58o THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



ranged nursery I ever saw was the Findel-zimmer (" foundling- ward ") 

 in the convent of the Ursuline nuns near Wiirzburg, Germany. The 

 landed estate of the convent having been sequestrated, their depart- 

 ment of charitable institutions had been reorganized on a more eco- 

 nomical basis, and the poor nuns thought it necessary to apologize for 

 the ingenious simplicity of their Zimmer, whose plan had been suggest- 

 ed chiefly by the necessity of dispensing with hired help. The room 

 was about forty feet square, facing south and west, with three large 

 windows on each side. These windows and the fireplace were barred 

 with net screens, soft to the touch, but securely fastened, and strong 

 enough to stop anything from a football to a forty-pound baby. The 

 floor was carpeted with rugs, covered with a sort of coarse sheeting to 

 prevent dust. From the floor to the height of the window-sills the 

 walls were padded all round with old blankets, secured with muffled 

 nails, and stuffed with something that felt like moss or cow's hair. 

 The only piece of furniture was a cushioned divan in the corner next 

 to the fireplace ; but the floor was covered with playthings and mov- 

 able nondescripts, balls of all sizes, and a big Walze, a sort of wooden 

 cylinder, muffled up with quilts and cotton. From the center of the 

 ceiling depended a hand-swing, two rings just low enough to be within 

 reach of a youngster standing on tiptoe, the original sitting swing 

 having been removed as liable to be used as a catapult in a general 

 row. Above the windows, out of reach of the boldest climber, were 

 shelves with flower-pots, reseda, gillyflowers, and wintergreen. In this 

 in-door Kindergarten, fourteen playmates twelve babies, namely, and 

 two puppies had been turned loose, and seemed to celebrate existence 

 as a perpetual circus-game. They could run races, pelt each other 

 with cotton balls, swing in a circle, roll on the floor, and ride the 

 Walze ; but the attempt to hurt themselves would have baffled their 

 combined ingenuity. There were no nurslings, of course, but all mis- 

 chief-ages from three to eleven, wrestling and quarreling now and 

 then, but, as the nuns solemnly averred, never crying except for causes 

 that would make the puppies cry a squeeze or an inadvertent kick 

 all disputes being referred to the umpire, a flaxen-haired girl of eight, 

 who often took charge of the Zimmer from morning till night. 



The squalling of new-born children can not be helped ; puppies 

 will whine, and young monkeys whimper for the first three or four 

 days it is the novelty of existence that bewilders them but, if babies 

 of two or three years scream violently for hours together, it generally 

 means that there is something wrong about the management. Indian 

 babies never cry ; they are neither swaddled nor cradled, but crawl 

 around freely, and sleep in the dry grass or on the fur-covered floor of 

 the wigwam. Continual rocking would make the toughest sailor sea- 

 sick. Tight swaddling is downright torture ; it would try the patience 

 of a Stoic to keep all his limbs in a constrained position for such a 

 length of time ; a young ape subjected to the same treatment would 



