Teeth
Bad teeth are troublesome, and are often the cause of neuralgia, indigestion, abscesses, and sleepless nights. Good teeth depend greatly on how you look after them when you are young. Attention to the first set of teeth keeps the mouth healthy for the second teeth, which begin to come when a child is seven and these will last you to the end of your life, if you keep them in order.
If one tooth is allowed to decay, it will spread decay in all the others, and this arises from scraps of food remaining between the teeth and decaying there.
A thorough Scout always brushes her teeth inside and outside and between all, just the last thing at night as well as other times, so that no food remains about them to decay. Scouts in camps or in the wilds of the jungle cannot always buy tooth-brushes, but should a tiger or a crocodile have borrowed yours, you can make your teeth just as bright and white as his are by means of a frayed-out-dry, clean stick.
Learn how to make camp tooth-brushes out of sticks. Slippery elm or "dragonroot" sticks for cleaning teeth can be got at chemists' shops as samples.
Measurement of the Girl
It is of paramount importance to teach the young citizen to assume responsibility for her own development and health.
Physical drill is all very well as a disciplinary means of development, but it does not give the girl any responsibility in the matter.
It is therefore deemed preferable to tell each girl, according to her age, what ought to be her height, weight, and various measurements (such as chest, waist, arm, leg, etc.). She is then measured, and learns in which points she fails to come up to the standard. She can then be shown which exercises to practice for herself in order to develop those particular points. Encouragement must afterwards be given by periodical measurements, say every three months or so.
Cards can be obtained from the "Girl Scouts" Office, which, besides giving the standard measurements for the various ages, give columns to be filled in periodically, showing the girl's remeasurements and progress in development. If each girl has her card it is a great incentive to her to develop herself at odd times when she has a few minutes to spare.