ools accomplish, not at all; on the other hand, we feel a just pride
in the liberality of the country, and realize that in them lies the only
security for a Republican form of government, and, indeed, our opinions
go further in this direction than that of most persons, for we would
make it obligatory on the part of parents to school their children to a
certain degree, and that no one should be eligible to vote who could not
read and write in the common language of the country.

It is the administration of the school system which we deprecate. Hear
what the famous Dr. Bowditch of Boston says upon this question,
namely:--"* * * Not only does our school system, in its practical
operation, entirely ignore the necessity for physical culture, but it at
times goes farther, and actually, as we believe, becomes the slayer of
our people. * * * We appeal to every physician of ten or twenty years'
practice, and feel sure that in reviewing his cases of consumption he
will find not a few of them in which he will trace to _overwork_ in our
schools the first springs of the malady.

"The result of all this school _training_ is as certain as the day.
Every child who goes through these modern processes must inevitably
suffer, but not all alike. Some have one complaint, some another, and
some, doubtless, finally escape unharmed. At times they only grow pale
and thin under the process. But not a few go through to the exhibition,
and, after working harder than ever for the two or three last weeks of
the term, they gain the much-coveted prize only to break wholly down
when it is taken. The stimulus of desire for success is gone. That has
sustained them up to the last moment. Success having been accomplished,
the victim finds, too late, that what he has been striving for is
nothing, now that it is won, compared with the vitality lost and the
seeds of disease sown."

It is true that there are a very few schools in the country where
physical culture receives, in connection with other duties, its due
share of attention. We know, personally, of but one--the Howland Ladies'
Seminary, at Union Springs, New York, and we understand, on the
authority quoted above, that the Latin and High Schools of Boston are of
this class. Our colleges, however, as a rule, seem as bad as the
schools. Half the students who complete their course come out broken in
health, and those who do not are about the toughest "horned cattle," as
Horace Greeley says, that can be