768 PROCEEDINGS OF SECTION J. 



derangement by fatigue and excitement. Naturally the fundamental 

 muscles must be developed first, and they are, as a matter of fact, up 

 to a certain stage. The child's greatest efforts are put forth in using 

 the muscles of his limbs, and trunk, and head, and it is a long time 

 before he establishes control over their movements. It is some time 

 before a child walks, and longer still before he runs. The develop- 

 ment of the accessory muscles is not neglected by the child. It has 

 hundreds of spontaneous movements which are quite sufficient for the 

 development of these liner muscles of the fingers, feet, lips, tongue, 

 hands, mouth, jaws, forehead, and face, and they are all developed 

 without the excessive expenditure of nervous energy. The young 

 child is exceedingly active, but its activities are prompted by its 

 inherited instincts, and not compelled by any outside agency. The 

 question for the child student is at what time may he take the child 

 from his play activities and begin his work of insti'uction. The 

 Queensland Education Department requires attendance at six, but 

 provision is made in the regulations for the teaching of children of 

 five years of age. As far as I can ascertain, authorities are not in 

 favour of sending the child to school before seven or eight. Hall 

 reluctantly says eight years. It is the accessory muscles which are 

 used in school, and the development of the fundamental muscles is. 

 checked if the child is sent too soon. There is the natural retardation 

 in growth at about seven or eight, and this seems to fix relatively the 

 time for beginning school life. The rule of Nature is — the fundamental 

 before the accessoiy. We must remember that, besides the checking of 

 the development of the fundamental muscles by disuse in school, the 

 use of the accessory muscles involves an increased expenditure of 

 nervous energy, and an extra drain upon the blood supply, so that 

 the child loses both ways. 



Professor Scott, writing in the '" Popular Science Monthly," with 

 reference to reading and writing, says these acts require a more 

 exact control of smaller muscles than any other act the individual is 

 ever likely to be called upon to execute in after life. The eye is 

 adapted for long sight when at perfect rest, and in reading and 

 writing the plastic organism of the child does not feel the strain, but 

 the result often is that the eyeball assumes the shape of the short- 

 sighted eye. Professor Scott says, too, that the loss of nervous energy, 

 necessitated by reading and writing at the ages of from five to eight 

 years, is an unwarranted drain upon the health of the child. 



Statistics are badly wanted in Queensland, but even without 

 them I am sure no one can view with complacency the number of 

 children who are compelled to wear glasses. Since the medical inspec- 

 tion of London schools, the out-patients' departments at the hospitals 

 are unable to cope with the number of children who attend from the 

 London schools with defective sight. A spectacled race, I am sure, is 

 not desired, and it is about time we began to attend to the eye 

 problem. 



In the body of the male adult more than half the muscles of the 

 body are connected with the legs, and it is obvious these do not get 

 much exercise in school. Some parts of the body — e.g., the ear, the 

 tongue — do not grow by use, but the muscles do, and if the child is 

 to grow it must do so by the exercise of the great fuiidamental 



