of tallow or bayberries. The twisting
of wicks. The attaching of wicks to rods. The dipping of them into
the melted mass in the kettle. Patience in keeping on dipping them.

(Pupils taking this course are required to report each morning at five
o'clock.)

2. A course in Wax Candles. The use of molds.

These departments might give a girl a pretty fair education of
the hand and a pretty fair acquaintance with the technique and
organization of the working world; but we haven't yet mentioned
the biggest and hardest department of all.

Before mentioning it, let us take a look at the picture reproduced in
this chapter from a book published in the year 1493. This book was a
French translation of Boccaccio's collection of stories called "Noble
Women." The picture shows a woolen mill being operated in the grounds
of a palace by a queen and her ladies-in-waiting. It summons back the
days when even the daughters of kings and nobles could not help
acquiring a knowledge of the working world, because they were in it.

One of the ladies-in-waiting is straightening out the tangled strands
of wool with carding combs. The other has taken the combed and
straightened strands and is spinning them into yarn. The queen, being
the owner of the plant, has the best job. She is weaving the yarn into
cloth on a loom.

[Illustration: THIS SKETCH OF A WOOLEN MILL OPERATED IN THE GROUNDS OF A
PALACE BY A QUEEN AND HER LADIES-IN-WAITING IS TAKEN FROM A VERY OLD
FRENCH TRANSLATION OF BOCCACCIO'S BOOK ON "NOBLE WOMEN." IN THOSE DAYS
EVERY HOME WAS A FACTORY AND A TRADE SCHOOL.

_Photograph by Burke & Atwell, Chicago._]

The daughters of the Emperor Charlemagne, who, besides being an
emperor, was a very rich man, learned how to card and spin and weave.
Noble women had to direct all that kind of work on their estates. They
lived in the very midst of industry, of business.

So it was with those early New England women. And therefore,
whether well-to-do or indigent, they passed on to their sons as
well as to their daughters a steady daily lesson in the world's work.
The most intelligent mother in the United States to-day, let her be
kindergartner and psychologist and child-study specialist as much
as she pleases, cannot give her children that broad early view of
the organization of life. The only place where her children can get
it now is the school.

On the first of January of the year 1910 Ella Flagg Young, superintendent
of schools in Chicag