APPENDIX.

PHYSICAL TRAINING IN GERMANY.

Physical training has been accorded a considerable place in the educational systems of the principal countries of Europe, including Germany, Sweden and Norway, Switzerland, France, Austria, Belgium, ard Denmark. It would be interesting and instructive to compare the systems of physical training now in vogue in these countries with what has been attempted and accomplished in Great Britain and the United States. The writer originally intended to embody such a comparison in this report, but found it impossible to gather, from the libraries to which he had access, sufficient data on which to base a comprehensive and accurate account of the actual working of physical education in any of the foreign countries named above.

Since the foregoing pages were prepared for publication, the writer has visited Germany, and, through personal observation and inquiry, made a tolerably comprehensive study of German methods of physical training, especially of those which obtain in Prussia. While he would not disparage the merits of the gymnastic training given in the schools of Sweden, Switzerland, and France, and of other countries which he was likewise unable to visit, the writer inclines to the opinion that the Prussian system is the most highly developed and the best organized of its kind, and is, therefore, more worthy than any other of close study on the part of those who desire to check the present tendency to brain-forcing in the education of American youth.

DEVELOPMENT of GERMAN GYMNASTICS.

English and American writers on education have very generally either entirely neglected, or largely failed to apprebend, the lessons which German experience teaches in regard to physical education.

The German for gymnastics is Turnkunst, or Turnen, though the term Gymnastik occurs not infrequently, especially in the earlier writings. Turnplatz and Turnhalle correspond respectively to our terms out-door gymnasium and gymnasium, which latter ordinarily signifies a building for gymnastic exercises. A gymnasium, in the German sense, is the highest of the secondary schools, and leads directly to the university. The uniform use of this term to designate such schools dates, in Prussia, from the year 1812.

German gymnastics embrace three well-marked fields, or departments, viz: Volksturnen, or popular gymnastics; Schulturnen, or school gymnastics; and Militärturnen, or military gymnastics. The organization of the last two departments is maintained and controlled by the Government for strictly educational purposes; whereas the Turnvereine, as the societies of the turners are called, are voluntary associations of a social and semi-educational, but wholly popular and patriotic, nature. The fondness of the German people for gymnastic exercises is as marked a national trait as is the liking of the British for athletic sports. The germ of the turning system is to be found in the martial games and exercises of the ancient Teutons.

Considered from an educational point of view, British athletics are rude and primitive when compared with German gymnastics, which, in many of their features, are almost Grecian. The two systems are as widely different in their aims and methods as are the British school-boy and the German school-master, and for the same reasons.

GERMAN REFORMS AND REFORMERS.

The reform whereby mental and physical training have been made conjoint factors in the compulsory education of every German, has been worked out during the last hundred years. At every stage of its course the quickening and shaping influence of innovating educators has been felt. The three most eminent names in the list of men identified with the revival and upbuilding of German gymnastics are those of Guts Muths, Jahn, and Spiess. Each was a teacher and writer. Jahn was an agitator and popular leader in addition. Guts Muths lived from 1759 till 1839, Jahn from 1778 till 1852, and Spiess from 1810 till 1858.

GUTS MUTHS AND HIS WORK.

Guts Muths was teacher of gymnastics in Salzmann's Philanthropinum, at Schnepfenthal, from 1787 till his death, in 1839. His "Gymnastik für die Jugend,” published in 1793, was the first German manual of gymnastics. He did much by his writings and labors to prepare the way for Jahn, the "Father of turning," and Spiess, the "Founder of German school gymnastics and the creator of gymnastics for girls." . Guts Muths's success at Schnepfenthal led many private and a few public teachers to attempt to give their pupils some gymnastic training. The influence of Guts Muths is also traceable in the revival of gymnastics in Denmark, under the lead of Nachtigall, and in Sweden, where Ling, the founder of modern medical gymnastics, made gymnastics extremely popular. It should not be forgotten that Ling did much more than to develop the Swedish movement cure, on which his fame outside of his own country chiefly rests. He organized admirable systems of popular and school gymnastics, which are still extant and flourishing.

REFORMS IN PRUSSIA.

