PHYSICAL EDUCATION. 755 



sun, the balm of old age, as Columella calls it ; and, on the summerless 

 Isle of Rtigen, Nature has taught the poor fishermen to carry their 

 bairns to the downs of Stubbenkammer, whenever the Baltic fogs 

 alternate with a few sunny days. Dry sand is, indeed, an excellent 

 medium of solar caloric. Children like it instinctively ; most babies 

 are fond of rummaging in some tangible, yielding element. In -de- 

 fault of a sunny beach, get a car-load of river-sand, spread it and 

 expose it to the sun for a couple of hours, then rake it together, mix 

 it ad captmidwn with a bushel of pebbles (good-sized ones, lest they 

 might be mistaken for sugar-plums), divest your bambino of all super- 

 fluous clothing, and let him wallow all afternoon, if he chooses ; if 

 the surface of the pile gets too warm, instinct will teach him to dig 

 down to the cooler substrata. Or take him to a meadow where fresh 

 hay has been piled up in little stacks ; climbing and tumbling will do 

 him more good than lying motionless in a narrow baby-carriage. The 

 inventor of the Kindergarten recommends a grassy hollow with scat- 

 tered playthings, piles of dry leaves, etc. (near a shade-tree in mid- 

 summer), where young squealers can take care of themselves for an 

 hour or two, and warrants that they will not cry, unless their botanic 

 researches should happen to acquaint them with the properties of the 

 German horse-nettle. On mild winter days, too, self-motive babies 

 ought to pass a few hours out of doors, even if the ground be a little 

 wet ; a sunny nook on the lee-side of a garden-wall is a healthier play- 

 ground than the dusty floor of a stove-room. 



From the fourth to the end of the fourteenth year children should 

 spend the larger part of every summer in out-door exercises, Next to 

 a total reform of our dietetic habits, a general observance of this rule 

 would be the surest way to regain the hardiness and longevity of our 

 forefathers. The years of growth lay the foundation of our bodily 

 constitution, and, under favorable circumstances, the human system, 

 during that period, seems to accumulate a surplus of physical vigor, 

 which in after-life will become available as an annuity-fund of health 

 and happiness. Education, like charity, ought to begin at home ; in 

 boarding-colleges, protectories, orphan asylums, etc., the rudiments 

 should be taught in icinter schools. At the price of life-long infirmities 

 precocious erudition is too dear-bought ; besides, it should not be for- 

 gotten that in the years when students can take a personal interest 

 in their lessons they will make more progress in a single month than 

 during years of involuntary confinement in boy-pens, as Dr. Salz- 

 mann calls our municipal baby-schools. The employment of young 

 children in cotton-factories is a crime against society, and ought to be 

 legally prohibited, like the trade in Italian organ-boys and Chinese 

 slave-girls. Swiss artisans, who have passed their boyhood in the 

 mountains, are comparatively proof against the influence of in-door oc- 

 cupations. And, in the mean time, out-door life need not be a life of 

 idleness. That children are fond of play means simply that they pre- 



