conductors of schools are therefore, from pecuniary motives, compelled to gratify the vanity of the parents, though their own feelings might prompt them to relax the discipline, and afford leisure for more healthful physical exercise. It is due to the accomplished members of the scholastic profession to say thus much, as we all know the difficulty—nay, the impossibility—of conforming to all the whims which are dictated by parental solicitude.
The first evil to be complained of in large educational establishments is the crowding together of a great number of children in small or insufficiently ventilated apartments. If a fresh supply of pure air be not constantly admitted, the carbon given off from the thirty or forty pairs of lungs accumulates, and is respired over and over again; the children become listless, and complain of headache and a sensation of tightness across the chest. Most adults are familiar with this feeling after sitting for some time in a crowded church or theatre; and it is so common in the latter place as to have acquired the title of "a playhouse headache." The dormitories of schools are also often insufficiently ventilated, in consequence of a very unnecessary apprehension of the ill effects of fresh air, which, if introduced freely and without draughts, never did, and never will do any injury. Children are also generally put two in a bed-a practice which we do not approve, but which cannot always be avoided. Where this is the case they should change sides every night; as, from their natural dislike to breathing in each other's faces, they will, if this be not attended to, contract the habit of always lying on the same side, and the weight of the arm above will compress the ribs in the manner which I have before described.
On rising in the morning, the young ladies are expected to be out of bed the moment the bell rings, and in a short time another imperative tinkle summons them to prayers in the school-room. The child is obliged to make her appearance at the wonted moment. Bills of pains and penalties are not only known in the outer world, but may be found also in a Ladies' Boarding School. Each drowsy pupil, in order to avoid the consequences of being too late, huddles on her clothes as rapidly as possible, and as for the corset, or bodice, which is supposed to be for the purpose of keeping its wearer erect, it is either not laced at all, or is laced in such an uneven manner that it had better not be worn at all. In our corsets all this is impossible; the fastening