Prussia's commanding position in science and politics is due to the perfection of her educational and military systems. Their present excellence and efficiency are, in a large degree, the outcome of reforms begun by the sagacious and energetic ministers of the father of Kaiser Wilhelm, in the period of Prussia's deepest humiliation and distress, the period between the battle of Jena, in 1806, and the War of Liberation, in 1813. Bismarck and his coadjutors, Roon, Moltke, and Falk, have but cultivated the seed and reaped the fruits of the reforms instituted or marked out by Stein, and Scharnhorst, and Wilhelm von Humboldt.

Stein emancipated the peasants from serfdom, broke down the barriers between them and the middle classes, and gave enlarged freedom to trade. His name is also associated with radical and successful reforms in the constitution and administration of the State. Scharnhorst reorganized the army in accordance with the principle that all the inhabitants of a country should be trained to defend it. "In the field of educational reform the providential man," says Professor Seeley, "appeared in Humboldt, as great a master of the science and art of education as Scharnhorst was of war."

As early as 1804, Guts Muths urged upon the Prussian minister, Massow, the importance of introducing physical education into the schools as a means of promoting the military efficiency of the people. The minister replied that he proposed to make bodily training an essential part of his plan for national education. The war with Napoleon prevented this reform from being more than projected. In 1808 Scharnhorst's provisional scheme for the reorganization of the army was submitted to Stein for criticism and suggestions. Scharnhorst urged that fencing, swimming, leaping, etc., should be taught in the town and city schools. Stein approved the views of Scharnhorst in regard to bodily exercises, called attention to the success of Guts Muths at Schnepfenthal, and suggested the desirability of securing his co-operation in bringing about the general introduction of gymnastics into the schools. Humboldt likewise

favored the scheme, but no efficient measures were taken, at this time, to carry it out. The first public gymnastic ground (Turnplatz) was established in the summer of 1809 at Braunsberg, in Prussia, under the auspices of a secret association formed under the name of "The Moral and Scientific Union," the so-called Tugendbund, for the purpose of arousing national feeling and throwing off the French yoke. The gymnastics adopted at Braunsberg seem to have been based on the principles of Guts Muths.

"FATHER JAHN AND THE TURNERS.

That gymnastics under the name of Turnen became a popular institution and a potent factor in national development, was due to Jahn, a man of much more aggressive spirit than the quiet teacher of gymnastics at Schnepfenthal. In 1810 Jahn became a teacher in the Köllnisches Gymnasium, one of the city schools in Berlin, and in 1811-'12 he also taught in Plamann's Pestalozzian Institute in the same city. Prince Bismarck was a pupil in this institute from 1822 till 1827.

Jahn was an ardent patriot, and was filled with an enthusiastic admiration of the spirit, manners, and speech of the ancient Germans. His strong and rugged nature, and his eager, restless, passionate spirit, qualified him for popular leadership in the movement which he initiated. He seized the idea of making bodily training a force in national regeneration and education, and dreamed and wrote and labored for a free and united Germany. Before he had fairly entered upon his course as a teacher in Berlin, his book on "German Nationality" appeared in 1810. In the interval which elapsed between 1810 and 1816, the date of “Die Deutsche Turnkunst,” he accomplished the main labor of his life. The nature of his work, the ideas by which he was animated, and the circumstances of the time which favored his success, are indicated in the following extracts from "Die Deutsche Turnkunst":

Like many other things in this world, the German_turning system had a small and insignificant beginning. In the end of the year 1809 I went to Berlin to see the entry of the King. Love to my fatherland and my own inclinations now made me a teacher of youth, as I had often been before. During the beautiful spring of 1810 a few of my pupils began to go out with me into the woods and fields on the holiday afternoons of Wednesday and Saturday, and the habit became confirmed. Their number increased, and we had various youthful sports and exercises. Thus we went on until the dog-days, when the number was very large, but very soon fell off again. But there was left a select number, a nucleus, who held together even during the winter, with whom the first turning ground was opened in the spring of 1811, in the Hasenheide [i. e., a pine forest on the outskirts of Berlin].

At the present time many exercises are practiced in company and before the eyes of all, under the name of turning. But then the names turning system, turning, turner, turning ground, and the like, came up all at once, and gave occasion for much excitement, scandal, and authorship. The subject was discussed even in the French daily papers, and even here in our own country it was at first said that the ancient German ways have brought forth a new folly.

