vocal and instrumental. 
 As a result, there is an inexpressible something in the German 
 character that carries mirthful and happy childhood into old 
 age, giving an added charm to social life, and lightness and 
 cheer to sober work. 
 
 Among the minor aims of these associations is the providing 
 of rustic seats under the shades for the comfort of pedestrians. 
 In the beautiful drive in West Ewing along the Delaware, how 
 pleasantly would such simple seats suggest neighborly kindness 
 and courtesy. Also, setting up watering-troughs for horses, at 
 convenient points, where, from adjacent hill-sides, never-failing 
 springs facilitate this improvement ; furnishing plans for rural 
 architecture, and for gates and fences ; in securing hedge-rows 
 in room of fences; or, better still, in villages, combining to 
 remove all fences, so that the private grounds seem to unite 
 with the wayside in one large lawn ; the suggestion of neutral 
 tints for dwellings and out-houses, in place of the glaring white 
 formerly so common; arrest of stray cattle, for strolling cattle 
 usually are, and always ought to be, outlawed; preventing 
 nuisances — one of these is the tearing up the turf fronting a 
 dwelling-house, by inconsiderate road menders. Painting or 
 posting advertisements on the rocks or fences by the myriad 
 nostrum makers is a nuisance in my State prohibited by law,* 
 and it should be everywhere forbidden. The same may be 
 said of the encroachments made upon the highway every time 
 the stone wall or fence boundary is rebuilt. The whole township 
 should show an interest in preventing such curtailment of its 
 roadways. A rural improvement association can develop a 
 public sentiment which will of itself correct these evils without 
 occasioning any neighborhood strifes or alienations. In this 
 matter, the interest of one is the interest of all. The motto of the 
 Swiss Confederacy, " One for all, and all for one," is the true motto 
 for the several districts, and for all the people of a township. 
 
 Reading associations increase the influence of an organization 
 of this kind very widely, and lectures as well. Its educational, 
 bearing is of the very highest consequence. The taste should 
 early be cultivated. It should be held to be a religious duty to 
 love the beautiful in nature, the beautiful in art, still more the 
 
 •Read carefully the law of the State of New Jersey on this matter.— Ed. 
 
20 
 
 beautiful in character ; for all the beauties, utilities and grand- 
 eurs of nature culminate in the formation of character. In the 
 very structure of our being, God rebukes the ignorance or indo- 
 lence that so often dwarfs that noble faculty — the love of the 
 beautiful — designed to be an ally of virtue and religion. Your 
 association here will develop in the minds of your children a 
 love of flowers, vines, shrubs and trees, all the stronger because 
 they have helped in planting and cultivating them. In regard 
 to the superior educational influences of rural scenes and 
 scenery and occupations, Dr. Bushnell was wont to say : " In 
 all my reading of history, I do not recollect the name of a truly 
 great man who spent his early life in a great city." Some one 
 said to me the other day, "What about Franklin?" To which 
 I replied : " Franklin grew up in a small village called 
 Boston." It was but a village at that time; and was not 
 incorporated as a city till one hundred and eighteen years after 
 Franklin was born; but would he have been equal to the 
 achievements which the world has admired, if he had been 
 reared in a great city like Paris? Would Washington have 
 been prepared to become the "Father of his Country" if he 
 had been dandled in the lap of affluence in a great city like 
 London? 
 
 Nature is the great educator; birds, flowers, insects and all 
 animals are our practical primary. teachers. Facts and objects 
 as best seen in the country are the earliest instruments for devel- 
 oping the juvenile faculties. In all our history, the country has 
 proved the great school of mind. Here dwell, and for wise 
 reasons here God intended should dwell, the great majority of 
 mankind. 
 
 The country sends far more than its proportion of gifted men 
 to the great centers of influence. It is thus continually enriching 
 the cities, for towards them are flowing, like their streams, the 
 material and mental treasures which have their origin in the 
 mountain springs, and without which the cities would die out. 
 A writer in one of our popular monthlies disparages farmers 
 and farming, saying : '' l can pick out the farmer and farmer's 
 boys in any assemblage by their manifest boorishness of looks 
 and action. Your farmer's boy is awkward and jagged, like the 
 oak growing in the open lot, while your city youth is trim and 
 
21 
 
 graceful like the pine in the forest." After reading that article, I 
 took a trip to Cape Cod, where a fearful storm had just swept the 
 coast and where were to be seen many a pine made the sport of 
 the tempest, but never an oak stirred from its moorings. So 
 your farmer's boy, trained to industry, to economy of time as 
 well as money, will breast a thousand storms, any one of which 
 would upset your tenderly-reared city youth. " It is not in the 
 great cities, nor in the confined shops of trade, but principally 
 in agriculture, that the best stock or staple of men is grown. 
 It is in the open air— in communion with the sky, the earth and 
 all living things— that the largest inspiration is drunk in and 
 the vital energies of a real man constructed." I often advise the 
 wealthy in our cities to secure Summer homes in the country, 
 or to send their children, for at least one entire year, to the 
 country, with its freer sports and wider range for rambles, and, 
 better still, to give one season to hard work on the farm or in 
 the shop. The practical skill thus gained in adapting means to 
 ends, in observing common objects and animals, may compen- 
 sate for some loss of book learning, and lead one afterward to 
 pursue text-books with greater zest. 
 
 It is the interest of the farmers, of all people on the globe, to 
 co-operate in the work of rural improvement. In no other 
 way can you farmers so surely counteract this excessive mania 
 for the attractions and distractions of city life. We need to 
 enforce in the school, as well as in the family, the necessity and 
 dignity of labor, and its vital connection with all human growth 
 and progress and welfare. The theory that labor is menial, 
 that the tools of the farm or a trade are badges of servility, 
 ought to be refuted in our schools. The Hebrews, acting under 
 divine inspiration, trained up their youth to thoroughly learn 
 some handicraft. When proclaiming the gospel for all the 
 world, Paul could, if need be, earn his livelihood by his 
 trade; and his associates did not dream that they were demean- 
 ing themselves or their sacred office by resuming their old 
 business of fishing. Why was it that the Great Teacher, whose 
 life was designed to be the perfect standard of duty to all men 
 in all ages, sought out — yes, sought out — the humble cottage of 
 the carpenter, and toiled at the carpenter's bench, except that 
 He might reprobate before the eyes of the world this heathenish 
 
22 
 
 notion that labor is servile ? It will do for the Chinese mandarin , 
 who lets his nails grow longer than his fingers, to prove that he 
 does not work because he cannot. I say more should be done 
 to dignify farm work ; and how can the farmer do this better 
 than by interesting his boys and girls in the adornment of the 
 home and the village? 
 
 While I feel a grateful pride in the fact that something in the 
 line of rural adornment has lately been accomplished in all the 
 towns of Connecticut, especially around the homes and grounds 
 of our citizens, I do not mean to slacken my efforts till an effi- 
 cient association is formed in every township. Though this is 
 no part of my prescribed duties, but only a volunteer avocation 
 in addition to my proper vocation, my interest in the work 
 grows with years and results. It is my ambition to do my 
 utmost to improve the homes and home life of our people, and 
 help them to realize that the highest privilege and central duty 
 of life is the creation of happy homes. The multiplied minis- 
 tries of nature, providence and religion, center in the main- 
 tenance of happy homes. The higher aim of the industries of 
 life, whether agricultural, manufacturing or commercial, and 
 the great end for which government itself is worthy to be sus- 
 tained, is, that men may live in happy homes. " The hope of 
 America is the homes of America." You improve the schools 
 by improving the homes, as truly as you improve the homes by 
 improving the schools. 
 
 It was a very fit thing that, in opening this meeting, we 
 should unite in a prayer of thanksgiving to God for our happy 
 homes, and a fit thing to pray, as we did most fervently and 
 heartily, that we might co-operate in the embellishment of our 
 homes ; and let me commend to you, my friends, the spirit of 
 that very appropriate prayer. The hope of Ewing is the 
 homes of Ewing, and when every citizen is induced to look 
 out for his own frontage, and his own grounds, this result is, in 
 the highest degree, secured. 
 
 It is a grand fact that modern civilization relates to the 
 homes of the people, especially to their health, thrift, comfort, 
 and their intellectual and moral advancement. In former 
 times, and other lands, men were counted only in the aggregate, 
 and valued only as they helped to swell the revenues and 
 
23 
 
 retinues of kings and nobles. The government was the unit 
 and each individual only added one to the roll of serfs or 
 soldiers, but with us the individual is the unit, and the govern- 
 ment is of the people, for the people, and by the people. Every 
 influence should, therefore, be employed with us to foster home 
 attachments. On Cape Cod, the other day, I met a widow, who 
 said to me : " I have not heard from my boy for twelve 
 months, but I know he hain't spoke ship," and she pointed to 
 the flowers and shrubs that her boy had helped to plant; and 
 I knew he had not spoken a ship, for a boy of that kind would 
 not let an opportunity pass, wherever he might be, to cheer her 
 with tidings of his safety. Said a man thirty-five years presi- 
 dent of a New England college : " I never knew a boy go far 
 astray who devotedly cherished his mother and truly reverenced 
 his father." 
 
 Now, fathers and mothers, if you want to improve your boys, 
 and make them reverence you, keep your homesteads clean, 
 and teach the children to cultivate a love for flowers. I think 
 we have an instance in point in that wonderful people, the Jap- 
 anese. There are no people on the earth who love flowers as 
 they do ; no people who cultivate them so universally. Every 
 one must have flowers in his front yard — must, not by imperial 
 edict, but by what is better, universal public sentiment. If, 
 possibly, the local conditions in a narrow street do not permit 
 a plat of flowers, they will then have potted flowers, and the 
 arrangements in the rear for flowers are ample. Was it not a 
 striking fact, at the Centennial Exhibition, that the only foreign 
 bazaar adorned with native flowers and shrubs was the Jap- 
 anese? and, however the commissioners mourned that they had 
 suffered greatly by the long passage, they were exquisitely 
 beautiful, as you well remember. My home has been fragrant, 
 much of the time the last few years, with bouquets sent by 
 Japanese students, which is their way of expressing gratitude 
 for some little favor given. Then, again, the love of flowers is 
 largely, in my mind, the secret of the wonderful politeness of 
 the Japanese. No people on the face of this globe, in the 
 family or in the school, so thoroughly teach the ethics and 
 sesthetics of etiquette as do the Japanese. The French are also 
 one of the politest peoples in the world, and the love of flowers 
 is one of their characteristics. 
 
24 
 
 I have been requested to say a word as to what trees to plant. 
 Your printed programme specifies a,list of trees. I would like 
 to add one or two, while admitting the excellence of those 
 named. I would add the linden, a magnificent tree and very 
 hardy, and the common hemlock. Another noble tree which 
 you have sought to grow is the tulip, and you have failed 
 because you planted it too large. It has a deep root, and 
 should be taken from the nursery young. It is a great mistake 
 to think you are going to gain by planting big trees. If you 
 plant them large, you must crop them, and a tree never recovers 
 thoroughly from the beheading process. There will grow up, 
 perhaps, two limbs and spread out, and then, in a tempest, the 
 tree splits, and never develops its full beauty. I want to urge, 
 also, as a very beautiful tree, which you will find growing across 
 the river in Pennsylvania, at various points, the hickory and 
 the black walnut. They both need to be planted young, and 
 with care, the hickory especially. Let me drop a word of 
 caution — not to plant big trees in little yards. While I advo- 
 cate tree planting most thoroughly, I want to reiterate the old 
 motto : " Where the sunlight cannot come, the doctor must." Don't 
 let the old Norway spruce stand so near as to shut out all 
 sunlight. Your list of trees, recommended for the roadside, justly 
 includes the elm, which unites the two elements of grace and 
 grandeur more than any other tree. Michaux calls it " the 
 most magnificent vegetable of the temperate zone." No doubt 
 its roots extend further into the adjoining fields than those of 
 any other tree. On this account the hickory, white ash, Norway 
 maple, mountain ash, and especially the tulip, with its straight 
 stem, that may be trimmed high, if need be, should be favorites 
 with the farmers for the road-side. The tulip is a rapid 
 grower, and attains large size, and is unsurpassed in the beauty 
 of its form and foliage. 
 
 Of all exotics, I recommend the European larch. You can 
 get it from Douglas & Sons, at Waukegan, Illinois, for $8 or $9 a 
 thousand. It is very hardy, has a perfect root, and probably 
 990 out of every 1,000 will live. They come in perfect condi- 
 tion. The tree unites three characteristics — rapidity of growth , 
 symmetry of form, and durability of the timber. We are plant- 
 ing it, in Massachusetts and Connecticut, for economical pur- 
 
25 
 
 poses, as well as for adornment. I find there is no need here 
 of reclaiming barren lands, as in a town so fertile you have no 
 sand banks. Further South, I should have dropped a hint 
 about reclaiming sand barrens by planting the trees appropriate 
 for that purpose. The larch is the great timber tree, as well as 
 ornamental tree, at the present time in Europe. 
 
 But I notice that I have overrun my time, and, therefore, I 
 stop abruptly ; for I would not deprive you of the privilege and 
 pleasure you have of learning the results of the sanitary survey 
 of this place, made by so competent a gentleman as Col. Waring. 
 May I congratulate you on your good fortune in securing such 
 a survey. If any one has doubted the wisdom of it hitherto, I 
 think ten years hence he will be thankful to this Association 
 for this step. I have been surprised again and again, in going 
 into our country towns, to find in the homes of men who 
 thought they had everything in perfection, that the sanitary 
 conditions were imperfe.ct and bad; that the waste-pipe from 
 the kitchen sink, for instance, emptied into a cesspool within 
 six or eight feet of the well, and from it conduits formed in the 
 course of years, so that the water was contaminated ; and the 
 most frightful diseases have, within my knowledge, come from 
 drinking water rendered impure by the sink cesspools, which 
 people think' little of as injuring the health of the home. But 
 I stop abruptly. 
 
 The President then introduced Col. George E. Waring, Jr., of 
 Newport, R. I. 
 
 Address of Col. George E. Waring. 
 
 Mr. President, Ladies and Gentlemen : — I find myself labor- 
 ing under a very unaccustomed embarrassment in appearing 
 before you to-day. It is my misfortune to have been compelled 
 to practice the gloomy profession of a Sanitary Engineer. I am 
 seldom called to perform any service except where my labors 
 are sorely needed. If I am sent for to visit a house, it is more 
 than likely that the undertaker has been there before me. When 
 I received the letter of your enthusiastic Mr. Fisk, inviting 
 me to make a sanitary survey of West Ewing, my first thought 
 was: "One more unfortunate!" I fully anticipated, judging 
 from my previous experiences, finding matters so very serious 
 
26 
 
 here, and, perhaps, life grown so uncertain, that something 
 would have to be done immediately, at least to maintain the 
 price of your lands. I accordingly sent my assistant here to 
 ferret out the sources of evil in all your houses, and I came yes- 
 terday myself to drive through your pestilential marshes, and 
 to investigate your filthy drains. I find, quite to my surprise, 
 that you have sent for the wrong man. It is no such place. 
 In more than one respect this is fortunate, because the hour is 
 getting late, and I shall say very little, for the reason that I 
 have very little to say. 
 
 I have no doubt that in what Mr. Northrop has said, and in 
 some things that I may say, there may be the suggestion of an 
 inquiry concerning sanitary matters, which may lead you to 
 desire further information on that subject. If so, I shall be glad 
 to answer any inquiries you may make, and to enlighten you, 
 if I can, on certain points. I beg you to disregard one require- 
 ment of the programme, which is that you shall put your ques- 
 tions in writing. I think it altogether unfair that you should 
 be restricted in your method of inquiry, while I shall enjoy 
 the more rapid one of answering your questions directly. 
 
 I say, frankly, after looking over so much of your town as is 
 embraced in the province of your Association, that I have found 
 only one serious source of trouble. A more beautiful and 
 generally healthy looking section of country than this which 
 surrounds your church here, I have rarely seen. There are 
 certain bays at the side of the canal and some of the ditches 
 running north and south between the canal and the river, that 
 might be improved, although none of them are so serious as to 
 require much professional advice. The saw-mill pond, on the 
 other hand, is in every respect as bad as it could be. It would 
 take too long for me to enter into a discussion regarding the 
 causes of malaria, and what it is, at least according to our imper- 
 fect theories ; but any one who has investigated the condition 
 of malarious regions must see that there are, toward the upper 
 end of that pond, conditions of soil such as may be surely 
 depended upon to produce malaria, if they occur in a country 
 where malaria exists at all. From what I see of the sources of 
 supply of that pond, it is evident that when the mill is used the 
 water must be drawn down very rapidly, and a considerable 
 
27 
 
 area of wet bank must be left exposed to the sun and air before 
 the water again rises t'o its level. This is one of the most serious 
 features of the problem. I state the case thus distinctly, because, 
 fortunately, a short time before I came here, Dr. Lowrie took the 
 pains to investigate the condition of the whole population within 
 the immediate neighborhood of that pond. If I remember his 
 figures correctly, he examined into the condition of the occu- 
 pants of twenty-three houses, and found only two of those houses 
 free from cases of chills and fever. While he does not know the 
 total of population, he says he found fifty-eight cases of chills 
 and fever. From the examination that my assistant has made 
 of the rest of the territory, I should say there were, altogether, 
 not ten cases in the whole remainder of the district. Now the 
 correction of this difficulty is very simple, if means are provided 
 for it; but it is absolutely essential, before that land can be 
 drained and made wholesome, so that the poor people who live 
 in the neighborhood may escape their chills and fever, that the 
 dam should be taken down, the mill-right extinguished, and that 
 land made as sound, in a sanitary sense, as that lying above or 
 below it. I am informed that there are legal steps which may 
 be taken, by virtue of recent action of the Legislature, by the 
 Town Committee as a Board of Health, to remedy defects of this 
 description ; but that is, of course, the last resort among neigh- 
 bors, who have associated themselves together, as you have, 
 in friendly union ; and it happens to be a case, if one can judge 
 by the appearance of manufacturing establishments, where the 
 entire value of the mill-right to its owner might be contributed 
 by the members of the Association, or the inhabitants of the 
 town, and thus the problem solved by other than extreme legal 
 measures. 
 
 This, as I have said, is the only thing I have seen in the whole 
 district covered by this Association, that is worthy of serious 
 comment. We have examined between forty and fifty houses, 
 and have found in no one of them gross defects such as we too 
 often find in cities, and which are so marked in their unhealthy 
 influence, and so much written about in the newspapers. But 
 it is to be remembered that, if the defects of the country are 
 not so gross as those of the city, they are sometimes more subtle- 
 The sanitary rule has never been better formulated than it was 
 
28 
 
 by Hippocrates when he prescribed "Pure Air, Pure Water, and 
 a Pure Soil." I think, if you look about your houses, even here, 
 you will find that you do r.ot, in all cases, live quite up to the 
 requirements of this prescription. We have, all of us, more or 
 less, inherited certain habits of life from our ancestors, who, if 
 they lived healthily, did so rather through good luck than by 
 good management, and who developed some habits which it 
 would be well for their descendants to forget. They had also some 
 advantages which the weather-strip man, and the carpenter, and 
 the stove-maker have taken away from us. In the old houses, 
 however impure the water and soil may have been, there was 
 abundant opportunity, with the help of the open fire-places and 
 the broad cracks, to obtain fresh air. 
 
 I find that in every house here, but no more than elsewhere, 
 there is a disregard of the more simple requirements concerning 
 pure air, pure water, and pure soil. For example, your house- 
 holders are very largely chargeable with ignorance of, or indiffer- 
 ance to, the maxim that Mr. Northrop aptly quoted, "Where the 
 sunlight cannot come, the doctor must." Your trees seem to 
 me to be too large, too near to the houses, and too close together, 
 and I sometimes wondered, as I was passing along, whether 
 there does not run in your veins a strong infusion of the old 
 New York Dutch blood, which leads to the closing of all your 
 front shutters from Saturday until Saturday. At all events, if the 
 population are still in their own homes, they are certainly living with 
 less direct, pure sunlight than they need and might have by a proper 
 opening of their windows and shutters. 
 
 The cellars of your houses we have found to be generally in 
 good condition, but, from their construction, and from the char- 
 acter of their windows and the uses to which they are put, the 
 idea seems to suggest itself that they are not in such good condi- 
 tion in Winter time. Your cellars are used, to a considerable 
 extent, for storing vegetables, and I imagine that in the Winter 
 time they are a good deal like farm-houses in other States, tightly 
 closed, pretty musty, not always absolutely dry, and generally 
 separated from the living rooms by only the board floor, with 
 no plastering or ceiling underneath. 
 
 One habit prevails here, more, I will say, than in New England, 
 and that is the making use of the back yard as a kitchen sink. 
 
29 
 
 Now, if this is done consistently, and faithfully, and intelli- 
 gently, it is a very good thing. If the house-maid will take 
 pains, each time, to flirt her water on a new place, so as to let 
 the old place dry, under the action of the sun and air, it is 
 certainly as wholesome (though not as tidy) a way of getting 
 rid of kitchen water as can be devised ; but this care is very 
 seldom taken, and in many places we have noticed that the 
 water is cast on the same place, and that the land is foul, often 
 very foul, and leading to the greater or less tainting of the well, 
 according to its nearness. I should say, that in so far as your 
 circumstances are suspicious, you have decidedly to look to your wells. 
 We have seen a good many that are more than suspicious. I would 
 venture to say, without having made a chemical analysis of the water, 
 or a microscopical examination of its contents, that it must, in many 
 cases, be impure, unsafe, and only to be used with risk. There is one 
 house, for example, in this town, where the well is in the cellar, 
 and where, outside of it, only thirty feet away, there is a vault, 
 eight feet deep, full pretty nearly to the top, and located in 
 soil which I believe would transmit impurities for a consider- 
 ably greater distance than thirty feet. That is the most extreme 
 case that we have found, although we have seen a good many 
 others where the distance is far within the danger line. Now, it 
 is quite true that you and your ancestors have lived (those who 
 have lived) under these conditions, and have, nevertheless, had a 
 lower death rate than many other places, not so favorably situ- 
 ated as regards soil and exposure. — 
 
 At this point the speaker was interrupted by the following 
 question from one of his audience : 
 
 Q. Please define what passes beyond the danger line between 
 the vault and the well? 
 
 To which the speaker replied : 
 
 That depends entirely upon the means of communication 
 between them — whether the soil is composed of clay, of gravel, or 
 of rock, with seams running from one to the other. It can only be 
 determined by using some test, such, for instance, as to put salt 
 water in the vault and to examine for salt in the well ; but I 
 should say that there certainly ought to be an interval of more 
 
30 
 
 than a hundred feet in such soil as this. It is natural for you 
 to think that the idea that there is danger in such a case is all 
 nonsense, and mere theory and "book-farming," for you have 
 drunk water out of that well, and you know there isn't a better 
 well in the State of New Jersey ; your grandfather said there 
 wasn't a better well anywhere round about. Now, such wells — 
 wells held in just as high estimation — have, unfortunately, done 
 great mischief in the world. One of the greatest outbreaks of 
 cholera in London was traced entirely to the impurity of a pub- 
 lic well. The degree of danger is very well illustrated by a 
 remark made by Mr. Clark, Engineer of the Improve Sewerage 
 of Boston, who said : " The risk is very slight, but it is a risk 
 of a terrible danger." I have recently been reading the report of 
 the Massachusetts Board of Health, which has just appeared, 
 and in which there is an article on typhoid fever, by a physician 
 of Massachusetts, where again and again there came, from the 
 immediate tainting of a farm-house well, an outbreak of the 
 fever, taking down nearly every person in the house, and result- 
 ing in one or two or three deaths in each case. The wells had 
 been in as good condition as yours, but the moment came 
 when they were in a state to receive and multiply the infection, 
 and every man drinking the water fell more or less under the 
 influence of the disease. 
 
 Our examination shows, in a few cases, that there are furnaces 
 in the cellars of the houses for heating your rooms, which take 
 their cold air from the cellar. It ought not to be necessary to 
 go into any long argument to prove that a cellar, used as the 
 cellar of any ordinary country-house is, for the storage of pro- 
 visions, which has very little circulation of air, which is full 
 of dust and impurities, which is more or less the home of rats 
 and mice and cats and dogs, does not contain exactly the sort 
 of atmosphere that you want to warm and bring into your living 
 rooms for your children to breathe during the Winter. I think 
 any one who has had the experience of such cases, or who has 
 investigated the effect of furnace-heated houses upon the health 
 of families, will agree that the fresh air should always be taken 
 entirely from the outside of the house. It is better still, that it 
 should not be taken from near the surface of the ground, the 
 pipe being turned up a few feet to take in a purer air. We 
 
31 
 
 have found two, and I think three, cases where drains leading 
 from the kitchen, emptied into the ground. In one case, where 
 there were the ordinary plumbing arrangements, the waste of 
 the whole house passed out through such a drain. We found 
 such cases where the drains passed within a very few feet of the 
 wells, being carried by vitrified pipe, with cemented joints, and 
 supposed to be safe on that account. Now, if the vitrified pipe 
 is sound, which it generally is, and has good joints, which it 
 generally has not, it is safe enough. It has been a part of my 
 work, for many years, to lay these pipes with cement joints, 
 and I have come to the conclusion, that the one great difficulty 
 in draining is, to make a tight joint where you are cementing two 
 pipes together. I have almost given it up in despair. There were 
 pipes taken up at Memphis the other day, which I had sup- 
 posed were absolutely perfect, but my assistant informed me 
 that there was a little stream of water running through in every 
 case. It was very slight, but if it was passing along through the 
 ground near a well, the constant dropping into the soil, not 
 enough perhaps, to go into the well in a stream, but saturating 
 the soil around it, so that when there is a heavy down-pour of 
 rain it might be washed in, it would constitute a dangerous con- 
 dition. The best remedy is, of course, to lay the pipe to some 
 distance beyond the well, of iron with leaded joints ; but where 
 the drain already exists, it is a very easy matter to surround 
 it entirely by a coating of cement concrete that will make it 
 practically tight. Wherever a drain must pass near a well, I 
 strongly advise that course of treatment. 
 
 I find another memorandum of a house where the vault is 
 fifteen feet away from the well, is eight feet deep, and is not 
 emptied until nearly full; the well itself being tweDty- three feet 
 deep. That case, I think, is very serious. In any community of 
 farmers it would, perhaps, hardly do for a local committee, even 
 if they were so disposed, to treat the hog-pen question as it is 
 treated in cities. We all know that it is absolutely necessary to 
 economical farming and country house-keeping to keep a pig, 
 but it is really not absolutely necessary to keep pigs quite in the 
 condition in which some few are kept in this town. I do not 
 believe the pig is naturally a nasty animal. I don't think he is 
 particularly fond of wallowing in dirty water .if he has any other 
 
32 
 
 way of cooling himself. I have seen swine kept in a different 
 way, and I would modestly commend to the farmers and house- 
 keepers of this town the suggestion that they learn how pigs may 
 be kept in such a manner that their presence will not be noticed 
 from the house or from the road. 
 
 Now, I believe I have stated the chief faults I have been able 
 to find in an examination of nearly every house within this 
 district; and, as you see, I have almost got a harvest of nothing, 
 with the exception of the malarious condition about the mill- 
 pond, due, I believe, entirely to the presence of that pond. 
 With that exception, there is nothing here that is really a justi- 
 fication of my presence in West Ewing. 
 
 I shall now be very glad, if any members of my audience 
 choose to ask questions on any sanitary subjects, to answer them 
 to the best of my ability. 
 
 Mr. Edward Fish. — I believe the Secretary has a letter from 
 Prof. Schanck, of Princeton, stating a number of questions, 
 which are quite comprehensive. 
 
 Col. Waring. — I will read the letter : 
 
 Lenox, Mass., Aug. 25th, 1880. 
 My Dear Sir : — I have not forgotten your request, and only 
 regret that I cannot be present and contribute questions sug- 
 gested by the occasion and circumstances. I should seek infor- 
 mation upon arrangement of grounds, shrubbery, fences, &c, 
 and upon water-closet sewerage and cesspool, &c. Thus : 
 
 1. What mixture of grass seed is best for lawns ? 
 
 2. How often should they be mown ? 
 
 3. Are door-yard fences needful in a village ? 
 
 4. Which is the best village hedge material — Arbor Vitae, 
 Hemlock, &c ? 
 
 5. For a village without public sewers, which is to be pre- 
 ferred, outside privies, or inside earth closets or water closets ? 
 
 6. If the latter, how can the efflux be safely disposed of? 
 
 7. If a cesspool is uncemented, will it not in time poison the 
 wells? 
 
 8. If cemented, will it not fill every few weeks or months, and 
 be a constant nuisance? 
 
 9. How should it-be trapped and ventilated ? 
 
33 
 
 10. What should be done with kitchen slops? 
 
 11. Is the Lenox sewerage system applicable to single country 
 houses? 
 
 12. In this case, what length of two-inch distributing pipe 
 suffices for each person ? 
 
 13. May this not freeze up in Winter so as to check distribu- 
 tion? 
 
 14. Typhoid fever and kindred diseases are often clearly 
 referable to human excrement, especially when moist and damp. 
 Is the poison introduced through water by stomach, or through 
 air by lungs ? 
 
 15. What disinfectant is the best for ordinary family use ? 
 
 16. Relative merits in this respect of air and light, of chlorine, 
 of carbolic acid and of sulphate of iron, also of dry clay. 
 
 These are hints and suggestions only, from which you can 
 frame questions and call out information. 
 Yours very truly, 
 
 J. S. Schanck. 
 
 - Col. Waring (quoting from letter.) — " What mixture of grass 
 seed is best for lawns?" [See Notes.] 
 
 I would respectfully call on my associate. 
 
 Mr. Northrop. — You are familiar with it. 
 
 Col. Waring. — Not as familiar as you are. We use Rhode 
 Island bent grass and white clover, introducing a little blue 
 grass seed. I think our best lawns have much white clover. 
 
 (Reading again from Prof. Schanck's letter.) — "How often 
 should they be mown?" 
 
 My answer to that would be, as often as possible. 
 
 (Reading again) — " Are door-yard fences needful in a village?" 
 
 Mr. Northrop. — No. 
 
 Col. Waring. — Are they desirable f 
 
 Mr. Northrop. — If you can bring the community to agree, I 
 think they are undesirable. Nothing is more beautiful in a 
 large village, than the absence of fences, and in a farming com- 
 munity like this, where you have the matter entirely under con- 
 trol, it seems to me to promote a sentiment of sociality to have 
 the fences taken away. At Williamstown, Mass., and that 
 model manufacturing village, Cheneyville, at South Manches- 
 3 
 
34 
 
 ter, Conn., and the St. Johnsbury factory, in Vermont, and in 
 places where the grounds are thrown together, it adds very 
 much to the general satisfaction. 
 
 Col. Waring. — Which is the best village hedge material ? 
 
 Mr. Northrop. — That depends altogether upon the climate. 
 You cannot give any general direction. There are some places 
 where the osage orange will not grow. It grows here, and very 
 beautifully, if properly cut. [See Notes.] 
 
 Col. Waring (reading from the letter.) — " For a village without 
 public sewers, which is to be preferred, outside or inside earth 
 closets, or water closets?" 
 
 I should say, where there is land enough about the house 
 to dispose of liquid waste, and where there is water that can 
 be pumped to a supply cistern in the house, that a water closet 
 is much more cleanly and certain of being in good order with- 
 out extra care, and, therefore, to be preferred. The earth closet 
 is a possible remedy for all evils ; but an in-door closet requires, 
 on the part of every person using it, the most constant watch- 
 fulness and care, or it becomes offensive. I had to do with 
 the introduction of that improvement in this country, and was 
 its strongest advocate for a very long time. I have no other 
 conveniences in my own house, but I have come slowly to the 
 belief that it is, after all, but a stepping-stone between the old- 
 fashioned arrangement and the well-constructed and well- 
 arranged water closet. 
 
 Question by one of the audience : 
 
 Dr. Lowrie. — What is the least distance from the house that 
 kitchen and other drainage may properly be disposed of? 
 
 Col. Waring. — I will read Prof. Schanck's question on the same 
 subject, in conjunction with this: "How can the efflux be 
 safely disposed of?" 
 
 If these matters are to be disposed of by discharging them 
 into cesspools, I should want to put the cesspool to the far- 
 thest possible distance— the back field of the farm rather than 
 nearer, for the reason that however well made, and however 
 tightly secured against escape into drinking-water wells, it is 
 really a vast retort filled with foul matter and dangerous gases, 
 which too often find no other means of escape than through the 
 
35 
 
 drain to the house. I believe it would be really much better, as 
 a question of health, if the drainage from the house was deliv- 
 ered directly upon the surface of the ground within twenty feet 
 of its back door, bad as this would be, than to have a cesspool at 
 that point. It would not look so well, but I think it would be 
 less dangerous. Fortunately, it is not necessary that either one 
 of these evils should be chosen. A system applicable to every- 
 
 
 #7 
 
 ^NJ^ V \>' 
 
 pitre(?) well water, defiled by drainage from the kitchen 
 
 sink and the cesspool. 
 
 (From " The Sanitary Engineer.") 
 
36 
 
 thing of a liquid character, growing out of an invention made 
 by the inventor of an earth closet in 1868, and since developed 
 by a long experience in England and this country, seems to 
 offer everything that one may desire, if there is a little land 
 around the house. Dr. Lowrie asks within what distance the 
 disposal may take place. I say, always get as far away as you 
 conveniently can. All the liquid waste of my own house is 
 disposed of on a tract of land the first edge of which is about 
 fifteen feet from my piazza, where we spend the Summer. If I 
 had more land, I should go farther away ; but with no more land 
 at my disposal I should not hesitate to repeat the same experi- 
 ment. This system is in use now in a large number of houses in 
 New England and New Jersey, particularly in Orange and in 
 the village of Lenox, from which Prof. Schanck writes, and still 
 more extensively at the Women's prison, at Sherborn, Mass., 
 where there is a very large consumption of water. Its principle 
 is this: That if foul matters are absorbed by the surface soil 
 within reach of the roots of vegetation, and within reach of the 
 atmosphere, the oxygen of which exists in that soil in a state of 
 condensation, they will be acted upon immediately, and will be 
 in a short time completely destroyed ; so that if the interval of a 
 day be left between one wetting and another, the action of the 
 roots and of the air will keep the soil always perfectly clean. 
 Suppose we have a drain running down the length of this aisle, 
 made of ordinary drain tiles, and loosely laid at the joints. 
 You attempt to run fifty gallons of sewage through that, and, 
 if the soil is at all porous, and there is a slight leak at every 
 joint, by the time it gets to the other end it has nearly or quite 
 all settled into the ground. Its tendency is to follow the laws 
 of gravitation and descend in the ground, the soil acting as a 
 filter and holding all the impurities behind. Immediately there 
 comes the fresh air, which changes its character or entirely 
 destroys it and consumes the foul matters left there. Now, if it 
 is a question of draining a single house, you have your pipe (we 
 will say a length of twenty-five to fifty feet, according to the 
 character of the soil and slope of the ground,) for each member 
 of the household. It may be one line, or a number of lines 
 branching out from each other, according to the character of the 
 soil. The liquid is delivered into a Field's Flush Tank. When 
 
37 
 
 that becomes full, it discharges its whole contents rapidly into 
 the drain. Your tank is arranged to become full once in about 
 two days, so that in every two days there is a rush of water 
 through the drain ; its foul waters sink into the soil well filtered, 
 and, by reason of the cleansing action of the air and the roots, the 
 soil is made ready to receive the next accession. In the case 
 of a village, the tank, instead of holding enough for a family 
 for a couple of days, should hold enough for a village a couple 
 of days. In Lenox, the tank holds three thousand gallons, about, 
 and the pipes that receive its discharge are about ten thousand 
 feet in aggregate length. At the prison, the tanks discharge 
 fifteen thousand gallons at a time, and they discharge alternately 
 into two sets of drains of ten thousand feet each; but always 
 working on the same principle, as if you put the water of a single 
 house into a single straight pipe, from which it leaks out into the 
 ground of a door-yard. 
 
 Now, as to the result, I can only say that I have never heard 
 of any suspicion of an odor from the surface of the ground 
 under which this operation is taking place. I have never heard 
 of a case of sickness being ascribed to it. I have dug down 
 close to the joints of my own drains, within half an inch of a 
 wide opening which evidently had been receiving copious dis- 
 charges, and it was impossible to tell, by smell or sight, any 
 difference between that earth and earth taken ten feet away. At 
 the prison, in Massachusetts, our disposal is into artificial drain- 
 ing ground. The whole tract is drained five feet under ground 
 with drains twenty feet apart. The water that is discharged 
 there from the purification of this very foul, black sewage is 
 simply pure water, which I would compare with the well water 
 of any farm-house ; at any rate, any village well water, where 
 villages are conducted as they ordinarily are. By chemical 
 analysis it is shown to have a little more organic matter than it 
 ought to have, but. it is in such a condition that it is impossible 
 to detect it by anything except a chemical analysis. It is per- 
 fectly sweet and clear. 
 
 Question. — What you stated as the greatest evil in this town, 
 in a sanitary point of view, was the existence of this mill- 
 dam. I would like to inquire, first, whether the conditions of 
 mill-dams generally are such as to generate this miasma or 
 
58 
 
 malaria ; and, secondly, whether there is anything special, and 
 what it is, in the condition of this mill-dam which generates dis- 
 ease ? You observed that, as a matter of course, it would pro- 
 duce these malarious effects. 
 
 Col. Waring. — There is no disadvantage in having a mill-dam, 
 as a mill-dam, if it is simply a reservoir of pure, deep water. 
 If it has steep sides, a change up and down in its elevation can 
 do very little harm ; but if, as in this case, the banks are in 
 many places very sloping, and the land is saturated with water 
 for a considerable distance back from its edges, and if, when it 
 is drawn down, a great width of saturated earth is exposed to 
 the sun, or if in parts it is so shallow that the sun's heat will 
 have an effect on the bottom, then the existing conditions are 
 considered to be dangerous, and I have never known them to 
 exist in a country where malaria had a foothold at all, without 
 causing or increasing it. 
 
 Question. — If there are, then, pools of standing water which 
 become dried up by drouth, there are similar tendencies ? 
 
 Col. Waring. — During the time it is passing from the wet to 
 the dry condition. After the ground is dried to a considerable 
 depth, I do not suppose that harm continues ; but one of the 
 greatest factors in the generation of malaria is the alternate 
 wetting and drying of land that is subject to malarial poison. 
 Prof. Schanck asks : 
 
 "If a cesspool is uncemented, will it not in time poison 
 wells?" 
 
 It certainly will, in the cases of wells near enough to it to 
 receive its contents unpurified. 
 
 " If cemented, will it not in a few months become a nuisance?" 
 
 Yes, if the cement is tight. I imagine that many cesspools 
 get rid of a large quantity of foul water through the imperfection 
 of their work. 
 
 " How should it be trapped and ventilated ?" 
 
 I think, if you have a cesspool, it had better be ventilated as 
 little as possible. If you have a great seething mass, and give it 
 ventilation anywhere within the reach of grounds where you 
 live, there will be great offence from it. I have tried several 
 times to ventilate a cesspool, but I have been compelled to shut 
 it off again. I should rather run drain pipes off through the 
 
39 
 
 ground, so that if there were any pressure of air it would work 
 up through the soil, purified in its passage. 
 
 Question. — Would you ventilate a cesspool by a chimney ? 
 
 Col. Waring. — No. Most of the time, if you have a strong 
 upward draft, it is all right ; but I never knew a house with 
 such an arrangement that did not at some time have an offensive 
 smell. I believe in ventilating the soil pipe most thoroughly, 
 but not in making it a vent for a foul cesspool. I always run a 
 soil pipe through the roof of the house, and am very careful to 
 place it much lower than any chimney near it. 
 
 Question. — In case you had no ventilation to the cesspool, 
 what would you depend upon to prevent the circulation of air 
 to the house? 
 
 Col. Waring. — I would have a strong trap in the drain leading 
 to the cesspool ; then have air pipes leading from the cesspool 
 out into the soil, so that pressure would be relieved that way. 
 
 Question. — What do you think of running a ventilator 
 directly into a chimney that is constantly used for a fire — a 
 kitchen chimney? 
 
 Col. Waring. — I do not like it. The fire is not constantly 
 burning. It is not burning at night, and I don't think it is 
 trustworthy. Of course it is better than running into any other 
 chimney. 
 
 Question. — What do you think would be the result from that 
 — that the gas might go through from the chimney to the house ? 
 
 Col. Waring. — I have frequently gone through houses ventilated 
 in that way, which had been unoccupied for two or three days, 
 and the stench from the cesspool was all through the house. 
 Then, frequently, I have found an odor in an upper room 
 through which the chimney passed, which I could trace from 
 no other source than the movement of air through the brick 
 work. 
 
 Question. — Suppose you run the ventilator right out across 
 the roof to the chimney ? 
 
 Col. Waring. — Then you would have danger from the down 
 draft when your kitchen is cold. 
 
 Question. — The trap in the closet would not prevent that draft 
 coming in the house ? 
 
 Col. Waring. — You are ventilating outside of your trap. 
 
40 
 
 Question. — That is what I said. You said it would be a down 
 draft into the house. How could it be? 
 
 Col. Waring. — It would be a down draft through the chimney 
 and out through the stove or fire-place. 
 
 Question. — What is the width of the lot where you distribute 
 the waste from the house ? 
 
 Col. Waring. — The main drain is about sixty feet long, and 
 there are nine drains about eighteen or twenty feet each. I 
 have had it in use just ten years. It was put in ten years ago 
 in November. 
 
 Question. — Your pipes average about fourteen inches from the 
 surface ? 
 
 Col. Waring. — Not more than ten or eleven. 
 
 Question. — Suppose you have a level surface to distribute it 
 over, where there is scarcely any fall ? 
 
 Col. Waring. — You need scarcely any. Two inches in a hun- 
 dred feet is enough, and you can always get that. Within the 
 range at which you can place these pipes, you can always get 
 the fall you need — even if you have to put the pipes a little 
 higher at one end than at the other. 
 
 Question. — Can it be worked without a flush tank ? 
 
 Col. Waring. — It can be; but the trouble is, you always keep 
 the ground about the upper end of the pipes saturated, and you 
 have to depend upon the rank vegetation that grows from that 
 excessive moisture. 
 
 Question. — You say you have had these drains in use ten 
 years and have not discovered any unpleasant odor arising from 
 the surface ? 
 
 Col. Waring. — Yes. 
 
 Question. — Would that probably be the case ten years hence ? 
 
 Col. Waring. — I don't think there is the least change in the 
 character of that ground. I think it is exactly the same as it 
 was before I began to use it. I think the oxidization has 
 destroyed all the matter. It may have become a little deeper in 
 color, but, practically, I think it is the same. And the action 
 of this material is so very slight in its reach that while my 
 drains are six feet apart, fully four feet of the space between 
 them shows no effect of the sewerage at all. 
 
 Question. — What effect has the frost ? 
 
41 
 
 Col. Waring. — I think it has no effect at all. I have had the 
 ground frozen three and one-half feet down, and there was no 
 trouble in my pipes. They have never had any trouble in 
 Lenox. One great point about it is that it is so cheap and sim- 
 ple, and so entirely within the hands of any one who wishes to 
 use it. If these poor cottagers down by the canal had these 
 pipes, all they would need would be some place to throw in a 
 bucket of dirty water and that would be their flush tank. [See 
 Col. Waring's Report, on page 42, for further details.] 
 
