AMUSEMENTS.
344. What amusements do you recommend for a boy as being most beneficial to health?
Manly games—such as rowing, skating, cricket, quoits, foot-ball, rackets, single-stick, bandy, bowls, skittles, and all gymnastic exercises. Such games bring the muscles into proper action, and thus cause them to be fully developed. They expand and strengthen the chest; they cause a due circulation of the blood, making it to bound merrily through the blood-vessels, and thus to diffuse health and happiness in its course. Another excellent amusement for boys, is the brandishing of clubs. They ought to be made in the form of a constable's staff, but should be much larger and heavier. The manner of handling them is so graphically described by Addison that I cannot do better than transcribe it—"When I was some years younger than I am at present, I used to employ myself in a more laborious diversion, which I learned from a Latin treatise of exercises that is written with great erudition; it is there called the [Greek: skiomachia] or the fighting with a man's own shadow, and consists in the brandishing of two short sticks grasped in each hand, and loaded with plugs of lead at either end. This opens the chest, exercises the limbs, and gives a man all the pleasure of boxing without the blows. I could wish that several learned men would lay out that time which they employ in controversies and disputes about nothing, in this method of fighting with their own shadows. It might conduce very much to evaporate the spleen which makes them uneasy to the public as well as to themselves."
Another capital, healthful game is single-stick, which makes a boy "to gain an upright and elastic carriage, and to learn the use of his limbs."—H. Kingsley. Single-stick may be taught by any drill-sergeant in the neighbourhood. Do everything to make a boy strong. Remember, "the glory of young men is their strength."
If games were more patronised in youth, so many miserable, nervous, useless creatures would not abound. Let a boy or girl, then, have plenty of play; let half of his or her time be spent in play.
There ought to be a gymnasium established in every town of the kingdom. The gymnasium, the cricket ground, and the swimming bath, are among our finest establishments, and should be patronised accordingly.
First of all, by an abundance of exercise and fresh air make your boys and girls strong, and then, in due time, they will be ready and be able to have their minds properly cultivated. Unfortunately, in this enlightened age, we commence at the wrong end—we put the cart before the horse—we begin by cultivating the mind, and we leave the body to be taken care of afterwards; the results are, broken health, precocious, stunted, crooked, and deformed youths, and premature decay.
One great advantage of gymnastic exercise is, it makes the chest expand, it fills the lungs with air, and by doing so strengthens them amazingly, and wards off many diseases. The lungs are not sufficiently exercised and expanded; boys and girls, girls especially, do not as a rule half fill their lungs with air; now air to the lungs is food to the lungs, and portions of the lungs have not half their proper food, and in consequence suffer.
It is very desirable that every boy and girl should, every day of his or her life, and for a quarter of an hour at least each time, go through a regular breathing exercise—that is to say, should be made to stand upright, throw back the shoulders, and the while alternately and regularly fully fill and fully empty the lungs of air. If this plan were daily followed, the chest and lungs would be wonderfully invigorated, and the whole body benefited.
345. Is playing the flute, blowing the bugle, or any other wind instrument, injurious to health?
Decidedly so: the lungs and the windpipe are brought into unnatural action by them. If a boy be of a consumptive habit, this will, of course, hold good with tenfold force. If a youth must be musical let him be taught singing, as that, provided the lungs be not diseased, will be beneficial.
