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difficult to induce them to do so, as they seem to have no idea of the importance of such training.
Many a mother, too, with a very young baby, likes to have it always near her, in the living-room
or kitchen, however late it may be, because of some obscure idea that the child " might have
a fit." This reason, absurd as it seems, is often alleged as an argument against the child being
put to bed at the proper time. Lack of discipline at home, indeed, seems to be one of the most
important factors causing physical defectiveness amongst these children.
Boots and clothing are usually quite good. The children, as has already been said, do not
come from the very poorest classes, and they are, if anything, more often over than under-clad.
It is very rarely that children are sent to school with poor clothes or bad boots. The parents
know that a school nurse supervises all these details, and they take a pride in seeing that their
child is as well dressed and clean as all the others. Like others, of course, the children vary in
their standard of neatness. Some are untidy, just as some children always are, but in general
the standard of boots, clothing and cleanliness is high, and better than that at an ordinary
elementary school. There is always an efficient care committee, attached to each school, that
supervises the well-being of the child.
Feeding at home is usually not so much insufficient in quantity, as failing in the right constituents
and proportions. It has been suggested that parents simply do not know anything
about dietetics, and that they do not realise that the way they are feeding their children is at all
inadequate. They usually do their best and are convinced that they are feeding the child well.
Here again there is a great necessity for the education of parents if anything is to be done to help
the child. It is found that after several months at one of the special schools where a good midday
dinner is provided, the general condition of the children improves, and that they are never at
their best after a long holiday spent at home.
Where the food at home is plentiful, the children usually receive far too much starch, white
bread and sweets, and not nearly enough fruit and vegetables. Meals are very often cold—in
many cases the school dinner being the only hot, freshly cooked meal the child receives—and
consist of tinned food, sausages, and ready cooked food from a " delicatessen" shop, etc.,among
those children who are better off, and bread and jam, bread and margarine, and fish and chips
among the others.
At one school the children were asked to give an account of their usual food at breakfast,
tea and supper. An analysis of the replies of the 32 children questioned will be found below.
These children were between nine and thirteen years of age.

Tea—
All had a meal, usually consisting of bread and jam, or bread and butter, and occasionally
cake or toast. Thirty had tea to drink, one coffee, and one nothing.

Feeding in school has to be, to a certain extent, a compromise between a really scientifically
balanced menu and the meals received by the children at home. It is unanimously agreed that
the children most definitely dislike eating anything that they have not had at home, and often,
indeed, refuse to do so. The force of example of the other children, however, usually soon persuades
them to do so, and they will soon try such things as vegetables which they have often
never touched or seen at home. They usually seem to enjoy the school dinners very much and
to have very hearty appetites. In some cases, however, "heart" children cannot eat too much
of distending foods, such as potatoes, soups and bread puddings at a time, and have to be helped
sparingly to such things.
The meals provided are generally hot, freshly cooked and nourishing. Fish is usually served
once a week, while plenty of potatoes, vegetables, fresh fruit and dried fruit salads are given.
Roast or boiled meat, stews and hot-pots are among the staple dishes, while suet puddings are
frequently given. An attempt is always made to balance the dietary carefully by giving fruit
with a first course containing much starch, such as stewed meat, dumplings and potatoes, or a
suet pudding after fish, etc.
The children's individual tastes seem to vary just as those of normal children do, in each
school. It is interesting to note, however, that a great discrepancy is to be found in the generalisations
made about each school. In one, for instance, it was declared that the children universally
detested fish, greens and milk puddings, while the nurse at another school actually enumerated