 Col. Waring (reading from letter) — " What disinfectant is the 
 best for ordinary family use ?" 
 
 Fresh air. 
 
 The hour had become too late to discuss all the questions of 
 Prof. Schanck's letter, and, on motion, the meeting was here 
 declared adjourned. 
 
THE 
 
 West Ewing Improvement Association. 
 
 REPORT ON THE SANITARY CONDITION 
 
 OF THE WESTERN PART OF 
 
 EWING TOWNSHIP. 
 
 BY COL. GEORGE E. WARING, JR., NEWPORT, R. I. 
 
 The examination upon which this report is based, includes 
 an investigation into the character and condition of between 
 forty and fifty dwelling-houses, including the disposal of house- 
 hold wastes and the water supply. No good purpose would be 
 served by detailing in a public report the enumeration of defects 
 of private property. Sufficient notes have been taken concern- 
 ing each place, and notification is given to the respective owners 
 that on their application, any information which may be desired 
 beyond that of a general character not included in this report, 
 will be cheerfully furnished free of charge. 
 
 As a whole, the houses average certainly better than is usual 
 in an agricultural and quarrying district. There is no one of 
 them which might not be very considerably improved by a 
 sufficient expenditure. But I am satisfied that in so far as they 
 or any of them are in a less healthful condition than similar 
 houses in other parts of the country, their defects are chiefly 
 due to two causes : 
 
 (1) An improper disposal of liquid and solid household filth 
 including faecal matter with its attendant fouling of the air, 
 and its contamination of the water supply, and in some cases of 
 the cellars of the houses. In some instances the same difficulty 
 results from the accumulation of the manure of domestic 
 animals in too close proximity to wells or dwellings. 
 
• 43 
 
 (2) A malarious condition of the site in certain parts of the 
 town, caused by stagnant bays at the side of the canal; by 
 standing water in the quarries ; and especially by the damming 
 back of the natural drainage by the dam at Keeler's saw-mill ; 
 this latter being far more important, in my judgment, than all 
 other defects combined. 
 
 It is not worth while, in making recommendations for the 
 practical improvement of country-houses like those under con- 
 sideration, to advise the introduction of modern improvements 
 in the way of water supply and drainage, which it would be in 
 some cases beyond the means, and in nearly all cases beyond 
 the inclinations, of the proprietors to adopt. It seems better to 
 confine ourselves to a few simple, practical improvements within 
 easy reach of all, which will constitute in every case a simple 
 and radical improvement over the present conditions, and which 
 will be as much in the way, at present, as it can reasonably be 
 hoped to secure. 
 
 The improvement of the ventilation, cleanliness, and, where 
 necessary, of the draining of 
 
 CELLARS, 
 
 Is certainly very important, and it needs no instruction from 
 me to teach all householders what they already perfectly well 
 understand. It must be evident to all that a wet, close, musty 
 cellar, with no access for fresh air during the Winter time, with 
 accumulations of decaying vegetables and rubbish, is not a 
 good accompaniment of any inhabited house. It is by no 
 means necessary that cellars should be so open to cold winds 
 as to lead to the discomfort of those who live in the rooms 
 above them. But there should certainly be, at all times of 
 the year, a sufficient opportunity for the supply of fresh air 
 to create a sufficient circulation to remove dampness and to 
 carry away the products of the slight inevitable decomposition 
 of what it is necessary to keep in them. A few of the houses 
 within the district are heated by 
 
 FURNACES. 
 
 These, I believe, with hardly an exception, take their air sup- 
 ply from the cellar. No matter how well ventilated and how 
 
44 " 
 
 clean a cellar may be, its atmosphere is never fit to be heated 
 by the furnace and distributed through the house. It is a very 
 simple, and most important, matter to connect the air supply of 
 the furnace with the outer air by means of a tight wooden box 
 which shall exclude the atmosphere of the cellar from the heated 
 flues. 
 
 A CESSPOOL LEACHING INTO A WELL. 
 (From " The Sanitary Engineer " of July 15, 1879.) 
 
 What is not so well understood, or, if understood, is not acted 
 upon, is the absolute importance of 
 
 SUNLIGHT AND FRESH AIR. 
 
 Let the sun have free access to the outside of the whole house at some 
 time during the day, and keep shutters and blinds and windows open 
 except when it is necessary to exclude it. Never mind faded carpets; 
 they are not so bad as faded cheeks, and these cannot be avoided except 
 by fresh air and ample daylight. 
 
45 
 
 THE DISPOSAL OF HOUSEHOLD WASTES 
 
 Is hardly less simple, but it is much less generally under- 
 stood; and I believe it is safe to say that in nearly every 
 instance where my examinations have been made, the system 
 now adopted is particularly bad. There are very few cases 
 where the well water is not subject to dangerous contamination 
 by the leachings from privy vaults or cesspools or hog-pens or 
 barn-yards, or by the settling into the ground of the drainage 
 from the kitchen sink. 
 
 It will be easy, in the matter of hog-pens and barn-yards, to 
 prevent the leachings of their manure from draining toward the 
 well, or from sinking into the ground near the well ; and this 
 certainly should be secured, even at the expense of selecting a 
 new site for such deposits, and, so far as possible, by protecting 
 manure from drenching rains. Such protection will be amply 
 repaid by the saving of fertilizing matter which it will secure. 
 
 The specific recommendation that I make is, that in every 
 case, whether it be a well-appointed farm-house or simply a 
 laborer's tenement, some means be adopted which will secure 
 an entire abandonment of privy vaults, and a safe disposal of 
 liquid household wasts. These are two distinct items of the 
 work, which may be carried out more or less elaborately accord- 
 ing to the means and inclinations of the proprietor. I propose to 
 recommend, in this case, only the simplest and cheapest avail- 
 able methods. 
 
 THE PRIVY 
 
 Should be removed from its foundation, its vault should 
 be entirely cleaned out, its foundation walls should be removed 
 and the excavation should be continued until clean earth 
 is exposed at every point. It should then be filled to the sur- 
 face of the ground with clean earth, and, if it is necessary to use 
 the same site in future, this should be so rammed in the fill- 
 ing as to prevent future settling. It will be better, in all cases, 
 to remove the building at least far enough to secure a sound 
 foundation. The building should then be set on posts or piers 
 so that the lower side of its sill shall be at least eighteen inches 
 above the surface of the ground ; suitable steps being constructed 
 for its approach. Lay ou the ground, with cross-stays to hold 
 
46 
 
 EARTH-CLOSET PEIVY. 
 
 SECTION 
 SCALE )6o 
 
 H 
 
 EARTH BOX 
 IN PLAGE 
 
 Vs/s/// J ////Sj> 7777 
 
 t 
 
 JOIST 
 
 E 
 
 EARTH 
 
 r 
 
 lis 
 
 
 
 o 
 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 m 
 
 //' s 
 
 PLAN j 
 BALE yao | 
 
 EARTH BOX OffiWN 
 OUT ' 
 
 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 // ■ 
 
 
 
 g 
 
 
 
 P9 
 
 
 
 eo. 
 
47 
 
 them in position, two joists extending at least from the front of 
 the seat to two feet outside of the building, at the rear. 
 
 Make a box of stout planks to rest upon these joists, large 
 enough to reach well under the seat and high enough barely to 
 pass the sill easily. Secure a stout handle to this box by which 
 it may be drawn out over the joists outside when necessary for 
 emptying. The inside of the box should be well rendered with 
 hot coal tar quite to the top. This is the receptacle for faecal 
 matter. Its bottom should be covered at least to the depth of 
 one inch with dry earth or ashes. In the house there should be 
 a second box containing dry earth or screened ashes, and a hand 
 scoop should be furnished with which to throw it into the box 
 below. After each use of the privy, rather more than a pint of 
 this material should be thrown down to cover the dejections and 
 and to absorb the urine. From time to time it will be necessary 
 to rake down or level off the accumulations, and when the box 
 becomes full it should be drawn out and emptied, its contents 
 being used as manure. This constitutes the cheapest form of 
 earth closet; and it secures, if care is given to the uniform 
 covering of the deposits, a perfect suppression of odor, and 
 entire prevention of injurious decomposition, and a perfectly 
 healthy and satisfactory condition. The value of the manure 
 will be quite sufficient to compensate for the slight additional 
 trouble; and the avoiding of the horrible stench of the usual 
 country privy will secure the great difference between a brutal 
 filthiness and civilized decency. Those who desire something 
 more elaborate and more convenient in its operation, may 
 address "Earth Closet Company, Hartford, Conn.," for the 
 mechanical apparatus by which the deposit of earth is made 
 automatic. 
 
 THE DISPOSAL OF KITCHEN SINK WASTE, 
 
 Chamber slops and laundry water, is a question which has 
 engaged the study and ingenuity of the world for many years. I 
 believe that, so far as isolated country-houses are concerned, it has 
 been perfectly accomplished by the system known as "sub-sur- 
 face irrigation." This system is susceptible of much elaboration, 
 and may be carried out in an expensive manner; but its essential 
 results may be secured with an expense so trifling that not even 
 in the smallest tenement-house need its cost be an obstacle to 
 
48 
 
49 
 
 its adoption. It is based on the fact that the surface soil 
 which is within the reach of the roots of grass or other plants, 
 and of the action of the atmosphere, is a very active destroyer 
 of organic matter. A cotton rag buried a few inches under the 
 surface is very soon entirely consumed by this action ; and all 
 decomposable matter so placed is destroyed by oxidation or 
 slow combustion as completely, though less rapidly, as when it 
 is thrown into the fire. In order to make this process continu- 
 ous, it is necessary that there should be free access of air into the 
 pores of the soil. In the case of liquid wastes, it is necessary 
 that the discharge be intermittent, for when a constant small 
 stream runs into the ground, saturating a small area, the entrance 
 of the air is prevented and the oxidizing action is retarded. 
 With even a few hours' interval between the two discharges, the 
 water settles away into the ground, which acts as a filter, holding 
 back all of its impurities, and its descent is followed by the 
 entrance of fresh air, which immediately attacks and destroys 
 the retained organic' matter. If the liquid is thrown on the 
 top of the ground, it produces in a short time a fuddled condi- 
 tion of the surface which prevents the free entrance of air. It 
 is, therefore, desirable to introduce it into the soil below the 
 surface, allowing it to soak away in so gradual a manner that 
 no fuddling of the earth can take place. This introduction into 
 the earth is by the use of common agricultural drain tiles with 
 open joints, laid not more than ten inches below the surface. 
 The intermittent action is secured by delivering liquid wastes 
 into these tiles, not constantly, but from time to time. 
 
 In the case of a small tenement-house, where only two or 
 three pailfuls of waste liquid are produced in the course of the 
 day, this absorption drain need not be more than forty feet 
 long. It may be one continuous line of pipe, or it may be 
 several shorter pipes branching from one main line, according 
 to the space devoted to the use. It may lie under the grass near a 
 row of currant bushes, under a grape-vine trellis, under a grass 
 plat, or elsewhere. Opening into it, there should be a box [See 
 cut on page 48] large enough to hold a pailful of water; and the 
 joints of this box, as well as the space around the pipe leading 
 from it, should be made tight. It may be covered in Winter, as 
 a protection against frost j but in Summer it will be better that 
 4 
 
50 
 
 it should have a full exposure to the air. A wire cloth or other 
 screen should be provided at its top to act as a strainer to hold 
 back coarse matters which might obstruct the pipe. From time 
 to time, this strainer, which should be movable, can be emptied 
 into the swill barrel, or its contents may be thrown upon the 
 manure heap, or buried in the ground. The liquid which passes 
 the strainer will enter the pipe, leach out into the ground and 
 be purified. The arrangement described will be quite sufficient 
 to receive the contents of one or two wash tubs ; but it should 
 not be connected with the kitchen sink delivering only a small 
 flow. Whatever is thrown into it should go with a rush, so as to 
 reach as far as possible through the whole length of the drains. 
 For houses of larger size, producing a greater amount of waste, 
 the length of drain should be from one hundred and fifty to 
 three hundred feet, including all branches, according to the size 
 of the family and the freedom with which water is used. A 
 uniform distribution through this length of pipe cannot be 
 secured by throwing into it a pailful at a time. Some arrange- 
 ment should be adopted which will retain water to the amount 
 of a barrelful or more, and which will, when 
 the tank becomes full, deliver the whole con- 
 tents suddenly. The apparatus best adapted 
 for this use is known as "Field's Flush Tank," 
 which is made of cast iron, and which is sold 
 for about thirty dollars, by A. G. Myers, 94 
 Beekman street, New York. A much cheaper 
 arrangement can be made at home, which, 
 while not having the advantage of the Field 
 automatic siphon, will secure the same result, 
 if attention is given to opening and closing its 
 outlet by hand. The construction of this tank 
 is shown on page 48. It is made of plank, and 
 is separated by a grease-catcher, which will pre- 
 vent congealed grease, floating substances and 
 heavy matters from passing into the discharging 
 chamber. It also has a spatter-board, to prevent the disturbance 
 of the sediment, and a screen to hold back coarse matters. It 
 is, in fact, a flushing tank with a grease-trap intervening between 
 it and the source of supply. This interposition of a grease-trap 
 
 FIELD S PATENT 
 ANNULAR SIPHON 
 
51 
 
 is covered by a patent of my own ; but permission is hereby 
 given to any member of the West Ewing Improvement Associ- 
 ation to use it, without charge. The size of tank indicated in 
 the sketch is sufficient for three hundred feet of drain. The 
 capacity of its second or discharging chamber may be propor- 
 tionately reduced or increased as the length of drain is made 
 greater or less. The grease-trap may be attached to any waste- 
 pipe from the house, or it may be filled by pouring into it the 
 
 contents of chamber pails, wash tubs, slop pails, &c. The 
 grease-trap serves to hold back all obstructing matters. The 
 outlet of the discharging chamber is closed by a plug of wood, 
 
 Description or Field's Flush Tank.— It is intended to be placed immediately out- 
 side of the walls of the house, and to receive all of its liquid wastes. It is made 
 entirely of earthenware or of cast iron. The liquids pass through the grating of the 
 pan (B), and are discharged through a trap which prevents the contained air of the 
 tank from escaping. (C) is a socket for a ventilating pipe to carry this contained air to 
 the top of the house. The tank holds ubout 20 or 30 gallons. This has no outlet 
 save through the siphon (D). The outer end of the siphon enters a discharging 
 trough (F), which is made to turn to the right or left, so that its mouth may be directed 
 as required to connect the tank with the line of outlet pipes. This trough is of a pecu- 
 liar shape which assists small quantities of liquid in bringing the siphon into action, 
 
52 
 
 or by an india rubber ball; the stopper being attached to a 
 chain, by which it may be lifted whenever the discharging 
 chamber becomes full. After the chamber has discharged itself, 
 this outlet should be tightly closed. To make this arrangement 
 automatic in its working, it is only necessary to substitute for 
 the plug, the Field's Patent Siphon shown on page 50. 
 
 A little judgment will be necessary in adjusting this apparatus 
 to the lay of the land. If the absorption ground is to be placed 
 at some distance from the house — and it should never be nearer 
 than fifteen feet to any well from which drinking water is taken 
 — it may be connected with the flush tank by a vitrified pipe 
 with very securely-cemented joints. These joints should first 
 be packed with oakum, or with rags, to prevent cement from 
 running to the inside of the pipe and making rough points 
 to arrest foreign substances passing through to them, and 
 they should be covered with a good band of the very best 
 hydraulic cement — the joints not being covered with earth until 
 it is quite certain that they are absolutely tight. This precau- 
 tion is especially necessary in passing near a well. The absorp- 
 tion tiles should be two inches in diameter, and only one foot 
 long, in order that the joints may be frequent. Their form is 
 not of much importance, but the best material for the use is 
 the round pipes with gutter tiles to lay them in, and caps to 
 
 instead of merely dribbling over the siphon without charging it as they otherwise 
 would do, and has a cover which can be removed to give access for cleaning. 
 
 When the tank is entirely tilled, the pouring in of a few extra quarts of water, 
 which is sure to occur at some time during the day, brings the siphon into action, and 
 it flows copiously until the tank is emptied to the depth below which solid matters 
 are permitted to accumulate, to be occasionally cleared out on removing the pan (B). 
 
 As the sink pipe discharges over the grating of the trapped inlet (B) outside the 
 house, the connection between the drains and the house is oompletely broken, and 
 any entry of foul air from the drain is rendered impossible. The top of the tank is 
 perfectly closed by means of the water joint around the cover, and the cover is readily 
 removed when required. The inlet, moreover, forms a basin, which may be used for 
 throwing down slops outside the house. 
 
 When used for the disposal of house slops where no regular system of sewerage exists, 
 the flush tank enables all house refuse to be removed inoffensively — the bed-room 
 slops being thrown down the basin at the top of the tank outside the house— and thus 
 where earth or other dry closets are used for the excreta, this apparatus supplies a 
 complete sanitary system of drainage. The concentration of the flow of the sewage 
 effected by the sudden discharge of the tanks, forces the liquid rapidly along the 
 pipes, and prevents their being choked. The liquid can thus be distributed over a 
 sufficient area of ground to give full opportunity for the soil to purify it. The tanks 
 are ordinarily made to contain 20 or 30 gallons in addition to space for deposit. 
 
53 
 
 keep the dirt from entering the joints from above, manufactured 
 by C. W. Boynton, Woodbridge, N. J. The joints must not be 
 too tight. If the gutters are not used, the tiles should be laid 
 on strips of board, for it is now and then necessary to remove 
 some portion of the drain to clear out accumulations, and either 
 the gutters or the strips are desirable to secure their being relaid 
 on the proper grade. The grade or pitch of these drains should 
 not be too rapid, lest the water flow too much to the far end 
 
 PIPES RESTING ON THEIR SHOULDERS. 
 
 THE IMPROPER WAY TO LAY THE VITRIFIED PIPE. 
 
 and force its way up to the surface of the ground. It has been 
 found in practice that four inches fall, or, at the utmost, six 
 inches fall in one hundred feet, is better than anything steeper. 
 If the land slopes more than this, the tiles should be laid 
 obliquely across the slope. If the yard or garden where the 
 disposal is to be made is on the same level with the house, the 
 tank will have to be built considerably out of ground. If the 
 ground about the house is higher than that used for disposal, it 
 
 PIPES RESTING ON THEIR FULL LENGTH. 
 
 THE PROPER WAY TO LAY THE VITRIFIED PIPE. 
 
 may be built entirely in the ground. In this latter case, the 
 cemented pipe will be enough below the surface to prevent its 
 disturbance by frost. If these joints must be within eighteen 
 inches or less of the surface of the ground, the course of the 
 tight part of the drain should be covered with litter during the 
 Winter season ; and in this case, as well as in that of the one 
 referred to above, the tank itself should be protected against 
 
54 
 
 frost. Its contents will be so warm that a little covering will be 
 sufficient. 
 
 I repeat that I am disposed to confine my general recommen- 
 dations to these two general improvements. If their general 
 adoption can be secured, the Association will have accomplished 
 a result which cannot fail to have the most advantageous influ- 
 ence upon the health of the community, and, I am disposed to 
 say, upon the self-respect and comfort of its members. 
 
 EATS AND THE TALE THEY TELL. 
 (From "The Sanitary Engineer" of July 16, 1879.) 
 
 THE BAYS AT THE SIDE OF THE CANAL 
 
 Or feeder are in many places too shallow. Wherever malaria 
 has gained a foot-hold, as it certainly has in this vicinity, shal- 
 low, stagnant water should be avoided. Every pond or bay 
 should be deep enough to be sufficiently beyond the influence 
 of the sun's heat to prevent vegetation at the bottom. The 
 banks of these bays and of all ponds should be steep, and they 
 should be grassed to the waters edge. If there is any material 
 
55 
 
 variation in the level of water in the canal, by which its edges 
 are made alternately wet and dry, this condition must be over- 
 come, or the people must accept the fact that they live in the 
 presence of a source of malaria which they cannot remove. 
 It may be a great source of malaria or it may be slight. It 
 certainly is incomparably less than the difficulty caused by 
 
 keeler's mill-dam. 
 
 This dam I consider by far the most serious factor, so far as 
 malaria is concerned, with which we have to deal. Its bad 
 influence is felt all the way from the mill up to the rear of the 
 River Bend estate, and as much farther as the wind is capable 
 of bearing the malarial influence. 
 
 The whole question of malaria is imperfectly understood, 
 and we can reason about it only from ascertained general prin- 
 ciples; but some of these are so well demonstrated that no 
 sanitarian would presume to disregard them. Two different 
 conditions are acknowledged to be of the very worst character. 
 They are : 
 
 (1) The complete saturation of the ground within a short 
 distance of the surface, that surface being exposed to the action 
 of the sun. 
 
 (2) The raising and lowering of the levels of bodies of water 
 so that their shores are alternately wet and dry. 
 
 Both of these conditions are secured in the most complete 
 manner in the case in question. Much of the land bordering 
 the brook and its enlargements, which constitute Keeler's mill- 
 pond, and which extend for nearly a mile along the west side 
 of the canal, is so low as to be completely saturated by the 
 water of that brook. The supplies of this stream are so insig- 
 nificant in amount that they can count as very little against the 
 draft upon the pond when the mill is in operation. The water 
 is drawn off much more rapidly than it flows in, and it exposes 
 wide stretches of bank to the action of the sun. 
 
 No doubt some difficulty comes from the stagnation of water 
 in the quarries, and still more, perhaps, from the leaking of the 
 canal. It is possible, too, that the draining between Keeler's 
 pond and the water-power is less effective than it should be. 
 But all these may be overcome if the dam is removed ; and all 
 
56 
 
 combined are insignificant as compared with the pond, which, 
 in my opinion, constitutes a nuisance of such magnitude that 
 the community cannot safely permit it to continue. 
 
 That there results from the sources that I have indicated, a 
 very serious malarial condition which is producing a disastrous 
 effect upon the people who live in this vicinity, is fully demon- 
 strated by an investigation recently made by Rev. Dr. Lowrie. 
 
 MILK AND PROVISION ROOM WITH UNTRAPPED SINK. 
 (Prom "The Sanitary Engineer.") 
 
 This investigation relates to twenty-three families, being all 
 the households beginning with his own and proceeding up the 
 Greensburg road, and at the quarries immediately about the 
 Greensburg railroad station. The inquiries related to chills and 
 fever during the Spring and Summer up to the middle of July. 
 At this latter date there were only three households in which 
 the disease did not exist at the time, and one of these three had 
 had it in the Spring. The total number of cases was fifty-one. 
 
57 
 
 Dr. Lowrie very truly says : " Fifty-one cases of chills and fever 
 in a total of twenty-three families is the expression of no small 
 amount of misery." 
 
 Obviously there are no means by which the difficulty caused 
 by the overflowing and saturation of the land by the mill-dam 
 can be obviated without injury to the water-power. Therefore 
 the simplest way to overcome it is the best way. The first step 
 to be taken is to extinguish the mill right, and to remove the 
 dam entirely, giving the brook for its whole length up to and 
 through Mr. Fisk's estate a deep, clean and permanent channel. 
 It would be better even that, wherever practicable, its bed 
 should be at least four feet below the level of its immediate 
 banks ; the banks having a slope of two horizontal to one per- 
 pendicular, and being grassed. 
 
 I have been asked to give plans and estimates of the cost of 
 this work, but I find that it would be impossible to do so even 
 approximately, without a more careful survey of the ground 
 than I have been able to make. Certainly the cost need not be 
 considerable, and it can bear no comparison to the value of the 
 result to be secured. 
 
NOTES. 
 
 The Proper Treatment of Deciduous Hedges, and in partic- 
 ular of the Madura or Osage Orange. 
 
 I. PREPARATION OP THE HEDGE ROW. 
 
 The ground should be in good condition, i. e., dry enough 
 and mellow enough to raise a good crop of corn. Spouty lands 
 should be drained ; low, wet places may be filled up by ditching, 
 on either or both sides, raising an embankment, which should 
 be fully eight feet wide,. This may be done by the plow alone, 
 or by using the scraper also, where horses can be worked, other- 
 wise the spade must be resorted to. 
 
 Have your line surveyed before preparing it; find exactly 
 where you want the hedge to stand, put a tall stake at each end, 
 and perhaps several between, if it is a long line ; plow first out 
 from the row on both sides [See Fig. 1], then finish by back furrow- 
 
 ing, so as to leave the row a trifle higher than the surrounding 
 surface, to throw off standing water. Harrow and roll the ground 
 well, and set stakes in a straight line with those at the ends, every 
 five rods. Stretch a line of cotton cord, six inches to one side 
 of these stakes, for a guide in setting the plants. 
 
 II. SETTING THE PLANTS. 
 
 This should be done in the Spring. Prepare the plant for 
 setting, by thinning off all side roots, and cutting back the main 
 root to about eight inches in length. The plants may be set in 
 various ways, either by the use of the spade, dibble or trowel. 
 The plan recommended by Warder, in his " Hedges and Ever- 
 greens," as being most sure of success and most rapid, is " to stretch 
 
59 
 
 a line upon the course of the future hedge, on the mellow and 
 well-prepared soil; then a clean spade is pressed deeply into the 
 ground, the blade being in a. vertical direction and close to the 
 line; pushing the handle from you, a crack is opened to the 
 depth of the instrument; into this the little plant is inserted 
 with the left hand, and retained in its position while the spade 
 is withdrawn, and until it is turned with its face toward the 
 operator and again inserted, at a distance of three inches from 
 the first cut, in such a direction that, when pressed home, the 
 edge shall reach the point of the first cut, near the place occu- 
 pied by the root of the plant, where it is to be drawn firmly 
 toward the operator, to fix the plant in its place. This operation 
 
 FIO. 2.— SHOWING THE YOUNG TLANT SET IN THE ROW. 
 
 is rapid and very simple ; in its first introduction, the blade is to 
 be perpendicular or vertical, with its back toward you ; in the 
 second, the handle is to be upright, and the cavity of the blade 
 should be held toward the digger. The distance may be regu- 
 lated by the eye, and a little practice will give sufficient accu- 
 racy." 
 
 Avoid two serious errors, viz. : (1) Crowding the row too near 
 a fence, and (2) setting the plants too close in the row. Five 
 feet is the least distance which the row should be planted from 
 a fence, and the plants should not be set closer together than 
 twelve, and, preferably, eighteen inches. 
 
 III. CULTURE DURING THE FIRST YEAR. 
 
 For the first year or two the main object is to make good 
 roots. To that end do not trim the hedge any the first year. 
 Keep the hedge row clean by frequent cultivation, just as you 
 would a row of corn, and late in the Fall plow two rather heavy 
 furrows to the row, forming a ridge about it to protect the roots; 
 for if the tops be frozen, it is no matter, as they are to be cut 
 off the following Spring. 
 
60 
 
61 
 
 IV. CULTURE DURING THE SECOND AND SUCCEEDING YEARS. 
 
 A most important duty in the second Spring is to replace all 
 dead or sickly plants with new, strong plants, cutting off the 
 tops of the replants as they are set out. 
 
 The culture of the hedge the second season should be care- 
 fully attended to and the ground frequently stirred with the 
 plow or cultivator, followed by the hoe when necessary. The 
 following directions for trimming should be closely followed : 
 
 In the Spring of the second year, the whole of the wood is to 
 be removed, by cutting off at the ground, with the scythe or 
 mowing machine. 
 
 In June of the same year, or so soon as the multitude of 
 shoots that will have made their appearance have become suffi- 
 ciently woody to bear the knife, they are to be cut off at four 
 inches from the ground (See Fig. 3). This will reduce the hedge 
 to a low level, although the horizontal branches may spread 
 over one or two feet, or more in width. No disturbance of the 
 lateral shoots should be allowed, as they are wanted to give 
 breadth to the future hedge ; and unless the bottom is provided at 
 first, it can never be afterward supplied. 
 
 The line d in the illustration shows the place for the cut to be 
 made in trimming with the scythe in the Spring of the third 
 year. The Summer pruning should be again performed in June, 
 and should follow the lines ef and e g of the illustration, for 
 now we must begin to give the hedge its proper form. The end 
 view of a properly trimmed hedge should present the appear- 
 ance of letter A. This shape secures to every leaf and twig the 
 benefit of all the sunshine, air, rain or dew, that it is possible 
 for it to receive. 
 
 Again, in August, the hedge should be trimmed, being careful 
 to preserve the pyramidal form. These trimmings need not be 
 so close as when we were forming the base. Six inches will do 
 very well. 
 
 The trimming of subsequent years should be kept up on the 
 same principle, being careful to preserve the slope of the sides 
 which will gradually become more precipitous as years go by, 
 but which must never be allowed to assume the perpendicular 
 form. — [Condensed from Warder's "Hedges and Evergreens" pub- 
 lished by the Orange Judd Company, 245 Broadway, New York. 
 
62 
 
 Sidewalks and Roadways.— How to Make Them and How 
 to Take Care of Them. 
 
 I. SIDEWALKS. 
 
 No one thing has more to do with the comfort of those living 
 in the country, than sidewalks which are good at all seasons of 
 the year. 
 
 To overcome occasional sloppiness where the difficulty is not 
 deep-seated, there is no cheaper nor better device than to dress 
 the surface with coal ashes. Indeed, if these are used to a suffi- 
 cient thickness, they are practically as good as concrete or the 
 best gravel. When first applied, they are dusty and unpleasant; 
 but the first wetting lays the dust, and they soon settle to a firm 
 
 consistency and make a very pleasant walk, with the great 
 advantage of being entirely barren, and preventing the growth 
 of weeds and grass. 
 
 It is a common impression, that all thoroughly good foot- 
 paths must be dug out to a considerable depth, filled with loose 
 stones, and dressed at the top with some good finishing material; 
 but this is not necessary even for the best work. The great 
 point is to secure a thorough draining of the sub-stratum, so 
 that there shall be no rising of ooze-water from below, and so 
 that the ground shall be free from such saturation as to cause 
 heaving during frost. This condition may be secured by a suit- 
 able draining of the ground immediately under the walk, and 
 by the use of a well-compacted and tightly-bound surface cov- 
 ering of such form as to shed or turn away rain water. Figure 
 1 shows the cross-section of a foot-path six feet wide, on slightly 
 eloping ground, where we have to apprehend an oozing of subsoil 
 
63 
 
 water from the land at the highest side. The center of the walk 
 is slightly crowning, — say one inch higher than the sides, — so 
 that rain falling upon it will flow readily toward the grass border 
 at either side. To prevent the ponding of water at the sides 
 when the ground is frozen, the surface of the walk at its edges 
 should be well above the level of the adjoining ground ; but it 
 may be necessary under some circumstances to furnish, here 
 and there, a channel or surface gutter across the walk, to allow 
 the accumulation at the higher side to escape. Rarely will deep 
 gutters at the sides be necessary or desirable. We will assume 
 that the path in question is to be made over a tenacious clay 
 soil, with a considerable oozing from the hill-side, — the most 
 unfavorable condition that can be found, especially in cold cli- 
 mates. The first thing to be secured is the cutting off of the 
 subsoil water from the hill. This may be done by digging a 
 trench as narrow as possible — six inches will be better than 
 more, as requiring less filling material — to a depth of three feet. 
 In the bottom of this drain lay a common land-tile drain, with 
 collars at the joints, if these can be procured, and, if not, with a 
 bit of paper laid over the joints to prevent the entrance of loose 
 material, and to hold the pipes in place during construction. 
 The ditch should then be filled with cinders, gravel, or coarse 
 sand. If stones are to be used, they should be broken to a 
 small size — not more than one inch in diameter — and the loose 
 bits should be mixed with them in the filling. Very small 
 interstices will be sufficient to allow water to pass freely through, 
 while if large stones are used, with large interstices, there will 
 be danger of a washing in of earth sufficient in time to obstruct 
 both the stone work and the tile. The smaller the tile, so long 
 as it is sufficient for its purpose, the better ; for lengths of five 
 hundred feet or less, an interior diameter of an inch and a 
 quarter will be sufficient; from this to one thousand feet, use 
 an inch and a half bore. If possible, before exceeding this 
 length, secure an outlet for the water in the road-side gutter or 
 some other channel of exit. The tile drain, at a depth of three 
 feet, will remove all subsoil water from under the walk and all 
 that may be delivered into the loosely-filled trench at its side. 
 The loose filling of the trench should not be carried nearer than 
 within six inches of the surface of the ground, and should be 
 
64 
 
 covered with fine and well-packed earth to prevent the entrance 
 of surface water which would soon carry in silt enough to stop 
 its action. Whatever covering is adopted for the walk itself, it 
 must be of such a character as to prevent anything like a free 
 admission of surface water. Concrete will do this perfectly; 
 and either ashes, or gravel dressed at the top with ashes, if well 
 raked and rolled at the outset to a smooth surface, will soon 
 become so bound together as to shed pretty nearly all rain fall- 
 ing upon it. The difference in cost between a walk made in 
 this way, and one dug out for its whole width to a depth of two 
 feet, and filled first with stone and then with gravel and a suit- 
 able surface dressing, will be very important ; and it is safe to 
 say that the cheaper will be at least as good and durable as the 
 more expensive method. 
 
 II. HOADWAYS. 
 
 The great expense of macadamizing or telfordizing puts these 
 systems almost out of the reach of small communities. Wher- 
 ever the original expense can be borne, the subsequent cost of 
 maintenance will be so slight, and the result generally will be 
 so satisfactory, as to make it always a good investment. The 
 circumstances under which these costly forms of construction 
 may be adopted will be greatly extended if we can overcome the 
 prevalent American prejudice in favor of wide roadways. 
 
 Under most circumstances twenty feet of roadway will be 
 ample. This will allow the moving of three vehicles side by 
 side, and will give a leeway of six feet between two vehicles 
 passing each other. 
 
 On both sides of this roadway, except for the necessary side- 
 walks, the whole space to the fences should be in well-kept grass, 
 which is the cheapest to secure, the most economical to maintain, 
 and the most agreeable to see, of all ground covering. 
 
 In considering the width to be given to roadways, it should 
 be understood that every form of road is more or less costly 
 to make and keep in order, and that the cost of both items is in 
 direct proportion to the width. If to the cost of making and 
 grading an ordinary roadway sixty feet wide, we add the capital 
 sum whose interest would be necessary to keep this width in 
 good repair, we shall have an amount that would go far toward 
 
65 
 
 the construction and maintenance of a road of the very best 
 quality only thirty feet wide. Furthermore, while it is impos- 
 sible to estimate such items exactly, and while the amount thus 
 saved cannot be controlled for the road-making account, the 
 saving in the wear and tear of vehicles, and in the team force 
 needed to move heavy loads, constitutes an important argument 
 in favor of the best construction. The amount thus saved in 
 the short streets of villages, where the principal traffic is over 
 rough country roads, would not be very great, but it would 
 enable the road authorities of the township to realize the advan- 
 tage of first-rate roads and the degree to which the narrowing 
 of the roadway cheapens construction. As a result, there would 
 soon be an extension of the improvement over the more import- 
 ant highways into the country, where a well-metalled width of 
 twelve feet would accommodate nearly the whole traffic, and 
 where the proper application of a cheap system of under- 
 drainage would make well-metalled roads extremely cheap to 
 maintain. 
 
 In the island of Jersey, there are many excellent roads only 
 six feet wide. These are provided with frequent little bays or 
 turn-outs to allow teams to pass each other. Although such 
 extremely narrow roads are not to be recommended, the differ- 
 ence in comfort and economy of team-power between these and 
 the average American dirt road is enormously in their favor. 
 The widest roads in Jersey, leading from a busy town of thirty 
 thousand inhabitants into a thickly-settled farming region where 
 business and pleasure travel is very active, and where " excur- 
 sion cars" carrying thirty or forty persons are constantly passing, 
 are only twenty-four feet wide; often only of this width between 
 the hedge-rows, the road itself being an excellent foot-path for 
 its whole width. Nowhere else in the world is the rural charm 
 more perfectly developed than in Jersey, and no element of its 
 great beauty is so conspicuous and so constantly satisfactory as 
 its narrow and embowered lanes and roadways. 
 
 The great enemy of all roads is excessive moisture ; and the 
 chief purpose of all methods of improvement is to get rid of this, 
 or to counteract its effect. As in the case of foot-paths, wher- 
 ever the porous character of the subsoil, and the absence of 
 higher-lying wet lands, is such that no accumulation of water 
 5 
 
66 
 
 upon or under the roadway need be feared, the greatest diffi- 
 culty is at once set aside. 
 
 Where such natural drainage is secured, no artificial under- 
 drainage will be needed. In many more instances, all that 
 will be required in the way of draining will be to lead away the 
 sources of wet-weather springs, which break through the road- 
 bed and cause deep sloughs. Where incomplete or partial artifi- 
 cial under-draining is needed, the need is absolute ; and whether 
 we consider the durability of the road, or the degree to which 
 its traffic is interfered with by its wet condition, we may be 
 confident that every dollar spent in well-directed under-drain- 
 ing will be invested to the very best advantage. 
 
 If the trouble is local, here and there in spots, and is obviously 
 caused by the breaking up of springs from the road-bed, such 
 partial work may be adopted as will tap the sources of these 
 springs, and lead their water harmlessly away. Gisborne, one 
 of the best agricultural writers of England, put the case tersely 
 and well when — objecting to the system of circumventing 
 springs — he said " Hit him straight in the eye, is as good a maxim 
 in draining as in pugilism." It is best not to pass up at the 
 side of a spring, and so creep around behind it to head off its 
 water ; but to drive the drain straight through it, and far enough 
 beyond it to tap and lead away at a lower level the water which 
 causes it. These drains, as well as all others intended simply to 
 remove subsoil water, and not to cut off a weeping stream, are 
 best made with common drain-tiles laid as before directed, and 
 covered immediately with well-packed earth. Water enters an 
 under-drain, not from above, but from below ; that is to say, as 
 water, from whatever source, fills the subsoil, it rises therein 
 until it reaches the floor of the drain, when it enters and is led 
 away, just as water falling into a cask which stands on end 
 flows off at the under side of the bung-hole when it reaches its 
 level. Even if the cask be filled to the top with earth, the rain 
 falling upon it will descend perpendicularly to the bottom, and 
 will flow off at the bung only when the soil to that level has 
 become saturated. It will descend through the soil by the 
 straightest course, and will raise the general level. It will not 
 violate the laws of gravitation, and run diagonally toward the 
 point of outlet, as seems to be the general supposition when the 
 
67 
 
 perplexing question, " How does water get into the drain ?" is 
 first considered. When we drive a drain through a spring and 
 into the water-bearing stratum which feeds it, we simply make 
 it easier for the water to escape by the drain than to keep on at 
 the higher level, and break out at the surface of the ground. 
 
 As in the case of the sidewalks illustrated in Figure 1, in cut- 
 ting off a continuous weeping or ooze from higher land, it is 
 best to introduce a vertical filling of porous material through 
 which the water will descend and enter the drain ; but, except- 
 HHI ing this single instance, all that we need to do, so 
 
 for as subterranean work is concerned, is to fur- 
 nish an easy and sufficient channel for the removal 
 of subsoil water. 
 v What constitutes a sufficient drain is something 
 
 Ilk very much less than what is generally supposed. 
 Illl In ordinary agricultural drainage, where the lines 
 Pr of tiles are forty feet apart, a well-laid tile an inch 
 and a quarter in diameter is sufficient for a length 
 of one thousand feet — that is, it is sufficient to re- 
 move the water of filtration from an acre of land. 
 If laid with only an inclination of six inches in 
 one hundred feet, its delivery will be so rapid as 
 to amount to more than a heavy, continuous rain- 
 Ik . fall upon this area. In road drainage, the same 
 ||j| d rule would hold true; but, as the soil offers a cer- 
 P^ fe tain resistance to the rapid descent of water, it is 
 best to give a means of outlet at smaller inter- 
 vals ; and for the best work in roads thirty feet 
 wide or more, three drains could be used with 
 advantage. In no case, however, need the size of 
 pipes be larger than above indicated, if the form 
 of the tiles is true, and if they are well joined 
 Ik together at their ends. 
 
 |||§ Figure 2 shows the cross-section of a country 
 
 lip road thirty feet wide, with three lines of tile-drain 
 laid at a depth of about three feet below it. Ex- 
 cept in case of necessity, these drains should have 
 an inclination of not less than six inches in one 
 hundred feet. There is no objection to their hav- 
 
68 
 
 ing more than this wherever the lay of the land permits or 
 requires it. They may often have considerably less in case of 
 need; but, the smaller the rate of inclination, the greater the 
 care needed in securing a true grade. The water of these drains 
 should be collected into a single drain, and led away at inter- 
 vals of from five hundred to one thousand feet. It may be 
 delivered into a road-side gutter, or into a collecting under- 
 drain, according to the requirements of the situation. 
 
 The removal of excessive subsoil moisture being secured, 
 attention should next be given to the surface of the road, which 
 should be finished with the firmest material at hand — with 
 the common earth of the subsoil where nothing better can be 
 afforded — and which should be brought to a true grade, with 
 a very slight slope from the center to the edge. For a road 
 thirty feet wide, the elevation of the center above the level of 
 the edges should not be more than four or six inches, and the 
 grade should be made on a straight line rather than on a curve. 
 If the road is made as flat as the turning-off of surface-water 
 will permit, it will be traveled upon in all its parts; while if 
 it is crowned to a high arch, as is often the case, it will soon be 
 found that the best place to drive is in the middle of the road, 
 and foot-tracks and wheel-tracks will soon form slight channels 
 or ruts which will lead water lengthwise along the road, and 
 which will cause an undue amount of wear and washing. A 
 road may be actually flat to the eye, and equally convenient 
 for travel at every part of its width, and still have enough lat- 
 eral slope to cause water to run off from it. 
 
 It is especially desirable that no surface-water flowing from 
 the road-side (above all, when frost is coming out of the ground 
 in the Spring) be permitted to run on to the road. This should 
 be effectively prevented by the formation of sufficient gutters, 
 with such outlets as will prevent ponding at the sides of the 
 road. When it is necessary to carry the water of the gutters 
 from one side of the road to the other, culverts should be pro- 
 vided ; and wherever the slope of the road is sufficient to cause 
 water to flow along it lengthwise — that is, wherever the inclina- 
 tion is more than about one in fifty— there should be frequent 
 slight depressions from the center diagonally toward the gutters to 
 
69 
 
 carry the flow away before it can accumulate sufficiently to form 
 a washing current. 
 
 If it can be done without hauling additional material, it is 
 always well to raise the road-bed somewhat above the level of 
 the adjoining land, and this may usually be accomplished by 
 throwing upon it the subsoil of the gutters. In no case should 
 surface-soil, sods, or fine road-mud be used for repairs. The most 
 serious objection to the absurd system of road mending so common in this 
 country lies in the fact that the annual repairing is little more than 
 the ploughing up and throwing back upon the roadway of the soft and 
 unsuitable material which has been washed into the gutters. 
 
 It is easy, in the country, to have the grades of all roadways 
 so regulated as to shed rain-water falling upon them, and to 
 have them so furnished with side gutters as to prevent water 
 from the road-side from running on to them. The simplest way 
 to effect this, and the neatest way, too, is to make gutters outside 
 of the line of the road, say six inches deep and eight feet wide, 
 these being at once sodded or sown with grass and grain to give 
 a,n early protection against washing ; made on such a shallow 
 curve, they will afford no obstruction to any system of mowing 
 that may be adopted, while their great width will give them 
 sufficient capacity to carry away the water of considerable storms. 
 
