134 
Indiana University Studies 
never wash their clothes in the winter but refrain from chang- 
ing until warm weather. 
Much the same condition is to be found in the home of 
Mrs. Philip Lant, of Township 12, altho she has not the money 
to buy as good a house as has the Johnson family. She lives 
in a two-room box house, 1 door of which is off the hinges. 
The floors, walls, and roof are in bad condition. The window- 
panes are broken and dirty and rags are stuffed into the open- 
ings. Outside is the bare ground, baked hard in dry weather 
and made into a sea of mud in wet weather. In this play 
dirty children, 3 dogs, and their playmates. Inside a dirty, 
slovenly woman rocked to and fro on the back legs of her 
chair seemingly as contented as if her work were well done. 
It was ten o’clock in the morning when the field worker ar- 
rived. The breakfast dishes were not washed, the floors were 
unswept, and the beds were unmade. One hen was eating 
her breakfast from the family table, another was preening 
her feathers on the bureau, while another was busy preparing 
to lay her egg on the family bed. In the midst of all this 
confusion, the ‘flady of the house” could see nothing to do. 
This is not an exceptional case but is typical of both town and 
country houses where the feeble-minded live. 
Obviously those homes of the first and second classes owe 
their good condition to the presence and care of normal mem- 
bers of the family. This is true in each case except 1 home 
of the second class where the good condition is due to the 
good training given the woman in her youth. It has been 
shown in institutions that feeble-minded women can learn 
many of the housewifely arts and that those who have had 
training in institutions make better homes than do those who 
grow up under the care of their mothers. Of the 50 rural 
homes, 13 fall in the third class. These are in poor condition 
but are not so bad as those of the fourth class. On the whole, 
they are managed by women of a higher mental level than 
those of the lower class. 
There is little difference between the condition of the rural 
and that of the urban homes except that there are more ex- 
cellently kept homes in the city. In the city there are 4 homes 
in excellent condition as compared with 1 in the country. The 
other classes run practically the same as in the country. The 
big difference then between the two groups lies not in the 
