VOCAL MUSIC IN THE FAMILY AND SCHOOL. 



BY JAMES MCNAMEE. 



DULNESS IN THE home circle is apt to make its members dul- 

 lards and society drones. The heads of many families thus af- 

 flicted seem to have never apprehended this fact, or else have never 

 made a persistent effort to brighten the situation in their own house- 

 holds. 



Though happiness has never been a drug in the market, its 

 scarcity is largely due to neglect, by those who sigh for it, to culti- 

 vate it on their own premises and with the best tools they may find 

 at hand. As for right living, it never has been easy, and, in these 

 later days, has become more difficult because life is more compli- 

 cated. Still, all the more must society strive to multiply and pro- 

 vide helps to better and happier living. The family is the true 

 location for such assistance and the spot on which to begin the work 

 of improvement, for life and social influence radiate from that 

 centre. 



"Well, says some one, what are your helps toward brightening home 

 and making right living easier ? You must guess them, except that 

 one bearing the title of this article, for there is the text and it be- 

 hooves me to be brief. And yet, let me interject this much about 

 such helps in general : no parent is helping to make home cheerful 

 or right living easy who will not spend ample time in the society 

 and training of the children. Such training is not possible by those 

 who stand aloof and simply act the martinet. Come down to the 

 level of their every day life, mingle with them in their amusements 

 and troubles, play and sing with them, win thus their affection and 

 not their fear, and they can be trained to almost anything. 



"Why do so many children in highly respectable families go wrong ? 

 is often asked. Because, in the home life, which we do not see, their 