 The work of construction having been duly attended to, it is no 
 less important to provide for regular and constant care. Any 
 rutting that comes of heavy traffic in bad weather should be 
 obliterated either by raking, or, better still, by filling the ruts 
 with gravel or ashes. If such work is attended to immediately on 
 the occasion for it arising, the amount of labor required will be very 
 slight; for it is especially true with reference to roads, that " a stitch in 
 time saves nine." If the filling of ruts and wheel-tracks be done 
 in time, the serious damage that comes from guttering flows of 
 water lengthwise along the road may be almost entirely avoided. 
 — [Extracts, with permission, from Waring's " Village Improvements 
 and Farm Villages," published by Houghton, Mifflin & Go., Boston, 
 Mass. See, also, Gillespie's Roads and Railroads. 
 
70 
 
 Lawns — Beet Mixtures of Grass Seeds. 
 
 Charles L. Flint, in his book entitled " Grasses and Forage 
 Plants," recommends the following mixtures: 
 
 He says : " If the object be to make a permanent lawn, as is 
 frequently desirable, around or in sight of the farm-house, some- 
 thing like the following mixture will generally be found to give 
 satisfactory results : 
 
 POUNDS. 
 
 Meadow Foxtail 2 
 
 Sweet-scented Vernal Grasses 1 
 
 Eedtop 2 
 
 Hard Fescue 3 
 
 Sheep's Fescue 1 
 
 Meadow Fescue 4 
 
 Eed Fescue 2 
 
 Italian Rye Grass 3 
 
 Perennial Eye Grass 6 
 
 Timothy 3 
 
 June Grass 4 y 
 
 Rough-stalked Meadow Grass 2 
 
 Yellow Oat Grass 1 
 
 Perennial Clover 2 
 
 Eed Clover 2 
 
 WhiteClover 6 
 
 Total 44 
 
 This mixture will resist the effects of our severe droughts 
 better than those commonly used for lawns. If anything is 
 omitted from it, the red and perennial clovers, the yellow oat 
 grass, and a part of the rye grass could best be spared. Red 
 clover, like other coarse and large-leaved plants, rather mars 
 the beauty of fine lawns ; though, as it disappears mostly after 
 the second year, it may be of service in protecting the finer 
 grasses. Lawns kept frequently mown are of most use as fur- 
 nishing food for calves and sheep, and are less adapted to sup- 
 ply the wants of larger animals. 
 
 Another mixture for lawns and pleasure grounds, which are 
 to be often mown or kept short, is recommended by Parnell, as 
 follows : 
 
71 
 
 POUNDS. 
 
 Crested Dog's-tail 11 
 
 Yellow Oat Grass 8 
 
 Hard Fescue 5 
 
 Wood Meadow 4 
 
 June Grass 2 
 
 Rough-stalked Meadow 2 
 
 Red top 4 
 
 Whitetop 4 
 
 Total 40 
 
 Lawns furnished with suitable grasses become much finer 
 and more velvety, from frequent mowing, than they otherwise 
 would be. The Lawson's mixture, for lawns frequently mown, 
 consists mainly of the same species, but in different proportions. 
 It is as follows : 
 
 POUNDS. 
 
 Crested Dog's-tail 10 
 
 Hard Fescue 4 
 
 Slender Fescue , 2 
 
 Perennial Eye Grass 10 
 
 Wood Meadow Grass 2 
 
 Rough-stalked Meadow 1 
 
 Yellow Oat Grass 1 
 
 June Grass 8 
 
 White Clover 8 
 
 Total 46 
 
 A mixture for permanent lawn pastures, or pastures lying in 
 the vicinity of dwellings or public highways, where the owner 
 has some regard to fineness and beauty of herbage, should, I 
 think, be composed of a still larger number of species. 
 
 The following is suggested as most likely to secure the end 
 desired : 
 
 POUNDS. 
 
 Meadow Foxtail 3 
 
 Sweet-scented Vernal 2 
 
 Orchard Grass 3 
 
 Hard Fescue 2 
 
 Sheep's Fescue 2 
 
 Meadow Fescue 2 
 
72 
 
 POUNDS. 
 
 Italian Bye Grass 3 
 
 Perennial Rye Grass 4 
 
 Timothy 3 
 
 Bed top 3 
 
 June Grass 4 
 
 Rough-stalked Meadow 3 
 
 Yellow Oat Grass 1 
 
 Red Clover 2 
 
 Perennial Red Clover 2 
 
 White Clover 4 
 
 Total 43 
 
 In all such mixtures the early Spring and the late Autumn 
 growth, as well as the general luxuriance of the Summer herb- 
 age, are to be regarded. Grasses, therefore, which are charac- 
 terized by their early and late growth, become of great value 
 and importance in the mixture, even though their nutritive 
 qualities are slight, and though they may be comparatively 
 valueless as field grasses to be mown for hay." 
 
 Factory Adornment. 
 
 An important work of rural improvement in many towns, 
 would be the betterment of the surroundings of their factories. 
 Too frequently these grounds are disfigured with rubbish, and 
 made unsightly by neglect. Keep a man in a pig-sty, and he 
 would become swinish in his habits, but reverse these condi- 
 tions, and you reverse the results. The influence of flowers, 
 shrubbery, or neat and cultivated grounds, upon operatives, in 
 refining their taste and promoting their happiness, I contend is 
 too often ignored. There is, however, a goodly number of our 
 most successful manufacturers, who show their interest in their 
 hands by making their factory buildings and tenement-houses 
 inviting, comfortable and healthful, and adorning the surround- 
 ing grounds. 
 
73 
 
 The two model manufacturing villages of America, and, so far 
 as I have been able to observe, of the world — the Cheney Silk 
 Factory, in South Manchester, Connecticut, and the Fairbanks 
 Scale Works, in St. Johnsbury, Vermont — happily illustrate the 
 desirableness and results of better provisions for the taste and 
 comfort of operatives. I do not assume that all factories can 
 fully adopt the high standard of these remarkable establish- 
 ments, which are exceptional in their opportunities. There are 
 serious embarrassments in large manufacturing towns, especially 
 where the factories are controlled by non-resident owners, more 
 anxious for dividends than for the comfort and improvement of 
 their workmen. 
 
 In the factories above named, there has evidently been mutual 
 sympathy and interest between employers and employed. The 
 senior Governor Fairbanks used to say to his men, " You should 
 always come to me as to a father." He maintained relations 
 of kindness with them, visiting the sick, helping the needy, 
 counseling the erring, encouraging their thrift and enjoining 
 habits of economy. He taught them that it was their interest 
 and duty "to lay up something every month." He was a con- 
 spicuous example at once of strict economy and princely liber- 
 ality. The fact that so many of the workmen here are "fore- 
 handed," besides owning their homesteads, is due to his teaching 
 and example. The worth and dignity of work he illustrated in 
 theory and practice. His sons worked in the shop and thor- 
 oughly learned the trade. Of course there is here the happiest 
 conciliation between labor and capital. It is not strange that 
 the workmen "hold on." Many have worked in this factory 
 from twenty to forty years. The liberal provisions for the educa- 
 tion, improvement, happiness and prosperity of the hands, 
 explain the absence of discontent, and the uniform good feeling 
 and harmony which prevail. How to harmonize labor and cap- 
 ital, is now one of the great questions of the age. Many mil- 
 lions of money have been lately lost in this country and in Eng- 
 land, by needless antagonisms between those who should be 
 
 partners. 
 
 B. G. Northrop. 
 
74 
 
 The Lenox System of Sewage, as described by Col. Waring 1 , 
 in his " Village Improvements." 
 
 " The third system — the distribution of sewage through irri- 
 gation pipes laid at the depth of ten or twelve inches below the 
 surface of the ground — has its efficiency attested by numerous 
 instances in private grounds. I have adopted this system for 
 disposing of the sewage of the village of Lenox, Mass., where 
 there was no other means available short of cutting an outlet, 
 at great expense, through a considerable elevation. This method 
 is an extremely simple one, and is available in every instance 
 where even a small area of land lying slightly below the level 
 of the outlet is to be commanded. The arrangement of the sub- 
 irrigation pipes is easily made : Suppose that in land having an 
 inclination of about one in two hundred, occupied by grass or 
 other growth, a trench be dug twelve inches deep, that there be 
 laid upon the bottom of this trench a narrow strip of plank to 
 insure a uniform grade, and that upon this plank is laid a line 
 of common agricultural land-drain tiles, say two inches in diam- 
 eter. However carefully these tiles may be placed, there will 
 be at their joints a sufficient space for the leaking out of any 
 liquid they may contain ; the tiles being laid either with collars 
 around the joints, or with bits of paper laid over them, to pre- 
 vent the rattling in of loose earth during the filling. The exca- 
 vated earth is to be returned to its place, well compacted, and 
 covered with its sod. Suppose this drain to have a cross-section 
 equal to three square inches, and a length of one hundred feet, 
 its capacity will equal about sixteen gallons, or a half-barrel. 
 If this amount of liquid be rapidly discharged into the drain, 
 the inclination being slight, it will at once be filled or nearly 
 filled for its whole length, and the liquid will leak away in tol- 
 erably uniform proportion at every joint along the line, and will 
 saturate the surrounding earth. The plan adopted at Lenox, and 
 recommended for all small villages which cannot secure a better 
 outlet, is simply a multiplication of these drains to a sufficient 
 extent. 
 
 A description of the manner in which the Lenox work is 
 arranged will illustrate the adaptation of the system to its cir- 
 cumstances. As circumstances vary, the adaptation must be 
 modified. (See Diagram.) 
 
75 
 
76 
 
 The main outlet sewer delivers at a distance of about one-half 
 mile from the last junction with a branch sewer. It is a six- 
 inch pipe five feet below the surface of the ground, and it 
 delivers into a flush-tank like that shown on page 51, but having 
 a capacity of about five hundred cubic feet. This tank stands 
 at the upper side of a field having an inclination of seven in one 
 hundred. There is a branch from the main sewer, above the 
 tank, supplied with a stop-cock, by which, in case of need, the 
 sewage may be carried on down the hill without going into the 
 tank. The outlet from the chamber below the siphon leads off 
 in another direction down the hill, and has a stop-cock and a 
 branch which will allow its flow to be diverted. The discharge 
 of this diverted stream and the discharge through the branch of 
 the main above the tank, both deliver into a horizontal surface 
 gutter to be well grassed, and lying at the top of the land to be 
 irrigated. By this arrangement, should repairs become neces- 
 sary in the tank, the flow may be turned into the gutter; or, 
 should it be desired for any reason to use the outflow of the 
 tank for surface irrigation, the second branch outlet will deliver 
 it into the same gutter, where, the outflow being uniform along 
 the whole length of five hundred feet, the stream will pass in a 
 thin sheet off on the descending ground. The hill-side imme- 
 diately below the gutter, is brought to a true grade and covered 
 with grass. As its inclination is much greater than would be 
 admissible for sub-irrigation drains, these are laid obliquely in 
 parallel lines at intervals of six feet from one end to the other 
 over the whole graded slope. These drains are connected at 
 their upper ends with the direct outlet-pipe leading from the 
 siphon chamber. They have an aggregate length of about ten 
 thousand feet. The method of operation is as follows: 
 
 The capacity of the tank is supposed to equal about two days' 
 discharge, or about thirty-five hundred gallons; and the whole 
 capacity of the drains is about half that of the tank, so that the 
 rapid emptying of the whole volume into them will insure their 
 being pretty thoroughly filled from end to end. This arrange- 
 ment will provide for the saturation of the soil about once in 
 two days, and will leave a sufficient interval between the periods 
 of saturation for the thorough dispersal and aeration of the filth. 
 
 The extent to which this system will be interfered with by frost, 
 it is impossible to say. This will probably be less than would 
 
77 
 
 be supposed, for the reason that the ground would often be 
 covered with snow, and that the sewage will have sufficient 
 warmth to exert considerable thawing influence. Whenever 
 the discharge of the liquid through irrigation pipes is shown to 
 have become obstructed by freezing, it will only be necessary to 
 divert the flow, and turn it into the surface gutter to be distrib- 
 uted over the ground. 
 
 It is possible that in this case, as in the one which has been 
 under my observation for six years past, there will be no inter- 
 ruption of the working because of cold ; but, should the inter- 
 ruption become serious, I shall propose the planting of ever- 
 green trees in parallel rows midway between the drains. The 
 protection that would thus be afforded, both by the trees and 
 by the drifting snow which they would gather, would probably 
 keep the ground free throughout the Winter. Incidentally to 
 the chief advantage of this system, there will be, so long as the 
 land is in grass, quite an addition to its product." 
 
 For further information, see Col. Waring's Report, in the preceding 
 pages. 
 
 Drainage for Health. 
 
 Col. Waring discusses fully the subject of the disposal of 
 house wastes and protection of wells. The object of this note 
 is to impress a not less important point, viz., the duty of secur- 
 ing such subsoil drainage as will insure dryness of the site of 
 foundation walls and of the cellar. 
 
 Lord Bacon has said : " He who builds a fair house upon an 
 ill seat, committeth himself to prison." 
 
 As a rule, the dry soils, sand and gravel, are the healthiest. 
 Coarse gravel is also the safest soil to build upon, as it is almost 
 incompressible and makes a firm foundation. 
 
 While typhoid fever and diphtheria are conceded to be gen- 
 erated and their virulence increased by impure air and water, 
 two other prevalent scourges, consumption and fever and agve, are 
 caused by the influence of stagnant water and excessive wetness 
 •of the soil ; and they may be much alleviated by the simple 
 
78 
 
 removal of the drainage water, through exactly the same pro- 
 cess that is employed in farm drainage. 
 We will consider first the mode to he adopted to secure 
 
 DRYNESS OF SITE. 
 
 As our space is limited, we must ask the reader to be content, 
 on many points, with simple rules and directions, without dis- 
 cussion of reasons. 
 
 To drain a tract, large or small, find an outlet low enough to 
 give the necessary fall — one foot in one hundred is sufficient, 
 and drains will work well with hut one-quarter of that fall. If 
 the fall is slight, the greater care will be necessary in laying out 
 and performing the work. 
 
 The work should be all laid out before breaking ground. 
 Usually a single main drain should run through the lowest part 
 of the tract, and it is not important that the main should be 
 straight as to line, but there must be no inequality in the grade. 
 Having laid out the main, lay side drains running into it, hav- 
 ing in view two principles : First, to run each drain up and 
 down the slope of the land, rather than across; and, second, to 
 have them parallel to each other. Like most principles, we 
 shall be compelled often to compromise them. The depth 
 should be four feet or more, and the distance apart, with this 
 ^^^ depth, may be from thirty to fifty 
 
 I s *'" 2kiif feet ' 
 
 M 0: , mm To open them, begin at the outlet, 
 
 |H M lip so that the water may run off as the 
 
 - ' p| Sp ;■'■■ work proceeds, and with a common 
 KM}'' spade and pick, cut a trench by a 
 
 ^^^m line, eighteen inches wide at the sur- 
 
 (Mf^i ' fice, narrowing to four inches, or the 
 *i If '■*... - width of a laborer's boot, at the bot- 
 ' torn. To finish the bottom, a spade 
 'Wff four inches wide is necessary, and 
 may be made by getting a black- 
 piG. 1.— peopee shape foe a sm ith to cut down a common long- 
 handled shovel to that width, no 
 wider at the heel than the point. Common drain tiles are 
 recommended, and the directions given are specially adapted to 
 their use. 
 
 
 * 
 
79 
 
 The drains being thus opened, we begin to lay the tiles at the 
 upper end. Lay the first tile (usually of two-inch size) with a 
 brick or flat stone over the upper end, to close it entirely, and 
 the next end to end with it, and so on to the main, keeping 
 always an inclination, however slight, for if any depression is 
 made, the silt will lodge in it and obstruct the work. 
 
 Here let this idea be fully impressed : In this system of 
 drainage no water is to be anywhere admitted except by perco- 
 lation through the soil. There is to be no opening to the sur- 
 face, or into any ditch, or to receive sink-water, or anything but 
 clear water creeping underground. 
 
 But how does the water get in ? Chiefly at the joints, which 
 are as close as two rough bricks laid end to end would be. 
 Nothing short of cementing the joints can keep the water out. 
 The great difficulty is to keep out silt or fine sand. 
 
 Having laid two or three tiles on the bare earth, if hard (and 
 on pieces of laths or other thin wood, if soft), cover each joint 
 half or more round the tiles with a piece of tarred paper as large 
 as a common letter envelope, and, holding the whole firmly, 
 place soil or gravel over it and on both sides of the tiles, press- 
 ing it enough to keep them in place. However tempted to do 
 so, put no stones nor straw nor shavings into the drain. Cover 
 and fill up with anything at hand except soft clay, fine sand or 
 sods, which should not be placed in contact with the tiles. 
 
 When we approach the junction of the minor drain with the 
 main, a curve should be made, so as not to bring in the side 
 stream at right angles. Branch tiles may be found made for 
 the purpose of junction, and these are much better than any 
 home contrivances. The last few feet of the main should be of 
 vitrified pipe, with cemented joints. 
 
 Having thus connected the drains in one system with only 
 one outlet, this should be so secured by a wire grating that no 
 frog or other creeping thing can explore it, and it should be 
 built up solid with stone, so as to be permanent, and should 
 have a clean fall of a few inches upon a flat stone, that it may 
 not be obstructed by back-water and mud. 
 
 The above instructions, if followed, will insure a dry site, 
 but in the case of particularly springy ground, or where a house 
 is situated on a side hill, it may be well to drain the cellar itself. 
 
80 
 
 This may be done by diggiDg a trench as above directed, in the 
 cellar, as close to the wall as it can safely be dug, and to a 
 depth six inches below the bottom of the foundation. The bot- 
 tom of this trench should have a slight but regular fall toward 
 the point where the pipe can most conveniently be carried 
 under the foundation to an outlet built as above directed, and 
 
 ; -i . 
 
 FIG. 2. — OUTLET. 
 
 the last few feet will be best constructed of vitrified pipe, with 
 tightly cemented joints, in order to make a lasting job. 
 
 Under no circumstances should these pipes be connected with 
 the sewer pipes or cesspools. 
 
 By this simple method damp walls and cellars may be 
 entirely cured at a small expense for material and about a 
 day's labor of a couple of careful men. 
 
 The directions given above for laying the pipes and filling 
 the trench should be exactly followed. 
 
 It has been scientifically demonstrated that damp sites, and 
 particularly damp cellars aggravate and to a large extent pro- 
 duce consumption and malarial disorders. It is a fact that 
 where the drainage of building sites and of cellars has been 
 attended to, deaths from consumption have fallen off fifty per 
 cent. 
 
 Which are of greater value, the few dollars it will cost to 
 
81 
 
 make our homes healthy, or the life and health of our wives 
 and little ones ? 
 
 Which will cost less, to spend a few dollars in prevention, or 
 many dollars in the cure or attempt to cure disease? 
 
 [Condensed from the Fourth Annual Report of the State Board of 
 Health of Massachusetts. 
 
 Filtering Cisterns. 
 
 As there may he some of our members who propose con- 
 structing cisterns for retaining their supply of drinking water, 
 the following description and illustration from " The Sanitary 
 Engineer " for November 1st, 1880, are given : 
 
 "The best material for rain water cisterns is brick, laid in 
 hydraulic cement and plastered inside. No lime should be 
 used for the plastering, but a mortar made of equal parts of 
 cement and good, clean, sharp sand. This is rarely found clean 
 enough to be used without first washing it. v After the plaster- 
 ing is hard, it should be washed twice with a grout of cement 
 and water, without sand, applied with a white-wash brush. If 
 the ground is firm, and stands plumb without caving in, one 
 layer of brick laid directly against the side of the pit is enough. 
 In this case the form of the pit should be carefully trimmed to 
 a true circle, and the walls trimmed plumb. Then the brick 
 work can be laid directly against it, filling all small cavities 
 between the brick and ground with cement, and not with earth. 
 If the ground is not firm enough to stand in this way, a thicker 
 wall will be needed, say eight inches. The earth that is filled 
 around it should be puddled in with plenty of water, to ensure 
 a solid packing. Ramming the earth without puddling is not 
 so good, and will not be likely to prevent the cistern from burst- 
 ing when first filled with water. A very small crack will spoil 
 it. The floor can be laid after the walls are plastered, so as to 
 avoid stepping on it much after laying it. The floor should be 
 dished like a saucer, to facilitate cleaning out. 
 6 
 
82 
 
 " For filtering, build a partition in the cistern by which any 
 portion, say one-fourth, of its contents can be separated from 
 the remainder. Insert the suction pipe or pump within this 
 chamber, and allow the inlets to discharge outside of it in the 
 larger part of the cistern. If the partition is built of one thick- 
 
 ness of soft, porous brick, the water will soak through it ; but 
 this brick partition should be domed over against the side walls 
 to prevent any pollution of the filtered water by dust or spat- 
 terings from above. If the water is quite foul, the pores of the 
 bricks will be choked in time, and refuse to pass more water. 
 In that case the partition must be renewed, or holes made near 
 the bottom, in which sponges, broken charcoal or sand can be 
 placed to do the work ; and these can be renewed when found 
 necessary. 
 
 " If gravel and charcoal are used, they are deposited in layers, 
 charcoal at bottom, and a few inches of gravel on top, each Bide 
 the filtering wall at A A [see cut], and confined by dwarf walls 
 on each side. Holes are left in the base of the filtering wall by 
 omitting alternate bricks in the bottom course. The water is 
 then filtered by passing down through one bed of charcoal and 
 up through the other. The gravel is chiefly useful to put on 
 top of the charcoal to protect it from wash. 
 
 "This charcoal will need frequent renewal if there is much 
 solid matter in the water. Hence two cisterns are convenient." 
 
83 
 
 Two other illustrations are given, showing a somewhat differ- 
 ent construction. These are taken from "Wood's Household 
 
 Practice," a valuable work on hygiene. They explain them- 
 selves sufficiently without need of description. 
 
 Heating and Ventilation. 
 
 The object of this note is to explain in a simple way how we 
 may keep our houses comfortably warm in Winter, and yet not 
 compel ourselves to breathe- over and over again air which has 
 become dirty and foul from washing out our lungs and contact 
 with our bodies. 
 
 Col. Waring has entered a plea for " a pure soil " and " pure 
 water;" now, pray heed Hippocrates once more, and be sure 
 you have an ample supply -of pure, life-giving air in your 
 dwellings. 
 
 Dr. Hamilton Osgood, in his admirable little book on " Win- 
 ter and its Dangers," says : " Human beings, as well as fish, live, 
 move and have their being in a fluid. That in which we find 
 fish is visible, and its slightest impurity noticeable. Not so the 
 fluid in which we live. It is invisible, and, in a general sense, 
 
84 
 
 so are its impurities. Eyes being of no use here, the sense of 
 smell, if properly regarded, will be our protector. When the 
 air of our rooms is foul, when drains are imperfect, when any 
 impure thing taints the atmosphere, the sense of smell gives us 
 warnings which should be religiously regarded and never neg- 
 lected. 
 
 " The air in which we live, and which we inhale, is composed, 
 when normally pure, of eighty parts nitrogen, about twenty 
 parts of oxygen, and a small quantity of carbonic acid, say" 
 about four-hundredths of one per cent. When absolutely pure, 
 the air, of course, is absolutely free from this poisonous element. 
 Our health depends upon keeping up the twenty per cent, of 
 oxygen and keeping down the carbonic acid to its lowest possi- 
 ble minimum. An increase of this gas to five or ten per cent, 
 would be fatal to life. 
 
 "When the blood leaves the lungs, it is in the condition called 
 arterial — that is, it has been purified by the air, or aerified. 
 And the name artery originated in the fact that, until the time 
 of Galen, in the second century of our era, the blood-vessels 
 leading from the lungs and heart were supposed to convey air 
 directly from the windpipe, and air only, because after death 
 they are always found/ empty. It was thought that the veins, 
 the vessels which bring the blood back to the heart and lungs, 
 were the only channels of the blood, for after death they were 
 always found full. 
 
 " The blood, carries myriads of small bodies called blood-cor- 
 puscles, which, with the exception of a few white ones, existing 
 in the proportion of about four to one thousand of the red, have 
 a color which is bright red when the blood is pure or arterial, 
 purplish or dark crimson when the blood is impure or venus. 
 These bodies have aptly been compared to boats. When the 
 blood leaves the lungs, these boats carry a mixed cargo, an 
 important portion of which is oxygen. This they discharge as 
 they pass through the canals of the body, some stopping here, 
 some there; but they alwa3's exchange it for an equal load of 
 carbonic acid. This carbonic acid changes the color of these 
 dainty boats from dark to bright red. When they reach the 
 lungs again, they expect to find a new cargo of oxygen, and 
 likewise to become purified and restored to their original 
 
85 
 
 brightness. Consequently, when the air inhaled by the lungs 
 is once in the air-cells, which cluster about the finer bronchial 
 tubes like grapes up^n their stems, the pure air finds a quantity 
 of carbonic acid which has been brought by the boats that have 
 just arrived from the rivers and canals of the body. 
 
 " By a wonderful process of which gases are capable, the car- 
 bonic acid from the boats and the oxygen from the inspired air 
 both pass through two exquisitely delicate walls which separate 
 the blood in the vessels from the air in the air-cells of the lungs, 
 and exchange places — the air in the lungs take the carbonic 
 acid from the impure blood, and becoming itself impure; the 
 blood-corpuscles, or the boats, taking the oxygen from the pure 
 air (if only it be pure), and thus becoming purified. Where this 
 latter takes place, the air-cells lie in a perfect mesh of the most 
 delicate vessels conceivable. The walls of each are so exceed- 
 ingly thin that the transfusion or passage through them of the 
 two gases is made possible. But for this delicacy of construction) 
 the exchange could not take place. The freshly-laden boats now 
 start on a new trip, their places being instantly taken by others. 
 The impure air is exhaled, and the new inspiration sends fresh 
 air to the air-cells and the waiting boats. And so this wonder- 
 ful process of exchange goes on day and night, whether we are 
 sleeping or waking." 
 
 " It is undoubted," says the same author, " that affections of 
 the lungs, notably consumption, find their origin in inhaled air 
 which is laden with organic vapors and particles arising from 
 the human body." He also attributes bronchial affections, 
 " colds," lassitude, head-aches and general dibility largely to 
 the breathing of impure air. 
 
 " Think, too," he continues " of the air of church, theater 
 and crowded parlor. Go into such from the fresh air an hour 
 after the company has assembled. How heavy the air with 
 personal effluvia and rebreathed breath. Pah ! these delicate 
 women have no thought of what they are doing. Offer such an 
 one a cup of ditch water; would she drink it? Would she 
 drink it if it contained even a speck ? No. And yet think of 
 it: in unventilated rooms and crowded assemblies, we inhale 
 dirty air — air which has washed out other lungs than ours, some 
 of them probably in a state of disease ! Such air contains per- 
 
86 
 
 sonal impurities, particles from the lungs, uncleanly odors. 
 Such air drawn into sensitive lungs — lungs which are only 
 waiting to spring into inflamed conditions — creates disease." 
 * * * * " God gives us pure air. Is it not a sin and a shame 
 that we do not keep it pure? Think, too, of the sick, of the 
 delicate, of the children who are confined to the house. They 
 are mainly helpless. For their pure air they are dependent 
 upon the foresight of others, and it is just as cruel to keep it 
 from them as it would be to deny them food, and almost as dan- 
 gerous. Their lives depend upon it. They die for want of it." 
 
 One other quotation, and then we are done : " It is a very 
 common belief that night air is unhealthful ; but, as Florence 
 Nightingale sensibly remarks, 'we must breathe night air at 
 night;' and she might have added: if pure night air is shut 
 out, then we breathe foul night air." * * * * " Statistics show 
 that where war has slain its thousands, bad night air has slain 
 its tens of thousands ; then do not fear, but welcome the pure 
 air of night." 
 
 " Better is it," says a wise writer, " to spend m.oney on a sup- 
 ply of pure air than on carven work and orations." 
 
 How to obtain this snpply of pure air in the Winter months, 
 without producing draughts and without causing an undue 
 waste of fuel, I now propose to state in a few plain words. 
 Those who desire to study the subject more fully, I refer to, the 
 series of articles on the subject in " The Sanitary Engineer," by 
 Dr. John S. Billings, U. S. A. 
 
 Most country-houses — and to those, these remarks are intended 
 more particularly to apply — are provided with ample fire-places. 
 Let the first step taken be to open these, substituting for the 
 tight fire-board either such screens as are used in windows in 
 the Summer time ; or, better yet, let the andirons be polished 
 and placed on the hearth as in "ye olden time." You now 
 have provided a means of escape for the foul air which is con- 
 stantly entering the room from lungs and lamps and emanations 
 from your bodies. 
 
 Now, it is necessary to replace this bad air which you have 
 sent up the chimney, with " good, pure country air." This may 
 be done, of course, by opening windows or doors, but we all 
 know that in the cold Winter time this would be, to say the 
 
87 
 
 least, very uncomfortable. The cheapest and simplest way to 
 introduce pure air without causing draughts, is to provide sev- 
 eral strips of wood one-third of an inch thick, of various widths, 
 from two to six inches, and long enough to fit the window-frame 
 under the lower sash. The latter is then raised, and the strip 
 inserted under it, thus closing the aperture. There will, in this 
 way, be left between the upper and lower sash a space where 
 air can enter, which may vary in size with the weather, accord- 
 ing to the thickness of the strip used. The air coming through 
 this space is deflected toward the ceiling by the lower sash, and 
 thus enters the room without any danger of causing a draught 
 or otherwise annoying the occupants. [Fig. l.J 
 
 pig. 1. 
 
 The method just described will be useful at all seasons, when 
 it is necessary to keep windows and doors closed, especially in 
 stormy weather in Spring, Summer and Fall, and in the cool, 
 Fall evenings before the fire is started. 
 
 The following suggestions from an article by Rev. Daniel C. 
 Jacokes, in " Carpentry and Building," for November, 1880, are 
 admirably adapted for houses mostly heated by stoves and not 
 provided with open fire-places : 
 
 " During cold weather, ventilation should be produced by the 
 aid of heat. The following rules should be carefully observed 
 in heating and ventilating : 
 
88 
 
 " 1. Conduct, in some convenient manner, out-door air against 
 a heated surface. 
 
 " 2. Conduct the in-door air from the floor into a heated flue. 
 In this manner a complete circulation of air may be had, and 
 an abundant supply of pure warm air may be secured ; pro- 
 
 vided, first, that the ducts be sufficiently large; and, second, 
 that the dust in the air be not burned by a red-hot surface. If 
 these rules are observed, the heating and ventilating will be 
 very economical and satisfactory. Most of the buildings, pub- 
 
89 
 
 lie and private, for human use are constructed without any 
 reference to ventilation; indeed, most of them seem to have 
 heen planned to prevent the possibility of either the light of 
 the sun or the pure air of heaven entering them. There is, con- 
 sequently, much difficulty in properly heating or ventilating 
 them. Those who prefer health to the sight of the changes 
 necessary in each case to secure such an end, must not object 
 to see an additional pipe to convey foul air out of the room, and, 
 also, a pipe to convey the pure outdoor air into it. 
 
 "There are many buildings heated by a furnace. In these 
 the pure outdoor air is properly heated ; but where there is no 
 preparation for ventilation, this may be secured in the same 
 manner as when heated by a stove. 
 
 " The great majority of houses are heated by stoves. The out- 
 door air in such cases must be conducted to the surface of the 
 stove, as illustrated by the following diagrams. These stoves 
 have various shapes ; whatever they may be, the principles will 
 here be explained, so that any person may modify the method 
 so as to secure the result desired. Fig. 2 shows how a sheet-iron 
 jacket may be fitted to the back of a stove for heating the out- 
 door air brought, within the jacket against the stove. The jacket 
 is seen at the top of the stove, and is represented by the line 
 marked D. The jacket should never be more than 4J inches 
 from the back of the stove, and should always be closed at the 
 bottom, so that the air in the room will never be reheated and 
 breathed over and over again. This should be remembered, 
 whatever kind or form of jacket is used. 
 
 " Fig. 3 illustrates the manner of conducting the outdoor air to 
 the stove within the jacket for heating. 
 
 "A wood stove may be jacketed in the same manner as a coal 
 stove. In this case the jacket may be fitted to the sides of the 
 stove very nicely, covering the back of the stove in the same 
 manner as the coal stove, so that the sheet-iron jacket will be 
 at an average distance of 4 i inches from the back ; never more 
 than this. 
 
 " Outdoor air may also be heated by conducting it within a 
 jacket around the stove-pipe of a wood or coal stove, as shown 
 in section in Fig. 4. 
 
 "In school-houses, where box stoves are mostly used, a sheet- 
 
90 
 
 iron jacket may inclose the stove excepting the front, which 
 should be left open for the escape of the heated air. The space 
 between the stove and jacket should be 4 inches — not more — on 
 the sides and top ; on the back the jacket may be as wide as the 
 hole in the floor— 6 inches. An opening should be made 
 through the floor at the back end of the stove near the jacket, 
 6 by 16 inches, if the jacket is wide enough to cover it. A pipe, 
 
 the shape of the hole, should be fitted so as to reach a little 
 above the bottom of the stove, that the air may reach the heated 
 surface at once. Pig. 3 snows this arrangement. 
 
 " Ventilation, according to rule second, should always convey 
 the indoor air from the floor into a heated flue. If the chimney 
 is properly constructed, this may be done with little expense or 
 trouble. Usually, however, this is not the case. The general 
 rule is to build chimneys very small— mostly 4 by 12 or 16 
 
91 
 
 inches on the inside. This narrow space will soon be more or 
 less filled with soot. In such cases ventilation will be difficult, 
 if not impossible. If the chimney has been constructed with 
 an apartment for ventilation, it will be sufficient to make an 
 opening into it at the floor — that is, the bottom of the opening 
 
 pig. 4. 
 
 must in all cases be exactly even with the top of the floor, 
 otherwise the ventilation will be imperfect ; this will give good 
 ventilation. All chimneys should be constructed with an apart- 
 ment for each story, as shown in Fig. 5, and should be plastered 
 smooth ; the partition should be made of brick, and built single 
 
92 
 
 width, so that it will be four inches thick. This wall will be 
 constantly heated to keep a continual draft in the ventilating 
 flue. 
 
 " If a chimney is sufficiently large, a 7 or 8-inch stove-pipe>— 
 or larger, if possible — may be let down inside of the chimney 
 and turned into the room at the floor by an elbow ; this will 
 make an efficient ventilator. If there is not sufficient room, or 
 if for any other cause, as a crooked chimney, this cannot be 
 done, ventilation may be effected as illustrated in Fig. 6. Take 
 a pipe one inch smaller in diameter than the supply pipe which 
 is to conduct the outdoor air to the stove, and carry it into the 
 chimney — if possible, below the entrance of the smoke-pipe. 
 This plan can be adopted more frequently and at less cost than 
 any other, as chimneys are generally constructed. 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 ~ 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 a 
 
 Kb 
 
 c'; 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 iz : '^ 
 
 
 
 
 :| D ' ' 4 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 1 
 
 
 
 
 PIG. 5. — CONSTRUCTION OP CHIMNEY FOB BOTH SMOKE AND VENTILATION. 
 D, SMOKE FLUE. A, VENTILATION FLUE FOE FIRST STORY. B, VENTILA- 
 TION FLUE FOR SECOND STORY. C, VENTILATION FLUE FOR THIRD STORY. 
 
 " In many houses the chimney is so constructed or situated 
 that the ventilation would not be equal to the work required. 
 Such an instance would be when the chimney is short, the bot- 
 tom being near the ceiling in the upper story, with a stove in 
 each story connected with it. In such cases ventilation would 
 be hardly possible. To remedy this the following plan may be 
 adopted : The stove-pipe in the second story may be surrounded 
 by a much larger pipe; a 6-inch pipe may be surrounded by a 
 10-inch pipe; a 7-inch by a 12-inch jacket pipe, and the ventil- 
 ator may be connected with this surrounding jacket. The stove- 
 pipe and the jacket are both to be carried into the chimney as 
 
93 
 
 ■one pipe ; the stove-pipe within will so heat the surrounding air 
 that a strong ventilation will be the result. The ventilator 
 should enter the jacket at or near its bottom, as seen in Fig. 7. 
 
 " This plan, as well as the others recommended, will secure 
 good heating and ventilation at a very moderate cost. I have 
 
 PIG. 6. — A METHOD OP VENTILATION WHERE PROPER FLUES HAVE NOT BEEN 
 PROVIDED. S, STOVE PIPE. V, VENTILATOR PIPE, 6 INCHES DIAMETER, 
 AND OPEN NEAR FLOOR. B, SUPPLY OF OUTDOOR AIR. P, SUPPLY PIPE 
 (OVAL IN SECTIONS). J, JACKET OF STOVE. 
 
FIG. 7. — METHOD OP VENTILATION WHERE 
 STORY. B, SUPPLY OP OUTSIDE AIR. V, 
 
 FLUE OPENING IS IN 
 VENTILATING PIPE. £ 
 
 SECOND 
 STOVE 
 
 PIPE. J, JACKET TO STOVE. D, DRUM, LOCATED IN SECOND STORY. X, 
 JACKET TO STOVE-PIPE, BY WHICH THE AIR WITHDRAWN FROM LOWER 
 ROOM IS SOMEWHAT HEATED BEFORE ENTERING CHIMNEY FLUE. 
 
95 
 
 known it to cost from ten shillings in the simpler forms to ten 
 dollars by the more complicated forms ; so that healthy and 
 comfortable homes may be enjoyed by the poor as well as by 
 the more favored of our fellow-citizens. 
 
 " The ventilation of churches, schools and other public build- 
 ings where large numbers of persons assemble, is of the highest 
 importance. The general practice is to construct very small 
 chimneys, which renders it difficult to secure efficient ventila- 
 tion. In all these cases it would be better to reconstruct them, 
 making them, say, 16 by 36 inches inside, dividing the space 
 into two or more apartments, if there is one story to be warmed, 
 or into three if two stories — one for the smoke, the others for 
 ventilation — with an opening into each ventilating flue, always 
 at the floor. One church has a chimney 16 by 36 inches inside, 
 divided by putting a 16-inch pipe of heavy sheet iron so as to 
 make the side flues of equal size ; the pipe is fitted close to the 
 brick wall to secure it to its place. This is the smoke-pipe, and 
 it warms the air almost instantly in the foul-air flues at its sides, 
 making a very powerful ventilator. This church has a base- 
 ment story, and needs two flues, one for each room. If this 
 pipe should ever be destroyed, another can be slipped inside of 
 it and thus renewed. In public buildings which are heated at 
 intervals this sheet-iron pipe is the best, as it heats the air on 
 each side at once. In a building constantly heated the best 
 way would be to build the partitions in the chimney with 
 brick. The flues should always be plastered smooth. When 
 this cannot be done, the ventilation must be made in the same 
 manner as for dwelling-houses, the ventilating pipes- being cor- 
 respondingly large. 
 
 " In another church a jacket pipe 16 inches in diameter was 
 put around a stove-pipe 7 inches in diameter, connected with a 
 stove — all in the room below — and carried into the chimney. 
 The end of the jacket opposite to the chimney was turned up 
 through the floor by an elbow to receive the foul air of the room 
 above and discharge it into the chimney. The 7-inch pipe 
 enters the 16-inch pipe about four feet from the end furthest 
 from the chimney, and passes through it to the chimney. A 
 fire in the stove below will warm the foul air in the large pipe, 
 and thus carry it away into the chimney. This fire must be 
 
96 
 
 made as soon as that made in the furnace or other heating 
 .apparatus, and continued as long. This church is finely heated 
 and ventilated. [See Fig. 8.] 
 
 "Another church, which is heated by a furnace, is ventilated 
 in the following manner : It has a chimney 16 by 36 inches 
 inside ; to secure good ventilation a hole is made through the 
 floor near the chimney 16 by 20 inches inside ; a tube is fitted 
 into this, and reaches down into the room below, near an open- 
 ing made into the chimney ; an elbow connects the tube with 
 
 FIG. 8. — A METHOD OP VENTILATING CHURCHES. THE PIPE OP A STOVE IN 
 THE BASEMENT IS. JACKETED THROUGHOUT ITS HORIZONTAL LENGTH, THUS 
 INDUCING A DRAFT FROM THE OPENING IN THE FLOOR ABOVE CONNECTED 
 ■WITH IT. S, STOVE-PIPE. J, JACKET AROUND STOVE-PIPE. 
 
 the chimney ; the foul air from the room above passes through 
 this tube into 'the chimney below, and this ventilates the 
 church, giving it pure warm air. The opening into the chimney 
 is made below the entrance of the smoke-pipe from the fur- 
 nace, so that'the smoke does not enter the ventilating tube. 
 [See Fig. 9.] 
 
 " In all these illustrations the two rules given have been 
 observed, and may be applied in many other forms : First, con- 
 
97 
 
 duct the outdoor air against a heated surface; second, conduct 
 the foul air in the room from the floor into a heated flue, and 
 good heating and ventilating will be secured." 
 
 The introduction of fresh air and removal of foul air simul- 
 taneously is accomplished in an almost perfect manner by the 
 stove illustrated in Fig. 10. It has a large drum above the fire, sur- 
 rounded by a jacket, so arranged that a constant supply of fresh 
 air may be brought into contact with greatly-expanded surfaces, 
 which absorb the maximum quantity of heat, and impart it 
 
 FIG. 9. — VENTILATING A CHURCH BY CONNECTING AN OPENING IN THE FLOOR 
 WITH THE MAIN CHIMNEY FLUE, MAKING THE CONNECTIflN BELOW THE 
 ENTRANCE OF THE FURNACE-PIPE. A, CHIMNEY FLUE. B, VENTILATION 
 TUBE. C, POSITION OF FURNACE-PIPE. 
 
 rapidly to the in-flowing currents — thus preventing over-heat- 
 ing, and at the same time supplying the room with an abundant, 
 genial and invigorating atmosphere. It will be observed that 
 two distinct currents pass through the stove. One enters beneath 
 the grate, ascends to the chamber above, passes over the dia- 
 phragm therein, and thence goes to the chimney, furnishing the 
 draft. The other enters under the stove, and becomes heated 
 by contact with the hot surfaces, and rises through the jacket, 
 thus compelling a constant circulation through the latter. The 
 7 
 
98 
 
 fire is entirely open, so that a large supply of additional heat is 
 radiated therefrom. The construction, evidently, is such that 
 
 FIG. 10. 
 
 there is no opportunity for leakage of the deadly carbonic acid 
 gas; nor is there any contact of highly-heated plates with the 
 air of the room to generate carbonic oxide. 
 
99 
 
 By its use the entire atmosphere of any room may be replaced 
 every fifteen or twenty minutes, with a supply of invigorating, 
 refreshing out-door air, moderately warmed, and not dried, 
 parched and devitalized; and the air supplied for breathing 
 may be rendered as pure and refreshing as the outdoor Summer 
 air. 
 
 And now that we are on the subject of heating, it will be in 
 place to warn householders against too great heal and too dry 
 heat. Too much cannot be said to impress on all householders 
 the great value, of keeping all parts of the hous3 — halls, and 
 best rooms, and bed-rooms — as well as the kitchen and living 
 rooms, comfortably warm. Many a doctor's bill, many a bad 
 cold, might be entirely prevented by attention to this matter. 
 It should be safe for the children to go anywhere in the house 
 without danger of catching cold. If our houses were moder- 
 ately heated throughout and thoroughly ventilated, how much 
 better it would be for all concerned, than to overheat one or 
 two rooms in the house and religiously exclude from them 
 God's pure air. 
 