During the winter we studied whatever could be got on the subject, and we reflected with gratitude upon our predecessors, Vieth and Guts Muths. The stronger and more experienced of my pupils made a very skillful use of their writings, and were able, during the next summer, to labor as instructors in turning. In the summer of 1812 both the turning ground and system of exercises were enlarged. They became more varied from turning day to turning day, and were mutually developed by the pupils in their friendly contests of youthful emulation. It is impossible to say in detail who first discovered, tried, investigated, proved, and completed one or another exercise. From the very beginning the turning system has shown great community of spirit, patriotic feeling, perseverance, and self-denial. Every extension or development of it was used for the common good, and such is still the case.

Toward the end of the summer exercises of 1812, a sort of association of turners was formed for the purpose of the scientific investigation and artistic organization of the turning system in the most useful and generally applicable manner. On the King's proclamation of February 3, 1813, all the turners capable of bearing arms entered the field. After long persuasion I succeeded at Breslau in inducing Ernst Eiselen, one of my oldest pupils, to take charge of the turning institution during the war. I myself accompanied Eiselen from Breslau to Berlin, and introduced him to the authorities and to the principals of schools, who promised him all manner of co-operation, and who have ever since shown confidence in him. Since that time Eiselen has been at

the head of the turning institution, during the summers of 1813 and 1814 and the intervening winter, and has conducted the exercises of those who were too young to carry arms.

At the end of July, 1814, I returned to Berlin. In the winter, when the volunteers returned, bringing many turners with them, the associated discussions were renewed. On the escape of Napoleon all the turners able to bear arms volunteered again for the field, only two who had fought during the campaigns of 1813 and 1814 remaining at home from the consequences of those campaigns.

The younger ones who remained behind now took hold of the work again with renewed zeal. During the spring and summer of 1815 the turning ground received still further improvements and enlargements. In the following autumn and early part of winter, the turning system was again made the object of associated investigation. After the subject had been ripely considered and investigated in the turning council, and opinions had been compared, experience cited and views corrected, a beginning was made in collecting into one whole all the results of earlier and later labors on the subject, and all the separate fragments and contributions relative to it, a labor which has lastly been revised by my own pen. Although it was only one architect who at first drew the plan, yet master, associates, pupils, and workmen have all labored faithfully and honestly upon the structure, and have all contributed their shares to it.

This is a brief account of my work, my words, and my book. Neither of the three is perfect; but the book may serve to promote a recognition of its ideal. It is put forth only by way of rendering an account to the fatherland of what we have done and endeavored.

The turning system would re-establish the lost symmetry of human development; would connect a proper bodily training with mere exclusive intellectual cultivation; would supply the proper counteracting influence to the prevailing over-refinement, and would comprehend and influence the whole man by means of a social mode of living for the young. Every turning institution is a place for exercising the bodily powers, a school of industry in manly activity, a place of chivalrous contest, an aid to education, a protection to the health, and a public benefit. It is constantly and interchangeably a place of teaching and of learning. In an unbroken circle follow constantly after each other, direction, exemplification, instruction, independent investigation, practice, emulation, and further instruction. Thus the turners do not learn their occupation from hearsay. They have lived in and with their work, investigated it, proved it, and perfected it. It awakens all the dormant powers and secures a self-confidence and readiness which are never found at a loss.

The director of a turning institution undertakes a high duty. He must cherish and protect the simplicity of the young, that it may not be injured by untimely precocity. He who is not thoroughly penetrated with a childlike spirit and national feelings, should never take charge of a turning institution. It is a holy work and life.

But all education is useless and idle which leaves the pupil to disappear, like a will-o'-the-wisp, in the waste folly of a fancied cosmopolitanism, and does not confirm him in patriotic feeling; and thus, even in the worst period of the French domination, love of king and fatherland were preached to and impressed upon the youth of the turning association. No one ought to enter a turning association who is knowingly a perverter of German nationality, and praises, loves, promotes, or defends foreign manners.

With such principles did the turning societies strengthen, train, arm, encourage, and man themselves for the fatherland, in the sultry times of the devil. Nor did faith, love, or hope desert them for a moment. "God deserts no German," has always been their motto. In war none of them staid at home, except those too young or too weak, and they were not idle.