346. What amusements do you recommend for a girl?
Archery, skipping, horse exercise, croquet, the hand-swing, the fly-pole, skating, and dancing, are among the best. Archery expands the chest, throws back the shoulders, thus improving the figure, and develops the muscles. Skipping is exceedingly good exercise for a girl, every part of the body being put into action by it Horse exercise is splendid for a girl; it improves the figure amazingly—it is most exhilarating and amusing; moreover, it gives her courage and makes her self-reliant Croquet develops and improves the muscles of the arms, beautifies the complexion, strengthens the back, and throws out the chest. Croquet is for girls and women what cricket is for boys and men—a glorious game. Croquet has improved both the health and the happiness of womankind more than any game ever before invented. Croquet, in the bright sunshine, with the winds of heaven blowing about the players, is not like a ball in a stifling hot ball-room, with gas-lights poisoning the air. Croquet is a more sensible amusement than dancing; it brings the intellect as well as the muscles into play. The man who invented croquet has deserved greater glory, and has done more good to his species, than many philosophers whose names are emblazoned in story. Hand-swing is a capital exercise for a girl, the whole of the body is thrown into action by it, and the spine, the shoulders, and the shoulder-blades, are especially benefited. The fly-pole, too, is good exercise for the whole of the muscles of the body, especially of the legs and the arms. Skating is for a girl excellent exercise, and is as exhilarating as a glass of champagne, but will do her far more good! Skating improves the figure, and makes a girl balance and carry herself upright and well; it is a most becoming exercise for her, and is much in every way to be commended. Moreover, skating gives a girl courage and self-reliance. Dancing, followed as a rational amusement, causes a free circulation of the blood, and provided it does not induce her to sit up late at night, is most beneficial.
347. If dancing be so beneficial why are balls such fruitful sources of coughs, of cold, and consumptions?
On many accounts. They induce young ladies to sit up late at night; they cause them to dress more lightly than they are accustomed to do; and thus thinly clad, they leave their homes while the weather is perhaps piercingly cold, to plunge into a suffocating, hot ballroom, made doubly injurious by the immense number of lights, which consume the oxygen intended for the due performance of the healthy functions of the lungs. Their partners, the brilliancy of the scene, and the music, excite their nerves to undue and thus to unnatural, action, and what is the consequence? Fatigue, weakness, hysterics, and extreme depression follow. They leave the heated ball-room when the morning has far advanced, to breathe the bitterly cold and frequently damp air of a winter's night, and what is the result? Hundreds die of consumption, who might otherwise have lived. Ought there not, then, to be a distinction between a ball at midnight and a dance in the evening?
348. But still, would you have a girl brought up to forego the pleasure of a ball?
If a parent prefer her so-called pleasures to her health, certainly not; to such a mother I do not address myself.
349. Have you any remarks to make on singing, or on reading aloud?
Before a mother allows her daughter to take lessons in singing, she should ascertain that there be no actual disease of the lungs, for if there be, it will probably excite it into action; but if no disease exist, singing or reading aloud is very conducive to health. Public singers are seldom known to die of consumption. Singing expands the chest, improves the pronunciation, enriches the voice for conversation, strengthens the lungs, and wards off many of their diseases.
350. Do you approve of corporal punishments in schools?
I do not. I consider it to be decidedly injurious both to body and mind. Is it not painful to witness the pale cheeks and the dejected looks of those boys who are often flogged? If their tempers are mild, their spirits are broken; if their dispositions are at all obstinate, they become hardened and wilful, and are made little better than brutes. [Footnote: "I would have given him, Captain Fleming, had he been my son," quoth old Pearson the elder, "such's good sound drubbing as he never would have forgotten—never!"
"Pooh! pooh! my good sir. Don't tell me. Never saw flogging in the navy do good. Kept down brutes; never made a man yet."—Dr Norman Macleod in Good Words, May 1861.] A boy who is often flogged loses that noble ingenuousness and fine sensibility so characteristic of youth. He looks upon his school as his prison, and his master as his gaoler, and as he grows up to manhood, hates and despises the man who has flogged him. Corporal punishment is revolting, disgusting, and demoralising to the boy; and is degrading to the schoolmaster as a man and as a Christian,
If schoolmasters must flog, let them flog their own sons. If they must ruin the tempers, the dispositions, and the constitution of boys, they have more right to practise upon their own than on other people's children! Oh! that parents would raise—and that without any uncertain sound—their voices against such abominations, and the detestable cane would soon be banished the school-room! "I am confident that no boy," says Addison, "who will not be allured by letters without blows, will never be brought to anything with them. A great or good mind must necessarily be the worse for such indignities; and it is a sad change to lose of its virtue for the improvement of its knowledge. No one has gone through what they call a great school, but must have remembered to have seen children of excellent and ingenuous natures (as have afterwards appeared in their manhood). I say, no man has passed through this way of education but must have seen an ingenuous creature expiring with shame, with pale looks, beseeching sorrow, and silent tears, throw up its honest sighs, and kneel on its tender knees to an inexorable blockhead, to be forgiven the false quantity of a word in making a Latin verse. The child is punished, and the next day he commits a like crime, and so a third, with the same consequence. I would fain ask any reasonable man whether this lad, in the simplicity of his native innocence, full of shame, and capable of any impression from that grace of soul, was not fitter for any purpose in this life than after that spark of virtue is extinguished in him, though he is able to write twenty verses in an evening?"