 " Immoderate use of heat during the Winter is the cause of 
 much illness. The effect upon the general vigor of many hours 
 daily spent in overwarm rooms is like that of heat upon a figure 
 in wax. It droops, loses its firmness, and, little by little, will 
 show absolute outward change. Moreover, one of the positive 
 results of hot air is, that it paralyzes the action of the heart. 
 Suppose you were to put your arm in a sling, and make no use 
 of it for three months ; at the end of that time, what would be 
 its condition ? It would be weak, shrunken, almost powerless ; 
 only by a system of careful exercise of weeks in duration could 
 its original vigor be restored. 
 
 " Now, when a person indulges in too much artificial heat, this 
 is what happens to the skin, and, through its collapse, also hap- 
 pens to the system at large. A person leads a sedentary life in 
 hot rooms. As Winter deepens, the cold grows more forbid- 
 ding, the fire more seductive. Fresh air is shut out, the skin 
 becomes less and less able to resist changes of temperature. 
 When this person does go out of doors, no matter how much 
 clothing he may wear, he suffers ; and a cold is almost sure to 
 result." 
 
100 
 
 The danger from overheating. will be greatly lessened if a large 
 pan of water is kept continually evaporating over the stove or 
 in the air-chamber of the furnace. It is a well-known fact that, 
 as air becomes ;heated, its capacity to absorb moisture is greatly 
 increased; and this moisture, which is naturally supplied in 
 Summer, it is necessary for us to artificially supply to the arti- 
 ficial Summer we create within our houses in Winter. 
 
 A safe rule would be to wear warmer clothing in Winter, and 
 keep the temperature of the rooms we live in not higher than 
 68° Fahrenheit. 
 
 • In all that has been said above, the requirements of ordinary 
 country farm-houses have been kept in view, and nothing sug- 
 gested which cannot be effected by a little care and forethought 
 by the head of the household. 
 
 Those who can afford furnaces, or hot water, or steam, I refer 
 to other and larger treatises, only let me add one word of advice 
 to those having these apparatuses in use or contemplating their 
 use, viz. : Be sure the furnace is (1) large enough not to over- 
 heat the air, in order to properly warm the house ; (2) be sure 
 there is a large supply of outdoor air to the air-chamber ; (3) be 
 sure there is an evaporating pan constantly filled in the air- 
 chamber. 
 
 Those having the ventilation and heating of the 
 
 SCHOOL-HOUSE 
 
 and the church in charge, have a grave responsibility resting on 
 their shoulders. To them is committed the care of others' lives 
 and health. The school trustees should make it their duty to 
 often visit the school-house and see that the supply of fresh air 
 is adequate to the wants of the scholars. In the ordinary 
 school-houses in Ewing, the air should be changed at least every 
 nine minutes. This can be easily and safely accomplished by 
 making in the ceiling at least three apertures one foot wide and 
 two feet long, carried through the roof, and a foot or two above 
 it, and fitted with an Emerson Ventilating Cowl, which is 
 intended to prevent a back draught. These openings are to 
 remove the foul air. 'I he fresh air can then be supplied by 
 any of the means mentioned above for houses. The surest 
 way, however, would be by the use of the open stove with a 
 
101 
 
 fresh air inlet, as illustrated above. Whatever stove is used, it 
 should be so placed that the children need not sit close to it, as 
 the effect, particularly of sitting with the back to a hot stove, is 
 very prejudicial to health, resulting often in congestion of the 
 kidneys and other disorders. 
 
 It would be better to have two stoves, with a moderate fire in 
 each, than one large stove overheated. Where there is a cellar 
 beneath the building, it would be better 4o place these stoves in 
 it, supplying fresh air to them by ducts, and then make as 
 many as five openings in the floor, one foot by two, through 
 
 EMERSON VENTILA 
 
 which the warmed air will rise into the room. The cellar in this 
 case should be used for no other purpose (some other place 
 being provided for the coal and wood), and be kept scrupulously 
 clean ; and, where wet, made dry by drainage, as shown in the 
 note on " Drainage for Health." Whatever method is used, the 
 school-room should be provided with thermometers, say one in 
 each corner, which the teacher should often consult to see that 
 the temperature is never above 68° nor below 64°. 
 
 It should be made the duty of the janitor to see that the 
 room is thoroughly aired, by having every window and door 
 opened immediately after the school is closed ; and this airing 
 should continue at least an hour. It should be equally the 
 duty of the janitor to have the room warm and all the shut- 
 
102 
 
 ters open, the sun streaming in, for an hour before school 
 assembles. 
 
 The above remarks have been written with a special view to 
 country district school-houses, and particularly those of Ewing 
 township, which consist of but one room with accommodations 
 for about fifty pupils, and an average attendance of a somewhat 
 less number. 
 
 The editor will be glad, at any time, to furnish, free of charge, 
 to any similar schools in New Jersey, plans and suggestions for 
 heating and ventilating, where he is given the size of the school- 
 room (width and depth), and height of ceiling, the average 
 number of the pupils, and the exposure. These suggestions will 
 be submitted to the best authorities on the subject, in order that 
 the result desired may be obtained at the least expense and in 
 the very best way for the particular case in point. 
 
 Let me impress on teachers that the health of the children 
 committed to their care is of vastly greater concern than the 
 knowledge they may be able to give them. " Ordinary attention 
 to these matters, if systematic and constant, will do much 
 toward lessening the ' murder of the innocents,' who so frequently 
 are the victims of their thoughtless elders." — {Revised by Carl 
 Pfeiffer, Arch. 
 
SYNOPSIS OF SUCH LAWS OF THE STATE 
 
 OF NEW JERSEY AS CONCERN A 
 
 RURAL COMMUNITY. 
 
 COMPILED BY A. G. RICHEY, ESQ. 
 
 Mode of Laying out Public Roads. 
 
 When ten or more persons, being freeholders, shall think a 
 public road necessary in any part of the county, they may 
 apply to the Court of Common Pleas of the county for the 
 appointment of six surveyors of the highways to lay out such 
 road. 
 
 Ten days' notice of such application must be first given. 
 
 The surveyors of the highway are to meet, at such time and 
 place as the court shall direct, for the purpose of laying out said 
 road. 
 
 Notice shall be given by advertisement of the time and place 
 of such meeting. 
 
 The surveyors of the highway, when met as aforesaid, shall 
 view the premises, and may, if they think necessary, lay out 
 such public road ; and they shall lay the same as it appears to 
 them to be most for the public and private convenience — having 
 a regard to the best ground for a road and the shortest distance 
 in such a manner as to do the least injury to private property. 
 
 And they shall make a return thereof, with a map of the same, 
 with the courses and distances, with the time when the overseers 
 of the highway shall open the same for public use. 
 
 The said surveyors shall also make an assessment of the dam- 
 ages, if any, the owner of any land (other than an applicant for 
 such road) shall sustain by laying out the same, above the 
 advantages that will accrue to the owner, which assessment they 
 must affix to their return, which return, with the assessments, 
 
104 
 
 shall be delivered to the clerk of the Court of Common Pleas of 
 the county, who is required to record the said return, together 
 with the map thereof, in a book to be kept for that purpose ; 
 and every road so laid out and recorded as aforesaid shall be a 
 lawful highway from the time appointed for opening the same. 
 
 That the clerk of any Court of Common Pleas shall not record 
 the return of the surveyors of the highway until the expiration 
 of fifteen days after he shall have received the same, so that 
 any person being aggrieved thereby may, within that time, enter 
 a caveat with the said clerk against recording the said return, 
 which shall operate as a supersedeas to further proceedings till 
 the next court. 
 
 At the next court, the persons who have filed the caveat, 
 may make application to the court for the appointment of six 
 of the chosen freeholders of the county in which the road shall 
 have been laid out. 
 
 And the court will appoint them and designate the time and 
 place for their meeting. 
 
 Notice of such meeting to be given. 
 
 And the chosen freeholders so appointed shall proceed to 
 view the road so laid out. 
 
 And if they or a majority of them shall believe such laying 
 necessary and useful, they shall certify the same to the court the 
 term next succeeding their appointment; and the court there- 
 upon shall cause the proceedings to be recorded; and their 
 proceedings shall be binding and conclusive in all cases ; but 
 if they shall believe such laying out to be unnecessary and 
 injurious, they shall certify the same to the court as aforesaid, 
 and the proceedings of the surveyors shall then be null and 
 void. 
 
 Law to Prevent the Spread of Canada Thistle . 
 
 If any person or persons owning or having the care of any 
 lands, enclosed or unenclosed, in this State, shall knowingly 
 permit any Canada thistle to grow up thereon, ar.d suffer the 
 same to stand until its seeds get ripe, he or they shall, for every 
 stalk or bunch thereof so suffered to grow up, forfeit and pay a 
 fine of twenty-five cents ; to be sued for and recovered, with 
 costs, by any person, in his name, before any court of competent 
 jurisdiction. 
 
105 
 
 The Law as to the Construction of Sidewalks. 
 
 That it shall be lawful for the inhabitants of any township in 
 this State, at their annual meeting, to provide for the construc- 
 tion of sidewalks on the public highway, not exceeding in width 
 one-fifth on each side of the road of the width thereof, and also 
 to place posts or railings by the side thereof, which sidewalks 
 shall be constructed out of any money raised for the repairs of 
 highways; and the amount so to be expended, and the road or 
 place where the sidewalks shall be made, shall be determined 
 by such meeting or by the township committee ; provided, that 
 this provision shall not apply to any public highway, which 
 hath been or which shall be hereafter laid out, of a less width 
 than three rods, except in such place or places where it shall 
 pass through a city, town, or village. 
 
 And it shall be lawful for any person owning or occupying 
 lands adjoining a public road or highway in any township, city, 
 or ward, to construct sidewalks on said highway in the manner 
 hereinbefore provided, contiguous and along the line of said land. 
 
 That when a sidewalk shall have been constructed as afore- 
 said, every person who shall ride or drive a horse or team 
 thereon, except for the purpose of crossing the same, when 
 necessary so to do, shall forfeit and pay the sum of five dollars 
 to the use of the township, to be sued for and recovered by any 
 person who shall sue for the same. 
 
 SUPPLEMENT TO THE FOREGOING ACT. 
 
 That the provisions of the act to which this is a supplement, 
 shall not authorize the construction of sidewalks of a greater 
 width than five feet on each side of any public road or highway 
 in this State, which hath been or which shall hereafter be laid 
 out of a less width than three rods, except in such place or 
 places where they pass through the cities, towns, or villages of 
 this State. 
 
 As to Working and Maintaining Public Roads. 
 
 The township committee who shall be hereafter chosen agree- 
 ably to law, in the respective townships of this State, or a 
 majority of such committee, are hereby authorized and directed 
 to assign and appoint, in writing, to the overseers of the high- 
 
106 
 
 ways, respectively, their several limits and divisions of the 
 highways within such township, for opening, clearing out, 
 working, amendment and repair, and the said overseers are 
 hereby commanded to observe and conform themselves to such 
 assignment. 
 
 That it shall be the duty of the said overseers to hire labor- 
 ers, and also horses, oxen, wagons, ploughs, carts and other 
 implements to open, clear out, make, work, amend, repair and 
 keep in good order the highways within their respective limits 
 and divisions, to make causeways, and to erect such bridges as 
 can be built by common laborers, and to procure whatever 
 materials they shall deem necessary to effect the purposes 
 specified in this section. 
 
 That the moneys necessary for defraying the costs, charges 
 and expenses of opening, clearing out, making, working, amend- 
 ing, repairing and keeping in good order the highways, and 
 procuring materials for the same, and also the compensation 
 allowed for the services of the overseers thereof, shall be granted, 
 assessed, collected and raised in the manner prescribed by the 
 act entitled "An act incorporating the inhabitants of townships, 
 designating their powers and regulating their meetings"; and 
 it is hereby enjoined upon the said townships, that they be 
 careful to have money in hand ready to advance sufficient for 
 the objects and purposes specified in this act. 
 
 Law as to Cutting Down Trees Along Highways. 
 
 That no overseer of the highways or other person, except the 
 Owner or owners thereof, shall cut down, willfully injure, or 
 destroy any fruit, shade or ornamental tree which may have 
 been or which shall be planted or set out by the owner or pos- 
 sessor of lands adjoining any highway in this State, and which 
 shall not extend more than seven feet out from the line of the 
 road towards the center of the same, unless the township com- 
 mittee of the township in which such road is situate, or a 
 majority of such committee, shall first order the cutting down 
 or destroying of the same. 
 
 That if any overseer of the highway or other person shall 
 offend against the provisions of the preceding section, he, she 
 or they so offending shall forfeit and pay the sum of fifty dol- 
 
107 
 
 lars for each and every such offence, to be recovered in an action 
 of debt, with costs of suit, in any court having cognizance 
 thereof, by any person who may prosecute for the same, within 
 six months after such offence shall have been committed, pro- 
 vided that this act shall not prevent any overseer from clearing 
 out any highways to their full width where they pass through 
 any wood or forest. 
 
 Law Against Girdling Trees Along Highways. 
 
 That no tree shall be girdled or killed on the highways, under 
 the penalty of two dollars, to be recovered by action of debt, 
 with costs, by the overseer of the highways, in any court of 
 record having cognizance of that sum, and applied to the work- 
 ing and repair of the highways ; and if any such tree shall be 
 girdled or killed in the manner aforesaid, it shall be the duty of 
 the said overseer forthwith to cut down such tree so girdled or 
 killed. 
 
 That if any person shall girdle or kill any tree standing within 
 two rods of such highway, the owner or possessor of the land 
 where the same stands shall, within two years after such girdling 
 or killing, cut down the said tree ; or, on failure thereof, shall 
 forfeit and pay two dollars, to be recovered and applied in the 
 manner above set forth. 
 
 The Law as to Wheel Carriages. 
 
 That all wagons and other wheel carriages of any kind or 
 description whatever, drawn by one or more horse or horses, 
 oxen, or other cattle, made and constructed, and all axle-trees 
 made or repaired from and after the first day of October, A.D. 
 1874, traveling or passing on or through the roads or highways 
 within this State, belonging to persons resident therein, shall 
 run or track on the ground, from center to center of the felloes, 
 not less than four feet and ten inches, under the penalty of five 
 dollars, to be recovered from the owner or owners, proprietor or 
 proprietors of such wagon or other wheel carriage, for each and 
 every offence, before any one justice of the peace of this State, 
 where the fact shall be committed, upon the oath or affirmation 
 of one or more witness or witnesses. Which said fine, when 
 recovered, shall be paid, one moiety thereof to the overseers of 
 
108 
 
 the highways for the township, division, or precinct where the 
 fact was committed, to he applied toward the repair of the 
 highways within the same ; and the other moiety to be paid to 
 the' person or persons prosecuting the same to effect ; and the 
 said overseers are hereby made accountable for all moneys they 
 may receive in virtue of this act, in the same manner and form 
 as they are for other fines and forfeitures; provided, always, 
 that the above fines shall not be set or levied more than once 
 upon one journey, and that every information relative to any 
 breach of this act be made within twenty days/after the offence 
 is committed. 
 
 Respecting Railroads and Canals. 
 
 Every incorporated company that hath been or hereafter may 
 be authorized to construct any railroad in this State, shall cause 
 to be placed on some part of every locomotive engine used by 
 any such company, a bell of a weight of not less than thirty 
 pounds, or steam whistle which can be heard distinctly at a 
 distance of at least three hundred yards from the place where 
 any such railroad crosses a turnpike road or highway upon the 
 same level with the said railroad, and such bell shall be kept 
 ringing, or such whistle shall continue to be blown, until the 
 engine has crossed such turnpike or highway, or has stopped. 
 
 And any railroad company which shall construct any railroad 
 by virtue of powers granted in their charter by this State, may, 
 in crossing any public highway, for the purpose of making such 
 highway cross over or under such railroad at an easy and suit- 
 able grade, alter the location of such highway at their own 
 expense, so far as shall be necessary to make such highway pass 
 over or under said railroad at such grade, and such alteration 
 shall be valid and of the same effect as if made by surveyors of 
 the highway according to law. And all alterations heretofore 
 made in any public highway in this State, by any such railroad 
 company, for the purpose and in the manner aforesaid, are 
 hereby confirmed and made valid as if the same had been made 
 by the surveyors of the highway according to law. 
 
 If any person shall be injured by a locomotive engine, car or 
 cars while walking, standing or playing on any railroad in this 
 State, or by jumping on or off a car while in motion, such per- 
 
109 
 
 son shall be deemed to have contributed to the injury sustained, 
 and shall not recover any damages therefor from the company 
 owning or operating the said railroad ; provided, however, that 
 this section shall not apply to any person or persons crossing a 
 railroad at any lawful public or private crossing. 
 
 Every railroad company shall cause a board with this inscrip- 
 tion, " Look out for the locomotive," to be erected and main- 
 tained wherever the road of such company may be crossed by 
 any turnpike road or public highway, so as to be easily seen by 
 travelers. 
 
 If any such company shall refuse or neglect to comply with 
 the foregoing provisions, they shall forfeit for every such refusal 
 or neglect, the sum of one hundred dollars, to be sued for by 
 the clerk of any township in which such refusal or neglect shall 
 occur, for the use of said township, and to be recovered, with 
 costs, in action of debt in any court having cognizance thereof; 
 provided, that all complaints of any refusal or neglect to com- 
 ply with said provisions shall have been made within ten days 
 thereafter; and, provided further, that nothing herein contained 
 shall be construed to take away from any individual or individ- 
 uals any right he, she or they may have to recover damages for 
 any injury which may be incurred by any refusal or neglect to 
 comply with the requirements of this act. 
 
 If any person shall willfully obliterate, destroy or injure any 
 such board so as aforesaid erected, he, she or they so offending 
 shall forfeit for every such offence the sum of twenty dollars, to 
 be recovered, with costs, by any such railroad company, in an 
 action of debt before any court having cognizance thereof, for 
 the use of said company. 
 
 The Law as to the Width of Public Roads. 
 
 That every public road or highway which shall be hereafter 
 laid out shall not be more than four rods wide, unless a greater 
 width shall be specified in the notices and applications for the 
 same ; nor shall any such road be less than two rods wide, unless 
 the same be laid out in a village, borough or city, and where, 
 by reason of buildings or other permanent erections, such road 
 •cannot be, conveniently, laid out of such width. 
 
110 
 
 That every private road which shall be hereafter laid out shall 
 not be more than thirty feet in width, but may be less, at the 
 discretion of the surveyors. 
 
 The Law to Prevent the Defacement of Natural Scenery. 
 
 That without the previous consent of the owner, all persons 
 are hereafter prohibited from advertising their wares or occupa- 
 tion, by printed notices of the same, on fences or other private 
 property, or upon cliffs or rocks or other natural objects. 
 
 And all persons violating the provisions of the above para- 
 graph shall be punished by a fine of ten dollars for each offence, 
 to be recovered before a justice of the peace ; the action to be 
 brought in debt, in the corporate name of the township, borough 
 or city in which such offence shall be committed ; one-half of 
 which said fine shall be for the use of the informer or prosecutor 
 of such action, the other half to the overseer of the poor of the 
 township, borough or city in which such offence shall have 
 been committed. 
 
 Malicious Mischief. 
 
 Whosoever shall unlawfully and maliciously pull, or throw 
 down, or in anywise destroy any bridge, whether over any 
 stream of water or otherwise, under which bridge any highway, 
 railway or canal shall pass, or do any injury with intent, and 
 so as thereby to render such bridge, viaduct, or the highway, 
 railway or canal passing over or under the same, or any part 
 thereof, dangerous or impassable, shall be guilty of a misde- 
 meanor, and shall be liable to imprisonment at hard labor, not 
 over one year, or fine, not over two hundred dollars, or both. 
 
 As to Certain Crimes. 
 
 Whoever shall unlawfully and maliciously destroy or damage 
 any statue, bust or vase, or any other article or thing kept for 
 the purpose of art, science or literature, or as an object of curi- 
 osity in any museum, gallery, cabinet, library or other reposi- 
 tory, which museum, gallery, cabinet, library or other repository 
 is open for the admission of the public, or of any considerable 
 number of persons, to view the same, either by permission of 
 the proprietor thereof, or by the payment of money before 
 entering the same; or any picture, statue, monument, or other 
 
Ill 
 
 memorial of the dead, or other ornament in any church or other 
 place of divine worship, or in any building, or in any church- 
 yard, burial ground, or public garden or ground, or any orna- 
 ment, railing or fence surrounding such statue or monument, 
 shall be guilty of a misdemeanor, and, being convicted thereof, 
 shall be liable to be imprisoned for any term not exceeding six 
 months, or fined two hundred dollars. 
 
 Whosoever shall steal or cut, break, root up, or otherwise 
 destroy or damage, with intent to steal, the whole or any part 
 of any tree, sapling or shrub, or any underwood or plant, root, 
 fruit or vegetable production, wheresoever the same may be 
 growing, or shall steal, or shall cut, break or throw down, with 
 intent to steal, any fence or any wooden post, pale, wire or rail 
 set up or used as a fence, or any stile or gate, or any part 
 thereof, respectively, he shall be guilty of a misdemeanor, and, 
 on conviction thereof, shall be liable to be punished as in case 
 of larceny. 
 
 As to Disorderly Persons. 
 
 Any person who shall enter the buildings or go upon the 
 lands belonging to any public school district of this State, or 
 used and occupied for school purposes, by any public school in 
 this State, and shall break, injure or deface such building, or 
 any part thereof, or the fences or out-houses belonging to or 
 connected with such building or lands, or shall disturb the 
 exercises of such public school, or molest or give annoyance to 
 the children attending such school, or any teacher therein, shall 
 be deemed and adjudged to be a disorderly person, and may be 
 apprehended in the manner hereinafter described in this act, 
 and taken before any justice of the peace of the county where 
 such person may be apprehended. And it shall be the duty of 
 the said justice to commit such disorderly person, when con- 
 victed before him by the confession of the offender or by the 
 oath or affirmation of one or more witnesses, to the county jail 
 of such county, there to be kept at hard labor for any term not 
 exceeding thirty days. 
 
 An Act to Define and Suppress Tramps. 
 That the following described persons are hereby declared to 
 be tramps : All persons who shall come from any place with- 
 
112 
 
 out this State, or from any city, county, township, borough or 
 place in this State, and have no legal settlement in the placeB 
 in which they are found, and live idly and without employment, 
 and refuse to work for the usual and common wages given to 
 other persons for like work in the place where they then are, or 
 shall be found going about from door to door, or placing them- 
 selves in the streets, highways or roads to beg or gather alms, 
 and can give no reasonable account of themselves or their 
 business in such places. 
 
 That if any person shall be found offending in any county, 
 city, township, borough or district in this State, against this 
 act, it shall and may be lawful for any constable or police 
 officer of such place, and he is hereby enjoined and required, 
 on notice thereof to him given by any of the inhabitants 
 thereof, or without such notice, on his own view, to apprehend 
 and convey, or cause to be conveyed, such person to a justice of 
 the peace or other magistrate of such place, who shall examine 
 such person, and shall commit him or her, being thereof legally 
 convicted before him, on his own view, or by the confession of 
 such offenders, or by the oath or affirmation of one or more 
 credible witnesses, to labor upon any county farm or upon the 
 streets, roads and highways of any city, township or borough, 
 or in any house of correction, poor-house, work-house or com- 
 mon jail, for a term not exceeding six months, and shall forth- 
 with commit him or her to the custody of the steward, keeper 
 or superintendent of such county farm, house of correction, 
 poor-house, work-house or common jail, or to the supervisors or 
 overseers of the highways, street commissioners, or other officer 
 or officers having in charge the repairs of any street, road or 
 highway, or overseers of the poor of the respective township, 
 borough, county or city wherein such person shall be found, as 
 in their judgment shall be deemed most expedient. 
 
 An Act to Prevent Trespassing with Guns. 
 
 If any person or persons shall carry any gun on any land not 
 his own, and for which the owner pays taxes, or is in his lawful 
 possession, unless he hath license or permission in writing from 
 the owner or owners or. legal possessor, every such person so 
 offending, and convicted thereof, either upon the view of any 
 
113 
 
 justice of the peace within this State, or by the oath or affirma- 
 tion of one or more witnesses, before any justice of the peace 
 within this State, or by the oath or affirmation of one or more 
 witnesses, before any justice of the peace of either of the coun- 
 ties, cities or towns corporate, of this State, in which the offender 
 may be taken or reside, he shall, for every such offence, forfeit 
 and pay to the owner of the soil, or bis tenant in possession, the 
 sum of five dollars, with costs of suit ; which forfeiture may and 
 shall be sued for and recovered by the owner of the soil or ten- 
 ant in possession, before any justice of the peace in this State, 
 for the use of such owner or tenant in possession. 
 
 Law to Prevent the Adulteration of Milk. 
 
 If any person shall knowingly sell any impure or unwhole- 
 some milk, he shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and 
 on conviction thereof, he shall be punished by a fine of not less 
 than fifty dollars for each and every offence. 
 
 And if any person shall adulterate milk with a view of offer- 
 ing the same for sale, he shall be deemed guilty of a misde- 
 meanor, and on conviction thereof shall be punished by a fine 
 of not less than fifty dollars for each and every offence. 
 
 The addition of water to milk is hereby declared to be an 
 adulteration thereof. 
 
 Law for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals. 
 
 That any person who shall overdrive, overload, overwork, 
 cruelly beat or otherwise abuse any living animal, and any per- 
 son having the charge of any living animal, who inflicts unnec- 
 essary cruelty upon the same, or fails to provide the same with 
 proper food, drink or shelter, or protection from the weather, 
 shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and for every such 
 offence, shall, on conviction thereof, be punished, by fine not 
 exceeding two hundred dollars, or by imprisonment in the 
 county jail not exceeding six months, or both, in the discretion 
 of the court. 
 
 And any person who shall keep or use any place for the pur- 
 pose of fighting or baiting any bull, bear, dog, cock, or other 
 living animal or creature, and every person who shall be pres- 
 ent and witness, encourage, aid or assist therein, shall be 
 
114 
 
 deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and for every such offence, 
 shall, on conviction thereof, be punished by fine not exceeding 
 one thousand dollars, or by imprisonment at hard labor not 
 exceeding two years, or both, at the discretion of the court. 
 
 And any person who shall use any dog or dogs for the pur- 
 pose of drawing any cart or other vehicle for business or other 
 purposes, shall forfeit and pay a fine of one dollar for the first 
 offence and ten dollars for each subsequent offence — such 
 offender, together with the dog, cart or other vehicle shall be 
 taken before a justice of the peace or police magistrate, who, 
 upon being satisfied, shall impose said fine, which said fine, as 
 soon as imposed, shall have the force and effect of a judgment, 
 and execution may be immediately issued thereon, and the 
 articles so seized levied upon and sold to pay and satisfy the 
 said fine, together with the costs. 
 
 That if a maimed, sick, infirm or disabled animal shall be 
 abandoned to die, by any person, in any public place, such per- 
 son shall be deemed guilty of a misdemeanor, and on conviction 
 thereof shall be punished as provided for in the beginning of 
 this article. That any person who shall overdrive, overwork, 
 torture, deprive of necessary sustenance, or cruelly beat or oth- 
 erwise abuse or kill, any living animal or creature, and every 
 person who shall be present, and witness, encourage or assist 
 therein, shall forfeit and pay such sum, not exceeding one hun- 
 dred dollars, as the court shall determine, to be sued for and 
 recovered in an action of debt, with costs of suit, by any person, 
 in the name of " The New Jersey Society for the Prevention of 
 Cruelty to Animals." 
 
 An Act for the Preservation of Sheep. 
 
 When any person shall sustain damage or injury by reason 
 of his or her sheep or lambs being killed or wounded by a dog 
 or dogs, wolf or wolves, it shall be lawful for such person to 
 take two respectable freeholders of the township wherein such 
 damage was done, who are in nowise akin to the party so call- 
 ing them, to view the sheep or lambs so killed or wounded, and 
 if it shall appear to their satisfaction that the said sheep or 
 lambs were killed or wounded by a dog or dogs, wolf or wolves, 
 then the said freeholders shall make a return or certificate 
 
H5 
 
 thereof in writing, stating the amount of damages such person 
 may have sustained, which shall in no case exceed five dollars 
 for one sheep or lamb so killed or wounded, which said certifi- 
 cate shall entitle the person so injured to the sum stated therein 
 as the damage sustained, to be paid by the township committee, 
 in conformity to the provisions made therefor in the fifth sec- 
 tion of this act. And in case the damage so certified shall 
 appear to the town committee to be excessive, it shall and may 
 be lawful for said committee to require the facts stated and the 
 claim exhibited, to be investigated before them on oath or 
 affirmation, and shall award payment accordingly. Provided 
 always, that nothing herein contained shall extend to cases 
 wherein a recovery of damages can be obtained of the owner or 
 owners of such dog or dogs as shall have committed the injury. 
 
 Protection Against Mad Dogs. 
 
 The mayor of any incorporated town in this State, by the 
 advice and consent of the common council of the town, and the 
 township clerk of any township in this State, by the advice of 
 the township committee, are authorized, whenever, in their 
 opinion, the public safety may require, to issue his proclama- 
 tion authorizing the destruction of all dogs, male and female, 
 found running at large within the limits of the town, except 
 such as shall be properly muzzled with a wire muzzle about the 
 nose, securely fastened, after one day's public notice by written 
 or printed hand-bills ; provided, that nothing in said proclama- 
 tion shall apply to a dog or dogs of a non-resident passing 
 through the town accompanied by the owner or owners of such 
 dog or dogs. 
 
 An Act to Prevent Spread of Contagious Diseases Amongst 
 
 Cattle. 
 
 The town committee of each township of this State, upon 
 notice of the existence of any disease among cattle in their 
 township, are authorized personally to examine the cases, and if 
 the symptoms which characterize contagious diseases are exhib- 
 ited, they shall cause such sick animals to be immediately 
 removed and kept separate from all other cattle; and the 
 remaining cattle of said owner shall be kept isolated from the 
 
116 
 
 sick ones, and both they and the sick animals shall be kept dis- 
 tant at least four hundred feet from the public road, and the 
 same distance from the premises of all neighbors. 
 
 The town committee are also authorized to prohibit the 
 importation of cattle from other places into or through their 
 respective township ; and if any one shall import or drive any 
 cattle into or through any township after the same shall have 
 been publicly prohibited by the town committee, he shall pay a 
 fine of one hundred dollars for every bull, ox, steer, cow, heifer 
 or calf so driven into a township. Any person who shall dis- 
 pose of any cattle or stock, knowing it to be subject to any con- 
 tagious disease, shall pay a fine of one hundred dollars for any 
 such animal sold within the township. 
 
 The persons qualified to vote at town meetings are authorized 
 at their annual meetings to make such provision and allow such 
 rewards for the destruction of wolves, wild-cats, foxes, crows, 
 black-birds, and other noxious wild animals and birds, as they 
 so assembled shall deem necessary or proper. 
 
 Destruction of Insectiverous, Small and Harmless Birds, 
 
 That it shall not be lawful for any person to wantonly shoot, 
 entrap for the purpose of killing, or in any other manner destroy 
 any upland birds whose principal food is insects, comprised in 
 the families of swallows, fly-catchers, finches, larks, wood-peck- 
 ers and other species and varieties of land birds of every 
 description regarded as harmless in their habits, and whose 
 flesh is unfit for food, excepting the eagle, raven, crow, all 
 hawks and owls which prey upon other birds, and that it shall 
 not be lawful for any person to take or destroy the eggs or 
 young of any of the species of birds which are intended to be 
 protected by this act. 
 
 And if complaint is made, under oath, before any justice of 
 the peace of this State, of any violation of the foregoing provi- 
 sions, it shall be the 'duty of such justice to forthwith issue, 
 under his hand and seal, a warrant against the person or per- 
 sons so offending, and the proceedings before the justice shall 
 be regulated according to the provisions of the act entitled "An 
 act constituting courts for the trial of small causes." 
 
-117 
 
 And every person offending against the provisions of this act, 
 shall, on conviction, be fined in any sum not less than ten or 
 more than twenty dollars, with costs of suit, in the discretion of 
 the court before whom such conviction shall be had. 
 
 As the school law is published in full in pamphlet form, it 
 has not been thought worth while to make any extracts there- 
 from ; but the editor would call attention to that provision of 
 the law which authorizes the State Superintendent to pay to 
 any school, which shall raise twenty dollars by subscription for 
 a library or for philosophical apparatus, a like sum to be used 
 for the same purpose. Furthermore, so long, after the first year, 
 as a school raises ten dollars a year for the above purpose, the 
 State will add a like sum. 
 
CONSTITUTION 
 
 OF TEfB 
 
 West Ewing Improvement Association. 
 
 We, the residents of the township of Ewing, county of Mercer 
 and State of New Jersey, in order to form an Association to 
 improve and ornament the public roads and grounds, do ordain 
 and establish this Constitution for said Association. 
 
 ARTICLE I. 
 
 This Association shall be called " The West Ewing Impeove- 
 ment Association." 
 
 ARTICLE II. 
 
 The object of this Association shall be to improve and orna- 
 ment the public roads and grounds of the township, by plant- 
 ing and cultivating trees, establishing and maintaining walks, 
 grading and draining the roadways, providing public drinking 
 troughs, breaking out paths through the snow, lighting canal 
 bridges, and generally doing whatever may tend to the improve- 
 ment of the township as a place of residence. 
 
 ARTICLE III. 
 
 The officers of this Association shall be a President, two Vice- 
 Presidents, a Secretary and a Treasurer, who shall constitute the 
 Executive Committee. 
 
 The officers shall be elected at the annual meeting, (except 
 for the first election, which shall take place October 8th, 1878,) 
 and shall hold their offices until their successors have been 
 elected. 
 
 ARTICLE IV. 
 
 It shall be the duty of the President, and, in his absence, of 
 the senior Vice-President, to preside at all meetings of the 
 
120 
 
 Association, and to carry out all orders of the Executive Com- 
 mittee. 
 
 ARTICLE V. 
 
 It shall be the duty of the Secretary to keep a correct and 
 careful record of all proceedings of the Association and of the 
 Executive Committee, in a book suitable for their preservation ; 
 to give notice of all meetings of the Association and of the 
 Executive Committee; to make all publications, and to give all 
 public and private notices ordered by the Executive Committee, 
 and to attend to all correspondence of the Association. 
 
 ARTICLE VI. 
 
 It shall be the duty of the Treasurer to keep the funds of the 
 Association, and to make such disbursements as may be ordered 
 by the Executive Committee. 
 
 ARTICLE VII. 
 
 It shall be the duty of the Executive Committee to employ 
 all laborers, make all contracts, expend all moneys, and gener- 
 ally to direct and superintend all improvements which, in their 
 discretion, and with the means at their command, will best 
 serve the public interest. 
 
 The Executive Committee shall hold a meeting at least once 
 a month, and as much oftener as they may deem expedient. 
 
 The Executive Committee shall have power to institute pre- 
 miums to be awarded for planting and protecting ornamental 
 trees, and for doing such other acts as may seem to them worthy 
 of such encouragement. They shall also encourage frequent 
 public meetings of the Association, and of citizens generally, 
 both with a view to maintain an interest in their work, and for 
 the general encouragement of meeting together for discussion 
 and amusement. 
 
 It shall be the duty of the Executive Committee to obtain the 
 preparation of papers on topics directly bearing on the work of 
 the Association, which shall be read at the social meetings. 
 
 ARTICLE VIII. 
 
 Auxiliary to the Executive Committee there shall be sub- 
 committees of an advisory nature, whose duty it shall be to pro- 
 
121 
 
 mote the objects of the Association in their district, by interest- 
 ing all members of the community in the work, and suggesting 
 improvements most needed in their immediate neighborhoods. 
 
 These committees shall be especially charged with preserving 
 and carefully providing for the safety of trees planted, and 
 other improvements effected in their districts. They shall be 
 composed of two ladies and one gentleman, and shall offer their 
 suggestions at the social meetings. 
 
 These committees shall be appointed by the President of the 
 Association. 
 
 ARTICLE IX. 
 
 Three members of the Executive Committee, present at any 
 meeting, shall constitute a quorum for transacting business, and 
 a vote of the majority of those present shall be binding on the 
 Association. 
 
 ARTICLE X. 
 
 No debt shall be contracted by the Executive Committee 
 beyond the amount of available funds within their control to 
 pay it ; and no member of the Association shall be liable for 
 any debt of the Association beyond the amount of his or her 
 subscription. 
 
 ARTICLE XL 
 
 Every person over fourteen years of age, who shall plant a 
 tree under the direction of the Executive Committee, and 
 obligate himself or herself to protect it for three years, or who 
 shall pay the sum of one dollar annually, shall be a member of 
 this Association, and every child under fourteen years of age, 
 who shall pay the sum of twenty-five cents annually, shall be 
 a member of this Association. 
 
 ARTICLE XII. 
 
 The payment of ten dollars annually for three years, or twenty- 
 five dollars in one sum, shall constitute a person a member of 
 this Association for life. 
 
 ARTICLE XIII. 
 
 The autograph signatures of all members of the Association 
 shall be preserved in a book suitable for that purpose. 
 
122 
 
 ARTICLE XIV. 
 
 An annual meeting of the Association shall be held at such a 
 place as the Executive Committee may direct, on the fourth 
 Wednesday of August, at two o'clock P.M. Notice of such 
 meeting shall be posted at the five most public places in the 
 district, at least seven days prior to the time of holding said 
 meeting, and a written notice shall be sent to all non-resident 
 members. Other meetings of the Association may be called by 
 the Executive Committee, on due notice being given. 
 
 ARTICLE XV. 
 
 At the annual meeting, the Executive Committee shall report 
 the amount of money received during the year, and the source 
 from which it has been received; the amount of money 
 expended during the year, and the objects for which it has been 
 expended ; the number of trees planted at the cost of the Asso- 
 ciation ; the number planted by individuals, with the location, 
 the kind of tree and the name of the planter, and generally all 
 of the acts of the committee. This report shall be entered on 
 the record of the Association. 
 
 ARTICLE XVI. 
 
 Any person who shall plant a tree under the direction of the 
 Executive Committee, and shall protect it for five years, shall 
 be entitled to have such tree known forever by his or her name. 
 
 ARTICLE XVII. 
 
 This Constitution may be amended by the Executive Com- 
 mittee, with the approval of the majority of the members 
 present, at any annual meeting of the Association, or at any 
 special meeting, the notice of which shall have been accompanied 
 by a copy of the proposed amendment, with the statement that 
 the amendment is to be voted on at such meeting. 
 
BY-LAWS. 
 
 I. The Executive Committee shall grant a certificate of merit, 
 of an artistic design, to such of the school children as shall be 
 certified by their teachers to have shown special zeal in keeping 
 the surroundings of the school-houses Deat and clean, or in 
 beautifying them in any way. These certificates to be pre- 
 sented by the President — the committee, or some of them, being 
 present — on the first Wednesday in June, at the morning ses- 
 sion for Scudder's Falls, and afternoon session for Birmingham 
 and Brookville. 
 
 II. RULES FOE TREE PLANTING. 
 
 1. Trees shall be planted on the road side of the line, and at a 
 distance of four feet therefrom, except in the case of roads two 
 rods wide and under, when the permission of the property- 
 holder shall be obtained, to set them one foot from the line, in 
 the field. 
 
 2. The trees shall be set apart a distance of 150 feet, the 
 opposite rows alternating. 
 
 3. The following trees are recommended as best for road 
 planting, viz. : Sugar Maple, Norway Maple, Elm, White Ash, 
 Linden, Horse Chestnut, Water Birch, Mountain Ash, and 
 occasionally a fruit tree. 
 
 III. The members of this Association shall, as a body and as 
 individuals, use their influence to prevent the erection of adver- 
 tising placards of any description, and to this end mutually 
 agree to remove or cause to be removed, within ten days from 
 June 1st, 1879, any such signs on the property of any of them, 
 whether painted on barns, fences or stones, or nailed or pasted 
 on trees or fences, or otherwise constructed, except legal notices 
 and the usual advertisements of church festivals, which latter 
 shall be allowed to stand for ten days before the date of the 
 festival. 
 
124 
 
 IV. Hereafter any person, upon compliance with Article XT 
 of the Constitution, may be elected a member of this Associa- 
 tion, on the nomination of any member whose dues are paid, 
 and a vote of two-thirds of the members whose dues are paid. 
 
 V. No charge shall be made for the patent road-scraper for 
 private use, by members of the Association, To all others, and 
 for work on the public roads, the charge shall be five dollars 
 per day, the Association furnishing a man to work the machine 
 (whom the Executive Committee shall pay a sum not to exceed 
 one dollar and a quarter), but no team. In all cases the consent 
 of the Executive Committee must first be obtained. 
 
LIST OF BOOKS 
 
 Which will be found valuable to those interested in Mural and Sanitary 
 Improvement Associations. 
 
 Air and Its Relations to Life, by W. N. Hartley. $1.50. 
 
 A- Pictorial Guide to Domestic Sanitary Defects, by T. Pridgin Teale, 
 M.A., Surgeon to the General Infirmary at Leeds. With 55 litho- 
 graphs. 8vo. $4. 
 
 A Treatise on Ventilation, by Lewis W. Leeds. $2.50. 
 
 Drainage for Profit and Draining for Health, by George E. Waring, 
 Jr. $1.50. 
 
 Frankland's Water Analysis for Sanitary Purposes. $1. 
 
 Hassell's Food and Its Adulterations. 
 
 Health and Comfort in House Building, by J. Drysdale, M.D., and 
 J. W. Hayward, M.D. Second Edition. $3. 
 
 Healthy Houses, by Wm. Eassie. $1. 
 
 Healthy Houses, by Fleming Jenkin, F.R.S., adapted to American 
 Conditions by George E. Waring, Jr. Harpers' Half-Hour Series. 25 
 cents. 
 
 Heat, as applied to the Useful Arts, for the Use of Engineers, Archi- 
 tects, etc., by Thomas Box. $5. 
 
 House Drainage and Water Service, by James C. Bayles. $3. 
 
 Lecture on Water Supply, Sewage and Sewage Utilization, by W. H. 
 Corfleld, M.A. 50 cents. 
 
 Parkes' Hygiene, edited by De Chaumont. $6. 
 
 Sanitary Engineering, by Baldwin Latham. 
 
 Sanitary Engineering, by J. Bailey Denton. 
 
 Sanitary Work in Towns and Villages, by Charles Slagg. 
 
 The House and Its Surroundings. 40 cents. 
 
 The Sanitary Drainage of Houses and Towns, by George E. Waring, 
 Jr. $2. 
 
 Villages and Village Life, by Rev. N. H. Eggleston. $1.75. 
 
 Village Improvements and Farm Villages, by Col. George E. War- 
 ing, Jr. 75 cents. 
 
 Wanklyn and Chapman's Water Analysis. $2.50. 
 
 Wilson's Hand-Book of Hygiene. $3. 
 
 Any of the above books may be obtained at the office of The Sani- 
 tary Engineer, 140 William Street, New York. P. O. Box 3037. 
 
INDEX 
 
 PAGE. 
 
