and third, by transfer from any institution within the commonwealth. After much experience, it has been decided to receive boys for three years, although if committed by a magistrate, the commitment extends until majority, and if for any reason a boy is discharged from the farm before then, he may be brought back for misbehavior within that period. The superintendent decides all cases of admission and discharge there is always a waiting list. None are admitted without a certificate of good health from a physician, and it may be said that sickness is almost unknown at the farm, a fact no doubt

twenty minutes of twelve, half the boys are at school, while the other half attend to the duties of the farm. From half-past one until four those boys who were in school in the morning are at work on the farm, and vice versa. They are receiving a good common school education, while with the assistance of a few employés, they do all the farm work; caring for the stock, planting, cultivating, and harvesting the crops. The large apple and pear orchard in itself requires considerable attention, and the hillsides abound in timber which the boys help cut and stack into many cords of wood. In the winter

attributable to the wholesome outdoor life and regularity of habits. The institution has to guard against the admission of boys to whom the training of the farm is not adapted; attempts having been made to secure admission of even feebleminded boys. Parents and guardians who are able are required to pay for the maintenance of their children; otherwise the institution is supported entirely by voluntary contributions.

The days at the farm are filled with well-planned work and recreation. From a quarter of nine in the morning until

time this wood is hauled and the ice house is filled. Carpentry, printing, shoe repairing and sloyd work are taught, and some of the boys have had a chance to do a little blacksmithing, pipe-fitting, and machine work about the place. They have also assisted in erecting and repairing buildings. Military training with settingup exercises helps keep them in good physical trim-and two rival baseball teams, a band, a good reading-room, and an occasional entertainment, and such sports as swimming, nutting, skating, and coasting, all contribute to the recreatio

periods. There is always something to mark off holidays from the rest of the calendar.

A feature of the institution that contributes largely to its success, is a system of credit known as the mills system. The boys are divided into three grades inmates, cadets, and graduates. They can earn promotion from a lower to a higher grade by gaining credit marks which are called mills. Every boy begins as an inmate and an inmate he must remain for at least six months. If during this period his conduct has been such that he

a week, every boy who has received sixtyseven or more mills for the week is given a check which entitles him to four hours of recreation on Wednesday afternoon, while every boy who has earned less than sixty-seven mills must work during this period. A boy soon learns that good conduct and faithful work count for something, and that he may shorten his stay at the farm if his mills account is kept up to the required standard.

No boy at the Berkshire farm ever receives corporal punishment. If he needs further discipline than can be ad

has not lost thirty mills per month, he will be advanced to the next higher grade; otherwise not. A boy is able to earn ten mills per day if he has a perfect record in everything, these ten mills being distributed as follows: Morals, 2; deportment, 3; school and work, 3; care of clothes, 1, and care of body, 1. Neglect or carelessness on a boy's part results in a reduction of his mills account according to this schedule.

In the cadet grade a boy must not lose more than twenty mills in six months in order to gain promotion. The honor rank the graduate grade and no boy is eligible discharge until he has gained it

Once

ministered by the reduction of his mills, he is required to stand at attention for an hour or is put on short diet for a few meals. If these punishments also fail, he is placed in solitary confinementsolitary confinement in a room well ventilated and comfortable, where he can think over the situation at leisure, for he is kept there until he is brought to terms. If a boy runs away the whole school is denied play hours and other usual privileges until he is returned. Consequently, there is great rejoicing when a runaway is brought back, and it is needless to say that running away is infrequent.

On Sunday atten

at church in the

morning, Sunday-school in the afternoon, and chapel in the evening, is compulsory. The institution is, however, entirely unsectarian.

When a boy is ready to leave he is either returned to his parents or a place is found for him on a farm, in some mercantile establishment, or at a trade. He is not lost sight of after he leaves the farm, for the superintendent, secretary, and other members of the board strive to keep up a correspondence with him. Within the past year some three or four hundred letters have been sent out mak

ing inquiries about these graduates. The number of letters as yet received is too limited to justify a generalization as to the entire number, but is sufficient to indicate very gratifying results. The New York members of the board make it their business to look after any boy who goes to the city and to help him find employment. It is proposed to form a club in New York where these graduates may be brought together, once or twice a month. As it is, many requests are received from graduates for permission to return to visit the superintendent and the farm.

When the commissioner of health, Dr. Ernst J. Lederle, took up the subject of trachoma or contagious eye disease in the schools in the late spring of 1902, it was to all intents and purposes a forgotten subject, of interest only to a few eye specialists in the dispensaries, who realized the extent to which the disease had spread, and its danger to the younger generation of New York City. A few physicians were interested in the eradication of trachoma, but almost nothing was known popularly regarding its extent.

While I do not, of course, attempt to speak of tracoma technically, as that is peculiarly the province of the physician, the layman can safely utter a few facts regarding the disease. The first of these E seems to be the fact that it is almost always an accompaniment of filth, and is generally more prevalent among people whose standard of cleanliness is not high. It has always been endemic in parts of Europe, and historians tell us that it was brought back in epidemic form by Napoleon's soldiers from Egypt after his campaign there. Those who have seen the blind beggars of the Nile country need not be reminded how great a scourge the disease can become. In the United

States, the disease undoubtedly had its origin with immigrants, especially in recent years, when this immigrant influx has been drawn to such an extent from the dirtier and more degraded elements on the Continent. Trachoma spreads rather slowly, and for that reason its transmission from one person to another in this country has been gradual. More marked, of course, in tenement districts, for obvious reasons, the spread of the disease has not been confined to those districts, but is found in other sections of New York City generally supposed to be rather high in the scale of cleanliness.

As a result of neglect by the municipal authorities, extending over a considerable period of years, a very large number of cases had undoubtedly accumulated in New York, afflicting persons of all ages. Medical inspectors of the department of health have frequently been confronted with the statement of parents that their children "needed no treatment for sore eyes," that "they themselves had had sore eyes all their lives, and their fathers before them." This experience is many times repeated on the East Side, where whole families are afflicted with the disThis condition of affairs obtained

ease.

M Sha

The

with four or five from the department of health, made an examination of about 55,000 children in various public schools more or less typical of different city districts. The results of this examination were surprising, even to those who had some knowledge of the conditions. health board had known, for example, that at certain times in some public institutions as many as fifty per cent to seventy-five per cent of the children were afflicted with trachoma, but it was thought that this represented extreme conditions. The board was astonished, therefore, to learn that in some public schools from

twelve per cent of these 55,000 children had trachoma. Adapting these figures to the total number of school children in New York City, gave rather roughly an idea of the extent of the work to be done.

If any confirmation had been necessary regarding the extent of trachoma it might have been gained from an examination of patients in the public baths. This, examination was made last summer by specialists in the employ of the health department, and it was found that in some baths fully fifty per cent of the bathers were affected with the disease. It was found to be more prevalent there