How often is corporal punishment resorted to at school because the master is in a passion, and he vents his rage upon the poor school-boy's unfortunate back!
Oh! the mistaken notion that flogging will make a bad-behaved boy a good boy; it has the contrary effect. "'I dunno how 'tis, sir,' said an old farm labourer, in reply to a question from his clergyman respecting the bad behaviour of his children, 'I dunno how 'tis; I beats 'em till they're black and blue, and when they won't kneel down to pray I knocks 'em down, and yet they ain't good.'"—The Birmingham Journal.
In an excellent article in Temple Bar(November 1864) on flogging in the army, the following sensible remarks occur:—"In nearly a quarter of a century's experience with soldiers, the writer has always, and without a single exception, found flogging makes a good man bad, and a bad man worse." With equal truth it may be said that, without a single exception, flogging makes a good boy bad, and a bad boy worse. How many men owe their ferocity to the canings they received when school-boys! The early floggings hardened and soured them, and blunted their sensibility.
Dr Arnold of Rugby, one of the best schoolmasters that England ever produced, seldom caned a boy—not more than once or twice during the half year; but when he did cane him, he charged for the use of the cane each time in the bill, in order that the parents might know how many times their son had been punished. At some of our public schools now-a-days, a boy is caned as many times in a morning as the worthy doctor would have caned him during the whole half year; but then, the doctor treated the boys as gentlemen, and trusted much to their honour; but now many schoolmasters trust much to fear, little to honour, and treat them as brute beasts.
It might be said that the discipline of a school cannot be maintained unless the boys be frequently caned, that it must be either caning or expulsion. I deny these assertions. Dr Arnold was able to conduct his school with honour to himself, and with immense benefit to the rising generation, without either frequent canings or expulsions. The humane plan, however, requires at first both trouble and patience; and trouble some schoolmasters do not like, and patience they do not possess; the use of the cane is quick, sharp, decisive, and at the time effective.
If caning be ever necessary, which it might occasionally be, for the telling of lies for instance, or for gross immorality, let the head master himself be the only one to perform the operation, but let him not be allowed to delegate it to others. A law ought in all public schools to be in force to that effect. High time that something were done to abate such disgraceful practices.
Never should a schoolmaster, or any one else, be allowed, on any pretence whatever, to strike a boy upon his head. Boxing of the ears has sometimes caused laceration of the drum of the ear, and consequent partial deafness for life. Boxing of the ears injures the brain, and therefore the intellect.
It might be said, that I am travelling out of my province in making remarks on corporal chastisement in schools? But, with deference, I reply that I am strictly in the path of duty. My office is to inform you of everything that is detrimental to your children's health and happiness; and corporal punishment is assuredly most injurious both to their health and happiness. It is the bounden duty of every man, and especially of every medical man, to lift up his voice against the abominable, disgusting, and degrading system of flogging, and to warn parents of the danger and the mischief of sending boys to those schools where flogging is, except in rare and flagrant cases, permitted.
351. Have you any observations to make on the selection, of a female boarding-school?
Home education, where it be practicable, is far preferable to sending a girl to school; as at home, her health, her morals, and her household duties, can be attended to much more effectually than from home. Moreover, it is a serious injury to a girl, in more ways than one, to separate her from her own brothers: they very much lose their affection for each other, and mutual companionship (so delightful and beneficial between brothers and sisters) is severed.