 Anniversary Meeting 1 
 
 Address of President 1 
 
 " " Hon. B. G. Northrop 7 
 
 " " Col. Geo. E. Waring 25 
 
 Constitution and By-Laws 119 
 
 Drainage for Health 77 
 
 Factory Adornment 72 
 
 Hedges 58 
 
 Heating and Ventilation 83 
 
 Laws of New Jersey 103 
 
 Lawns 70 
 
 Lenox System 74 
 
 Report of Col. Geo. E. Waring 42 
 
 Cellars 42 
 
 Furnace 42 
 
 Sunlight and Fresh Air 43 
 
 The Privy 45 
 
 Disposal of Kitchen Sink Waste 47 
 
 Bays at the Side of the Canal 54 
 
 Keeler's Mill-dam 55 
 
 Eoadways 64 
 
 Sidewalks 62 
 
[From the Report of the Secretary of Conn. Board of Agriculture, 1881.] 
 
 WHAT SHOULD OUK SCHOOLS DO FOE 
 A(MCULTUEE ? 
 
 BT PROP. B. G. NORTHROP. 
 
 Fakming is the leading and most essential business of the coun- 
 try, occupying more than three-fourths of our laboring population. 
 It is the basis of the wealth, prosperity, and power of the Ameri- 
 can people. Its depreciation would demoralize the nation. It 
 was the original, divinely-appointed calling of man. God planted 
 a garden in Eden, and made it man's first duty to " dress and keep 
 it." "When driven from Eden, it was stil his mission to " till the 
 ground from whence he was taken, and to eat bread in the sweat 
 of his face." The Creator plainly intended that Agriculture should 
 be the ground-work of civilized society ; the basis of all progress. 
 On its prosperity hang the hopes of the race, far more than on any 
 other calling. It must provide the means of sustaining an increas- 
 ing population, or there can be no growth. Commerce and manu- 
 factures depend upon it more than it does upon them. In the 
 words of Webster, "they all stand together like pillars in a cluster, . 
 the largest in the center, and that largest is Agriculture." For an . 
 
interest so broad and vital to the prosperity of the whole country, 
 our schools should accomplish the best possible results. 
 
 Now that slavery is abolished, we have no vestige of a caste sys- 
 tem in America. Labor is honorable, and the laborer is honored. 
 The most popular rallying-cry to help a candidate for the highest 
 office is some term which affiliates him with farmers or other 
 workmen, like "the rail-splitter," or "tow-path boy." In contrast 
 with the distinct classes and hereditary nobilities of the old world, 
 it is our proud national characteristic that we are a working peo- 
 ple, that he is the noblest who works most and best for the general 
 weal, and that the cause of the workmen is recognized as the cause 
 of all. The best way to elevate farming is to elevate the farmer. 
 The people are learning that mere muscle is weak, and that brains 
 help the hands in all work, that knowledge and skill multiply the 
 value and productive power of muscular efforts. "Whatever the 
 chemical analyses of our Experiment Station may show, the best 
 of all fertilizers isbrains. In farming, as every where, if knowl- 
 edge is power, ignorance is impotence. What a man is, stamps 
 an impress upon what he does, on the farm or in the shop. The 
 style of the work depends on the character of the workman. 
 Whatever elevates the farmer ultimately improves his farming. 
 Whatever degrades the farmer at once depreciates his work. The 
 wealth and welfare of individuals and communities, always de- 
 pendent on labor, can be most fully secured only by educated labor. 
 You can dignify farming in no way so surely as by educating, and 
 thus elevating, the farmer. As mind triumphs over matter, the 
 amount of manual labor requisite to secure equal results constantly 
 lessens. The future improvement of farming depends on brain as 
 well as brawn. The progress of civilization has always been com- 
 mensurate with man's dominion over nature, and his utilization of 
 her forces and resources. " Subdue the earth and have dominion 
 over it," was the primeval command. We gain that dominion 
 over nature just in proportion as we discover and obey her laws. 
 In struggles for material success, he wins who best wields physical 
 forces. 
 
 To enable our schools to accomplish better results for agriculture, 
 I invite our farmers to do more for the schools, and especially to 
 visit them. We need a still higher appreciation of them, and a 
 more active and intelligent interest in their improvement. Apathy 
 on the part of parents would neutralize the efforts of the best teach* 
 
3 
 
 ers. The character of the schools in every place must answer to the 
 local public sentiment. You stimulate public interest by improv- 
 ing the schools, no more surely than you improve the schools by 
 elevating public opinion. The Legislature alone cannot create 
 good schools. Right laws may accomplish much, but the people, 
 once in earnest, will do more. In our rural districts, no class can 
 so effectually advance this great interest of the people as the 
 farmers. 
 
 The most essential service our public schools can render for 
 Agriculture is to give all our youth a thorough training in the 
 common English branches. These lay the foundation for success 
 in all after work, whether on the farm, in the shop or store. The 
 point of greatest weakness, 'even in our colleges, is found in the 
 deficiency of their candidates in the elementary branches. Thor- 
 oughness here at the outset means thoroughness everywhere. The 
 habits of accuracy, of application, of self-control, and self-reliance 
 in overcoming difficulties, early formed in school, constitute the 
 best preparation for the farm and all other callings of life. Far 
 more thought and time and drill should be given to these simple 
 elements. Eightly taught, they provide the truest discipline for 
 the juvenile mind, and form the best basis for all future acquisi- 
 tions. "When we build the superstructure without a firm founda- 
 tion, all is insecure. The first effort of the school is to lay the 
 ground-work broad and strong. That done, and you create the 
 desire and the skill to build up the edifice ; that done, and school 
 is a welcome place, and study becomes a pleasure ; that done, and 
 there follows such a hungering for knowledge that when one's 
 school-days are ended he realizes that his education is but just 
 begun, and for the rest, it shall be the aim and pleasure of his life 
 to educate himself. Even though the milking may summon him 
 early in the morning, and the chores detain him late at night, he 
 will seek time and find time for the cherished work of self -improve- 
 ment. Place him where you will, let his work press as it may, he 
 will find leisure for reading, and occupy rainy days, the long win- 
 ter evenings, and all intervals of labor in efforts for self-improve- 
 ment. Even the odd moments thus utilized, in the end yield a 
 large reward. The habit of utilizing these odd moments, and thus 
 learning how to economize time as well as money, has most im- 
 portant moral bearings. The boy who thus early learns that "life 
 is real, life is earnest," and makes the most of each passing hour, is 
 
gaining self-command and self-respect, high aims and purposes 
 that lift him above temptation and give him the true farmer's self- 
 poise and conscious independence. 
 
 To secure the best results for our farmers, I would advocate giv- 
 ing greater prominence to reading, ■which I have long regarded as 
 by far the most important study taught in our schools. This is 
 the surest way to the mastery of all higher studies. Early pro- 
 ficiency here fosters a fondness for books, while aversion to study 
 springs from tasking youth in severer branches before they can read 
 fluently. Let a child early learn to read with facility, and he has 
 the key by which he can open any door in the temple of science. 
 Isolated as the farmer's homes necessarily are, to a great extent, 
 reading should be made the never- failing attraction, of the long 
 Winter evenings. But when it is. a toilsome process to spell out 
 the words, there'can be little pleasure in reading or -interest in the 
 narrative. It is the duty or rather the privilege of the farmer to 
 see to it that his children are liberally supplied with attractive and 
 wholesome reading, whether by the purchase or exchange of 
 books, or by reading clubs, or by a town or district library. 
 Whenever its importance, is duly felt, some method of gaining the 
 proper supply will be devised, ' 
 
 For the best results to our farmers, and to all industrial classes, 
 less time should be given to the complex puzzles qf arithmetic, 
 and more to the simple ground rules. Master addition, subtrac- 
 tion, multiplication, division, percentage, and the keeping of ac- 
 counts, and the rest which is, of practical value is easily and quickly 
 gained. Our arithmetics are too voluminous. Let there be more 
 drill in rapid mental combinations and practical methods and prin- 
 ciples, and less study of abstruse processes. Such topics as alliga- 
 tion, medial and alternate, and commutation of radix, and others 
 as intricate and useless,, may well be omitted in a common-school 
 course. These and kindred topics, never applied in ordinary busi- 
 ness, fill a large space in the arithmetics,, and waste much precious 
 time of the pupils. They have the sanction of tradition rather 
 than of common-sense. In continuing them, teachers and authors 
 have consulted usage more than utility. Like the titled scions of 
 rank, in the old world, they • have come dowft by so long a literary 
 descent that no one disputes their right, to their honored place. 
 "Worth more than all these obsolete processes is the thorough 
 mastery of the ground rules. Rapid mental combinations should 
 
be daily practiced, till pupils can add, multiply, and divide with 
 the utmost rapidity and accuracy. The art of arithmetic will thus 
 be mastered, though the profundities of the science be not ex- 
 plored. Ex-President Thomas Hill, of Harvard college, himself 
 an eminent mathematician, strongly condemns the common prac- 
 tice of stupefying and disgusting pupils with premature attempts 
 to understand arithmetic as a science, while, as a consequence, they 
 fail to acquire facility in it as an art. Life is not long enough to 
 spend so much time on the intricacies of compound proportion, 
 permutation, and the lite, that not one in a thousand ever applies 
 in business. 
 
 The public school should train our youth in habits of observa-, 
 Hon, which is the prime secret of success in farming, and forms 
 the true basis of all higher education. The child's intellectual life 
 begins with impressions from the senses, which are the windows 
 of the soul. The noblest of these, and the royal avenue to the 
 mind, is the eye. This sense-education commences in the cradle, 
 and should continue through life. Hence, "Things before names, 
 ideas before words," and, in higher stages, "Principles and pro- 
 cesses before rules," should be the motto. Too often the teacher 
 begins with books and continues with books only, teaching that 
 which is impractical, if not incomprehensible, to the neglect of 
 things nearest at hand, things most interesting, suggestive, and 
 useful. God designed nature to be the earliest and most constant 
 teacher of the juvenile mind, and has made objects and events 
 the leading instruments of developing the faculties. Invaluable 
 as are books, they are but the art of man, while nature is the art 
 of God. It is therefore a narrow view of education that makes 
 books its only instruments. Every device should be employed to 
 foster love of nature, and form habits of careful observation of 
 common things. The organs of sense, when not early trained, be- 
 come rigid and unimpressible. The teacher who relies upon the 
 text-book alone is more than three thousand years behind Job, 
 whose maxims deserve a place in the most modern didactics. 
 "Ask now the beasts, and they shall teach thee, and the fowls Of 
 the air, and they shall tell thee; or speak to the earth, and it shall 
 teach thee; and the fishes of the sea shall declare unto thee." Such 
 a teacher forgets the motto of the wise man, who said, " Go to the 
 ant, thou sluggard; consider her ways and be wise," or that of the 
 Great Teacher, who said, "Consider the lilies of the field, how they 
 grow," and "Behold the fowls of the air." Milton well says, "To 
 
6 
 
 know those things which about us lie in daily life is the prime 
 wisdom." ' 
 
 I commend to our farmers' hoys the advice given to youth hy 
 Hugh Miller: "Learn to make a right use of your eyes ; the com- 
 monest things are worth looking at, even stones, weeds, and the 
 most f amiliar animals. One of the best schools I ever attended 
 was the miscellany of objects and circumstances surrounding me 
 in my native district, challenging the first exercise of my senses 
 and fancy, and this is a species of education open to all." True, 
 but how few are open to it. How many go through the world 
 practically blindfolded. Under the lead of his uncle Sandy, the 
 keen-eyed harness-maker, Hugh Miller, while a boy, had observed 
 carefully the rocks, rains, tides, trees, ferns, shell-fish, sea-fowl, and 
 insects along the rocky shore of his native Chromarty. "While 
 working seventeen years as stone-mason in the quarries or sheds, 
 he studied the stones he was hammering, and thus became the 
 most eminent geologist of his age. So, in general, the most dis- 
 tinguished men of all ages and countries have been close students 
 of nature and observers of common things. 
 
 I have emphasized this subject because the careful observation 
 of nature's processes is specially essential to the success of the 
 farmer. Unless acquired early, the habit is not likely to be ever 
 formed. This work cannot be done by proxy. The judgment of 
 the farmer must be based on his personal observations. Indispen- 
 sable as is the knowledge gained from books, its use and applica- 
 tion depends on one's own study of things. The failures of fancy 
 farmers come from following book theories without that adapta- 
 tion to changed local conditions which personal observation and 
 experience alone can suggest. Hence, both in the family and 
 school, curiosity should be so stimulated as to prompt an insatiable 
 desire for that knowledge which , comes through the senses when 
 trained in observing the qualities of common things. Curiosity,' 
 or, what is kindred, love of knowledge, is one of the strongest 
 natural desires of the child. Though too often dwarfed by our 
 blundering, when the senses are sharpened it is one of the most 
 vital forces in education, becoming the parent of perception and 
 attention, of memory, imagination, and expression. It prepares 
 the soil and fertilizes the seeds of truth. A farmer might as well 
 sow a field without plowing as a teacher instruct pupils in whose 
 minds no love of knowledge has been awakened. Strong in child- 
 hood, it should grow with years and attainments. Though at first 
 
a restless instinct, it should mature into a ruling passion. Curi- 
 osity is to the mind what appetite is to the body. It creates a 
 hungering for knowledge, which is the mind's food. Love of 
 truth was as strong a passion with Newton or Agassiz as love of 
 conquest with Napoleon. Under its healthful inspiration, study is 
 a pleasure, — without it, a task ; the dullest • drudgery, "a weari- 
 ness of the flesh.'' Curiosity is the primal desire to which the 
 child's nature responds ; it is the impelling power to which genius, 
 when enriched with the treasures of science, is most susceptible. 
 The amplest supplies only add fuel to the flame. Instead of sur- 
 feit, there comes an intenser craving for more. Each new attain- 
 ment gives strength and stimulus for higher acquisitions. To show 
 how susceptible is the plastic mind of childhood when consciously 
 brought into contact and sympathy with Nature, by a teacher com- 
 petent to be her interpreter, I mention two out of a multitude of 
 similar illustrations. An eminent botanist narrated to me the fol- 
 lowing personal incident: "When I was a mere boy, my teacher, 
 handing me a flower, asked me to notice all its parts, and when I 
 had done so, for the first time in my life, he gave their several 
 botanic names, introducing each with its Saxon synonym, which I 
 never forgot. That brief talk of twenty minutes inspired me 
 with an interest in observation and study that led to collegiate cul- 
 ture." Said another gentleman, author of popular text-books on 
 Natural History: " My teacher once invited me to search on my 
 father's farm for curious stones. I found a white stone, with 
 sharp edges, of which he said, ' That is a good specimen, though 
 very common, for three-quarters of the earth's crust is made up 
 of this stone. It is very useful. The grains and grasses get the 
 sharpness and strength of their stalks from a minute portion of 
 this stone, which the rootlets dissolve and send up for their 
 growth. It is useful also in the arts. You have it in the wall 
 and common plaster. Glass is made of it, only a little stuff is 
 mixed with it to make it work well, and the very best spectacle- 
 glasses are made of pure specimens of stone like this,' showing 
 me a pure quartz crystal, and pointing out its exact hexagonal 
 form and pyramidal cap. That brief talk changed my history 
 and fired my mind with love of learning." 
 
 The farmer's boys have the best opportunities of learning these 
 practical lessons from nature, provided the teacher is competent to 
 start them in the right lines of observation. On the farm, birds, 
 insects, fishes t and all animals, flowers and foliage, plants, shrubs, 
 
8 
 
 creeping vines, and trees, to say nothing of the minerals under his 
 feet, are all practical primary teachers. 
 
 In the interests of agriculture, and all industrial pursuits, our 
 youth should be taught at school the necessity of labor, its vital 
 relation to all human excellence and progress; the evils of indo 
 lence, and the absurdity of the common aversion to manual labor, 
 This popular distaste for industrial pursuits should be early coun 
 teracted, and the silly and pernicious notions that labor is menial 
 and that the tools of the farm, or of a trade, are badges of ser- 
 vility, should be refuted in our schools, and more should there be 
 said and done to dignify labor, and render industrial pursuits 
 attractive and reputable. The agricultural, forestral, and indus- 
 trial schools, so numerous in Germany, Switzerland, and other por- 
 tions of Europe, have proved as efficient in dignifying labor as in 
 increasing its efficiency and market value. Girls, as well as boys, 
 are there early taught, both in the family and school, that to learn 
 to be useful is alike their duty, privilege, and interest. 
 
 Many of our youth are afflicted with an ambition for easier lives 
 and more genteel employments, and with the infatuation that city 
 clerkships are the most eligible positions, while farming and the 
 trades are not " respectable." Let them learn that the intelligent 
 farmers or mechanics have a better chance of securing wealth, 
 health, and influence than the over-crowded city clerkships can 
 afford. In any average farming community, let twenty young 
 men form a stay-at-home association, and employ their best skill 
 in rural pursuits; and another twenty, we will suppose of the 
 same capacity and education, start in quest of city clerkships, and 
 at the end of twenty years I am confident our stay-at homes 
 would, on the average, have better health, better character, greater 
 influence, and more money than the twenty who turned their 
 backs on the humble industries of the country. 
 
 Clerks are often paid less than skillful mechanics, and are less 
 independent. In their iprecarious positions, they are liable to 
 disappointments and humiliating struggles with the thousands of 
 others "looking for a place." Every advertisement for a clerk 
 brings a whole swarm of applicants. How pitiable the condition 
 of this superabundance of book-keepers and exchangers, wasting 
 their lives waiting for a place, while our farms and factories, rail- 
 roads and trades, are clamoring for educated superintendents, 
 foremen, engineers, skillful managers, and "cunning workmen." 
 The position of the educated and well-trained farmer or mechanic 
 
9 
 
 is far preferable to that of average city clerks. The latter may 
 dress better, talk more glibly, bow more gracefully, not to say ob- 
 sequiously, but they compare unfavorably with our best farmers 
 and mechanics in manly independence, vigor of thought, and 
 strength of character. 
 
 Too many of our young men leave the homestead on adventures 
 less safe and reliable than the arts of industry. A good trade is 
 more honorable and remunerative than peddling maps, books, pic- 
 tures, patent-rights, and clothes-wringers, or in a city store to be 
 cash or errand-boy, store-sweeper, fire-kindler, or even book-keeper. 
 Without in any way disparaging the useful position of the clerk, 
 our young men may properly be cautioned against further crowding 
 this already plethoric profession. To the boys in the country I 
 say, instead of aspiring to an uncertain and precarious clerkship, 
 stick to the farm, or learn a trade, and you will lay the broadest 
 foundation for prosperity. 
 
 The value of work as an educator hitherto too little appreciated, 
 needs to be taught in our schools. Children learn by doing. This 
 principle underlies the whole Kindergarten system. Its prime 
 motto is, " Do nothing for the child which he can be encouraged 
 to do for himself." His planning, combining, constructing, and 
 designing, with simplest materials, foster interest and skill in work. 
 It would be a grand achievement if the public schools should lead 
 our youth to realize that their education is essentially, deficient 
 until they have learned to work in some useful form of industry. 
 
 Such was the theory and practice of the ancient Hebrews, carry- 
 ing out the plan given them from Heaven. That is plainly the 
 Divine plan for the race. The Hebrews held that all children 
 should be taught some handicraft as an essential part of education. 
 Among them labor was always honorable. No man was ashamed 
 of his trade. No matter what his rank, every one must be trained 
 to work. The chief of the Apostles did not degrade his high 
 office by occasionally resuming his trade of tent-maker. By his 
 own example, he enforced his precept "if any would not work, 
 neither should he eat," and sharpened his censure of "the disor- 
 derly busy-bodies working not at all." His associates never sus- 
 pected that their old business of fisherman was disreputable. 
 "Why was it that the Great Teacher, when all possibilities were 
 open to his choice, sought out the humble home of the carpenter 
 and worked patiently at His reputed father's trade, except that He 
 might condemn before the world the unchristian and heathenish 
 
10 
 
 notion that labor is menial. On the other hand, the Chinese Man- 
 darins who let their nails grow as long as their fingers, to show 
 that they never work, are the ilhistrous predecessors of the preten- 
 tious snobs who affect to despise the industrial arts. 
 
 The Jews still maintain their ancestral pride and faith in work. 
 Notwithstanding long ages of bitter persecution, they are, as a race, 
 most remarkable for perseverance, energy, and ability. These 
 manly traits have been fostered by their hereditary habits of indus- 
 try. Debarred by oppressive laws for many centuries from the 
 ownership of land and from the ordinary industrial pursuits, they 
 were driven to trade, which naturally continues to be their leading 
 occupation, and in which they have gained marked success by dint 
 of indomitable energy in the face of opposition and manifold dif- 
 ficulties. In his own life, as well as in Endymion, Beaconsfield has 
 strongly illustrated the power of an indomitable will. 
 
 In every country, where the civil disabilities which oppressed 
 them for so many centuries, have been removed, the Jews have 
 soon risen to be leaders in education, in the press, in finance, in 
 science and literature. Their wonderful ability and success seem 
 to be the secret of the new and strange outbursts of medieval 
 intolerance and hostility which now disgraces Germany. The real 
 trouble is, that the Jews so often outstrip their rivals and win the 
 prizes which are open to fair competition. The complaints made 
 in late German periodicals fully betray this unworthy motive. 
 The outcry is " The Jews are monopolizing the best positions in 
 the universities, absorbing millions of money, controlling exchange, 
 becoming our leading capitalists, and even crowding into Parlia- 
 ment, and in danger of moulding the destinies of the nation." 
 
 It is a redeeming feature of this outburst of narrowness that the 
 Crown Prince, who himself once thoroughly learned a trade, de- 
 nounces the present persecution of the Jews as " a shame to Ger- 
 many." No man in Germany has done more than he to make 
 labor reputable. He has practiced as well as preached the gospel 
 of work, having early learned the cabinet-maker's trade. At 
 Babelsberg, near Potsdam, the summer palace of the Emperor of 
 Germany, are shown choicest articles of furniture made by him. 
 "When his only sister, the Grand Duchess of Baden, placed her 
 daughter in the Schloss, a famous school in Carlsruhe, she directed 
 that she should be excused from none of the household industries 
 required of the other pupils, that she should be trained in sewing 
 and knitting, -and made as thorough a seamstress as if she were 
 
11 
 
 expecting to earn her livelihood by her needle. Such royal exam- 
 ■pies of honoring industry have exerted a vast influence through- 
 out the German Empire. 
 
 The tendency on the farm is to overwork the boys and allow too 
 little respite for play, for with the young of all animals, play is the. 
 dictate of nature. The earth, the air and sea are full of animals 
 who seem to luxuriate in playful activity. But, while all work and 
 no play represses the jubilant impulses of childhood, the tendency 
 of our times to all play and no work is far more harmful. Exces- 
 sive amusements dissipate the mind, weaken the will, and demor- 
 alize the whole character — making one restless, selfish, discontented, 
 and dependent. The habitual idler naturally degenerates into 
 something worse, for idleness and vice are twins. Labor, though 
 called the curse and consequence of sin, may be a blessing to beings 
 constituted as we are. We need the spur of necessity to energize 
 our minds. Our richest thoughts and experience, and our best 
 discipline come to us when we are intensely active. Toils and priva- 
 tion seven, give strength, endurance, and courage for future achieve- 
 ments. The successful merchant who, with a fortune retires from 
 business, and sits down to enjoy himself, with nothing to do but 
 take his comfort, becomes the victim of ennui", if not of dyspepsia. 
 
 Industry is essential to thrift and virtue, to mental, moral, 
 and physical health. The Devil tempts everybody, but the idler 
 tempts the Devil, who gives plenty of work to all whom he can 
 find with nothiiig to do. The historian Proude, well says, " There 
 are but three ways of living; by working, by begging, or by steal- 
 ing; Those who do not work, disguise it in whatever pretty lan- 
 guage we please, are doing one of the other two.'' Every man 
 should have one vocation and as many avocations as he can. Men 
 of mark are men of work. The most industrious individuals 
 and races are the most intelligent and powerful; the most elevated 
 morally as well as mentally. In whatever land man can subsist 
 in indolence, he droops in intellect, and there is the greatest de- 
 moralization in those tropical climates where leisure rather than 
 labor is the rule of life. Man rises in the scale where his necessi- 
 ties compel constant industry, as he sinks where his wants exact 
 no labor. Where industry becomes habitual and skillful, it not 
 only supplies mere necessities, but stimulates demands above abso- 
 lute wants. Every pure enjoyment gained by labor, prompts the 
 desire for other and higher gratifications. Theodore Parker said, 
 " The fine arts do not interest me so much as the coarse arts, which 
 
12 
 
 feed, clothe, house, and comfort a people. I should rather be a 
 great man as Franklin, than a Michael Angelo ; nay, if I had a 
 son, I should rather see him a mechanic who organized use, like 
 the late George Stephenson, in England, than a great painter like 
 Eubens, who only copied beauty." Edward Forbes says, "He 
 who knows not what it is to labor, knows not what it is to enjoy." 
 
 I once began a census of the eminent men of Connecticut, those 
 who have been most successful in business, or in the various pro- 
 fessions, and found that the great majority of them had the disci- 
 pline of rural occupations in their youth. The successive govern- 
 ernors of our State, for a long time, with a single exception, were 
 early accustomed to 'manual labor. The town of Lebanon has 
 raised up five governors. Many retired rural districts and hill- 
 towns have been fertile in the richest treasures of intellect. The 
 Litchfield County Jubilee showed a proud array of her sons among 
 the most distinguished men of our country. On the other hand, 
 those who despised labor in their youth, have not been the bene- 
 factors of the community nor of themselves. " The artificers and 
 inventors of the world, the men who revolutionize human indus- 
 try and manifold the wealth and power of nations by new machines 
 and new processes of art — the "Watts, the Arkwrights, the Brah- 
 mahs, the Clements, the Nasmytbs, the Stephensons, the Fairbairns, 
 the Fultons, the Ericssons, the Goodyears, the Howes, the McCor- 
 mics, have usually had their training on the farm or in the shops." 
 
 A striking illustration of the value of work as an educator has 
 been recently furnished by Eev. Washington Gladden of Spring- 
 field. He sent a circular to one hundred of the most prominent 
 men of that place, asking, " "Was your home during the first fifteen 
 years of your life on the farm or in the city, and were you then 
 accustomed to work when not in school." Of the eighty-eight who 
 replied, five only "had nothing particular to do," while ninety-four 
 per cent, were farmer's sons, or hard-working boys. So every- 
 where, as he clearly shows, the prizes of life are carried ofE by the 
 men who learned to work. Men energized by such discipline are 
 sure to outstrip those who were dandled in the lap of affluence and 
 enervated by excessive indulgence. The "farmer's boy learns pa- 
 tience and persistence by doing tough tasks without flinching. 
 Mr. Gladden's conclusion from his inquiry was that the boy early 
 trained to work, has eighteen chances of succeeding in life to one 
 chance for the boy without this discipline. 
 
 Farm work, by the great variety of its forms and conditions, is 
 
13 
 
 peculiarly fitted to task and test the mind of a boy in planning, 
 contriving, and adapting means to ends under constantly varying 
 circumstances. The necessities of the farm teach the needful 
 lesson that " where there is a will there is a way." Coleridge said 
 " a perfectly educated character is little else than a perfectly dis- 
 ciplined will." The will is by no means the only faculty to be 
 educated, but its right culture involves that of every other faculty 
 of the mind and heart. It is the will that differentiates men. 
 This is the regal power of the mind, and more than anything else 
 in our intellectual nature constitutes the man. A disciplined will 
 equips the mind for action. An earnest will is the agent of every 
 great achievement. There is nothing like it to make the mind 
 resolute and successful, loyal to duty, superior to doubt, disdain- 
 ful of ease, delighting in achievement and rendering toil, self- 
 denial, exertions in whatever form, easy and pleasant. A resolute 
 mind will spare no effort; neglect no opportunity to accomplish 
 its end. 
 
 Labor develops inventive talent. The exigences of the farmer, 
 remote from villages and shops, compel him to be something of a 
 carpenter, joiner, blacksmith, and harness-maker — a man of all 
 work — " handy at anything." His business varies with Jhe sea- 
 sons, and sometimes changes everyday. A farmer's boy myself, 
 early trained in practical industry and familiar with farm work, I 
 have ever valued highly those practical lessons learned among the 
 rough hills of grand old Litchfield county. 
 
 I counsel even the sons of affluence to spend at least one season 
 at hard work on the farm or in the shop. The practical business 
 drill there gained, the knowledge of nature and domestic animals, 
 will amply compensate for the consequent loss in book-learning, 
 to say nothing of the health and physical training thus secured. 
 "With all our improved gymnastics, none is better than manual 
 labor, when it is cheerfully and intelligently performed, and es- 
 pecially farm work. The habits of industry, once formed on the 
 farm, or in the shop, may shape all the future, teaching one to 
 value time, to husband the odd moments, to scorn sloth and love 
 labor, or at least to practice diligence in business. 
 
 The pupils who luxuriate in the wealthiest homes of the city 
 would profit by one year in the country, with its peculiar work and 
 play^ its freer sports and wide range for rambles by the springs 
 and brooks, the rivers and water-falls, the ponds and lakes, over 
 the hills and. plains, through the groves and forests; in observing 
 
14 
 
 nature, searching for wild flowers and curious stones, learning to 
 recognize the different trees by any one of their distinctive marks, 
 viz., the leaf, flower, fruit, form, bark, and grain, watching the ant- 
 hills, collecting butterflies and various insects, noticing the birds so 
 as to distinguish them by their beaks or claws, their size, form, 
 plumage, flight, or song. Studying nature in any one or more of 
 these varied forms, each so fitted to charm children, would refresh 
 their minds as well as recreate their bodies. 
 
 The simple elements of the practical sciences should be taught 
 in our schools, at least in oral lessons. A few talks on Agricultu- 
 ral Chemistry will invite its fuller study when the school days are 
 ended, especially in observing the chemical marvels that will meet 
 one on every rod of his farm. The lectures given in our Teachers' 
 Institutes on the geological characteristics of Connecticut, show 
 how profitably our -teachers might each give simple lessons on the 
 prominent physical features of his town, county, and State. Such 
 talks will intensify the interest of the farmer's boys in the study of 
 the stones and rocks which line their pathway. Specimens of our 
 most common minerals ought to be in all our schools, procurable 
 as they are by any competent teacher, without cost. No pupil 
 should leave the public school without knowing the names and 
 leading characteristics of at least a dozen of our common minerals. 
 
 Familiar lessons should also be given about plants and animals, 
 the laws of health and animal physiology. A few hints on "how 
 plants grow " will add interest to the flora found in such great 
 variety on every farm. With specimens in hand, a few minutes 
 devoted to pointing out the difference between inside growers and 
 outside growers (saying nothing of endogens and exogens) or be- 
 tween parallel-veined and net-veined leaves, or the evergreens and 
 those trees which drop their leaves annually, will awaken a lasting 
 interest in the study of botany. How early children may learn 
 the difference between the animal, vegetable, and mineral kingdoms, 
 or that some animals have jointed backbones, that others have 
 their bones outside of their bodies, while others have none at all. 
 Such glimpses of the beauties and wonders of science awaken a 
 healthful desire to observe and study. I remember well the in- 
 terest awakened at a Teachers' Institute in Massachusetts, when 
 Prof. Agassiz gave a lecture on the grasshopper. Having by the 
 aid of the boys collected several hundred grasshoppers and ether- 
 ized them so that they would not jump about, he passed one to 
 each of his auditors. This created general laughter, and seemed 
 
15 
 
 ridiculous to many. But soon instead of laughing, or looking at 
 him, every one was looking intently at the object in hand. When 
 he pointed out minute parts some one said "can't see them," to" 
 which he replied "look again and learn to look, for I can see 
 things ten times smaller than those to which I have called your 
 attention. The power of the human eye is very great, and it is 
 only the want of practice which sets such narrow limits to its 
 powers. By learning how to examine one thing thoroughly, you 
 learn how to see any thing. I present this subject to you teachers 
 for the purpose of suggesting the desirableness and method of 
 teaching Natural History in schools, and of using that instruction 
 as a means of developing the juvenile faculties and leading them 
 to the knowledge of the Creator." 
 
 If you ask, where can teachers be found competent to give such 
 lessons, I invite you to visit our Normal School and observe how 
 well its pupils are trained in the methods of teaching the elements 
 of the practical sciences in our schools, and I ask the cooperation 
 of the farmers In securing better qualified teachers for their child- 
 ren. By leading children to plant flowers, shrubs, and trees in the 
 school-grounds, and by brief lessons on rural art, and especially on 
 the beauty, variety, and value of trees, such an interest in their 
 study and culture might be awakened as to make our youth prac- 
 tical arborists. Very little time would be required for those talks 
 which would be sure to inspire an interest in arboriculture and in 
 the broader subject of rural art and adornment. In this way, our 
 public schools may prove a partial substitute for the schools of 
 Forestry in Germany and other European countries, which have 
 exerted there a remarkable influence in diffusing a general interest 
 in arboriculture among the people. They regard forests as their 
 friends, and understand their climatic influence and economic 
 value in staying spring torrents, preventing summer droughts, as 
 well as in supplying lumber and fuel. The Germans have a pas- 
 sion for nature, and love to frequent their beautiful groves and 
 gardens, for parks and woods abound in and near their cities and 
 towns. The rural and suburban adornment, now the pride and 
 glory of so many beautiful towns in Germany, and the fruit of 
 this revived love of arboriculture, is largely due to the influence 
 and literature which have emanated from her schools of Forestry. 
 Hence the wanton forest fires so common and destructive in Amer- 
 ica are comparatively unknown in Germany. The forest incendi- 
 ary would be regarded as a common enemy, like the poisoner of 
 
16 
 
 an aqueduct, recklessly destroying that which it is the interest of 
 all to preserve. Like their Forest schools, our public schools 
 should create that healthful public sentiment which constitutes the 
 best possible protection of the woods. 
 
 In connection with the Sheffield Scientific School, which by the 
 act of the Legislature in 1833 became the College of Agriculture 
 and the Mechanic Arts of Connecticut, the endowment of one or 
 two additional professorships would inaugurate a department of 
 Forestry. This could be done the more economically here, where 
 the existing cabinets, laboratories-, and philosophical apparatus 
 might be utilized in forestral instruction. The endowment of 
 such a department would prove a great benefaction to the State 
 and to the country, opening new fields of investigation which 
 would bear directly on the ultimate resources and permanent pros- 
 perity of the nation. The conclusions of foreign foresters, though 
 confirmed by the broadest observations and experience in Europe, 
 cannot all be wisely adopted in American sylviculture. Differen- 
 ces in soil, climate, and other conditions may affect trees in regard 
 to their rapidity of growth, health, durability of timber, texture, 
 elasticity and grain of the wood, and many other qualities. These 
 vital questions can be determined only by careful investigations 
 carried on in each country. 
 
 The Lombardy poplar^ for example, was planted extensively in 
 New England many* years ago. Brought to England from the 
 banks of the Po, in 1758, the facility of its propagation from cut- 
 tings, its rapid growth, its tall columnar outline in contrast with 
 the spreading oaks and elms, soon made it a favorite in England, and 
 hence with the fathers of New England. Sending out its almost 
 upright branches all along its tall stem, it was much admired here, 
 as it is still, by the Italians, and was of old by the Romans, who 
 called it the airbor popvM. But in New England, so many of its 
 branches were winter-killed, that it soon became an unsightly col- 
 lection of dead limbs, and it is now seldom seen. This is one of 
 many illustrations of the necessity of adaptation to soil and climate, 
 and of the fact, that some trees which thrive in one locality, will 
 fail in another. 
 
 More than those of other workmen, the farmer's business binds 
 him to his home. He lives on or near the soil he tills. Hence the 
 farmer's home must of ten be somewhat isolated. To promote soci- 
 ality and content, CoL Waring proposes that farmers should con- 
 centrate in villages, and for this purpose submit to the necessity of 
 
17 
 
 long daily journeys to their farms. This is unfortunately the 
 European usage. There tlhe cottages of the peasants are often 
 crowded together more closely than are the homes in any well laid- 
 out city, leaving scant room for outbuildings, to say nothing of 
 gardens. This custom grew out of the necessities of a barbarous 
 age as a protection from robbers, or out of that feudal system 
 under with the serfs were crowded into huts under the castle walls 
 of their lord or chief. 
 
 The very, isolation of the American farmer is one source of his 
 conscious individuality, independence, and strength, when he is 
 thus led to greater care and taste in adorning his home and 
 grounds, and increasing the attractions of the fireside. It has 
 long been my ambition to improve the homes and home-life of our 
 farmers, and of all our industrial classes, and help them realize 
 that the highest privilege and central duty of life is the creation 
 of happy homes. The chief aim of the industries of life, whether 
 agricultural, manufacturing, or commercial, and the great end for 
 which government itself is worthy to be maintained, is that men 
 may live in happy homes. "The hope of America is the homes of 
 America," and the hope of Connecticut is th$ homes of Connecti- 
 'cut. You improve the schools by improving the homes, as truly 
 as you improve the homes by improving the schools. Modern 
 civilization relates especially to the homes and social life of the 
 people, to their health, comfort, thrift, their intellectual and moral 
 advancement. In earlier times and other lands, men were counted 
 in the aggregate. They were valued as they helped to swell the 
 revenues or retinues of kings and nobles. The government was 
 the unit and each individual only added one to the roll .of serfs 
 or soldiers. With us the individual is the unit and -'the govern- 
 ment is of the people, and for the people, and by the people." 
 America may be and ought to be the paradise of the laborer in 
 the neatness, comforts, amenities, and attractions of his home. In 
 no other-way can the best interests of this nation be more surely 
 promoted than by the elevation and ennobling of its home-life, 
 and no agency can contribute to this grand advancement so uni- 
 versally and efficiently as our public schools. 
 
RURAL IMPROVEMENT. 
 
 BY 
 
 B. G. NORTHROP, 
 
 Secretary of Connecticut Board of Education. 
 
 NEW HAVEN: 
 
 TUTTLE, MOREHOUSE & TAYLOR. 
 
 18 8 0. 
 K 
 
Public interest in home and rural adornment is rapidly increasing. A little 
 foresight will show that no rural community can afford to continue without some 
 organized efforts for this purpose, such as have done great good in promoting 
 public health, cultivating public spirit, quickening social and intellectual life, build- 
 ing up and beautifying towns, and thus enhancing the value of real estate. I shall 
 be happy to cooperate with public-spirited citizens who are moving in this matter, 
 and will lecture on this subject, without charge either for services or expenses, in 
 any town in Connecticut. In this reprint from an official Report, a few local allu- 
 sions are retained to show the original aim of the writer and the application of 
 kindred plans and principles to other fields. 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 Objects of Rural Improvement Associations: — 
 
 1. To cultivate public spirit and town pride, . . . .3 
 
 2. To quicken the intellectual life of the people, ... V 
 
 3. Promote good fellowship, . . . . . .8 
 
 4. Secure better hygienic conditions, .... 9 
 6. Improve road-sides,, roads, side- walks, arid light streets, . .10 
 
 6. Improve public grounds, . . . . . . 11 
 
 7. Educational bearings, ...... 14 
 
 8. Improve the homes and home-life of the people, ... 17 
 
 9. Tree-planting, . . . . . . . .21 
 
 lb. Economic bearing's, ...... 29 
 
 11. Recuperation of sterile lands, .... .30 
 
 12. Improve the surroundings of railway stations, . . 43 
 
 13. Minor aims, . . . . . . . .44 
 
 14. Betterment of factory surroundingB, .... 45 
 
 15. The Two Model Factories, . . ... 46 
 
 16. Plan or "Constitution" of a Rural Improvement Association, . 51 
 
EUEAL IMPROVEMENT ASSOCIATIONS. 
 
 When, over ten years ago, an effort was begun to improve 
 and build up our country towns,* it encountered, as I then 
 predicted, some misapprehension and ridicule. During this 
 period of quiet work, my faith in the final result has never 
 faltered. But sooner than I expected, this Rural Improvement 
 movement has assumed such large proportions as to silence 
 cavil, and command the respect and cooperation of the wisest 
 and best men of our State. There are now over fifty of these 
 associations in Connecticut which speak for themselves. Their 
 objects are manifold, of which the following are the more 
 important : 
 
 1. To cultivate public spirit and foster town pride, is 
 an object which should enlist the sympathies of all our 
 citizens. Our youth should be trained in their homes 
 and schools to be jealous of the good name of their town 
 and State. Hence the history of our towns and our State 
 should be generally taught in order to develop a just town 
 and State pride. We are prone to underrate the great value 
 of this feeling. The love of home and the love of one's 
 town and State are akin. This sentiment formed in early life 
 should grow with our years and attainments. The want of it 
 indicates a serious defect of character. I believe with Dr. 
 Bushnell that " the man who does not wish to love and honor 
 the town and State in which he and his children were born has 
 no heart in his bosom. We are too little aware of our noble 
 history as a State, a history of suoh transcendent beauty, 
 freshened by so many heroic incidents, having so great a 
 wealth of character and achievement. This early history of 
 Connecticut is really the most beautiful that was ever permit- 
 ted to any people in the world." This cannot justly be called 
 a partial but unfounded laudation of one's State. The Histo- 
 
 * " How to beautify and build up our country towns" was the title of an article 
 In my Report for 1869. 
 
 2 
 
rian, Bancroft, a citizen of Massachusetts, biased by no Con- 
 necticut predilections says, in language as striking as that of 
 Dr. Bushnell, "There is no State in the Union, and I know not 
 any in the world, in whose early history, if I were a citizen, I 
 could find more of which to be proud and less that I should 
 wish to blot.' J 
 
 The sentiment that honors and cherishes one's birth-place 
 is noble and ennobling. I am aware that a popular prejudice 
 associates weakness and effeminacy with such taste and refine- 
 ment. . But this sentiment has ever characterized the greatest 
 and best of men and is a prime element of true manhood. 
 The cold and selfish soul is sterile in heroic virtues. There is 
 an American railway king, now a millionaire, who seldom 
 visits his native town, takes no interest in it, does nothing for 
 it, and leaves even the old homestead and grounds, though still 
 owned by him, neglected and forlorn. This fact alone natu- 
 rally suggests a selfish, soulless character. Indeed such exam- 
 ples are too common. ,On the other hand, the greatest grandeur 
 of intellect accords with fervor of filial feeling, with fondest 
 home attachments and with refinement and delicacy of taste. 
 It is perfectly in keeping with the intellectual greatness of 
 Daniel Webster to find him fondly cherishing and beautifying 
 the old homestead, enriching and improving the paternal acres 
 and eloquently discoursing on the sacred associations of home, 
 the transcendent sweets of domestic life, the happiness of kin- 
 dred, and parents and children. Washington was as delicate, 
 courteous and affectionate in his domestic relations and attach- 
 ments as he was wise in council and courageous in war. A 
 beautiful trait in Bryant's character was evinced by his devo- 
 tion to the old homestead and the little secluded town of 
 Cummington among,the Hampshire hills, hallowed to him by 
 the memories of father and mother, and the sacred associations 
 of childhood. To that little town which he did so much 
 to adorn and enrich and educate, he ever deemed it a privi- 
 lege to make an annual visit — a summer visit with his house- 
 hold, often prolonged for weeks and months. That the early 
 associations might remain, raising the old house, he built 
 beneath and around it a stately mansion, so that the paternal 
 rooms remained intact. 
 
