SCIENCE AND PHILOSOPHY OF RECREATION. 787 



sons ought to begin at once to give their constitutions some chance 

 of recovery ; they ought regularly to take as much exercise as they 

 can endure without distressing fatigue ; and in a few months they 

 would be surprised to find how greatly the length of their walks may 

 be increased, and with what immense benefit they are attended. 



Women in the lower classes of society may to a large extent share 

 in the recreation of their male relatives ; and I feel confident that the 

 more those kinds of recreation are encouraged which invite participa- 

 tion by both sexes, the better. Great additional enjoyment is infused 

 into a holiday if it can be spent in company with those most near and 

 dear ; the heart is then most open to the best influences of affection, 

 and family ties are closest drawn in hours of happiness together. 

 Such institutions as the Crystal and Alexandra Palaces, where a vari- 

 ety of amusements are provided at a cheap cost in country air and 

 amid aesthetic surroundings, constitute the best type of institutions 

 for the healthy and improving recreation of both sexes and all ages. 

 Of parks and public pleasure-gardens I have already spoken, and the 

 desirability of preserving commons and heaths in the near neighbor- 

 hood of large towns is generally recognized. I will only add that no 

 time ought to be lost in promoting the suggestion recently made to the 

 First Commissioner of Public Works by the National Sunday League 

 viz., that in all such places of public resort harmless refreshments 

 ought to be plentifully provided. As a type of more strictly town 

 recreation, that which is afforded by the Polytechnic Institution de- 

 serves honorable mention, and the sustained popularity of the Moore 

 and Burgess Minstrels' entertainment goes far to indicate that a much 

 more healthy tone might be given to the entertainments which are 

 generally provided by music-halls. Now that Cremorne Gardens, the 

 Argyll Rooms, and similar places of public resort are being closed, 

 there is certain to be a greater pressure of vice thrown upon the music- 

 halls, and the increased demand for low, quasi-immoral entertainments 

 which will thus be set up is only too certain to be supplied. It is 

 greatly to be deplored that, excepting the " gods " galleries in thea- 

 tres, there are now scarcely any places where respectable women of the 

 lower classes can witness a public entertainment that is not more or 

 less of a degrading kind. Philanthropists would do well to start in 

 London several People's Theatres, where amusing dramas, part-sing- 

 ing, and other forms of innocent entertainment, would be sufficiently 

 attractive to render the theatres self-supporting. I have no doubt that, 

 if this were done, there would be a very marked distinction between 

 the character of the audiences attending such theatres and that of the 

 audiences which now attend the music-halls. 



Before quitting the class of workingwomen, I must put in a good 

 word for penny readings, mothers' meetings, window-gardening, and 

 last, though not least, I should like to recommend some general and 

 definite system for the loaning of books at a nominal cost. 



