598 Missouri Agricultural Report. 



the second class, 18 months to 30 months, Vivian Long of 

 Warrensburg was winner. And in the third class, 30 months 

 to 42 months, Camilla Collins of St. Louis w^as declared most 

 nearly perfect. Camilla Collins was also found to make the 

 highest score of any child entered. 



It is hoped that the home makers in each county will make 

 plans to have local baby health co=ntests, with the thought 

 always in mind that it. is the physical development and not 

 beauty of the child that is under consideration. 



THE INFLUENCE OF GOOD MUSIC AND ART IN THE HOME. 



(Mrs. J. C. Jones, Columbia, Mo.) 



We women are beginning to take ourselves so seriously, 

 and amid the din caused by the woman question it is so hard 

 to determine whether we really are butterflies or the saviors 

 of the Republic, and between deciding on the tango and the 

 ballot we are in a frenzy of indecision. One epithet which 

 was heard less frequently in former years is the mother of future 

 generations, and appalling as this sounds, we cannot over- 

 estimate the underlying meaning or minimize the responsibility 

 which belongs to the phrase. 



Agnes Repplier has said if parents do not know by this 

 time how to bring up their children it is not for lack of in- 

 struction, and we are prone to agree with her when we con- 

 template the amount of literature upon this subject, the variety 

 of theories advanced in regard to it, and the attention paid to 

 the child problems, both before and after birth. The little 

 girl who said she wished she had been born in the time of Charles 

 II because her history said that during his reign education was 

 much neglected has our heartfelt sympathy. 



We are not concerned today with the complexity of the 

 general educational problems. Happily, we are not to decide 

 whether our child material, which is the proper name now for 

 any little boy and girl, has to sit on a hard bench many hours 

 of the day and really learn his alphabet and how to spell with 

 it and his multiplication table and how to multiply with it, or 

 whether by suggestion and symbolic play he shall learn the 

 necessary requirements of the three r's, which, by the way, 

 seem now to be of far less importance than we once believed. 

 Let those of us who had little boys and girls and not child ma- 

 terial wonder and be thankful that we brought them safely to 