Ex-Governor Hubbard well says, " this work of Village Im- 
 provement* will not fail, I trust, to awaken public attention 
 and provoke imitation throughout our State, and excite and 
 even shame our own people into a larger public spirit and 
 better efforts to redeem from negligence our rural homes and 
 villages. Nearly all our towns are full of objects of natural 
 beauty easy of development, and very many of tbem rich in 
 legendary and historical associations. "What is greatly wanted 
 is something more of rural art and adornment. Something 
 which shall beautify our country villages, educate public taste, 
 make the homes df the fathers dearer to their sons and the local 
 associations of childhood dearer to old age, and thus turn back, 
 in part at least, the tide of migration from the rural towns, and 
 make the city seek the country life and make it what it used 
 to be in our own State, and what it still is in the oldest and 
 most cultivated nations of the world." 
 
 In our declining towns especially, local pride and public 
 spirit should be fostered. Discouragement, if not self-dis- 
 paragement, has been their danger and a source of increasing 
 weakness. Instead of the despair that says "it is of no use, 
 the fates are against us, we are doomed to decline more and 
 more," true courage and patriotism would face the facts, 
 inquire into their causes, and, if possible, find a remedy. The 
 lack of public spirit has contributed to the decline of many 
 towns. The ( evidence of this is sometimes seen in dilapidated 
 school-houses, poor roads, absence of sidewalks, and neglected 
 common, cemetery or church. Remembering that what any 
 people can be depends largely on what they have been, the his- 
 tory of our towns should kindle within us a just pride for the 
 past and a new inspiration for the future. To this end, each 
 town needs to be distinctly conscious of itself, jealous of its 
 good name, liberal in supporting its schools and churches, 
 adorning its park or "Village Green," cemetery and streets, 
 and in every practicable way guarding its honor, and ambi- 
 tious of its prosperity. 
 
 In New England, the township is the unit, but in the Southern 
 and in many of the "Western States the " parish" or the county 
 is the unit, while the township organization is wanting or is 
 * Referring to the example set in Haddam. 
 
6 
 
 comparatively insignificant. The maintenance of schools and 
 roads and bridges, the support of the poor and many kindred 
 matters which in New England are town affairs, are there man- 
 aged countywise. The town organizations with the town meet- 
 ings where every citizen is the peer of any other, have been 
 one of the prime factors in developing the sterling traits of 
 New England character. They have fostered that self-reliance, 
 independence and energy which have given strength and vitality 
 to our northern civilization and effectively aided in the main- 
 tenance of our free institutions. The influence and importance 
 of the towns of New England was early and ably set forth by 
 Samuel Adams. It was a sound motto of old John Adams, 
 that " the ownership of land is essential to individual self-respect 
 and thrift and to national dignity and prosperity." It is not 
 the landless, but farmers, who have been foremost as defenders 
 of liberty because they have been thus defenders of home. The 
 free land tenure, the system of small farms grouped into town- 
 ships from the early settlement of New England fostered the 
 free, liberty-loving spirit of our fathers, without which the Rev- 
 olutionary war would have been impossible, for these "little 
 democratic republics" nurtured that capacity for self govern- 
 ment to which was due the achievement of our independence. 
 
 Says Professor Joel Parker : " It was through these organiza- 
 tions that an industrious yeomanry, while following the plow, 
 and the diligent tenants of workshops while handling their 
 tools, were converted into an armed soldiery on the first news 
 that the British left the limits of Boston and were marching 
 into the country. The dragons' teeth that produced that har- 
 vest were sown in the shape of farmers and mechanics, who, 
 holding themselves in readiness as minute men, required but 
 the heat of warlike intelligence to burst into full life and vigor, 
 as a patriotic army. It was through these town organizations, 
 and not through a want of patriotism elsewhere, that the sup- 
 port of the Declaration of Independence was more effectual in 
 New England than in any other of the colonies." 
 
 Nothing analogous to our town system prevails in the South- 
 ern States or in England. The influence of these town organi- 
 zations and town meetings, where all meet on a level with- 
 out distinction of race or party or sect, has largely caused 
 
the contrast in the civilization of the North and the South, from 
 our early history till to-day. In the language of Senator Dawes, 
 ""With the township here, its vital force unimpaired, New 
 England can never become South Carolina or Mississippi, and 
 without the educating influence that comes of the town, neither 
 South Carolina' nor Mississippi will ever become New England 
 in the enjoyment of liberty regulated by law. They are the 
 very corner-stpne of republican institutions among us, and they or 
 their equivalent must take the place of that unorganized parish 
 system by which Southern plantation society is loosely linked 
 together, before a representative republic, in anything else than 
 name, can be maintained among them. The tpwn is not 
 therefore to fade, but is to continue to be the nursery of intelli- 
 gent, untrammeled, thinking freemen, the source, the supply of 
 the government they themselves have instituted on this conti- 
 nent." My sympathies and efforts have long been enlisted in 
 behalf of the declining towns which most need help and encour- 
 agement. 
 
 This is one source of my interest in the work of Rural 
 Improvement, now so widely diffused through the State. 
 Connecticut cannot afford to allow any of these old towns to 
 die out. Many of them have a noble history, and if we of the 
 present generation do our duty, they are to have a grand future. 
 A most encouraging history would be that fitly recording the 
 achievements of those who have gone out from these rural dis- 
 tricts which are thus continually enriching the great centers of 
 population and wealth. 
 
 2. To quiqken the intellectual life of the people is an 
 important aim of these associations. Besides the liberal 
 support of schools, the founding of libraries is an important 
 help in this direction which should be encouraged in all 
 our towns. Their value cannot be over-estimated. The sup- 
 ply of good books increases the demand. A taste for books 
 has been awakened in many towns by a well-selected library 
 where the improvement has been as marked in the quality 
 as in the quantity of the books read. Such a library natu- 
 rally becomes the pride and treasure of a town, rendering 
 it a more desirable place of residence, adding attractions to 
 every intelligent home within its limits, and helping both 
 
8 
 
 teachers and pupils in the schools. With books at hand, the 
 teacher 'may be continually progressing. Without them he is 
 in danger of getting into the ruts.. The mind that ceases to. 
 progress soon retrogrades ; unless himself eager for improve- 
 ment, the teacher can impart no inspiration or, love of 
 knowledge to his pupils. While libraries educate the whole 
 people, I have been especially gratified to observe how diligently 
 their volumes are used bythe school boys and girls who would 
 otherwise have only the dime novel or papers more objection- 
 able. Once give a boy a taste for good books and access to a 
 choice library, and then place him where you will, let his 
 calling be what it may, he will find time for study and will 
 devote the intervals of labor to reading. Multitudes of men, 
 thus self-educated, owe their eminence and success to an early 
 taste for reading and access to libraries. Their example should 
 show our youth that their evenings need not be idled away 
 because the days must be occupied with business or labor. 
 
 3. The promotion of good fellowship is another aim. The 
 charm of country life, so dependent on the interchange of 
 neighborly courtesies and the maintenance of friendly relations, 
 is often marred by needless strifes and alienations. The social 
 life of a town is thus sadly embittered. A Eural Improve- 
 ment Association tends to fraternize the people of a town by 
 leading all classes to meet on common ground and work 
 together for a common object. Thus differences of rank, or 
 sect or party are forgotten, while as fellow-citizens they carry 
 out plans of equal interest to all, and effectively combine 
 to promote the general good. In some towns, good fellowship 
 as well as intellectual improvement has been promoted by 
 organizing reading circles. Selections in prose and poetry, 
 often a play of Shakespeare, the several parts having been 
 previously assigned, are the subject of careful private study 
 and drill. These weekly circles make a profitable evening 
 school. Their social influence is still more extended by an 
 occasional "rehearsal" of a more public character. Divided 
 as the residents of our rural districts and villages too often are 
 by prejudice or neighborhood difficulties, every association 
 where social amenities are cultivated should be encouraged. 
 The support of a Village Reading Room, well supplied "with 
 
9 
 
 the leading journals of the day — daily, weekly, monthly or 
 quarterly — is a movement in the same direction. A course of 
 Lyceum Lectures is sustained by many Eural Improvement 
 Associations, the profits of which are their " benefit " while the 
 social opportunities thus opened are clear gain. 
 
 An annual festival under the direction of the Rural Im- 
 provement Association tends to deepen and sustain public 
 interest in its work. In some towns literary exercises, ad- 
 dresses, a poem, and music, fill the programme; in others a 
 collation becomes another bond of union and fellowship. In 
 the rigid, and sometimes frigid, state of rural life, too often found 
 in New England, we need to cultivate the social amenities and 
 learn the art of " turning work into play." The supposed 
 monotony and dullness of country life drive many to the city. 
 It is wise to multiply occasions for social enjoyment. The 
 arbor-day festival may help to counteract the tendency of rural 
 life to isolation and seclusion, lifting out of the ruts of a dull 
 plodding monotony, promoting neighborly feeling, and strength- 
 ening social ties. The rural laborers in Switzerland and Ger- 
 many socialize far more than American farmers. Their festive 
 spirit is a strongly-marked feature of their character. It is 
 manifested in the family, in neighborhood greetings and meet- 
 ings, in schools, in rifle feasts, in processions and various social 
 gatherings. They have a passion for nature, and love to fre- 
 quent their beautiful groves and gardens, for parks or woods 
 abound in or near their cities and towns. This genial spirit is 
 everywhere fostered by music — both vocal and instrumental. 
 As a result, there is an inexpressible something in the German 
 character that carries mirthful and happy childhood into old 
 age, giving an added charm to social life, and lightness and 
 cheer to sober work. 
 
 4. Another aim of these associations is the promotion of 
 public health by securing better hygienic conditions in the 
 homes of the people and in their surroundings. Some of our 
 country towns, naturally favorable to health and longevity, 
 have suffered fearfully from the ravages of diseases, evidently 
 caused by neglect of hygienic laws. In many towns much has 
 lately been done in the matter of drainage, removal of waste 
 and guarding wells and water supplies from impurities. 
 
10 
 
 5. The improvement of road sides is attracting much atten- 
 tion. Some towns have made appropriations to clear them of 
 brush and rubbish and keep them like a lawn. Others are 
 adorning them with extensive lines of trees. 
 
 6. The improvement of roads, though of great importance, 
 has secured less attention from these associations, as the town 
 authorities usually care for them, and other objects are more 
 urgent. Dr. Bushnell well says : " The road is that physical 
 sign, or symbol, by which you will best understand any age or 
 people. If they have no roads, they are savages ; for the road 
 is the creation of man and a type of civilized society. If you 
 wish to know .whether society is stagnant, learning scholastic, 
 religion a dead formality, you may learn something by going 
 into universities and libraries; sonlething, also, by the work 
 that is doing on cathedrals and churches, or in them ; but ' 
 quite as much by looking at the roads. For if there is any 
 motion in society, the road, which is the symbol of motion, 
 will indicate the fact Nothing makes an inroad without mak- 
 ing a road. All creative action, whether in government, in- 
 dustry, thought or religion, creates roads." 
 
 7. The making or improving of sidewalks meets a felt want 
 in many towns. In no other way can the comfort and 
 sociality of a village be- promoted so economically as by making 
 sidewalks. Simple gravel walks, when the concrete would be 
 too expensive, serve an admirable purpose. One town has 
 lately completed many miles of neat sidewalks, which add 
 greatly to the attractiveness of the village. 
 
 The fine footways abounding throughout England invite the 
 pedestrian habits of the women of that country. It is largely 
 because they exercise daily in the open air, that they retain so 
 long the bloom and vigor of youth. More outdoor rambles 
 would promote the health and prolong the lives of American ( 
 women. Besides favoring the luxury' and healthfulness of 
 open air exercise, footways invite friendly calls and foster 
 social life and rural enjoyment. 
 
 8. Street lights remove another hindrance to social inter- 
 course in country villages. When the day's work is done the 
 evening is the favorite time for calls, if the darkness does not 
 forbid. The cost of kerosene illuminators is now moderate. 
 
11 
 
 It is one of the signs of social advancement that many of our 
 associations are thus practically saying " Let there be light." 
 
 9. Increased attention is given to parks, the village green, 
 the cemetery, church grounds, school lots and other public 
 grounds. I hope hereafter to give a brief sketch of the public 
 parks of Connecticut, some of which are already exceedingly 
 beautiful. Others are now planned which will contribute 
 greatly to the beauty and adornment of our State. 
 
 Two fine parks, recently provided by private munificence 
 deserve a special mention. On the thirty-first day of October, 
 1878, Hon. , David Dudley Field, Stephen J. Field of the 
 United States Supreme Court, Cyrus W. Field, and Henry 
 M. Field, D.D., surviving sons of Eev. David Dudley Field, 
 D.D., appropriately celebrated the seventy-fifth anniversary of 
 their father's marriage by presenting to the town of Haddam 
 two tracts of land for a public park. These grounds, finely 
 laid out with drives and walks by Mr. Olmsted of New York, 
 the landscape gardener, and adorned with the choicest orna- 
 mental trees, indigenous and imported, is a grand contribution 
 to the taste, sociality, good fellowship, education, growth and 
 prosperity of the town. Isinglass Hill, a high bluff on the 
 eastern border of these grounds commands for many miles a 
 magnificent view of the Connecticut river and its valley, with 
 the long range of hills beyond. In behalf of the friends of 
 rural adornment and of education, so far as I may represent 
 them, 1 desire to express to the eminent Field brothers, a high 
 appreciation of their grand gift to Haddam and thus to Con- 
 necticut, for our State takes a lively interest in the growth and 
 prosperity of each of her towns. This worthy example ought 
 to make many others, opportune as it is, in view of the grow- 
 ing interest in rural improvement throughout our State. 
 There is hardly one of our towns, that has not at home or 
 abroad, some favored sons who by forming parks or founding 
 schools or libraries, could easily render this most fitting tribute 
 to their mother soil, and thus be gratefully recognized as the 
 1 benefactors of their fellow citizens and of future generations. 
 The ambition to beautify and benefit one's native town is 
 worthy of the best and noblest characters. There is a rare 
 luxury in witnessing the fruits of one's benefactions, giving 
 
12 
 
 while living and able to enjoy the rich results, rather than 
 leaving legacies to be lessened or lost in the wrangles of con- 
 tending heirs. 
 
 The value of a park was happily set forth by Hon. David 
 Dudley Field in the following presentation address given before 
 a large concourse of people at the dedication of these grounds. 
 
 " We are here to deliver into your hands the parcel of 
 ground on which we are standing, and that other which lies in 
 view before us, to be kept as pleasure grounds for the people 
 of Haddam in all time to come. We give them in memory of 
 our father and mother, who were married seventy-five years 
 ago to-day, and came immediately afterward to make their 
 abode on this river-side, where he was soon to become the 
 pastor of the church and congregation. Here they lived 
 active and useful lives, in the fear of God and love of man, 
 doing faithfully their several duties, he in public ministrations 
 from pulpit and altar, at bridal, baptism, and burial, and she 
 in the quiet tasks of her well-ordered household. Here they 
 pdssed their first years together ; here they raised their first 
 domestic altar, and here most of their children were born. 
 For this cause, and in grateful remembrance of their love and 
 'sacrifices for us, we, their surviving children, four of us only 
 out of ten, present these memorials, not of cold stone, though 
 the hills about us teem with everlasting granite, but of shaded 
 walks, green lawns, and spreading trees, where this people 
 ,may find pleasure and refreshment, generation after generation, 
 so long as these fertile meadows, these rugged hills, and this 
 winding river shall endure. And remembering that " beauty 
 is truth, truth beauty," we hope that they will cultivate here 
 that love of nature, which is a joy in youth and a solace in 
 age ; which nourishes the affections, and refines while it 
 exalts ; which rejoices 'in the seasons and the months as they 
 pass, with their varying beauties ; catches the gladness of June 
 and the radiance of the October woods ; and in every waking 
 moment, sees, hears, or feels something of the, world around 
 to take pleasure in and be grateful for. We trust that they 
 will come, not in this year only or this Gentury, but in future 
 years and centuries, the fair young girl, the matron in the 
 glory of womanhood, the boy and the man, grandson and 
 
13 
 
 grandsire, in whatever condition or circumstance, poverty or 
 riches, joy or sorrow, to find here a new joy or a respite from 
 sorrow ; to drink in the light of sun and moon, listen to the 
 music of birds and winds, feel the fresh breath of life-sustain- 
 ing air, thank God and take courage. 
 
 " Eeverently then we dedicate these memorials of our parents, 
 to the enjoyment forever hereafter of those, and the descend- 
 ants of those, whom they loved, and among whom they dwelt." 
 
 Roseland Park, in Woodstock, promises to be one of the 
 largest and finest private parks in the country. It includes 
 sixty acres of land, with an undulating surface, bordering on 
 Woodstock Lake, a beautiful pear-shaped sheet of water one 
 mile long and half a mile wide, situated in a broad amphi- 
 theatre of wooded hills and fields, some fifteen miles long and 
 five miles wide. The park contains three miniature mounts, 
 the highest of which is Mount Eliot, so named from the 
 "apostle" John Eliot who preached to the Indians in Wood- 
 stock, and as tradition has it, upon this hill. About one- 
 quarter of the ground, including the three hills, is already a 
 well-wooded grove of chestnut, oak, maple, beach and but- 
 ternut, many of which have reached majestic proportions. 
 About 2000 ornamental trees of choicest varieties have 
 recently been planted in these grounds and along the many 
 paths and drive-ways. Over 8000 flowering shrubs, plants 
 and rose bushes have also been set out. 200,000 loads of 
 sand and loam have already been used in filling lip marshy 
 spots and inequalities and in grading walks, avenues and 
 grass-plots, and as much more will be required to complete the 
 present plans. The tasteful buildings erected on the " made 
 grounds" near the lake are a fine boat and bath house, a 
 keeper's lodge with ample stable and shed. A windmill sup- 
 plies the dryer portion of the park with water. 
 
 The citizens of Woodstock, and of Windham county, owe 
 this magnificent park to Henry C. Bowen, of the New York 
 Independent, who has already expended upon it over $40,000. 
 Though the work is rapidly progressing and Mr. Bowen 
 usually devotes five hours a day during the summer to assist- 
 ing and directing these improvements, the work will not be 
 completed till 1884. This park, accessible to all classes, is a 
 
14 
 
 favorite place of resort to the citizens of Woodstock and 
 indeed of . Windham county, who gratefully appreciate the 
 taste and liberality of the proprietor. Thousands of people 
 annually gather here to celebrate the fourth of July, and listen 
 to the distinguished speakers invited to address .them. In 
 view of the number and eminence of the speakers and the wide 
 range of their topics this celebration on these beautiful grounds 
 is quite unique. 
 
 10. The educational bearings of this subject, if less obvious, 
 are not less important. ,The external improvements prompted 
 by these associations have in many towns developed a local 
 pride and public spirit wbich have displaced many a bleak, 
 weather-worn and comfortless school-house. Public interest 
 once enlisted in the adornment of streets, parks, cemeteries and 
 kindred plans is sure to embrace the school-house. The people 
 are learning tl^at village improvement promotes the growth . 
 and prosperity of a town by inviting wealthy and desirable 
 residents from abroad, just as neglected streets, school-houses 
 and other signs of an illiberal policy invest a town with an 
 air of discouragement and decay. The influence of such an 
 association in cultivating the taste, ( fostering the study of 
 nature, developing in youth a love of flowers, vines, shrub- 
 bery and trees, all the stronger because they have planted or 
 cultivated them, thus fostering domestic attachments and 
 checking the excessive passion for city life, suggest some pf 
 the ways in which it supplements the work of the school. 
 The love of natu-re sharpens the. senses and quickens all the 
 intellectual faculties. An early interest in natural history 
 favors habits of observation and trains both the memory and 
 imagination. 
 
 The taste should be early cultivated. To love the beautiful 
 should be held as a religious du^y. In the very structure of 
 our being, God rebukes the ignorance or indolence that so 
 often dwarfs this noble faculty, designed to be an ally of virtue 
 subordinating the animal and sensuous to the intellectual 
 and spiritual. The love of the beautiful may become a 
 source of high enjoyment, and give new incentives to mental 
 effort. It reverently admires nature and makes her a constant 
 teacher. 
 
15 
 
 " No department of mind ought to be placed higher than the 
 love of the beautiful. The love of beauty in God must be 
 immense. The love of beauty carries a high moral quality 
 with it. It is a law that we should worship God in beauty. 
 Nowhere was it more powerful than in the temple. We see it 
 in Eevelation. The love of beauty increases in people the idea 
 1?hey have of the truth." 
 
 A true Christian culture should lead our citizens, each to 
 adorn his town, village, street, school-house, and first of all his 
 home. Every tree, flower or shrub in the garden, every tasteful 
 engraving or painting in the house, may add a new link to the 
 golden chain which should ever bind the heart of childhood to 
 the hearth-stone. Let taste brighten the joys of the domestic 
 circle, and help to invest every scene in life with higher signifi- 
 cance and beauty. The esthetic element as an educational 
 force has been often ignored, and the craving of the juvenile 
 mind for the beautiful rudely repressed. 
 
 Nature is the great educator. Birds, flowers, insects, and 
 all animals are our practical primary teachers. In God's plan, 
 facts and objects as best seen in the country are the earliest 
 and the leading instruments of developing the faculties of the 
 juvenile mind. They cannot be fully trained when cooped up 
 within brick walls, witnessing only city scenes. 
 
 In all our history the country has proved the great school 
 of mind. Here dwell and for wise reasons, here God intended 
 should dwell, the great majority of mankind. The country 
 sends far more than its proportion of gifted men to the great 
 centers of influence. It is thus continually enriching the 
 cities, for towards them are flowing, like their streams, the 
 material and still more the mental treasures which have their 
 origin in the mountain springs and without which the cities 
 would die out. Called officially to visit all the towns of 
 Massachusetts and Connecticut, I have often asked "what emi- 
 nent men have you raised here." Almost every town can give 
 a list of which they are justly proud. A most instructive his- 
 tory would be that which should fitly record the achieve- 
 ments of those who have gone out from these rural districts 
 to fill positions of commanding influence. In the language 
 of Dr. Bushnell : " It is not in the great cities, nor in the con- 
 
16 
 
 fined shops of trade but principally in agriculture, that the 
 best stock or staple of men is grown. It is in the open air 
 — in communion with the sky, the earth and all living things 
 — that the largest inspiration is drunk in and the vital energies 
 of a real man constructed." Certainly the country may claim 
 superior advantages for the physical, mental, and moral train- 
 ing of the young, wherever good schools are maintained. 
 
 though I studied the Kindergarten system in Germany, and 
 advocate it, I still contend that the best sort of Kindergarten 
 is the open fields and varied objects of the country, if only 
 the eye be trained to habits of careful observation. There, 
 things are studied more than mere words, or rather the per- 
 ception of objects and their qualities furnishes the material 
 for thought and gives precision to language. Hugh Miller 
 used to say : " The best school I ever attended was the miscel- 
 lany of objects and circumstances surrounding me in my 
 native district, challenging the first exercise of my senses and 
 my fancy and that is a species of education open to all . ... 
 Open your eyes, the commonest objects are worth looking 
 at, even weeds and stones and the most familiar animals." 
 He was educated by the rocks of old Cromarty on the shore 
 of the North Sea. Scott was educated by the sounding surges 
 of the sea. "Webster was educated by the Salisbury Mountains. 
 How different would have been the history of Washington 
 had he spent his youth amid the excitements and diver- 
 sions of a great city like London. Would Jefferson have 
 attained his. eminence and power, had he been early dandled 
 in the lap of affluence in a city like Paris ? How different 
 would have been the career of the great naturalist of our day, 
 had he spent his childhood in a large city. How fortunate for 
 Agassiz and, for the -world that his native home, was in the 
 beautiful little village of Mottier in Switzerland, lying midway 
 between the lakes of Neuchatel and Morat. The woody hills, 
 the gardens and vineyards, the banks, cascades and lakes ; 
 the Jura and more distant Alps, with magnificent glaciers, 
 glistening fields of snow and ice ; these were his early teachers. 
 His very sports served to convert the observing boy into the 
 future naturalist. These were boating,' fishing, hunting, study- 
 ing birds and turtles, gathering bugs, butterflies and other 
 
17 
 
 insects, roaming in the woods, taking long excursions on Lake 
 Neuchatel, in whose waters clear to an unusual depth he could 
 find the haunts and study the habits of the fish ; climbing 
 steep hills and rqcky cliffs and even ascending the magnificent 
 precipices of the Jura. Living much in the open air, he 
 observed the birds so as to distinguish them by their beak, 
 claws, size, form, plumage, song or flight. If in early life he 
 knew less of books he had studied nature more. 
 
 The late Charles Hammond, one of the most successful of 
 American teachers, used to say he was educated by the grana 
 scenery of his native town — Union — comprising the highest 
 land in the State east of the Connecticut river. From the 
 homestead, he could see the church spires in many of the 
 surrounding towns. From a hill near by, he used to "gaze 
 at Wachusett Mountain in Massachusetts, and in a clear day 
 could distinctly see "the deep blue peak of Monadnock in 
 Jeffrey, New Hampshire." To continue his own words, " my 
 father observed nature and loved flowers, and early taught me 
 to observe the, properties of plants and trees, and learn the 
 names, habits, retreats and voices of the birds." He often 
 revisited this grand scenery to which he attributed the inspira- 
 tion of his youth. 
 
 I often advise the sons of wealth in our cities to spend at 
 least one year in the country, with its freer sports, and wider 
 range of rambles, or better still, for both physical and mental 
 training, to give one season to hard work on the farm or in the 
 shop. The practical skill thus gained in adapting means to 
 ends in observing things, common objects and animals, may 
 compensate for some loss of book learning and lead one 
 afterwards, like Agassiz, to pursue text-books with greater zest. 
 
 11. My interest in this work centers in the improvement of 
 the homes and home life of our people. " The hope of America 
 is the homes of America," and the hope of Connecticut is the 
 homes of Connecticut. There remain still too many homes 
 . and grounds desolate, neglected and repulsive, where taste and 
 trees, shrubbery, hedges or creeping vines with a lawn would 
 make " the wilderness blossom as the, rose." Unquestionably, 
 neglect and slatternliness in and around the house repel from 
 their rural homes many youth who might otherwise be bound 
 
18 
 
 in strongest ties to the fireside. Our farmers and mechanics, 
 or their thoughtful and thrifty wives, are beginning to realize 
 how easily and economically, often, without any outlay of 
 money, they can surround their homes with flowers, the Vir- 
 ginia creeper, grape vines or trees, and thus increase the 
 beauty, the attractions and market value of the homestead. 
 These embellishments of the home and grounds help to culti- 
 vate domestic sentiments. 
 
 Without a Eural Improvement Association our best towns 
 fall far short of what they- might be and ougbt to be. Too 
 often, neglected private grounds, dilapidated dwellings, barns 
 or sheds, or a street ugly with piles of decaying brush or 
 chips, discarded fruit cans, broken harrows, carts or sleds, 
 a front fence with missing pickets and a disabled gate, give 
 an air of shiftlessnes3 that sadly mars the effect of an 
 otherwise beautiful village. Here an Association is needed to 
 develop that private taste and public spirit which will remove 
 such defects and disfigurements. When every citizen is thus 
 stimulated to make his own grounds and wayside not only 
 free from rubbish, but neat and attractive, the entire town 
 becomes so inviting and home-like as to give new value to 
 its wealth and new attractions to all its homes. Such affec- 
 tionate care and attention to the homes indicate a kindly, 
 intelligent, home-loving people, and no better praise need be 
 given to any people than that they tenderly cherish their homes. 
 A stranger can hardly drive through such a town without say- 
 ing " Here are people of refinement, who love their homes, 
 and therefore tastefully guard the surroundings of their daily 
 life." These surroundings, trifling as they seem to some, are 
 the more important, because they are constant forces in mould- 
 ing character. " Cleaning up, dusting, putting things in order," 
 are little matters in "the parlor, sitting-room or kitchen, yet 
 how soon each becomes forbidding, when these trifles are neg- 
 lected. Just so in a village, these minor matters neglected, 
 and the comfort, content, reputation and prosperity of a whole 
 community suffer, but worst of all, home life suffers and char- 
 acter deteriorates. 
 
 Modern civilization relates specially to the homes and social 
 life of the people, to their health, comfort and thrift, their 
 
19 
 
 intellectual and moral advancement. In earlier times and 
 other lands, men were counted in the aggregate. They were 
 valued as they helped to swell the revenues or retinues of kings 
 and nobles. The government was the unit, and each individual 
 only added one to' the roll of soldiers or serfs. With us, 
 the individual is the unit and the government is for the people 
 as well as by the people. 
 
 It is a good omen that public interest in the embellishments 
 of rural homes and villages is widely extending, and that the 
 varied charms of the country with its superior advantages for 
 the physical and moral training of, children are attracting many 
 thoughtful men to -the simpler enjoyments. and employments of 
 rural life. With the growth of public taste the day is not 
 distant when beautiful country seats and villages will abound 
 throughout Connecticut. Dr. Bushnell, with his keen observa- 
 tion and intense love of rural scenery was wont to say, "No 
 part of our country between the two oceans is susceptible of 
 greater external beauty than Connecticut." A taste for rural 
 adornment is a source of physical, mental and moral health 
 as well as enjoyment. The parentage of parks, lawns, trees, 
 flowers, vines and shrubs becomes a matter of just pride and 
 binds one to the spot he has adorned. 
 
 The hankering for city diversions and excitements, and am- 
 bition for easier lives and more genteel employments have 
 brought ruin to multitudes and financial disaster to the nation. 
 A great peril to the land to-day comes from the swelling 
 throngs, ranging from the reckless tramp to the fashionable 
 idler, who are ever devising expedients, foul or fair, to get 
 a living without work. The disparagement of country life has 
 been one of the worst tendencies of the times. 
 
 Every influence should therefore be combined to foster 
 home attachments, for there is protection as well as education 
 in the fervent love of home with its sacred associations. Patri- 
 otism itself hinges on the domestic sentiments. When one's 
 home becomes the Eden of taste and interest and joy, those 
 healthful local ties are formed which bind him first and most to 
 the spot he has embellished, and then to his town, his State 
 and country. Whatever adorns one's home and ennobles his 
 domestic life, strengthens his love of country and nurtures all 
 
20 
 
 the better elements of his nature. On the other hand, no man 
 without local attachments can have genuine patriotism. As 
 happy in one place as in another, he is like a tree planted in a 
 tub, portable indeed, but at the expense of growth and strength. 
 Said Monsieur Lariaux, the French Deputy to the American 
 Eyangelical Alliance, in his farewell address, " your homes, 
 homes, sweet homes — these are the safeguards of your freedom. 
 Oh,' pray, as you gather at your family altars,, that my poor 
 France may have such homes." 
 
 In traveling thousands of miles annually for many years, 
 my experience has led me to expect kindness and refinement 
 in the humblest hamlet to which flowers, well trimmed shrubs, 
 or neat and cultivated grounds invite. But these outward 
 adornments of the house, however valuable, are but symbols of 
 what should be the attractions of its inner life, realizing the 
 highest beauty in the unwearied and delicate attentions of each 
 to all. The central duty of life is the creation of happy homes. 
 The higher aim of the industries of the world, whether in agri- 
 culture, manufactures or commerce, and the purpose for which 
 government itself is worthy to be sustained, is that men may 
 live in happy homes. Let then the sunlight of ge,nerous love 
 fertilize our homes as the garden of God — worthy to be as 
 heaven designed, a divine institution, the only earthly paradise, 
 the best symbol of and the best school for the paradise above, 
 the spot' most sacred on earth, to be cherished with the most 
 grateful memories in all the future. Back to this holy ground 
 consecrated by flowers and shrubs and trees each tenderly asso- 
 ciated with a mother's love and a father's care, let Thanksgiving 
 gather the scattered circle. Let the Christmas tree bear some 
 fruit; even for the youngest. Let the birthdays be happily 
 observed, and the marriage anniversary joyfully remembered. 
 
 The home should be the first and chief place to promote a 
 love of flowers, vines, shrubs and trees by cultivating them, 
 and thus early develop a love for the beautiful in nature, in 
 art and still more in character. We need more heartily to 
 cultivate home affections, provide home enjoyments and foster 
 home courtesies. In the every day intercourse of home, there 
 should be a more sacred observance of the amenities of life 
 and a freer interchange of kindly feeling. As flowers seem 
 
21 
 
 worthless to the thoughtless, so the morning and evening 
 salutations in the family may seem little in themselves, but 
 when fitly observed are mighty in their influence. As the 
 sunbeam is composed of myriads of minute rays, so the home 
 should be illumined and brightened by nature's richest hues 
 without and still more by winning smiles within, cordial greet- 
 ings, loving looks, gentle words, sweet laughter and nameless 
 little kindnesses. Such beauties of nature and art, such ameni- 
 ties and affections should be the sunshine of home. They 
 refresh and purify the social circle. Like the clinging vine, 
 they twine themselves around the heart, calling forth its purest 
 emotions and securing its < most healthful activity. Such a 
 home is worthy the name Ordinance of Grod. Such a heaven 
 here will help prepare its members for the heaven above. 
 Such an ideal may be an inspiration towards its realization. 
 
 If parents combine to make the circle of home-life beautiful 
 without and within, they will sow the seeds of truth, kindness, 
 honesty, and fidelity in the hearts of their children from which 
 they may reap a harvest of happiness and virtue. The mem- 
 ory of a beautiful and happy home, and a sunny childhood is 
 one of the richest legacies parents can leave to their children. 
 The heart will never forget its hallowed influences. It is a 
 fountain of enjoyment, to which the lapse of years will only 
 add new sweetness. Such a memory is a constant inspiration 
 for good and restraint from evil. If taste and culture adorn 
 our homes, and grounds, and music adds its charms, our 
 children will find the healthful pursuits and pleasures of rural 
 homes more attractive than the pomp, and glare, and whirl 
 of city life. Such early occupations and enjoyments will 
 invest home life, and then school life and all ones future with 
 new interest and value, with new significance and joyousness. 
 For life is ever what we make it. We may by our blindness 
 or folly or sin live in a world of darkness and gloom, or we 
 may live in a world full of sunlight, and beauty, and joy, for 
 the world without always reflects the world within. 
 
 12. These Associations have awakened new interest in tree- 
 planting, both ornamental and economic. In answer to the 
 question what ornamental trees to plant, I have usually recom- 
 mended among our native trees the following, naming them in 
 
22 
 
 the order of preference : The elm, maple, tulip, ash, linden or 
 basswood, hemlock, white oak, black walnut, and hickory. 
 
 The white ash deserves more favor both as an ornamental 
 and a timber tree. Combining lightness, strength, toughness, 
 elasticity and beauty of grain in a rare degree, it is in great 
 and growing demand for farming tools, furniture, interior 
 finishing of houses and railroad cars, the construction of car- 
 riages, for oars and pulley blocks, and many other purposes. 
 The excellence of our ash is one secret of the preference given 
 abroad to American agricultural implements. It is hardy, will 
 bear the bleakest exposure, is a rapid grower and attains large 
 size, but will not thrive on ; poor lands. It is every way supe- 
 rior to the European ash, much as that has been cultivated and 
 lauded abroad. 
 
 Connecticut is rich in its variety of native trees, having 
 nearly sixty species, of which about forty are sizable for tim- 
 ber. The elm, when growing under favorable conditions, has 
 been pronounced "the most magnificent vegetable of the tem- 
 perate zone." The tulip tree or common white wood deserves 
 much greater favor as an ornamental tree. It is a rapid grower, 
 has a straight stem and attains large size. Taken from the 
 woods when ten or fifteen feet high, it is not likely to live, but 
 transplanted young from the nursery it proves thrifty and 
 hardy. It As a common mistake to select too old trees for 
 transplanting — so old that they must be beheaded. Not even 
 the elm ever developes its full symmetry when subjected to 
 such unnatural treatment. It is better to transplant all trees 
 so young that with complete roots and good care they can grow 
 without cropping. 
 
 Among imported trees the European larch should hold a 
 prominent place. It combines the three qualities of rapidity 
 ,of. growth, symmetry of form and durability of timber. Mr. 
 Maro Hammond, of Vernon, covered a worn-out, unsightly, 
 gravelly hill in the rear of his home with a thousand larch, dur- 
 ing this spring of 1880. If these thrive, he is to set out a much 
 larger number next spring. John W. Nichols, of Branford, 
 plants a large number this year. Three thousand larch and 
 other exotics were set out in Clinton last year, besides many 
 native trees. Some ten thousand larch trees were planted 
 
23 
 
 last spring in Pomfret to reclaim exhausted hillsides. -If these 
 experiments in recuperating sterile soils are successful, they 
 may lead to important economic results in addition to the 
 adornment given to fields now barren and unsightly. Grigor 
 says, "No tree is so valuable as the larch in its fertilizing 
 effects arising from the richness of its foliage which it sheds 
 annually. The yearly deposit is very great ; the leaves remain 
 and are consumed on the spot where they drop." Trees also 
 enrich the soil by a curious chemistry which disintegrates even 
 the* rocks, and transmutes their particles into forms of life and 
 beauty. The radicles and rootlets, in their under-ground labor- 
 atory, secrete acids which dissolve the very sands and stones. 
 
 In many positions groves are of great service as wind-breaks ; 
 even narrow strips of trees afford a shelter to fruit trees and to 
 various crops, as well as a shield to cattle from piercing winds. 
 Evergreens serve best for screens, as deciduous trees are leaf- 
 less when their shelter is most needed, especially for stock 
 and around farm buildings. The evergreens most suitable 
 for this purpose are the Norway spruce, white pine, Scotch 
 pine, and Austrian pine ; and next to these are the American 
 arbor vitse, hemlock, and spruce. Sheltered orchards are most 
 productive and less likely to lose their fruit prematurely by 
 violent winds, and the farmer with proper wind-screens con- 
 sumes less fuel in his house and less forage in his stables. 
 
 In some portions of Germany the law formerly required 
 every landholder to plant trees along his road frontage. Happy 
 would it be for us if the sovereigns of our soil would each 
 make such a law for himself. Happy, also, if the law of 
 usage, fashion, or interest here, as did the civil law there, 
 required that every young man before he married should 
 plant a wedding tree. In some of our Western States tree- 
 planting by the road-side is encouraged by a bounty from the 
 State treasury, and in the fields by both a bounty and exemp- 
 tion from taxation for a term of years. The law in Minnesota 
 provides that "every person planting, protecting and cultiva- 
 ting forest trees for three years, one-half mile or more along 
 any public highway, shall be entitled to receive for ten years 
 thereafter an annual bounty of two dollars for each half-mile 
 so planted and cultivated, to be paid out of the State treas- 
 
24 
 
 ury ; but such bounty shall not be paid any longer than such 
 line of trees is maintained." I "may be pardoned for repeating 
 a personal allusion. The maples which I planted, when a 
 mere boy, before the old homestead in Litchfield county, are 
 now beautiful and stately trees. As I have often said, they 
 have paid me a thousand-fold for the work they cost, and 
 added new charms to that beautiful spot, to which I count it a 
 privilege to make an annual visit. Among the memories of 
 my boyhood, no day has recurred with, such frequency and 
 satisfaction as that then devoted to tree-planting. My interest 
 in this subject is due to this incident (or perhaps accident) of 
 my boyhood. I should be thankful if I could help put a sim- 
 ilar incident, and an equally grateful experience, into the child- 
 hood of our boys of to-day. 
 
 In tree-planting, the economic and ornamental, touch at so 
 many points that the cases are rare where they really diverge. 
 Nothing, for example, can add so much to the beauty and 
 attractiveness of our country roads as long avenues of fine 
 trees. One sees this beautifully illustrated in France, where, for 
 over a hundred miles on a stretch, the road is lined with 
 trees. In many ways the first Napoleon's interest in arbori- 
 culture proved a benefaction to France. No time should be 
 lost in securing the same grand attraction to the highways of 
 Connecticut. Growing on land otherwise running to waste, 
 such trees would yield most satisfactory returns. The shade 
 and beauty would be grateful to every traveler, but doubly so 
 to the owner and the planter, as the happy experience of many 
 Connecticut farmers can testify. A grand work in this direc- 
 tion is already well started. No class can contribute so much 
 to the adornment of our public roads as the farmers. They 
 have already in abundance the very best trees for the roadside, 
 such as the elm, maple, ash, American linden (or bass), oak, 
 and in some localities the walnut. The hard maple will thrive 
 in dry and gravelly soils, while the elm and red maple are 
 specially desirable for moist, low ground. As the maples 
 should be planted twenty-five feet apart, and the elms from 
 forty to fifty, poplars or willows or trees growing rapidly from 
 scions, may be placed between, to be cut down when their 
 statelier neighbors require the room for their full development. 
 
25 
 
 Tree-planting is fitted to give a needful lesson of forethought 
 to the juvenile mind. Living only in the present and for the 
 present, youth sow, too often, only where they can quickly 
 reap. A meager crop soon in hand, outweighs a golden 
 harvest long in maturing. They should learn to forecast the 
 future as the condition of wisdom. Arboriculture is a disci- 
 pline in foresight — it is always planting for the future, and 
 sometimes for the distant future. Says Washington Irving, 
 " There is something nobly simple and pure in such a taste for 
 trees. It argues a sweet and generous nature to have this 
 strong friendship for the hardy and glorious sons of the forest. 
 There is a serene majesty in woodland scenery that enters into 
 the soul, dilates and elevates it, and fills it with noble inclina- 
 tions. There is a grandeur of thought connected with this 
 heroic line of husbandry. It is worthy of liberal and free- 
 born and aspiring men. He who plants an oak, looks forward 
 to future ages and plants for posterity. He cannot expect to 
 enjoy its shelter, but he exults in the idea that the acorn 
 which he has buried in the earth shall grow up into a lofty pile, 
 and shall keep on flourishing and increasing and benefiting 
 mankind long after he has ceased to tread his paternal fields." 
 It was the trees of his own planting at Sunnyside-on-the- 
 Hudson, more than the beauty of the surrounding landscape, 
 that led Irving to say, " After all my wanderings, I return to 
 this spot with a heartfelt preference for it over all others in the 
 world." It was the simple beauty he had created at Marsh- 
 field, — the grassy lawns, the shaded approaches, the hundreds 
 of trees of his planting, — that bound Daniel Webster so 
 strongly to that sequestered spot. The charm of Abbotsford, 
 the grand Mecca of Scotland, comes mainly from its beautiful 
 ivy and shrubbery and the thousands of trees planted by the 
 hand of its illustrious proprietor. Says Sir Walter Scott, 
 " My heart clings to this place I have created. There is scarce 
 a tree in it that does not owe its being to me. Once well 
 planted, a tree will grow when you are sleeping, and it is 
 almost the only thing that needs no tending." 
 
 Over three million dollars have been expended in the last 
 ten years in Connecticut, in building and repairing school 
 houses. Wise and necessary as was this expenditure, had one- 
 
26 
 
 hundredth part of this sum been spent annually in planting 
 trees and adorning the school grounds, a still better result 
 would have been accomplished in cultivating the taste of our 
 youth, leading them to study and admire our noble trees, and 
 realize that they are the grandest and most beautiful products 
 of nature and form the finest drapery that adorns this earth in 
 all lands. Thus taught, they will wish to plant and protect 
 trees, and find in their own happy experience that there is a 
 peculiar pleasure in their parentage, whether forest, fruit or 
 ornamental — a pleasure that never cloys, but grows with their 
 growth. Such offspring they will watch with pride, as every 
 year new beauties appear. Like grateful children, they bring 
 rich filial returns and compensate a thousand-fold' for the trou- 
 ble they cost. This love of trees early implanted in the school 
 and fostered in the home, will be sure to make our youth prac- 
 tical arborists. They should learn that trees have been the ad- 
 miration of the greatest and best men in all ages. The ancients 
 ttnderstood well the beauty and hygienic value of trees. The 
 Hebrews almost venerated the Palm. It was the chosen sym- 
 bol of Judea on their coins and graven on the doors of the 
 temple as the sacred sign of justice. The Cedar of Lebanon 
 was the pride of the Jews and became to them the emblem 
 of strength and beauty as is seen in Ezekiel's description of a 
 Cedar in Lebanon with fair branches and with a shadowing 
 shroud and of a high stature and his top was among the thick, 
 boughs. The height was exalted above all the trees of the 
 field and his boughs were multiplied and his branches became 
 long. Thus was he fair in his greatness, in the length of his 
 branches, nor any tree in the garden of God like unto him in 
 beauty. 
 