The turning system [says Von Raumer] soon spread from Berlin throughout Germany, and a large part of Southern Germany. Next to Berlin, Breslau had the largest number of turners, some eight hundred. In that city students, Catholic and Protestant, seminary pupils, the pupils of four Gymnasien, officers, and professors frequented the turning ground. Singing flourished. On Wednesday and Saturday afternoons, after exercising from three to seven, the whole company returned singing to the city.

Together with this first natural development of the turning system, there came up also a reaction against many received and universal customs and manners. This necessarily aroused enemies, and the more because the turners frequently overpassed the bounds of moderation, and made turning identical with a warfare against all ancient errors. This was particularly the case after the war of freedom.

THE ATTITUDE OF THE STATE AUTHORITIES.

The state authorities, especially those at the head of the department of education, seem to have manifested a lively and, on the whole, friendly interest in Jahn and his work. In 1813, during Jahn's absence in the field, six hundred and seventy thalers were appropriated to enable Eiselen to conduct an eight weeks' normal course of instruction for teachers of turning, but it was impracticable to carry out the plan at that time. Several reports of a favorable nature were made to the Government on the pedagogical and hygienic worth of turning, and turning grounds were established in various parts of the Kingdom under governmental auspices. In 1814 the Prussian chancellor, Prince Hardenberg, bestowed a pension of five hundred thalers upon Jahn, in recognition of his services to the state. In September, 1815, Jahn's pension was increased to eight hundred thalers, and Eiselen was granted a salary of four hundred thalers. This was due to a report made to Hardenberg in April, 1815, by Minister Von Schuckmann, to whom Hardenberg had referred a plan of Jahn's for enlarging the turnplatz, purchasing certain buildings, and bringing the turning institution into close connection with the Berlin school-system. Von Schuckmann was averse, by reason of the low state of the treasury, to incurring the large expenditures suggested by Jahn, and deemed it unadvisable to introduce turning formally into the schools, lest it should lose its spontaneous popular character.

In 1818 Altenstein, the minister of education, caused an official investigation to be made into the nature, extent, and effects of turning throughout Prussia. During the period 1816-'19, the department of education elaborated a provisional scheme for a general education law, which, however, was never enacted in its entirety. In this scheme a place was assigned to gymnastics, and it was proposed to introduce them into the rural schools as well as into the middle schools, normal schools, and Gymnasien.

At last, in 1819, a plan was perfected by the educational authorities for the establishment of turning grounds thonghout Prussia in connection with the schools. O March 23, 1819, the very day that this plan was laid before the King for his approval and signature, the news of Kotzebue's murder by Sand, who was a student and a turner, reached Berlin, and the King refused his approval. Sand's deed of crazy violence had, as it appears now, no political significance; but the Prussian Government feared revolution, and looked upon the spread of liberal ideas among the rising generation with alarm. The Burschenschaften, or students' societies, and the Turnvereine were put under the ban as being hotbeds of liberalism. Jahn was arrested in July, 1819, on the charge of engaging in revolutionary practices and conspiring to assassinate a privy councilor, Von Kamptz by name. Francis Lieber, then a youth of nineteen, one of Jahn's oldest and favorite pupils, was also arrested on suspicion. Lieber regained his freedom in a few months, but was forbidden to study at a Prussian university. Jahn was acquitted and set free in 1825, but was banished from Berlin, and forbidden to reside in any town where there was a university or Gymnasium. Francis Lieber came to the United States in 1827 for the express purpose of taking charge of the then recently founded Tremont Gymnasium, in Boston, Mass., where he established a swimming school on his own account.

In January, 1820, the Government abolished turning in Prussia by closing the turning grounds, some ninety in number. Volksturnen was not again allowed until 1842. Gradually gymnastics found a place in the instruction of a few schools. In 1836, Dr. Lorinser, of Oppeln, published in a medical journal an article entitled "The Protection of Health in Schools." Dr. Lorinser was very severe in his strictures on the management of the schools, especially of the Gymnasien. He declared that bodily and mental weakness were on the increase among school children, and especially the Gymnasium pupils, by reason of the overburdening due to multiplicity of studies, too many school hours, and an undue amount of home work. This paper gave rise to a wide and somewhat heated discussion, and indirectly brought about a renewed interest in school gymnastics.

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