State Board of health. 
297 
the nerv^ous systems of our girls; yet it is a fact within the knowl¬ 
edge of every expert, that our school buildings appear to have been 
constructed with the express design to superadd physical exhaustion 
to the other destructive forces that threaten the lives of the future 
mothers of America. Dr. Claik says, “ the sick chamber, not the 
school room, the physician’s private consultation, not the commit¬ 
tee’s public examination, the hospital, not the college, the work¬ 
shops, not the parlor, disclose the sad results which modern social 
customs, modern education and modern ways of labor have entailed 
on woman.” Dr. Fisher says, ‘‘ for the sake of a temporary repu¬ 
tation for scholarship, girls risk their health at tlie most suscepti¬ 
ble period of their lives, and break down after the excitement.’^ 
These opinions glance at our modes of education only; but the am¬ 
bition of school boards to erect showy buildings, the architectural 
proportions of which shall tower above surrounding edifices, com¬ 
pels the young to ascend and descend interminable flights of stairs 
day after day, thereby terribly increasing the pains and penalties 
■which are exacted by our educational experiments. It is well that 
bodies should be developed as part of the educational process; but 
stair-climbing is not of itself a desirable accomplishment; and 
physiological reasons, unanswerable in their force, argue against 
the continuance of the perilous practice. 
In great cities it may not be possible to build the suits of rooms 
necessary for school purpose in structures of one story; but even 
then it may be worthy of consideration whether suburban sites, 
easy of access, may not with advantage be substituted, where all 
the training of ihe Ij/ceum can be afforded on one floor, in houses 
not too high to permit of their being readily warmed and ventilated, 
cheaply and well, nor too expensive to allovvof sufficient floor room 
being given to each individual. Another generation than the pres¬ 
ent will conclude to use the pretentious school buildings of to-day 
for other purposes in which adult humanity is concerned, so that 
our girls may have a fair opportunity to develop into the strength 
and beauty that are essential to the fruition of maternal solicitude. 
The expense involved in the additional outlay will prove a bagatelle 
in comparison with the gain of health and vigor to the community. 
Systems of schooling do not fall within our province; but the con¬ 
struction of edifices in which the business of training shall be car¬ 
ried on is of paramount importance, upon the evidence before us, 