 The Egyptians, Greeks and Eomans were proficients in tree 
 planting. Hence Thebes, Memphis, Athens, Carthage, Eome, 
 Pompeii and Herculaneum, as their very ruins still show; had 
 each their shaded streets or parks. Two thousand years ago, 
 it was the ambition of the richest Eomans to maintain a rural 
 home in or near the city as it is of the wealthy Londoner, 
 Viennese, or Berliner to-day, and their ancient villas were most 
 lavishly adorned. The Paradise of the Persians was filled with 
 blossoming trees and long lines of roses. This taste for beauti- 
 
27 
 
 ful gardens was transplanted from Persia to Greece, and the 
 greatest Greek Philosophers held their schools in beautiful 
 gardens and groves. The devastation, of parks, the destruction 
 of shade trees, the neglect of public streets and private grounds, 
 the decay of rural tastes and the utter slight of home adorn- 
 ments were clearer proofs of the great relapse to barbarism than 
 the vandalism which merely destroyed the proud monuments 
 of classic art and literature. 
 
 In tree planting, the beginning only is difficult. It is the 
 first step that costs — at least it costs effort and persuasion to set 
 this thing on foot — but that step once taken, others are sure to 
 follow. On this account, I have tried various devices to get 
 our youth initiated in tree-planting. In 1876 an effort was made 
 to promote " Centennial Tree-Planting " by the offer of prizes, 
 which proved successful far beyond my expectation. Many 
 youth in Connecticut whose first experience as little arborists 
 was prompted by those prizes, have become so interested in 
 this pleasant work that they have continued it each subsequent 
 spring. In 1878 the accident of the blowing down of a famous 
 willow led me to offer them several thousand scions. Beau- 
 tiful as that exotic is, I was careful to state that it is not com- 
 parable to many of our majestic natives, saving in a circular 
 then addressed to our boys : "Because the main tug is at the 
 start, on account of the inertia of ignorance and indifference, 
 that start should be made easy. I should greatly prefer to 
 start five thousand elms or maples this year in Connecticut, if 
 it could be done as easily as my five thousand willow scions 
 seem likely to be stuck in the ground. This proposal is made 
 as a mere beginning in tree planting, sure to lead to something 
 more and better." 
 
 These and other plans have manifestly increased the interest 
 of our youth in arboriculture through the State. There is 
 nothing more ennobling than the consciousness of doing 
 something \for. future generations, something which shall prove 
 a growing benefaction in coming years. Tree-planting is an 
 easy way of perpetuating one's memory long after he has 
 passed away. The poorest can in this way provide himself 
 with a monument grander than the loftiest shaft of chiseled 
 stone, which may suggest duty to the living while it commemo- 
 
28 
 
 rates the dead. Such associations grow in interest from year to 
 year and from generation to generation. It will yield a rich 
 harvest to future generations, if we can now stimulate a revival 
 of arboriculture throughout our State. I confess tip a grateful 
 pride in the fact that something in this line has been recently 
 accomplished in nearly every town of Connecticut. If this 
 work is duly extended, our whole State will be transformed 
 into a series of beautiful villages. Nothing can add such a 
 charm to our country roads as long and magnificent avenues of 
 stately trees. 
 
 The benefits that may accrue to our country from the dis- 
 cussion of tree-planting, were strikingly exhibited two hundred 
 and fourteen years ago, when Sir John Evelyn published his 
 celebrated work, entitled, "Sylva: or, a Discourse on Forest 
 Trees and the Propagation of Timber." It was at once 
 received with great public favor, and honored with royal com- 
 mendation. He had remarkable success in awakening general 
 interest in sylviculture. He was one of the founders of the 
 Eoyal Society, and wrote this book at its special request, and 
 that society has originated few books in the last two hundred 
 years more useful than this which still survives in its grand 
 results, although his other works on painting, sculpture, archi- 
 tecture, and medals have long since been forgotten. In many 
 ways England has recognized her great obligations to the man 
 who worked so lovingly and effectively for the good of his. 
 countrymen. 
 
 Disraeli, in his " Curiosities of Literature," fittingly says : 
 " Had Evelyn only composed the great work of his Sylva, his 
 name would have excited the gratitude of posterity. The 
 voice of the patriot exults in the dedication to Charles II, pre- • 
 fixed to one of the later editions, in which he says : ' I need 
 not acquaint your Majesty how many millions of timber trees, 
 besides infinite others, have been planted throughout your vast 
 dominions at the instigation of this work, because your Majesty 
 has been pleased to own it publicly for my encouragement.' 
 Surely, while Britain retains her situation among the nations 
 of Europe, the Sylva of Evelyn will endure with her triumph- 
 ant oaks. It was a retired philosopher who aroused the genius 
 of the nation, and who, casting a prophetic eye towards the 
 
29 
 
 i 
 
 age in which we live, contributed to secure our sovereignty of 
 the seas. The present navy of Great Britain has been con- 
 structed with the oaks which the genius of John Evelyn 
 planted." 
 
 18. The economic bearings of this subject claim attention. 
 The money wisely expended for the adornment and improve- 
 ment of a town is a good investment. It pays in many ways. 
 Such improvements help to retain in a town its wealthy and 
 public-spirited citizens, whom a narrow and unprogressive pol- 
 icy would repel. Dr. Bodwell, who was long a resident in 
 England, took a deep interest in this subject, when professor in 
 the Theological Seminary of Hartford, and after journeying 
 widely through Connecticut, said, "This village improvement 
 all over our State is of great promise in a variety of ways. 
 One most valuable result will be that a larger proportion of 
 the enterprising young men will stay at home and cultivate 
 the farms and make it a good thing too, with their intelligence 
 and improved methods, and then the maidens will stay of 
 course, and weddings will multiply, and the old homes will 
 again be full of rosy children as in 'the ages past,' and the 
 commonwealth will make a new and noble start in the career 
 of riches and honor. In traveling over the State, one is con- 
 stantly greeted with new surprises in the discovery of charm- 
 ing landscape pictures, with the finest possible sights for delight- 
 ful residences; such as merchant princes might envy. Eng- 
 land in its natural features is not comparable to Connecticut in 
 wide variety of the picturesque and romantic. How exceed- 
 ingly beautiful our little Commonwealth is destined to become 
 at a future day, by the culture which is every day extending 
 under the lead of village improvement associations, and in the 
 erection of elegant country seats, is a thought continually sug- 
 gested." 
 
 In the history of our towns public improvements and growth 
 often stand related as cause and effect. Immigration from 
 New York is one source of the increase of these towns. Since 
 the solution of the long-vexed problem of rapid transit by the 
 elevated railroads, Connecticut has the opportunity of inviting ' 
 or repelling desirable residents in greatly increasing numbers. 
 Growing rapidly as New York now is, where shall its swelling 
 
30 
 
 throngs of business men find their homes ? A liberal spirit 
 will invite wealth and population in still larger measure to our 
 borders. The new comers from New York city to the shore 
 line and other progressive towns are the friends of public 
 improvements, because these are investments which ultimately 
 enrich a cpmmunity. A penurious policy is penny-wise and 
 pound-foolish. It defeats its own aim of saving, and results in 
 final deterioration and loss. Men of affluence and culture 
 shun a narrow-minded and illiberal community.. A good name 
 tends to enrich a town as well as an individual, while a bad 
 one may impoverish both. ; 
 
 14. There is no rural improvement more practical and valuable 
 than the recovery of once fertile lands now.lost to tillage. The 
 waste lands of New England and the Atlantic states are already 
 very extensive. They consist of, first, exhausted pasture land 
 once arable, second, rough, rocky hills and 'hill-sides, formerly 
 good grazing ground, but now so overrun with hard-hack or 
 other useless bushes as to be worthless for pasturage, third, 
 swamps, marshes, moors and bogs, and fourth, sand-barrens. 
 Except the third class here named, nearly all these lands have 
 been made barren by our improvidence and carelessness. My 
 special aim has been to encourage the recuperation of such 
 lands by tree planting. 
 
 For the reclamation of our pastures and waste lands aban- 
 doned to hard-hack, sumac, and other worthless brush, the 
 European larch deserves to become a favorite. A native of 
 the Alps, Apennines, of the Tyrol and Carpathian Mountains, it 
 is a very hardy tree, and at home in a variety of well-drained 
 soils, especially on rough, rocky, or gravelly ground, and the 
 most rugged ravines. There are in our State large tracts of 
 bleak hill-sides and mountain declivities or summits exhausted 
 and now practically worthless, where the larch, thickly planted, 
 would soon cljoke out all brush, and weeds. As an orna- 
 mental tree it grows finely even in deep and rich loam, but its 
 extraordinary qualities for timber may be impaired when grown 
 on the rich prairies of the West or the best lands of the East. 
 When raised under' right conditions, it combines the two qual- 
 ities of rapidity of growth and durability "of wood more than 
 any other tree. More than two thousand years ago, this wood 
 
31 
 
 was in high favor with the Romans for the building of "ships 
 and bridges. Julius Caesar spoke strongly of its strength and 
 durability. 
 
 I heard a lumber-man in, Yenice say that its durability was 
 amply attested there, as most of the houses of the city are built 
 upon larch piles, many of which, though in use for centuries, 
 show no signs of decay. In a large Doge's palace, uow used 
 as a hotel, he showed me some very ancient larch window- 
 casings which are still sound. For gondola posts in the canals 
 adjoining the houses the larch is preferred. In wharves and 
 many other positions in England, where there is an alternation 
 of wet and dry with the tide, the larch has stood this most try- 
 ing test far better than oak. In England it is regarded as the 
 best timber for railway ties. Monville says : "In Switzerland, 
 the larch, as the most durable of woods, is preferred for shin- 
 gles,, fences, and vine-props. These vine-props remain fixed 
 for years, and see crop after crop of vines bear their fruit and 
 perish without showing any symptoms of decay. Props of sil- 
 ver fir would not last more than ten years." Evelyn says : 
 "It makes everlasting spouts and pent-houses, which need 
 neither pitch nor painting to preserve them." Michie affirms 
 that " For out-door work it is the most durable of all descrip- 
 tions of wood. I have known larch posts that have stood for 
 nearly fifty years." Professor Sargent expresses the opinion 
 that " For posts it will equal in durability our red cedar, while 
 in the power to hold nails it is greatly its superior." The chest- 
 nut railway sleeper, secreting an acid which corrodes iron, loses 
 its power to hold the spikes in about seven years, though the 
 tie itself may not so soon seriously rot. The larch, while it 
 holds iron as firmly as oak, unlike the latter, does not corrode 
 iron. 
 
 The president of tbe Illinois Central Railway, having exam- 
 ined the vast planted forests of larch in Europe and learned its 
 remarkable fitness for railway ties, offers to transport the young 
 plants free of charge to any point on their lines or leased lines, 
 provided they are to be planted in the vicinity of the same. 
 It is, however, an experiment which time alone can determine, 
 whether the larch will retain its durability when planted in 
 the level, deep, vegetable mould of the prairies, with their 
 
32 
 
 retentive sub-soil. That it will grow there rapidly and luxu- 
 riantly is amply proved, but its history for many centuries 
 shows that elevated lands suit it better than low grounds, and 
 side-bills and mountain slopes better than flats. In the rich 
 river flats of Kew Gardens and in the vicinity of London the 
 larch does not thrive. The specimens found in that remarka- 
 ble collection of all known trees are puny. The Kew arborist 
 informed me that in the two hundred and 'seventy acres appro- 
 priated to the arboretum, no spot had been found suited to the 
 larch. 
 
 No other tree has been planted so extensively in Scotland. 
 It attains maturity long before the oak, and serves well for 
 nearly all purposes for which oak is used. Larch trees thirty 
 years old are sometimes sold for fifteen dollars each, while oaks 
 of the same age are not worth three dollars each. As the 
 larch grows erect, with short and slender laterals, it may be 
 planted much thicker than the oak. According to Loudon, 
 ten acres of larch will furnish as much ship timber as seventy- 
 five acres of oak. Its large timber yield per acre is one source 
 of its popularity in Britain. It was first planted on the estate of 
 the Duke of Athole, in 1741. Some stately specimens nearly 
 one hundred and forty years old may be seen near the cathe- 
 dral at Dunkeld. Mr. McGregor, the duke's forester, informed 
 me that on this one estate have been planted over twenty- 
 seven millions of larch trees, covering over sixteen thousand 
 acres, some of which was formerly worth only from one to two 
 shillings per acre. Dr. James Brown says he has seen matured 
 crops of larch of sixty-five years' standing sold for from $750 
 to $2,000 per acre, when the land was originally worth only 
 from $2 to $4 per acre. 
 
 The reclamation of marshes by drainage, both surface and 
 subsoil, has been carried on for so long a period and on so 
 broad a scale and with such grand results as to need no de- 
 tailed disqussion here. England, Ireland and Holland, to 
 name no other countries of E'urope, contain millions of acres 
 of such land, now reclaimed and exceedingly fertile. Even 
 lakes from ten to fifteen miles in length' have been drained. 
 In 1848 was completed the draining of the Lake of Haarlem 
 in Holland. The lands thus recovered have since been sold 
 
33 
 
 by the Government for nearly $3,500,000, or about $80 per 
 acre. The success of this grand experiment has prompted 
 others, like the draining of the Zuid Plas — a lake covering 
 nearly 12,000 acres, and the great work now progressing to 
 drain an arm of the Sheld, which will recover some 35,000 
 acies. Encouraged by the results of these enterprises, the 
 Netherlandish engineers now advocate the stupendous project 
 of draining the great salt water basin of the Zuiderzee — an 
 inland sea which covers 1,300,000 acres. The Italians have 
 nearly completed the work of enlarging and deepening the 
 tunnel cut by the Emperor Claudius 1800 years ago, to drain 
 Lake Celano. 30,000 workmen were employed on this sub- 
 tearanean passage for eleven years. Though this remarkable 
 undertaking — the wonder of that age — was successful, in the 
 following reign it fell into disrepair and continued to be neg- 
 lected for centuries. It is one of -many proofs of the revived 
 energy and enterprise of the present generation, rivaling their 
 historic ancestors, that they have restored and surpassed this 
 old Eoman work. This new tunnel, more than four miles in 
 length and costing over six millions of dollars, will ultimately 
 recover for agricultural occupation forty-two thousand acres of 
 most fertile land. Already some 36,000 acres of rich arable 
 land have been reclaimed, on which the crops yield a profit of 
 from thirty to thirty-six per cent. 
 
 "While it is interesting to know the extent and success of 
 lake drainage in the old world, in our country with millions of 
 acres of virgin soil, such expenditures would be unwise. But 
 in New England and the Atlantic States there are large tracts 
 of bogs and swamps that may be easily and economically 
 reclaimed by drainage. The hygienic advantages of stopping 
 malarious exhalations from stagnant pools would be clear gain. 
 This practice has been common in Europe for a long period. 
 When the works now in progress in Hungary are completed, 
 that country will have over a million acres of swamp land 
 drained and brought under cultivation. Many thousand acres 
 have thus been recently improved in Italy and similar works 
 are now progressing in France and elsewhere in Europe. Much 
 has lately been done in the same direction on our New Jersey 
 sea coast, along the shore of Lake Michigan and somewhat in 
 
34 
 
 the New England States. Several successful experiments in 
 swamp-drainage and securing land from overflow have been 
 tried in California, thus already improving some 200,000 acres 
 of land on our Pacific coast. The diking in and reclaiming the 
 salt marshes along the seashore is worthy of increased attention. 
 In Marshfield, Massachusetts, over 1400 acres of salt marsh 
 have been already greatly improved by shutting off the tides 
 of the ocean, at a cost of over $30,000. If the success expected 
 attends this experiment, it will deserve to be repeated on a 
 broad scale along our seashore. The improvement of moors 
 and wet lands by spreading layers of sand is too familiar to 
 need description. Tile drainage, though but recently intro- 
 duced in this country, is rapidly growing in favor. Though 
 more expensive than surface drainage, it produces- far better 
 results. In this way large tracts of wet land have been 
 recently improved, especially in the Western States. The 
 statistics from a single State will indicate the general progress 
 in this direction. In 1876 less than five million feet of tiles 
 were sold in Illinois : in 1877 over fourteen million feet were 
 sold. 
 
 The extent of soil depletion in many of the Southern 
 States, according to Dr. Tichenor of Alabama, is "painful 
 and humiliating. The fields of Middle Georgia were' once 
 the richest cotton lands of the South. After wearing them 
 out, the planters went to Alabama, and there repeated the' 
 same process of exhaustion. Now the line of greatest pro- 
 ductionfhas receded from the seaboard to Texas. Those who 
 thus "carelessly strip 'the soil of its wealth are traitors to those 
 who come after them. This ignorant plundering of the soil is 
 an evil which threatens our national stability. , One cause of 
 the long continued fertility of China and Japan is the care 
 with which every element of the soil is husbanded." 
 
 The practicability and even the possibility of reclaiming the 
 sand-barrens of the Atlantic States is so generally doubted, 
 that it is needful to show what has been done in this direction 
 under conditions the most unfavorable and where it was confi- 
 dently predicted nothing could be made to grow. The feasi- 
 bility of reclaiming our barren wastes, is proved by many facts 
 abroad and at home. Our Atlantic sand plains were once cov- 
 
35 
 
 ered with forests. The now bare, white sand hills of Province- 
 town were described by the Pilgrims, on their landing there, 
 as well-wooded. The sand hills on the coast of Prussia were 
 formerly wooded, down to the water's edge, and " it was only 
 in the last century, says Geo. P. Marsh, " that in consequence 
 of the destruction of their forests, they became moving sands. 
 King Frederick William I. when in pressing need of money, 
 sold the forests of the Freische Nehrung for 200,000 thalers, 
 and the trees were all felled. Financially the operation was a 
 temporary success, but in the lasting material effects, the State 
 received irreparable injury and would now gladly expend mil- 
 lions to restore the forests again. The dunes of the Nether- 
 lands were clothed with trees until after the Eoman invasion. 
 The old geographers speak of vast forests extending here to 
 the very brink of the sea, and the drifting coast dunes have 
 assumed a destructive character in consequence of the improvi- 
 dence of man. The history of the dunes of Michigan is the 
 same. Forty years ago, when that region was scarcely inhabi- 
 ted, they were generally covered with a thick growth of trees, 
 and there was little appearance of undermining and wash on 
 the land side, or of shifting of the sands, except where the 
 trees had been cut or turned up by the roots." 
 
 The sand dunes of Denmark cover over 160,000 acres — 
 those of Prussia 110,000( — those of the single province of Gas- 
 cony in France over 200,000, and in all Europe the drifting 
 sands, according to Pannewitz, cover 7,000,000 acres. Says 
 Marsh : " There is no question that most of this waste is capa- 
 ble of reclamation by simple tree planting, and no mode of 
 physical improvement is better worth the attention of civilized 
 governments than this. There are often serious objections to 
 extensive forest planting on soils capable of being otherwise 
 made productive, but they do not apply to sand wastes which, 
 until they are covered by woods, are not only a useless incum- 
 brance, but a source of serious danger to all human improve- 
 ments in the neighborhood of them." 
 
 This is a subject of practical interest to us because / we have 
 along the Atlantic coast as at Oape Cod, in Connecticut, at some 
 points in New Jersey, and other Atlantic States, on the shores of 
 Florida, on the Gulf Coast, on the eastern shore of Lake Mich- 
 
 4 
 
36 
 
 igan and elsewhere, long tracts of drifting sand that have done 
 serious local damage. To stop this extension, considerable 
 expenditures have already been made in several States to cover 
 their surface with a vegetable growth. 
 
 But this reclamation of barrens and sand dunes has been 
 carried on most extensively and successfully in France. These 
 sand hills or dunes as they are called, stretched over a hundred 
 miles along the coast of the Bay of Biscay, between the rivers 
 Adour and Gironde. Eanging from 180 to 320 feet above 
 the level of the sea, they are composed of white silicious 
 sand rounded and reduced to minute grains by, trituration. 
 These grains are still too heavy to be borne aloft by the winds 
 and scattered afar like the ashes of volcanoes. On the Atlantic 
 shore of Prance, the prevailing and most violent winds are from 
 the west and southwest. Hence at low tide,, the sands dried by 
 the sun and -the wind were driven as along an inclined plane 
 up the slopes which descend seaward and thus formed these 
 growing dunes, which moving inland created great desolation. 
 
 Nearly a century ago Bremontier published a memoir on the 
 reclamation of sand dunes. Under the patronage of the French 
 Government, he successfully introduced the planting of the 
 maritime pine along the Atlantic coast of Gascony. These 
 plantations have been perseveringly continued from that .time 
 to the present, and now cover over 100,000 acre,s in that single 
 district. Not only has this wide area been reclaimed and made 
 productive soil, but a still greater extent of fertile land has 
 been rescued from the destruction threatened by the advancing 
 sand hills. In speaking of the monument erected to Bremontier 
 in this now stately forest, Marsh says : " He deserves to be . 
 reckoned among the greatest benefactors of the race;" 
 
 In planting the dunes, a barrier along the shore was found 
 necessary at first to protect the young trees from the rolling 
 sands which otherwise would bury them. A double line of 
 paling was erected parallel to the shore and a hundred meters 
 from high water mark — the second line being a hundred meters 
 further inland. This paling is made of planks sharpened at 
 the lower end and driven into the sand. Spaces of an inch 
 between the planks allow sand enough to pass through to bank 
 up equally on both sides and relieve somewhat the force of the 
 
37 
 
 ■wind by allowing it to pass through these openings. As the 
 paling is covered by the sands the planks are raised one at a 
 time. A movable frame with a long lever mounted on run- 
 ners, so that it can be slid along the top of the fence, and 
 having pinchers or a clamp and chain, is easily carried and 
 operated by one man. 
 
 The total cost of planting and protecting the pines has some- 
 times been as much as $40 per acre. The timber of this plan- 
 station has long been a source of profit, affording both resin and 
 wood. France now draws an annual revenue of 130,000 francs 
 from the resinous products of these forests. But in this case 
 the greater profit comes from the consequent protection of the 
 adjoining country from the encroaching sands, which had for- 
 merly sterilized fertile regions and buried thriving villages. 
 M. Samanos says that' "in all Prance nearly one million acres 
 (400,000 hectares) of desolate, land, supposed to be doomed to 
 everlasting sterility, have been reclaimed, and these savage des- 
 erts are now stocked with maritime pines which will become 
 for the country a fruitful source of wealth, and supply some 
 day the wants of the whole of France." 
 
 A liberal appropriation is now made annually for the con- 
 tinuance of this work. The whole extent of dunes in France 
 that remains to be planted is nearly 80,000 hectares, or about 
 200,000 acres. A small subsidy is given by the State to those 
 who own and plant them, but most of this land belongs to the 
 State and is managed entirely by the Forest department. 
 
 These successful experiments, conducted on so broad a scale 
 and for so long a period, clearly prove the practicability of 
 arresting and utilizing sand drifts by the plantation of trees. 
 What has been done abroad on the most unpromising beach 
 sands may surely be accomplished under the more favorable 
 conditions of our Atlantic barrens, not necessarily by planting 
 the same trees or by the same methods, but by those plans 
 which a study of the local climate and conditions in each case 
 will suggest. The young plants in France have been sheltered 
 at • the outset by sowing with the pine seeds certain hardy 
 weeds, herbs and grasses like the yellow lupin, which gave a 
 temporary shade and protection, and by their decay helped 
 somewhat to enrich the soil. Some arborists affirm that oats 
 
38 
 
 or rye, or our blue lupin which thrives in dry soil, will serve 
 the same purpose on our barrens. I have not space to detail 
 the kindred methods of recuperating sand barrens in other 
 countries of Europe. 
 
 I can only name a few illustrations of the extent of this 
 work. Hummel attributes the devastation of the Karst, the 
 high plateau lying north of Trieste — until recently one of the 
 most parched and barren wastes in Europe — to the felling of 
 its woods, centuries ago, to build the navies of Venice. The 
 Austrian government is now making energetic and thus far 
 successful efforts for the reclamation of this desolate waste, 
 having planted over half a million of young trees and sown 
 great quantities of seed. In the vicinity of Antwerp less than 
 fifty years ago was a vast desolate plan. 'Looking to-day in 
 the same direction from the spire of the cathedral, one can see 
 nothing but a forest, whose limits seem lost in the horizon. 
 Forest plantations have transformed these barren lands into 
 fertile fields. On the Adriatic, Baltic, Mediterranean as well 
 as the Biscayan coasts the disastrous encroachments of the sea 
 have been checked by forest plantations. Extensive plains, 
 . once barren sands south of Berlin, about Odessa and north of 
 the Black Sea and vast steppes in Russia, are now well wooded. 
 R. Douglass & Sons, of Waukegan, Illinois, who have been the 
 pioneers in promoting economic tree-planting in the West, 
 began four years ago the experiment of reclaiming barren sand 
 ridges near the shore of Lake Michigan, trying pitch pine, 
 white pine, Austrian pine and Scotch pine. Here, as on Cape 
 Cod, the Scotch pine proved the ^est for reclaiming sandy 
 barrens. "With these facts from abroad and at home it cannot 
 be denied that even the poorest soils of the Atlantic States 
 may be reclaimed. 
 
 All sand wastes are by no means alike. Trees which will 
 grow luxuriantly on one will pine away and die on another. 
 The climate, too, varies, as well as the soil. The soil of Gape 
 Cod and Nantucket is well fitted for the maritime pine, where 
 it has been amply tried. It grows well for a season or two, 
 but is sure to winter-kill in^ a few years. It suffers from the 
 severity of the winter in Holland and Germany. Sea spray 
 and saline constituents in the soil or air are fatal to some trees 
 
39 
 
 and favorable to others. A knowledge of the natural growths 
 of each vicinity will favor adaptation to local conditions. 
 
 Though dry at the top, sand dunes and most sand plains 
 and hillocks are moist a little below the surface, by reason of 
 evaporization from the lower strata, retention of rain water 
 and capillary attraction. The latter cause depends upon the 
 size of the grain of sand. The finer the grain the greater is its 
 capacity for receiving moisture and the longer is the moisture 
 retained. 
 
 As this scheme of recuperating sand wastes will be regarded 
 as chimerical by many who have not investigated the subject, I 
 will cite facts found near home. Having made a trip on Cape 
 Cod, expressly to inspect their reclaimed lands and confer with 
 the intelligent tree planters there, who are the American pioneers 
 in this work, I will summarize briefly the information gained 
 from them. The amount of land planted with trees in Barnstable 
 county is about 10,000 acres. Before the trees were planted 
 these well-nigh worthless lands could be purchased at from 25 
 to 50 cents per acre. I was interested in the plantations of 
 John Doane, of Orleans, the oldest living silviculturist in 
 America (now 89 years of age), who has planted 170 acres. 
 He has sold planted lands for $14 per acre, not worth over 50 
 cents before planting, which he considers a good investment. 
 But the best pay has been his enjoyment of this work, so 
 manifestly growing with the growth of these trees. The 
 forests he has created have long been to him a source of pride 
 and satisfaction, greatly improving the surroundings of his 
 place, and thus helping to brighten and prolong his years. 
 John Kenrick, of South Orleans said: "My experiments in 
 tree-planting have been made on over a hundred acres now 
 covered with trees from one to thirty-five years old, chiefly 
 pitch pine. I am now trying Scotch and Corsican pine and 
 European larch. My first aim has been to cover my worn out 
 lands with beauty and verdure, and it has proved a successful 
 and economic experiment. The seed of the pitch pine is worth 
 from one to two dollars, a pound, the higher price being in the 
 end the cheapest Fresh seeds carefully gathered are as sure to 
 vegetate as corn. I have tried every method of tree-planting, 
 transplanting trees from the smallest to those that are two feet 
 
40 
 
 high. This is a costly plan, but may be adopted when one 
 wishes to save time, or desires a few trees as a wind-break o] 
 otherwise. In transplanting trees immediately from my owr 
 nursery to the fields, my favorite time is just as the buds begir 
 to start in the spring. I have planted seeds both with a plan 
 ter and by hand. On our light sands a man and a boy wil 
 plant three acres in a day — dropping six seeds in a hill, it wil 
 take about one-half a pound of seed to the acre. This is mj 
 favorite method and is more satisfactory in results thougl 
 more costly than that of using the plough and planter. Wher 
 the evergreens are two feet high I would thin them, leaving 
 one thrifty plant in each hill. I do not trim till they get large 
 and' them cut off only the dead branches." 
 
 Tully Crosby, of Brewster, said : " In our small town aboul 
 1500 acres of old waste land have been planted with pitcl 
 pine. The Norway pine has not proved a success with us 
 Many old fields bought for fifty cents per acre and planteo 
 with pine twenty-five years ago; are now worth from $10 tc 
 $20 per acre. The pines grow well for twenty -five or thirty 
 years and when cut off a second crop springs up immediately 
 and this crop does better than the first. The pitch pine takes 
 root and grows on our barren beach sand where no soil is per 
 ceptible. Our people are now planting trees every year. ] 
 have recently planted twelve acres. Two years ago I cut off a 
 lot planted thirty years since and the land is now full of young 
 pines scattered by the first growth. A man with a two-horse 
 team and planting machine can plant ten acres in a day and 
 three pounds of seed will do the whole." 
 
 E. Higgins, of Bastham, said: "Thirty years ago twenty 
 acres of condemned tillage land, worth one dollar per acre, was 
 planted with pitch pine. The present value of this land is $15 
 per acre. In 1870, 225 acres more of the same sort of land 
 was thus planted, the present value of which is $8 per acre. 
 About 150 acres of sandy land, utterly barren and not worth 
 fifty cents to the acre have been planted, the present value ol 
 which is $7 per acre." John G-. Thompson, of North Truxo, 
 says : " About 650 acres have been planted in this town. The 
 price of pitch pine seed for the 1 last few years has been $1.50 
 per pound. Thirty years ago land in this town could i be 
 
41 
 
 bought for tree planting at twenty-five cents per ^cre ; now 
 the same kind of barren land sells for $2 per acre for tree-- 
 planting. I find the expense of planting the pines to be $2.25 
 per acre." 
 
 S. P. Phinney, of Barnstable, said : " Large tracts of worn- 
 out lands in this country, that were worth comparatively 
 nothing, have been planted from the seed of the pitch pine. 
 These experiments have proved successful. I know of no way 
 in which the light sandy lands in this section can be made so 
 valuable as by planting the pitch pine. Our experience proves 
 that the cultivation of forest trees is feasible and profitable in 
 New England seaport towns. In 1845 I planted in this town 
 a ten acre lot with pitch pine seed, much as corn is planted, 
 dropping three, seeds in a hill and covering them with half an 
 inch of soil. To-day many of these trees will gird more than 
 a man's body. Hundreds of acres in this section are being 
 planted annually." 
 
 We have a great Sahara in Connecticut less than ten miles 
 from New Haven,' produced by improvidence and neglect. 
 The local traditions tell us that the sand-blow covering so 
 large an area in the towns of North Haven and Wallingford 
 was once finely wooded. Here and there clumps of low pines 
 and birches, the lone relics of a former growth, still resist the 
 drifting sands. So general is the conviction, that this sand- 
 blow is. utterly irreclaimable, that it has long since been aban- 
 doned to hopeless sterility. I shall be happily disappointed 
 if my plan for utilizing it is not regarded by many farmers as 
 visionary and impracticable. But the feasibility of reclaiming 
 such wastes is proved by many facts. ' The cost of reclaiming 
 the sand barrens on Cape Cod has been small — from three to 
 five dollars per acre, but the profit has been satisfactory to the 
 planters. The best time for planting the pine seeds is as early 
 in the spring as the frost permits. The work is done by hand 
 or by a seed-planter, and in rows about as thick as corn is 
 ordinarily planted. On the Cape Cod barrens there was no 
 vegetation, except a little moss, low poverty grass, so-called, 
 and in some cases light beach grass. 
 
 Experiments are now in progress to fix the dunes or sand 
 hills which threaten the Suez Canal by planting the maritime 
 
42 
 
 pine and other trees. I visited the celebrated forest of Fon- 
 •tainbleau in France, which covers an area of sixty-four square 
 miles. The soil of* this wide tract is composed entirely of 
 sand and apparently as dry as the sand plains of Wallingford, 
 Conn. Jules Clare, a student of forest science of world-wide 
 fame, says, " the sand here forms ninety-eight per cent, of the 
 earth, and it is almost without water ; it would be a drifting 
 desert but for the trees growing and artificially propagated 
 upon it." 
 
 "What has been done with signal success at Fontainbleau 
 in Gascony and many other provinces of France, as well as in 
 other European countries and on Cape Cod, shows the practi- 
 cability of reclaiming the worst deserts that can be found in 
 our Atlantic States. Many other facts might be cited were it 
 necessary, both from home and foreign fields, to prove the 
 feasibility of this plan of reclaiming sterile lands. If one is to 
 be commended who makes two blades of grass grow where but 
 one grew before, how much more the farmer who makes forests 
 thrive where nothing now grows. 
 
 The question is still often asked, will it pay the average 
 farmer to plant trees? Certainly not, if early profit is essen- 
 tial. The answer depends on various circumstances, such as 
 the size of one's farm, its soil and situation. But on an ordi- 
 nary farm of from sixty to one hundred acres and upwards, I 
 answer yes. If you are looking ahead and seeking an invest- 
 ment for future profit, "trees will make dollars, for they will 
 grow in waste places where nothing else can be profitably 
 cultivated. A soil too thin and rough for cereals may be 
 favorable for trees. Hillsides and plains exhausted and worn 
 out by the plow have often been reclaimed by planting forests. 
 Ra vines too steep for cultivation are the favorite seats of tim- 
 ber, and wherever a crevice is found in a rocky ledge, the root 
 of a tree will burrow and spread, taking a hold so firm as 
 to defy the storm, and acting mechanically disintegrate the 
 rock and change its constituent elements into '.useful products. 
 By the road-side, the river-bank, 'along the brook, and on the 
 overhanging cliff, a tree may be always earning wealth for its 
 owners. In no way can we ultimately enrich a State more 
 than by planting the choicest trees on our. exhausted and un- 
 
43 
 
 productive lands. In such situations, forests will yield a large 
 percentage of profit. This is a duty we owe to ourselves and 
 to our children. ; 
 
 George Peabody, who did ,so much to encourage schools and 
 learning, originated the motto, so happily illustrated by his , 
 own munificent gifts to promote education : " Education — the 
 debt of the present to future generations." We owe it to our 
 children to leave our lands and towns the better for our tillage, 
 and we wrong both ourselves and them if our fields are impov- 
 erished by our improvidence. But much as foresight is ad- 
 mired when its predictions are realized and its achievements 
 made, all history too plainly tells that the mass of men are not 
 easily persuaded to provide for exigencies far in the future. . 
 
 Thbugh the profit from tree-planting is remote, the pleasure 
 is immediate. The sour and selfish soul may say, " Posterity 
 has done nothing for me, and I will do nothing for posterity." 
 But every effort to start agencies whose benign influence shall 
 long endure, gives a glad inspiration and a conscious elevation 
 of character. 
 
 15. The improvement of the surroundings of railway stations 
 may well enlist the efforts of these associations. The railroad 
 depots in America are often made repulsive by neglect or by 
 the accumulation of discarded and decaying sleepers and other 
 unsightly rubbish, while those in Switzerland, France, Ger- 
 many and England are always neatly kept and usually adorned 
 with shrubs, flowers, or their beautiful English or German ivy, 
 sometimes covering the station-house with its dense garniture 
 of foliage. The Pennsylvania Central Bailroad, at the stations 
 west of Philadelphia, is following this worthy European exam- 
 ple. The beautiful little parks at Pomfret and Stonington 
 depots in Connecticut, and those at Kingston, Ehode Island, 
 and at North Conway and Plymouth, New Hampshire, show 
 how simply and inexpensively our railroad stations may be 
 made attractive. Parks and gardens are a proof and product 
 of civilization, and are an index of the wealth and culture of 
 any community. In the European countries above named,, the 
 Railway managers make it a part of the regular duty of the 
 station-masters to adorn the surrounding grounds. There is a 
 generous rivalry among these agents, who become justly proud 
 
44 
 
 of their railway gardening and sometimes find their gain 
 from the sale of bouquets to passengers. In striking contrast 
 with these adornments is the slatternliness disfiguring our de- 
 pots, as well described by D. G. Mitchell. "There are many 
 
 . charming suburban retreats near New York city, to which the 
 occupant must wade his way through all manner of filthiness 
 and disorderly debris, making his landing as it were in the 
 very xlung-heap of the place. Is there no remedy for this? 
 Must we always confront -the town with its worst side fore- 
 most? To make a township attractive, the approach to it 
 must be attractive. Every village station wants its little out- 
 lying Green to give character and dignity to the new approach. 
 In nine out of ten of way-side towns,' such space could be 
 
 - easily secured, easily held in reserve, easily made attractive ; 
 and if there was no room for a broad expanse of sward, at 
 least there might be planted some attractive copse of evergreens 
 or shrubbery, to declare by graceful type the rural pride of the 
 place. First impressions co'unt for a great deal — whether in 
 our meeting with a woman or with a village. Slipshoddiness 
 is bad economy in towns as in people. Every season there is a 
 whirl of citizens, tired of city heats and costs, traversing the, 
 country in half hope of being wooed to some summer home, 
 where the trees and the order invite tranquillity and promise 
 enjoyment. A captivating air about a village' station will 
 count for very much in the decision." 
 
 16. Among the minor aims of Eural Improvement Associa- 
 tions, are the providing of rustic seats under the shades for the 
 comfort of pedestrians, pleasantly suggesting neighborly kind- 
 ness and courtesy ; setting up watering troughs for horses at 
 convenient points where from adjacent hillsides never failing 
 springs invite and facilitate this improvement ; furnishing plans 
 for rural architecture, and for gates and fences, or securing 
 hedge-rows in room of fences, or, better still, in many villages 
 combining to remove all fences and visibly dividing lines, so 
 that the private grounds seem to unite with the way-side in one 
 large lawn ; the suggestion of the neutral tints for dwellings 
 and outhouses in place of the glaring white hitherto so com- 
 mon ; arrest of stray cattle, for strolling cattle usually are and 
 always ought to be outlawed ; preventing nuisances, one of these 
 
45 
 
 is the tearing up the turf fronting a dwelling house by incon- 
 siderate road-menders. There is ample room for the needful 
 work of the scraper and the hoe without making unsightly cuts 
 and gutters in front of residences. Painting advertisements on 
 the rocks by the myriad nostrum makers is a nuisance 'that 
 should be prohibited by law. The same may be said of the 
 encroachments made upon the highway every time the stone- 
 wall or fence boundary is rebuilt. The whole town should 
 show an interest in preventing such curtailment of its road- 
 ways. A Eural Improvement Association can develop a pub- 
 lic sentiment which will of itself correct these evils without 
 occasioning any neighborhood strifes or alienations. In this 
 matter the interest of one is the interest of all. The motto of 
 the Swiss Confederacy, " One for all and all for one," is the 
 true motto for the several districts and for all the people of a 
 town. Hence the term Rural is preferable to that of Village 
 Improvement, for not the village only but all parts of a town 
 should be included in the plans and benefits of this movement. 
 17. An important work of rural improvement in many 
 towns would be the betterment Of the surroundings of their 
 factories. Too frequently these grounds are disfigured with 
 rubbish and made unsightly by neglect. Keep a man in a 
 pig-sty and he would become swinish in his habits, but reverse 
 the conditions and you reverse the results. The influence of 
 flowers, shrubbery, or neat and cultivated grounds upon 
 operatives in refining their taste and promoting their happi- 
 ness and content is too often ignored. There is, however, a 
 goodly number of our manufacturers who show their interest 
 in their hands by making their factory buildings and tenement 
 houses inviting, comfortable and healthful, and adorning the 
 surrounding grounds. A description of the two model manu- 
 facturing villages of America and so far as I can judge, of the 
 world, will show the desirableness and results of better pro- 
 visions for the taste and comfort of operatives. I do not assume 
 that all factories can fully adoptthe standard of these establish- 
 ments, which are in *many particulars exceptional in their oppor-. 
 tunities. There are serious embarrassments in large and crowded 
 manufacturing towns, especially where the factories are. con- 
 trolled by non-resident owners, more anxious for dividends 
 
46 
 
 than for the comfort and improvement of their workmen. The 
 liberal policy of the Willimantic Linen Company, to give one 
 ofinany similar examples, shows how these difficulties may be 
 surmounted by wise provisions for the improvement and edu- 
 cation of the hands. 
 
 One of these "models" is the silk factory of the Cheney 
 Brothers in South Manchester, Conn., by far the largest and 
 most successful factory of the kind in the world, making over 
 25,000 yards of ribbons and broad silks a day. This business 
 started here by the Cheney family in 1836, has steadily grown 
 in extent and prosperity to the present time. The factory village 
 covers about eight hundred acres of land and includes some two 
 hundred houses. A fine lawn laid out with winding concrete 
 walks and adorned with shrubs and flowers fronts the mills, 
 and usually each of the houses. No fence or visibly dividing 
 line separates the front yards from the roads. The Cheneys 
 have encouraged their hands to build and own their home- 
 steads, and to this end furnish the land, arid loan money for 
 building at a low 'figure, with a "liquor reservation" in the 
 interest of temperance and with the understanding that all 
 houses shall be on a plan provided or approved by their archi- 
 tect and that all shall be neatly painted some neutral tint. 
 Not a house in glaring white here offends the eye. The beau- 
 tiful grounds of the Cheney mansions, of- the operatives and of 
 the factories all present the appearance of an extended park, 
 and give a look of refinement, kindliness, and good neighbor- 
 hood to the whole village which is like a well-kept garden. 
 No private yard is left in an untidy state. No debris or rub- 
 bish is seen around or near any dwelling. There is evidently 
 a public sentiment in favor of neatness and order that per- 
 vades the entire community and allows no dirty nooks to be 
 found. Creeping vines cover "the office" and some of the 
 factory buildings and dwellings. No block houses are found 
 here. The cottages stand apart and vary in style, giving an 
 individuality to each place. A capacious aqueduct carries 
 water to every house. This village seems 'like a community 
 in the best sense of the term, with common interests, pursuits, 
 and sympathies. The providing of a large and commodious 
 lecture hall costing $50,000, together with interesting and in- 
 
47 ' 
 
 structive lectures and entertainments and a free library and 
 reading room, solely by the Cheney Brothers, shows their 
 intelligent and liberal methods of promoting the well-being 
 and content of their employe's. The hands highly appreciate 
 the liberality of their employers and feel a manifest interest in 
 their work and a pride in the place. Hence strikes and aliena- 
 tion between capital and labor are here unknown. 
 • The other model manufacturing village is that of the Fair- 
 banks Company at St. Johnsbury, Vermont. There is the 
 largest manufactory of scales in the world, employing in the 
 factory and branch departments elsewhere, over one thousand 
 men, and manufacturing over 60,000 scales annually, the 
 sales now amounting to over $2,000,000 a year. It has 
 long been a marvel how such a concern could be made a 
 permanent success for fall fifty years .in the northeast corner 
 of Vermont, so far from tide-water, with expensive freightage, 
 the items of coal and iron alone being yearly about 10,000 ' 
 tons, with many other heavy supplies from the sea-board and 
 the necessity of transporting thither, the manufactured 
 products. Throughout New England of late the tendency of 
 manufacturers has been from the interior to the seaside. They 
 have often abandoned old sites and water privileges far inland 
 and built near the great markets, where they must run by 
 steam only. But in St. Johnsbury, notwithstanding these dis- 
 advantages, the business has steadily grown and become a suc- 
 cess, which, in view of the difficulties overcome, is unparal- 
 leled in this country. 
 
