rce of amusement to children, but as a medium of
instruction.

Battledoor or shuttlecock may be taught to children of both sexes very
early; and it affords a healthy and almost untiring source of amusement.
It gives activity as well as strength to the muscles or moving powers,
and has many other important advantages. There is some danger, according
to Dr. Pierson [Footnote: See his Lecture before the American Institute
of Instruction] of distorting the spine by playing at shuttlecock too
frequently and too long; but this will seldom be the case with little
children in the nursery. Neither shuttlecock nor any other amusement
will secure their attention long enough to injure them very much.

Perhaps this exercise comes nearer to my ideas of a perfect amusement
than almost any which could be named. The mind is agreeably occupied,
without being fatigued; and if the amusements are proportioned to the
age and strength of the child, there is very little fatigue of the body.
It gives, moreover, great practical accuracy to the eye and to the hand.

A rocking-horse is much recommended for the nursery. I have had no
opportunity for observing the effects of this kind of amusement; but if
it is one half as valuable as some suppose, I should be inclined to
recommend it. But I am opposed to fostering in the rider lessons of
cruelty, by arming him with whips and spurs. If the young are ever to
learn to ride, on a living horse, the exercises of the rocking-horse
will, most certainly, be a sort of preparation for the purpose.

Tops and marbles afford a great deal of rational amusement to the young;
and of a very useful kind, too. Spinning a top is second to no exercise
which I have yet mentioned, unless it is playing at shuttlecock.

Dr. Dewees recommends a small backgammon table, with men, but without
dice. He says, also, that "children, as soon as they are capable of
comprehending the subject, should be taught draughts or checkers. This
game is not only highly amusing, but also very instructive." In another
place he heaps additional encomiums upon the game of checkers. "It
becomes a source of endless amusement," he says, "as it never tires, but
always instructs." Of exercises which instruct, however, as well as
amuse, I shall speak presently.

The amusements called "morrice," "fox and geese," &c., with which some
of the children of almost every neighborhood are more or less
acquainted, are of the same general character and tendenc