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fill in their manhood and womanhood, is of little use
to themselves and of none to the State—their time has
been wasted and the State has not benefited.
Surely the more logical aim would be to first
make good citizens and then make clever ones—the
latter would follow as a natural sequence in any case.
Why, instead of wasting their precious hours over
parsing, cube root, and such like refinements, should
these boys and girls not be given practical lessons in
the science of living decently; in the dangers lurking
in dust and dirt; in the importance of having clean
air to breathe and clean homes to live in? As a
mental exercise instruction of this kind would be
equally useful and its educational value immensely
superior.
In the case of the girls more particularly, what
profit might the State and the municipality not derive
from their having gained in school a good practical
knowledge of such subjects as housekeeping—how to
cook foods properly and how not to waste them—the
nature of a substance like milk and the terrible wastage
of infant life that results yearly from its improper use
and careless handling? If the elder girls were given a
course of sound instruction in the care and management
of infants, their feeding and clothing; if they
were shown why it is necessary to a child's health that
it should be kept clean and live in a clean home, we
should find before long the present unnecessarily high
infantile death-rate rapidly on the decrease.
I am aware that elementary science, both general
and sanitary, is, in many cases being taught in our