ever been before, so that those who have charge of the young may be told not only that nervous strain is an important cause of neurotic disease, but told also why this is so."

Teachers and guardians of the young should know that the nervous system of the child differs very materially from the nervous system of the adult. They must be told that the child, especially in his nervous organization, is not "a little man." His nervous system is structurally and functionally immature. It is excitable, unstable, and under feeble inhibitory control. The sources of reflex irritation in the child are many, and the nerve centres discharge their force more fitfully and readily than in the adult. The period corresponding with the onset and establishment of the reproductive function in girls is a time when they are especially predisposed to nervous disease. These and other physiological peculiarities of the nervous system of childhood are much more potent for evil when associated with the various "blood conditions" casually related to the neurosis of childhood.

With children of good physical constitution, working within the limitations of their proper grades, there is almost no danger that a moderate amount of school work will in any way assist the development of neurotic disease, provided always that the hygienic conditions of the school, especially the light and ventilation, are good. But the strain of ordinary school work affects children of poor physical development (many of whom are, unfortunately, precocious) very differently. A large number of these children, by reason of bad heredity, are neurotic, poorly nourished, and anæmic, and many of them have tuberculous, rheumatic, or syphilitic inheritance; while others, from accidental causes, such as bad hygiene, improper food, etc., are below the normal in physical development. The nervous systems of such children are in a condition of malnutrition, and are, therefore, not capable of doing the ordinary work of their grades in the public schools. And, if they are permitted to do this work, or if, as is often the case, they are encouraged to push forward into higher grades than the one to which their years and strength should assign them, disastrous consequences will surely follow, and their nervous systems may be injured beyond repair.

Such children, under the actual strain of school work, may develop chorea, hysteria, and other neuroses. An important duty, therefore, of every physician is to advise against much school work in children. of feeble physical development, and to explain to parents and

teachers why they should first have their physical defects looked after, and then be placed in a grade lower than that to which their age and intelligence should assign them. Under conditions of overpressure and nervous strain, every grain of knowledge is gained at the expense of health. Of course, the predisposition to nervous disease is due to heredity. Would' that every teacher could, in accordance with Beecher's trenchant injunction, for each of his pupils "select good parents to be born from"!

In all education we should, if we would do the most for the child's health, follow the path of least resistance. Suppose you have a dynamo with four strands of wire — one of copper, another of German silver, a third of steel, and a fourth of zinc- to transmit the current generated. Which wire will conduct the most of the electric current from the great generator? Why, the copper wire, of course. If you insist that the current must be conducted by the German silver wire alone, what takes place? You burn out and ruin your dynamo, for the electric current will follow the path of least resistance. Why not use the same common sense in the case of children?

When we speak of school work as the cause of disease, we mean not only brain work, but also the mental excitement that attends examinations, and is a direct consequent of the reward of merit system still in vogue in some of our schools, producing such symptoms as the grinding of the teeth and jaws in sleep. It must be made to include and comprehend all that is comprehended in the term "school environment," comprising lighting, heating, ventilation, seating, rest periods, programme of work, and the like.

Again, fathers and mothers, beware of the danger of parading your children before the public in early childhood. How sad to see the little child, unduly excited, robbed of sleep, worried with anxiety, attempt to sing a song or "speak a piece"! When will parents learn that precocity is an abnormal condition in the human infant? This mental cramming is generally begun at home, with the probable result of mental impairment. Mothers, look to the physical, and retard, if need be, the intellectual development of your child. Vegetation, and not intellection, is the ideal life of early childhood. Above all, give the child fresh air. The child may exist without fresh air, but no child can grow or work without fresh air.

Let us do all in our power to make the development of the child natural, in the most significant sense. In the fullest and most complete sense let us guard against nervous depletion, degeneracy, and

disease, by seeking ever and always to make the child's nervous sys- · tem his ally instead of his enemy.

SOME REFERENCE BOOKS ON CHILD STUDY.*

"Child Study the Basis of Exact Education." G. S. Hall, Forum, vol. xvi. p. 429.

"Child Study in the Hospital, a Record of 600 Cases." H. D. Chapin, Forum, vol. xvii. p. 125.

44

Reports for Various Sections of the National Association for Child Study." Addresses and Proceedings National Educational Association, 1894

"A Method of Examining Children in Schools as to their Development and Brain Condition." Dr. F. Warner, British Medical Journal, Sept. 22, 1888. "Topical Syllabi of Child Study." G. S. Hall, 1895, Nos. i.-xv.

"A Study of Child Nature." Elizabeth Harrison, Chicago, 1891.

"Child Study as a Basis for Psychology and Psychological Teaching." G. S. Hall, Proceedings of the International Congress of Education, 1893.

46

Mental Development in the Child." Preyer, New York, 1893

"Growth of St. Louis Children." W. T. Porter, Transactions of Academy of Science of St. Louis, 1894.