If home education be not practicable, great care must be taken in making choice of a school. Boarding school education requires great reformation. Accomplishments, superficial acquirements, and brain-work, are the order of the day; health is very little studied. You ought, in the education of your daughters, to remember that they, in a few years, will be the wives and the mothers of England; and, if they have not health and strength, and a proper knowledge of household duties to sustain their characters, what useless, listless wives and mothers they will make!
Remember, then, the body, and not the mind, ought, in early life, to be principally cultivated and strengthened, and that the growing brain will not bear, with impunity, much book learning. The brain of a school-girl is frequently injured by getting up voluminous questions by rote, that are not of the slightest use or benefit to her, or to any one else. Instead of this ridiculous system, educate a girl to be useful and self-reliant. "From babyhood they are given to understand that helplessness is feminine and beautiful; helpfulness, except in certain received forms of manifestation, unwomanly and ugly. The boys may do a thousand things which are 'not proper for little girls.'"—A Woman's Thoughts about Women.
From her twelfth to her seventeenth year, is the most important epoch of a girl's existence, as regards her future health, and consequently, in a great measure, her future happiness; and one, in which, more than at any other period of her life, she requires a plentiful supply of fresh air, exercise, recreation, a variety of innocent amusements, and an abundance of good nourishment—more especially of fresh meat; if therefore you have determined on sending your girl to school, you must ascertain that the pupils have as much plain wholesome nourishing food as they can eat, [Footnote: If a girl have an abundance of good nourishment, the schoolmistress must, of coarse, be remunerated for the necessary and costly expense; and how can this be done on the paltry sum charged at cheap boarding schools? It is utterly impossible! And what are we to expect from poor and insufficient nourishment to a fast-growing girl, and at the time of life, remember, when she requires an extra quantity of good sustaining, supporting food? A poor girl, from such treatment, becomes either consumptive or broken down in constitution, and from which she never recovers, but drags on a miserable existence.] that the school be situated in a healthy spot, that it be well-drained, that there be a large play-ground attached to it, that the young people are allowed plenty of exercise in the open air—indeed, that at least one-third of the day is spent there in croquet, skipping, archery, battle-dore and shuttlecock, gardening, walking, running, &c.
Take care that the school-rooms are well-ventilated, that they are not over-crowded, and that the pupils are allowed chairs to sit upon, and not those abominations—forms and stools. If you wish to try the effect of them upon yourselves, sit for a couple of hours without stirring upon a form or upon a stool, and, take my word for it, you will insist that forms and stools be banished for ever from the schoolroom.
Assure yourself that the pupils are compelled to rise early in the morning, and that they retire early to rest; that each young lady has a separate bed [Footnote: A horse-hair mattress should always be preferred to a feather-bed. It is not only better for the health, but it improves the figure] and that many are not allowed to sleep in the same room, and that the apartments are large and well-ventilated. In fine, their health and their morals ought to be preferred far above all their accomplishments.
352. They use, in some schools, straight-backed chairs to make a girl sit upright, and to give strength to her back: do you approve of them?
Certainly not: the natural and the graceful curve of the back is not the curve of a straight-backed chair. Straight-backed chairs are instruments of torture, and are more likely to make a girl crooked than to make her straight. Sir Astley Cooper ridiculed straight-backed chairs, and well he might. It is always well for a mother to try, for some considerable time, such ridiculous inventions upon herself before she experiments upon her unfortunate daughter. The position is most unnatural. I do not approve of a girl lounging and lolling on a sofa; but, if she be tired and wants to rest herself, let her, like any other reasonable being, sit upon a comfortable ordinary chair.
If you want her to be straight, let her be made strong; and if she is to be strong, she must use plenty of exercise and exertion, such as drilling, dancing, skipping, archery, croquet, hand-swinging, horse-exercise, swimming, bowls, etc. This is the plan to make her back straight and her muscles strong. Why should we bring up a girl differently from a boy? Muscular exercises, gymnastic performances, and health-giving exertion, are unladylike, forsooth!