 What is the explanation of this -marvelous prosperity ? On 
 revisiting St. Johnsbury recently, the first impressions made 
 seven years ago were confirmed. I inspected the works, talked 
 freely with the hands as well as the owners and with the citi- 
 zens of St. Johnsbury not connected with the factory. To 
 observe the home-life of the operatives, I entered their houses 
 and conversed with their families. These inquiries brought 
 out facts and inferences suggestive alike to all employers and 
 employed. 
 
 This village, where nature has been lavish of her gifts, 
 shows the added charms of landscape art. The whole town 
 is justly proud of their beautiful soldiers' monument, their 
 
48 
 
 fine public building, and manifold rural adornments. This 
 company maintains the highest reputation for integrity. 
 Many names honored abroad are tarnished at home. Only the 
 strictest honesty and fair dealing can stand the test of daily 
 business intercourse with hundreds of hands for half a century. 
 " They do everything on the square," was, in substance, the 
 answer of many citizens and workmen to my inquiries on this 
 point. The company has fairly earned and gained the confi- 
 dence of their men and of this entire community, and a good 
 name at home naturally follows them everywhere. The work- 
 men say that they are never permitted to do any sham-work,' 
 even for the most distant market. To quote the pithy phrases 
 of the men, " no shoddy here," "no veneering," " no puttying." 
 
 There is a superior class of workmen in this establishment. 
 All are males. Their work is proof of skill. Their looks and 
 conversation indicate intelligence. They are mostly Ameri- 
 cans, and come from the surrounding towns. More than half 
 of them are married, and settled here p,s permanent residents, 
 interested in the schools and in all that relates to the prosper- 
 ity of the place. Many of them own their houses, with spa- 
 cious grounds for yard and garden, and often a barn for the 
 poultry and cow. These houses are pleasing in their exterior, 
 neatly furnished, and many of them supplied with pianos and 
 tapestry or Brussels carpets. How different from the nomadic 
 factory population, ' swarming from Canada and from other 
 lands to densely crowded tenement houses, who never bind 
 themselves to civilization by a home, much less by a house of 
 their own I The tenement houses, also, are inviting and com- 
 fortable, and surrounded with unusually large grounds. The 
 town is managed on temperance principles, and drunkenness, 
 disorder and strife among the hands are almost unknown. 
 Most of them are church-goers, many of them church members. 
 
 I examined the pay-roll and found the wages very liberal. 
 The workmen seem well satisfied on that score. Wherever it 
 is possible, the work is paid for by the piece. The work itself 
 is largely done by machinery and that sui generis, invented 
 here and for the special and peculiar results here reached. The 
 men are encouraged to expedite their processes by new inven- 
 tions and share largely in the benefits of all such improve- 
 
49 
 
 ments. I conversed with one of the hands who invented a 
 curious apparatus by which he marks a hundred register-bars 
 with greater accuracy and in but little more time than he could 
 formerly do one. He now finds working by the job especially 
 profitable. Paying by the piece has worked well here. The 
 men say it is fairer to pay for results than by hours. The 
 worth of labor depends upon its products. This plan stimu- 
 lates industry, promotes skill, and fosters inventiveness. It 
 apportions rewards to the quantity and quality of work done. 
 But more than all, this plan is recognized by the men as just 
 and satisfactory. With the time left practically to their own 
 choice, there is no eight-hour movement here. No "Labor 
 League" or Union has ever existed — no strike ever been sug- 
 gested. This would be a poor place for the Internationals to 
 preach the gospel of idleness or agrarianism. Imagine one of 
 these delegates just arrived at St. Johnsbury and beginning his 
 
 arguments for a strike with Mr. , whose house I visited. 
 
 I fancy him replying somewhat as he did to my inquiry. 
 " Why is it you never have any strikes here ?" " Well, we 
 have a good set of men to start with — temperate and moral. 
 Then we are well paid. Wages have often been advanced. 
 The owners take an interest in the men. They are liberal 
 and public spirited, and are doing a great deal for the place, 
 and we feel an interest in the success of the concern which 
 has been the making of St. Johnsbury." 
 
 There has evidently been mutual sympathy and interest 
 between employer and employed. The senior Governor Pair- 
 banks used to say to the men, "You should always come 
 to me as to a father." He maintained relations of kindness 
 with them, visiting the sick, helping the needy, counseling 
 the erring, encouraging their thrift, enjoining habits of econ- 
 omy. He taught them that it was their interest and duty to 
 "lay up something every month," and that the best way to 
 rise in the social scale was to unite economy with increasing 
 wages. He himself both preached and practiced economy. 
 He was a conspicuous example at once of strict economy and 
 princely liberality. His benefactions were munificent, both 
 at home and abroad. The fact that so many of the work- 
 men are " fore-handed," besides owning their homesteads, is 
 
50 
 
 due to his teaching and example. The worth and dignity 
 of work he illustrated in theory and practice. The notion 
 that labor was menial, or that the tools of trade -or farm were 
 badges of servility, he despised. His sons worked in the 
 shop, and thoroughly learned the trade. The brothers of the 
 Governor were in full sympathy with him, and the same 
 spirit characterizes the sons and the surviving brother who 
 now manage the concern. There is still the fullest and hap- 
 piest conciliation between labor and capital. It is not strange 
 that the workmen " hold on." Their permanency is a striking 
 fact. Many have been here from twenty to over forty years. 
 , Years ago the men were aided in forming and sustaining a 
 Lyceum, and liberal prizes were offered for the best essays read. 
 Recently, Horace Fairbanks has founded a library, and opened 
 a large reading-room free to all. The Athenseum containing 
 the library, reading-room, and also a spacious lecture-hall, is an 
 elegant structure, ninety-five by forty feet, two stories high. 
 The books, now numbering nearly ten thousand volumes, are 
 choice and costly ; two hundred and thirty volumes have been 
 drawn in a single day. In the reading-room, besides a good 
 supply of American periodicals, daily, weekly and quarterly, I 
 noticed on the tables many European journals, including four 
 English quarterlies, six London weeklies, and ten monthlies. 
 The library and reading-room are open every week-day and 
 evening, except Wednesday evening, when all are invited to 
 attend the weekly "lecture," which is held at the ( same hour in 
 all the churches. Having visited nearly every town of Massa- 
 chusetts and Connecticut, and traveled widely in this country, 
 I have nowhere found in a village of this size an art gallery so 
 costly and so well supplied with painting and statuary, a 
 reading-room so inviting, and a library so choice and excellent 
 as this. 
 
 Thaddeus Fairbanks, one of the three founders of the scale 
 factory, has liberally endowed a large and flourishing academy, 
 which promises to become the " Williston Seminary" for north- 
 eastern /Vermont. 
 
 These various provisions for the' improvement, happiness, 
 and prosperity of this people, coupled with liberality and fair- 
 ness in daily business intercourse, explain the absence of dis- 
 
51 
 
 content and the uniform sympathy, good feeling and harmony 
 which prevail. 
 
 How to harmonize labor and capital is now one of the great 
 questions of the age. Their alienation has recently caused idle- 
 ness, distress and crime on one side, and lock-outs, derange- 
 ment of business and enormous losses on the other. The many 
 millions lately lost by mistakes on this question furnish only a 
 new version of the old story of antagonisms between those who 
 should be partners. I have nowhere seen a better practical 
 solution of the Labor Question than in South Manchester and 
 St. Johnsbury. 
 
 18. As plans for Eural Improvement Associations are often 
 called for, the following, adopted in Clinton, Conn., is given. 
 
 This association, though organized less than two years since, 
 has already accomplished important results. A circular ad- 
 dressed to the citizens of that town by this association, says : 
 
 " At our last town meeting, a liberal sum was unanimously 
 appropriated for improving our road-sides. The cooperation 
 of every citizen is heeded to carry on this good work. While 
 no sudden changes are expected, and while the full results 
 desired will require time, still, with the united efforts of our 
 people, Clinton can soon be made the most beautiful town on 
 the Shore Line, offering with the rare privileges opened, in the 
 Morgan School, unequaled advantages and attractions to invite 
 wealthy and desirable residents who are seeking a country 
 home." • i 
 
 By-Laws and Eegulations of the Clinton Eukal 
 Improvement Association. 
 
 1. This Association shall be called " The Eural Improve- 
 ment Association of Clinton." 
 
 2. The object of this Association shall be to cultivate public 
 spirit, quicken the social and intellectual life of the people, 
 promote good fellowship, and secure public health by better 
 hygienic conditions in our homes and surroundings, improve 
 our streets, roads, public grounds, side-walks, establish good 
 grass borders in the streets and public squares, provide drink- 
 ing troughs, break out paths through the snow, light the 
 
52 
 
 i ■ ^ 
 
 streets, remove nuisances, and in general to build up and 
 beautify the whole town, and thus enhance the value of its 
 real estate and render Clinton a still more inviting place of 
 residence. 
 
 3. The officers of this Association shall consist of a Presi- 
 dent, a Vice-President, a Treasurer, a Secretary, and an Execu- 
 tive Committee of fifteen, six of whom shall be ladies. 
 
 4. It shall be the duty of the Executive Committee to make 
 all contracts, employ all laborers, expend all moneys, and 
 superintend all improvements made by the Association. They 
 shall hold meetings monthly from April to October in each 
 year, and as much oftener as they may deem expedient. 
 
 5. Every person who shall plant three trees by the road-side, 
 under the direction of the Executive Committee, or pay three 
 dollars in one ' year or one dollar annually, and obligate him- 
 self or herself to pay the same annually for three years, shall 
 be a member of this Association. 
 
 6. The payment of ten dollars annually for three years, or 
 of twenty-five dollars in one sum, shall constitute one a life 
 member of this Association. 
 
 7. Five members of the Executive Committee present at 
 any meeting shall constitute a quorum, 
 
 8. No debt shall be contracted by the Executive Committee 
 beyond the amount of available means within their control, 
 and no member of the Association shall be liable for any debt 
 of the Association, beyond the amount of his or her subscrip- 
 tion. 
 
 9. The Executive Committee shall call an annual meeting, 
 giving due notice of the same, for the election of officers of 
 this Association, and at said meeting shall make a detailed 
 report of all . moneys received and expended during the year, 
 the number of. trees planted under their direction, and the 
 number planted by individuals, length of sidewalks made or 
 repaired, and the doings of the Committee in general. 
 
 10. This constitution may bd amended at any annual meet- 
 ing by a two-thirds vote of the members present and voting. 
 
RURAL IMPROVEMENT. 
 
 " How can we start a Rural Improvement Association in our town where 
 there is little or no interest in the subject?" is a question often asked of late. 
 In answering this inquiry I present some suggestions growing out of a 
 varied experience in organizing over fifty associations in Connecticut and as 
 many more in the other N*v England and the Middle States. The indiffer- 
 ence complained of, is to be expected wheje attention has not been called to 
 the importance and results of such improvements, while interest and often 
 enthusiasm naturally follow the proper presentation of this subject. 
 
 When this work was begun in Connecticut a dozen years ago it encountered, 
 as I then predicted, some misapprehension and ridicule, but that ceased 
 sooner than I expected and it now commands the sympathy and cooperation 
 of the wisest and best men of our State. While I feel a grateful pride in 
 the fact that something in the line of rural adornment has lately been accom- 
 plished in all our towns, especially around the homes and grounds of our 
 citizens, this effort should not be slackened till an efficient association is 
 formed in every township. I shall be happy to cooperate with public- 
 spirited citizens who are moving in this matter, and will lecture on this 
 subject without charge either for services or expenses in any town in 
 Connecticut, Though this is no part of my prescribed duties, but simply 
 a volunteer avocation in addition to my>. proper vocation, my interest in 
 the work grows with yeafs and results. It is my ambition to do my 
 utmost to improve the homes and home life of our people and help 
 them to realize that the highest privilege and central duty of life is the crea- 
 tion of happy homes. The multiplied ministries of nature, providence, and 
 religion center in the maintenance of happy homes. The higher aim of the 
 industries of life, whether agricultural, manufacturing, or commercial, and 
 the great end for which Government itself is worthy to be sustained is that 
 men may live in happy homes. " The hope of America is the homes of 
 America." You improve the schools by improving the homes aB truly as 
 you improve the homes by improving the schools. 
 
 In forming a Rural Improvement Association the main tug is at the 
 start on account of the inertia of ignorance and indifference. It is the first 
 step that costs — at least it costs effort and information to set this thing on 
 foot, but that step once taken and others are sure to follow. Experience 
 shows that the best way to begin this work is to call together the people for 
 a free lecture, setting forth the importance, aims and results of this move- 
 ment, and then strike while the iron is hot by adopting a constitution and 
 appointing the proper officers. To give a single example, after such a loc- 
 ture in Warwick Neck, Rhode Island, recently, an association was formed, 
 " a constitution" which I furnished was adopted, the proper officers appointed 
 and over $300 raised by membership fees, and all this was done in about 
 half an hour after the close of my lecture. Before I left town the next 
 morning, some of the improvements recommended were begun. The next 
 week $2,000 were raised. This is certainly a good beginning for an asso- 
 ciation not yet two weeks old. 
 
 The fact of " want of interest" in any town should suggest the need ami 
 methods of creating interest! A proper presentation of the subject will 
 show that no community can afford to continue without some organized 
 efforts, such as have elsewhere done great good in cultivating public spirit 
 and town pride, quickening intellectual and social life, securing better hygi- 
 enic conditions, improving roads, road-sides, sidewalks, public grounds, the 
 surroundings of railway stations and factories, and best and most of all, the 
 homes of the people, and in general so beautifying and building up our towns 
 as to enhance the value of real estate. The citizens of New Milford, Litchfield, 
 Clinton,* and many other towns of Connecticut, have already learned that 
 money wisely expended for public improvement, proves a good investment. 
 Such improvements pay in many ways. They help to retain in a town its 
 wealthy and public spirited citizens, and attract desirable residents from 
 abroad, whom a narrow and unprogressive policy would repel. Our expe- 
 rience pr6ves that public improvements and growth stand related as cause 
 and effect. The proximity of Connecticut to the commercial metropolis of 
 our country, opens grand opportunities of thrift and prosperity to her public 
 spirited towns. Since the achievement of rapid transit by the elevated rail- 
 
 • Clinton has Jnst appropriated 11,000 for concrete walks to be made where the abutters 
 pny one-halt' the expense. This will secure the expenditure of »'J.000 for this purpose., 
 
roads, Connecticut can invito or repel desirable residents in greatly increas- 
 ing numbers. A liberal spirit will invite wealth and population in still 
 larger measure to our borders. The many new comers from New York city 
 to our progressive towns are the friends of rural adornments, knowing well 
 that these are investments which enrich any community. On the other 
 hand, a penurious policy is penny-wise and pound-foolisb. It defeats its 
 own aim of saving and results in deterioration and loss. Men of culture and 
 influence shun a narrow-minded and illiberal community. A good name 
 tends to enrich a town as well as an individual, while a bad one may im- 
 poverish both. 
 
 The remotest districts of some towns show great interest in this work. 
 Hence the term Hural is preferable to Village Improvement, for all parts of a 
 township should be included in the plans and benefits of such an association. 
 At Warwick Neck, Rhode Island and West Ewing, New Jersey, where so 
 much is now doing in tljis line, there is no village, but only scattered homes 
 and farms. 
 
 The educational bearings of this subject, though less obvious are not less 
 important. As this movement met opposition at the outset and often 
 encountered the question : " What has that to do with education," I may be 
 pardoned for giving two or three brief extracts from extended articles in 
 papers outside of our State. The notices in the Connecticut journals have 
 been too complimentary to be quoted here. A Boston paper in urging that 
 rural improvement should be made as general in other States as it is in Con- 
 necticut, says: " Mr. Northrop began years ago the development of a plan 
 to make the State of his nativity, and of his ijiore recent labors worthy of 
 her grand natural opportunities. He has blended the idea of rural improve- 
 ment very intimately with educalional ideas, and it seems justly to belong in 
 that company. There is so much dependent upon rural development, that he 
 who convinces the public of its importance, is laying single-handed, the 
 foundation of greatly increased culture, health and profit in every rural com- 
 munity. Beauty is its own excuse for being and needs no reinforcement of 
 its claims before a jury where the aesthetic principle is allowed due 
 influence." — Boston Post. 
 
 " Mr. Northrop's plan, the result of years of observation and experience, 
 is simple and practical in any community. It contemplates the indirect as 
 well as the direct improvement of personal and social life in the country, 
 and includes all that can make country places attractive, and facilitate refin- 
 ing social intercourse among the people who inhabit them. The great 
 difficulty is in the beginning. The need is that there shall be organized in 
 every village and country town, a rural improvement association. The man 
 or woman who shall take hold of this matter and create the needed organiza- 
 tion in any community will be a public benefactor, worthy of reverence and 
 deep gratitude. 
 
 " The educational effect of such employments and interests, the refining 
 influence, the assthetic improvement wrought, the enlargement of heart and 
 mind which grow directly and indirectly out of work of this kind, done by 
 united effort by the boys and girls of a town, under the stimulus of public 
 approval, are not to be set down in words or expressed in figures. In any 
 town in which juvenile enthusiasm is awakened in public improvements, 
 the schools will accomplish better results ; the library will be more freely and 
 more profitably used, there will be less idleness less wrong-doing ; habits 
 will be better, aspirations higher, the tone of life stronger. Every such 
 town must improve in intelligence, taste, public spirit and morality, quite as 
 positively as it grows in external beauty and attractiveness."— if. F. Evening 
 
 Post. 
 
 Money judiciously expended in rural improvement would do an amount of 
 good not easily computed. Such an expenditure would in time come back 
 by thousands and millions. Those towns which begin the earliest and work 
 wife- the mortwl,4aieHUity and- taste in alLthese matters, will be the most 
 populous and prosperous. With our rapidly returning prosperity, we are 
 soon to see a new movement in all directions to adorn and beautify our 
 country towns and villages. The appetite for the beautiful-without as well 
 as within doors-and the demand for plants, flowers, flowering shrubs , and 
 ornamental trees is increasing enormously from year to year. -N. Y. 
 
 "ihe'V. Y.Oteerver, Scribner's Mnthly and many other periodicals endorse 
 this "Connecticut Movement" in the strongest terms. 
 
 B. G. NORTHROP. 
 
 Capitol, Hartford, October 13, 1880. 
 
pilfered at the Post-Office at Springfield, 3fans., 
 • Second-Class Matter. 
 
 SPRINGFIELD?, WEDNESDAY. FEB. IB. 
 
 THE PROPOSED BOSTON PARK. 
 
 Tract Five Times as I.Bi«r as Central 
 
 Park. 
 
 t retary B. 6. Northrop in the New York Inde- 
 pendent.] 
 
 he Fells lie wholly in Middlesex county, aDd 
 *ie center of this mountainous tract is with- 
 l miles of the Boston post-office. It lies in 
 state of betweenity," on the borders of the 
 , r t towns of Stoneham, Medford, Winchester, 
 iiielrose and Maiden. This is historic ground. 
 :uv;o hundred and fifty years ago Gov John 
 inVinthrop described these rugged nights, over 
 iwhich he made a toilsome journey and from 
 hich he surveyed with admiration the pri- 
 al forests, the adjacent ponds, and all this 
 1 and varied landscape, and further on the 
 ,•■ autiful bay and distant ocean. This "forest 
 , jserve," or "five-mile wood," has been greatly 
 ' dmired from that day to this. Prominent citi- 
 ens of Cambridge and other surrounding towns 
 c ave long shown a d&p interest in the preserva- 
 - tion of this forest. Some five years ago a peti- 
 tion to convert this tract into a public park, 
 signed bv such men as ex-Gov Washburn, H. 
 i W. Longfellow, and James Russell Lowell, was 
 presented to the Legislature. John Owen of 
 j Cambridge has labored zealously for the same 
 i end, as has Elizur Wright, now the president of 
 < the Fells association. The earliest advocate of 
 • the public ownership and protection of such a 
 "forest preserve" was Wilson Flagg, the author 
 of the "Woods and By-ways of New England," 
 who published an elaborate article on this sub- 
 ject in 1856. He would guard this "White 
 mountains in miniature," with all its native 
 grandeur, from the sesthetie vandalism that 
 would substitute for its primitive wildness 
 the artificial attractions of a city garden. 
 Though its proper name is, and is to 
 be The Fells, I have called it above a Boston 
 park, because, if this magnificent plan is 
 carried out, it must be done largely by Boston 
 capital and liberality. I fully agree with Mr 
 Flagg that it should not be subjected to the 
 elaborate ornamentations of ordinary parks, 
 but be kept like that adjoining the old castle 
 in Heidelberg in all its native beauty and pict- 
 nresqueness. It is remarkable that this large 
 tract of 4000 acres (about five times the size of 
 Central park in New York, comprising so great 
 a variety of surface and scenery, with rugged 
 ridges, valleys and lakes, and nearly all the 
 best conditions for a magnificent natural park, 
 much of it well-wooded with a good variety of our 
 best forest trees) can be found so near the me- 
 tropolis of New England, and still nearer the 
 homes of the 20,000 people who live in the 
 abutting towns above named. 
 
 With a proper addition, it might become a 
 complete arboretum of all the American trees 
 which thrive in our climate. That would make 
 it still more a favorite resort with the thou- 
 sands who in coming years would thread the 
 winding foot-ways or ride over the rustic bridle-i 
 paths, or drive through the carriage roads that 
 would be open to the public. Its educational in- 
 fluence, in fostering a love of nature, and es- 
 pecially the study of trees of every kind, would 
 be of great value. The large ponds in the Fells 
 furnish charming water views, in comparison 
 with which the little lakes in Central park, 
 beantiful as they certainly are, seem tame. 
 Charles Sumner said that in all his foreign 
 travels he had seen but one lake of the size of 
 Spot pond comparable with it in beauty. One 
 of the speakers said: "Were this park l03ated 
 among the other wonders and marvels of Switzer- 
 
 i in rriiTrHTTiiiii _• *&£ mSb&im rnnri""; 
 
 thusiastic in its praise. . 
 
 Aside from its aesthetic attractions, it is in- 
 tended to reforest the denuded portions of these 
 hills. The influence of forests on climate and 
 water-supply was discnssed, and it waa shown 
 that extensive forest denudation everywhere 
 diminishes the flow of springs. Dr Piper, wno 
 lived near one of these nonds, in his "Trees of 
 lerica," referring to the fact that it owed its 
 :ence to a stream which has its source in the 
 s, says: "Within 30 years these hills, which 
 were clothed with a dense forest, have been 
 stripped of trees, and, what w as ne ver beard of 
 
 BftS ?Jarr*'^ 
 
 the old fofes? Tndt„i for merly occupied by 
 
 the year » A £?««£*?£ Wat ?. r rvms th Wh 
 
 be given. TlTe fore lu , seL'Zt* fac , ts mi * ht 
 
 moisture, both from thlfr7e a fl 8 i° re - ho,lses of 
 
 shuts out the snTand th. Iea ty,. can opy, which 
 
 < on ering the soil and acting \Z™ ° f ]eaves 
 
 »>K up and retaining the ^n and ^ P ° n P'- soak - 
 
 distribution, while 8 the rooh fil e ^ tm S. »«■ 
 
 drams, loosening the soil r„ • act hke vertical 
 
 and promoting th decent of £* S infiltra tion, 
 
 lower strata of the elrtt ? there tTT ^ the 
 
 firings; while in imi. 'i 2 t0 nourish the 
 
 -inks* less LV the soil 6 W ° f trees the «^ 
 
 reaches the brooks alid rivers and^uns f Speedilv 
 
 « not resulting in disastrous fl 00 d s nS l ° Waste ' 
 
 As the water supplv of "O mnT' , , 
 nainly on the Fells and '», «T PeopIe de Pends 
 ' suggested at the Medford nfeetfnf^^.P 6111 ' ' 
 \ ions remedy, extensive JiL? , 1Bg M tn e ob- i 
 oar noble naUlrSf^^ *My of | 
 
 the | 
 ad- 
 
 best and greatest rari«t ■ W *i? h we hav e 
 voeatedcfv e nW t irsunim if t a he -r r,d '' but *» 
 -ides with the F^todS^ a " d J ^ ug « ed oi "- 
 lowing reasons- i?. 1 ^" arch ' and f or the fol- 
 
 old trfes'cTbeprocwedTr^ (the tW °- vea ™ 
 >te hardy character (rwilTthriv^ w t h h0Q8and,; 
 else will grow and may be eS«t J"*™ ,V ttle 
 .'.onomically transplanted) -the M ,« WeU , as 
 'e rapidity of its I iSwth . ™ e th /emarka- 
 "f the tree, its svmmrtS» Zt i tbe beauty 
 durability of thHSfbe? "m&J" th * 
 ►-'•onomic tree nt P„.^Z. . . . ls the treat 
 r"K«d W^£Sfi^£«9»W* to 
 'bundantly tested. bothii,iaJ?? nn , d has be en 
 ! >«. In Scotland'™* ZEFSliZ* A u mer " 
 worta not over a sMlUne^n JL* ba 5 en W,ls ' 
 densely covered with tnl feL ■% ? h a ™ been 
 very beautiful and valuabte ' Co? S M - made 
 differing from me on thhurint =? H >gginson. 
 ! tat no foreign trWhS^itf*??!?^ nxged 
 
 ■» 'neFellsjTntTha^ould be I? 6 planted 
 digenous garden and nursn™ % >». ° nl *, J* in " 
 and fauna of New E^Und *? SN. fl °ra 
 
 previously spoken of 
 
 had 
 
 Though I 
 " variel 
 
 urged" their 
 
 beauty of ou^native U%L tfSS ***»& and 
 propagation to the utmortttm^h ^ g ^„ thel r 
 seemed to me desirSS ™*>ugh the Fells, it 
 barren ridgeTtbrtlSSfr trt fe° n -^ e "« 
 where nothing e^W^Z" 1 ^^ 1 tnri .ve 
 
 The Need of the Country Towns. 
 
 [New York Evening Post.] 
 "When weSsfiect how, easy it i s to make a 
 rural place or a countT? viOa^e attractive' in 
 appearance, how little labor is necessary to 
 that end where tfleVe is ground enough, as 
 there is in every village and country place; 
 when we reflect that nature herself is con- 
 stantly trying to do "tlie^frork and needs 
 scarcely more than man's permission, it seems 
 a wonder that there are other than beautiful 
 country places and atoativTTillages any- 
 where. Nevertheless dreary, treeless, dusty, 
 desolate, disordered and disreputably-appear- 
 ing villages and country phaces out at elbows 
 are in many parts of the country the rule, not 
 I the exception. As oue looks at such villages 
 out of a car window, and contemplates their 
 dreary slatternliness, the thought of passing 
 a lifetime in them brings a shudder with it. 
 Without doubt, too, the desire to escape such 
 a life has much to do with the speedy run- 
 ning away of all the young men in such vil- 
 lages who have aught of aspiration or 
 strength. Without quite understanding their 
 own motives perhaps such young men em- 
 brace the first opportunity of quitting the 
 place of their Birth, where life is inexpressi- 
 bly dreary ; and th? villages and country dis- 
 tricts thus stripped of the flower of their 
 youth sink- steadily lower and grow constant- 
 ly more and more slatternly. 
 
 For these things there is no excuse. Where- 
 ever they exist they bear testimony that can- 
 not be contradicted to the indolence, unthrift 
 or aesthetic grossness of the people. An un- 
 tidy house is not a worse reproach to its 
 mistress than an untidy village or rural neigh- 
 borhood is to its people. The planting of 
 trees and shrubs and vines, the care of grass 
 the maintenance of good footways, the prop- 
 er care of waste materials so that they shall 
 not fitter the streets or station ^ W 
 
 - grounasjTBe 
 
 setting up of lamp-posts, the care of garden 
 fences, these and lixe things cost very little 
 either in time or in money, and there can be 
 no doubt that attention to such matters in the 
 end makes a full return even in money, to 
 say nothing of the good that intelligent rural 
 folk gel from such things by the amelioration 
 ol their own lives. 
 
 Mr. B. G. Northrop, whose apostleship of 
 rural improvement has been a beneficent in- 
 fluence in Connecticut for years, has recently 
 published a pamphlet on the subject, entitled 
 •Rural Improvements." which we heartily 
 wish every dweller in village or country might 
 read attentively. We do not intend now to 
 review the pamphlet, or to do more than di- 
 rect attention to it and to its subject, but it is 
 worth while to say that Mr. Nonhrop's plan 
 the result of years of observation and practi- 
 cal experience, is simple and practicable in 
 any ^ommanity, and that it cmteniDlates the 
 indirect as well as the direct improvement of 
 personal and social life in the country. Brie.1y 
 expressed, his purpose is to induce the people 
 ot every village and town to make their sev- 
 eral homes and their towns also attractive to 
 the eye and mind, healthful, convenient and 
 beautiful. Ho would have trees planted alon<* 
 the road ways and upon worn and barren 
 spots ; he would have good sidewalk", proper 
 street lamps, well kept greens, tidy station 
 houses ; he pleads for libraries and other 
 means of self-culture for young and old ; for 
 attractive surroundings to schoolhouses and 
 churches, and for all else that can in any way 
 tend to make country places attractive and 
 to facilitate refining social intercoui-oe among 
 the people who inhabit them. 
 
 The desirableness of all these improve- 
 ments is apparent in a general way, on the 
 surface, but Mr. Northrop succeeds in point- 
 ing out many benefits likely to arise from 
 rural improvements, which do not suggest 
 themselves at first. One great advantage 
 gained is due to a difficulty. Becau-e com- 
 paratively little can be accomplished without 
 organized and united effort, success, wherever 
 it is achieved, brings a double benefit. The 
 organization of the people for a local public 
 purpose is in itself scarcely lees a benefit than 
 the material results of the work done. Such 
 union for a common purpose promotes sociul 
 intercourse, heals the le'uds which distract 
 most rural communities and breeds public 
 spirit, local pride and local attachment, and 
 all these things are agencies of the greatest 
 good in every village or rural town where 
 they exist. Moreover if the people of a town 
 unite in an effort lo improvejts streets and 
 commons aud footways and to make it a 
 pleasant place to live in, the additional duty 
 of improving individual surroundings mav 
 safely be left lo stimulated personal pride and 
 improved persoual laste. 
 
 Another indirect but valuable result grows 
 naturally out of the exigencies of the work. 
 Every association for rural improvement must 
 enlist the youth, the boys and girls of the 
 place in the work. They, more readily ihan 
 anybody else, become interested iu such .nut- 
 ters, and they may easily be induced to brin" 
 trees from the forest and to plant them where 
 they are needed^withont cost to anybody and 
 without other than willing and eager work 
 How great the good is that boys and girls 
 derive Irom their own active interest in such 
 things, every attentive observer of youth 
 every enlightened parent and teacher knows' 
 The educational effect of such employments 
 and interests, the refining influence, the aes- 
 thetic improvement wrought, the enlarge- 
 ment of heart and mind which grow directly 
 and indirectly out of work of this kind, done 
 by united eflo*t by the boyg and girls of a 
 town, under the stimulus of public approval 
 
 
nopolis of New England, and still nearer the 
 home? of the 20,000 people who live in the 
 abutting towns above named. 
 
 With a proper addition, it might become a 
 complete arboretum of all the American trees 
 which thrive in our climate. That would make 
 it still more a favorite resort with the thou- 
 sands who in coining years would thread the 
 winding foot-ways or ride over the rustic bridle- 
 paths or drive through the carriage roads that 
 would be open to the public. Its educational in- 
 fluence, in fostering a love of nature, and es- 
 pecially the study of trees of every kind, would 
 be of great value. The large ponds in the Fells 
 furnish charming water views, in comparison 
 with which the little lakes in Central park 
 beautiful as they certainly are, seem tame! 
 Charles Sumner said that in all his foreign 
 travels he had seen but one lake of the size of 
 .Spot pond comparable with it in beautw One 
 of the speakers said: "Were this park located 
 a»Kl{l£the other wonders and marvels of Switzer- 
 land, Americans woui'f* ■I'Miiit " imd^.llgc.paie en- 
 thusiastic in its praise." 
 
 Aside from its aesthetic attractions, it is in- 
 tended to reforest the denuded portions of these 
 bills. The influence of forests on climate and 
 water-supply was discussed, and it was shown 
 that extensive forest denudation everywhere 
 diminishes the flow of springs. Dr Piper, who 
 lived near one of these ponds, in his "Trees of 
 America," referring to the fact that it owed its 
 existence to a stream which has its source in the 
 Fells, says: "Within 30 years these hills, which 
 were clothed with a dense forest, have been 
 
 •_iv,mcj wilu a ueusB lorest, uave ueeu 
 
 has sprung up on thelald t!Z g . r ° Wth of w °° d 
 the old forest, and now thi"^ y occa P ied by 
 the year." A 22 „f ■ at -, r runs tnr O"Sh 
 be given. The fiaJSS . f s,m,lar fa «ts might 
 moisture, both iom 1h8i> V L a f SSt0re - nouses of 
 shuts out the sun and th P ,e ^ y ,. caD °Py. which 
 covering the soil and acting uZJ° US of leaves 
 wg up and retaining tl, e "1 k ^H Spon ? e ' soak- 
 distribution, while" the ^oom $ l e fi llatia e ^ 
 drams, loosening the sofl 7»l • act 1,ke vertical 
 and promoting the deceit W° g lnfi 't»Mon, 
 lower strata of the ea rt h thLl e t "' ater int0 tb « 
 spnng s; while ta lands idevnfr? J°» now 2 8l » the 
 sinks less into the soil hi, f trees the rai ° 
 reaches the brook 11. ' J moie speedily 
 
 1. suggested at the Medford „\ PP ^ geDCyis , great ' 
 vious remedy, extensive J™, f 1D ? M the ob- 
 onr noble iiamS 'L^P 1 ? 11 ^ chie «y of 
 best and greatlst variety in^ J e „ h ™ fh « 
 vocated covering the s.immi, - world; but afi " 
 sides with the K^ShS* and ™*S«» hill- 
 lowing reasons ■7?«,h Cb * and for 'be fol- 
 
 old trfes^rbeprocuredT^ (the %*■*"*■ 
 its hardy characterfit wil? M 8 per thousand); 
 else will grow and uav hi *f\? wber « Httle 
 economically transrfanferti !? M wel1 a * 
 Me rapidity of if, ■ ^Lu the , «*narka- 
 oi the tree" its symmetfv of 1- the beam v 
 durability of the tSfbe? it TV™ 1 the 
 economic tree of Eurone L |{ f the "eat 
 rugged hill-sides- and 'rockv ™ adapt , abiIity t0 
 . abundantly tested/both to LSW has been 
 iea. In Scotland ' £,, ?' £*? n?l and Ame <" 
 ! V orth not over a shilling an a ban ' en hi " s ^ 
 densely covered with n fs tree Z 6 '. \ Rve been 
 very beautiful and Valuab,; ' r . d & US made 
 differing from me on^b s oofnt ?' H Sginson, 
 that no foreign tree t vhal»v B r °i st ™ a p7 ur «ed 
 w the Fells fbuttbafrt should thT n i* P ' anted 
 digenous garden and nmsurv of >< ° D,y , an ia ~ 
 and fauna of New Engffid Tht W , lId rtora 
 previously spoken of tilt Ihoa S h I had 
 
 beauty of our nativ^ t ees *2S Van ' e , ty and 
 propagation to the utmost ?'„'■• and " r S ed their 
 seemed to me desSd« tbroiI eh the Fells, it 
 
 barren ridges thafhardy tv% fe°S t ,, e '" ost 
 "'here nothing else will ' b,th Wl11 thrive 
 ledges might L'SSJS If .*'. Tb e rocky 
 
 ledges might 
 ! gmia creeper 
 
 Americanism exclude 
 
 andTwn 5 , f itb the h"ardy Vk! 
 
 [of its delicate leave's woumJ 60 ^ " arait '^ 
 nnla rrp»™. „J? I" 8 ' would vie with the Vii- 
 
 ith 
 
 ?e 
 . ■■ the 
 of Boston. 
 
 Every city town and village should have its 
 own special attractions in the way of parks 
 sidewalks, shade-trees, fountains, flowers, etc ' 
 and all the people should be earnestly and cor- 
 dially invited to participate personalfy in help- 
 ing forward such improvements. Those who 
 propose to act in this matter should secure Mr 
 -Northrop, or some other able man, to address 
 
 snM«.? P i e „H Dd , St ', r V P a . general iutele st on the 
 !» ' f a t hcl| l in ^e organization of a 
 ocal society. We ask our readers in all direc- 
 tions to take hold of this matter now, so that a 
 
 tev Dg w ay , bem ? de tbe coining sunimer.- 
 [New Yo rk Independent. 
 
 ■W 
 
 A 
 
 i 
 
 ™ ™provement has been a beneficent in- 
 fluence » Connecticut for years, has receulv 
 published a pamphlet oti the subject, e „tUled 
 'Rural Improvements." which we heS 
 wish every dweller in village or country S 
 read attentively. We do not mtend now to 
 
 !" e n w , lh t P " I ' pl,let ' ° r t0 d0 m »'« thM d- 
 rect attention to it and to its subject, but His 
 worth wlnle to sny that Mr. Northrop' p an 
 the result of years of observation and prac£ 
 
 any comnmmtjr, and that it cutcninlates the 
 md>roct as well as the direct improvement of 
 personal and social life in the country Brie 3y 
 expressed his purpose is to induce tho people 
 ol every village and town to make hei sev- 
 eral homes and their towns also Mtrac ive to 
 
 Oeautilul. Ho would have trees planted along 
 the road ways and upon worn and barren 
 spots; he would have good sidewalk-, pioper 
 street lamps, well kept greens, tidy station 
 houses ; he pleads for libraries and oilier 
 moans of self-culture for young and old ; for 
 attractive surroundings to tclioolhouses and 
 churches, and for all else that can in any way 
 tend to make country places attractive and 
 to facilitate refining social intercourse among 
 the people who inhabit them. 
 
 The desirableness of all these improve- 
 ments is apparent in a general way, on the 
 surface, but Sir. Northrop succeeds in point- 
 ing out many benefits likely to arise from 
 rural improvements, which do not suggest 
 themselves at first. One great advantage 
 gained is due to a difficulty. Because com- 
 paratively little can be accomplished without 
 organized and united effort, success, wherever 
 it is achieved, brings a double benefit. The 
 organization of the people for a loc;il public 
 purpose is in itself scarcely less a benefit than 
 the material results of the work done. Such 
 union for a common purpose promotes social 
 intercourse, heals the le'uds which distract 
 most rural communities and breeds public 
 spirit, local pride and local attachment-', and 
 all these things are agencies of the greatest 
 good in every village or rural town where 
 they exist. Sforeover if the people of u totvn 
 unite in an effort to improve its streets and 
 commons and footways and to make it a 
 pleasant place to live in, the additional duty 
 of improving individual surrounfings may 
 Safely be left to stimulated personal pride and 
 improved personal taste. 
 
 Another indirect but valuable resist grows 
 naturally out of the exigencies of the work. 
 Kvery association for rural improvement must 
 enlist the youth, the boys and girls of the 
 place in the work. They, more readily than 
 anybody else, become interested iu such .nat- 
 ters, and they may easily bo induced to bring 
 trees from the forest and to plant them whore 
 they are needed, without cost to anybody and 
 without other than witling and eager work. 
 How great the good is that boys and girls 
 derive Irom their owu active inteiest in such 
 things, every attentive observer of youth, 
 every enlightened parent and teacher knows. 
 The educational effect of such employments 
 i and interests, the refining influence, the aes- 
 thetic improvement wrought, the enlarge- 
 ment of heart and mind which grow directly 
 and indirectly out of work of this kind, done 
 by united eflott by the boys and girls of a 
 town, under the stimulus of public approval, 
 j are not to be set down in words or expressed 
 1 in figures. It is perfectly safe to say that 
 in any town in which juvenile enthusiasm is 
 awakened in public improvement the schools 
 will accomplish better results; the library 
 will be more (recly aud more profitably used; 
 there will be loss idleness, less wrong-doing : 
 hibits will be better, aspirations higher, the 
 tone of life sponger. Every such town must 
 improve in intelligence, taste, public spirit 
 and morality — which is decency of life re- 
 duced to principle— quite as positively as it 
 grows in external beauty and attractiveness 
 There is no reason why any village or any 
 rural town in this country should be desolate 
 or unsightly; no reason why life in any vil- 
 lage or country town should lack pleasure or 
 society should be deficient in refinement or 
 culture. In great cities large sums of money 
 must be spent for small patches of ornament- 
 al grounds called parks; in the country every 
 villlage, every street road and lane, every 
 dooryard may be made pa rt of a great park, and 
 thai, too, at scarcely appreciable cost which is 
 returned at once in enhanced property values 
 to say nothing of the larger returns made in' 
 other and higher ways. 
 
 Unluckily, men move iu matters of this 
 kind ooly in answer to the impulse of a lead- 
 er, and local leaders are not always to be 
 found, while there are very pew men capable 
 of working as Sir. Nortiirop has done for tou 
 years in a systematic effort to arouse the en- 
 thusiasm of his state for rural improvement 
 His pamphlet, if it shall be widely circulated' 
 will do much to awaken attention, and wher- 
 ever there are active men disposed to become 
 local leaders in the cause it will serve also to 
 direct the efforts made into right channels 
 1 he great difficulty here, us elsewhere is in 
 the beginning. The need is that there' shall 
 be organized in every village and country 
 town and rural neighborhood a rmal improve- 
 ment association, and that active etlbrts shall 
 be made to draw into it as nearly as possible 
 everybody who lives in the place. Such an 
 oiganization will always find ways enough in 
 which to work improvement, aDd the spirit 
 of friendly rivalry between the associations 
 of neighboring towns, each striving to im- 
 prove upon the others' methods, must very 
 soon create something like an art of rural 
 improvement which thall bring to light tlie 
 best ways of accomplish ng the desired re- 
 sults. 
 
 There ought to be in every rural place some 
 man or woman— for the work is eminently fit 
 to enlist the sympathy and taste of woman- 
 kind— who will take hold of this matter and 
 create the needed .organization. The man or 
 woman who shall do this in any community 
 will be a public benefactor, worthy of rever- 
 ence and deep gratitude. 
 
arW38206 Ome " Un ' VerS,,y Ubrary 
 
 v.1-8 
 
 (Agriculture and education: 
 
 3 1924 032 003 968 
 olin,anx 
 

 : -•> '?& 
 
 
 Jfeu^ * 
 
 
 * ' * s 
 
 
 
 * A-' 
 
 'MST^T^' ,**