"Growth of Brain." H. H. Donaldson, Scribner, New York, 1896.

"American Childhood from a Medical Standpoint." H. L. Taylor, Popular Science Monthly, vol. xli. p. 721.

Growth of Children." Bowditch, vols. viii., x., and xxii., Report of Massachusetts State Board of Health.

"On the Development of Voluntary Motor Ability." Bryan, American Journal of Psychology, 1893.

"The Nervous System and Education." Crichton-Brown, J. & A. Churchill, London.

"Mental Faculties." Warner, New York, 1890.

46

Eye-mindedness and Ear-mindedness." Jastrow, Popular Science Monthly, vol. xxiii. p. 597.

"The Contents of Children's Minds on Entering School." G. S. Hall, Ped. Sem., vol. i., No. 2.

"Fatigue." F. B. Dresslar, Ped. Sem., vol. ii., No. 1.

"Remarks on the Influence of Mental Cultivation and Mental Excitement upon Health." A. Brigham, London, 1874.

"Report of the Examination of 27,927 Children for Color Blindness," Boston, 1880.

"Legal Aspect of the Child Problem." F. Wayland, Charity Review, vol. ii. p. 249.

"Child Laborers and their Protection in Germany." W. Steidra, Chautauquan, vol. xviii. p. 88.

"Problem of Children in Cities." J. H. Finley, Review of Reviews, vol. iv. p. 683.

Articles in the Child Study Monthly, a magazine devoted to the scientific study of children. Edited by W. O. Krohn and Alfred Bayliss, Chicago, 1895, to date.

Published by request.

XII.

Deserted Children.

DESERTION BY PARENTS.*

BY REV. E. P. SAVAGE,

SUPERINTENDENT OF THE CHILDREN'S HOME SOCIETY OF MINNESOTA.

7,334 children deserted by one or both parents in the year 1895. This is my text, found in the book of the Depravity of Man. It is the report that I have obtained from 205 institutions and societies that care for children in this country. 788 such institutions are enumerated in the United States census of 1890, and besides these are many Humane Societies and Children's Home Societies in twenty States not thus enumerated, so that the whole number much exceeds 800. Therefore, these reports are from less than one-fourth of the whole.

Only 30 report from the 75 or more in Ohio, 18 of the 140 in New York, 9 of the 45 in Indiana, 4 of the 27 in California,— crowded with children by the thousands. It is safely within bounds to say that not less than 25,000 children were deserted in this country in 1895.

100 institutions report the cost of the care of the 4,223 such children in their care was $244,883.

4,408 are reported as deserted by the father, 1,180 by the mother, 1,338 by both parents.

Now what shall we do about it? What can be done about it? This is the problem before us. Little did I dream of the magnitude of it two years ago, when I first proposed it at the National Conference at Nashville.

I had found it constantly pressing upon my attention in my own work. I found that the same evil confronted other workers, and Read at the National Conference of Charities and Correction at Grand Rapids, Mich., June 5, 1896.

alarmed them. As Rev. M. J. Eagan, of Minnesota, says, "It is a question that clamors for solution." Mr. Frank Lewis, of Minnesota, says, "This is a great evil, and requires heroic treatment; and it seems to me that the time has come when it should receive our closest attention, best thought and effort to provide an adequate remedy." But I could find no authority to which to appeal either for information as to the extent of the evil or the solution of the problem. The national government never had got the statistics. No State had done so. No statement had ever been published that attempted to measure the wide extent of this unnatural and awful crime. So I resolved to appeal to the workers themselves who come most in contact with it. I sent a list of questions to many of them in all parts of the land; and 80 replies came from 30 States and from Canada, but statistics came from only 18 States. The replies gave glimpses of the greatness of the evil, but the statistics were not sufficient to give us an accurate estimate of the numbers concerned. This year, although the returns are far from complete, they are sufficient to enable us to form some proper idea of its extent. About 240 replies have been received, and 205 have given statistics. They have come from 46 States and Canada, reaching from Alaska to Texas and from Maine to California. The evil exists everywhere. The need of a remedy is universal.

I can give but a few of the replies.

Mr. James Smith, of Cincinnati, in his report of the Truant Fathers' department of their effective society, says: "In this department more meanness, badness, deceit, and duplicity is manifested than in all others combined. Our records disclose cases where the father has compelled the wife and mother to submit to the embraces of strange men, and then robbed her of the proceeds of her shame; cases where he has by habitual neglect and abuse driven her to the use of strong drink, and then left her without a cent; cases, where, as the result of his evil life, he has ruined her physically, often beyond the means of a partial recovery; cases where his abuse has maimed, wounded, and crippled her for life, and then abandoned her with her children to make a living for herself and children as best she may."

Is it strange that after such a category of terrible crimes, to which more might be added, C. L. Brace, of New York, and several others from various States recommend as a penalty "the whipping-post";