STUDENTS AXD THE RURAL PROBLEM 219 



your youth may have been spent in the country. One 

 does not know forestry because he roamed the woods 

 in childhood with delight. A knowledge of the rural 

 social status of depletion, for example is not instinc- 

 tively acquired. Residence in the country does not 

 make one an adept in the social psychology of rural 

 life, in isolation and its results, for example. " How 

 can even rural teachers learn to appreciate the social 

 function of the rural school, except they be taught ?" 



Your work calls for knowledge of the forces which 

 make or mar country life. You need to know the coun- 

 try's needs, to recognize the less patent as well as the 

 apparent ones. What, for instance, is lacking that so 

 many of our country boys take so little interest in school 

 studies '. What are the successive unmet needs indi- 

 cated in these verses : 



Poor wee Sandy, he wanted to play, 

 But the bairns on the village green warned him away, 

 For Sandy was always more ragged than they 

 Fearful wee, tearful wee Sandy! 



Poor boy Sandy, alack and alas! 

 At school he was always the dunce of the class; 

 " That thick-headed laddie no standard could pass " 

 Cowering, glowering Sandy. 



Poor lad Sandy, he never could learn 

 Any business by which he a living might earn; 

 And the world with her weak ones is angry and stern 

 Wondering, blundering Sandy.* 



What would play have done to brighten, brightness to 

 educate, education to employ, unhelped Sandy? 



And you need to know the country's wealth. Say 



* Anonymous, in " Social Advance," by David Watson, p. 252. 



