This centre is a large basement room in a Mission Hall, dark and unattractive, accommodating between 200 and 300 children. It serves several neighbouring schools, and the numbers on the day of our visit were too large to admit of all the children sitting down together. As each child came in and gave up its ticket, it seized a spoon and fork from a pile on a table near the door, and rushed to its place. When about half the children were seated, grace was sung or rather shouted, and then the food was brought in and literally flung on to the table by the server and one or two of the elder boys. Though the numbers were so large there was only one supervisor, though we were told that occasionally one of the sisters from the neighbouring settlement came to help. With such inadequate supervision it was, of course, impossible to teach table manners. The children, the boys especially, gobbled down their dinner, amid a hubbub of noise, and hurried out as soon as they had finished, other boys rushing in to take their places. No special provision was made for the infants; they were placed with the other children and were given the same food. No attention was paid to individual appetites and much of the food, we were told, was wasted.
(e)—Centre, visited June, 1913.
This is a centre for Jewish children, serving three or four neighbouring schools. The room not being large enough to accommodate all the children at once, two relays are necessary, even in summer. Over 200 children were present, but there was only one supervisor, assisted by four or five women. The children entered in an orderly fashion and seated themselves at the table, none being allowed to begin the meal till all were seated. The infants were placed at a separate table; they are given special food when the dietary provided for the other children is not suitable for them. Some of the elder girls acted as monitresses and helped to serve the food and clear up afterwards. Unfortunately, owing to the fact that other children were waiting to come in, the meal was necessarily hurried, the second course being placed on the table while the children were still eating the first course. Though the order maintained was wonderful, considering the large numbers present, it was impossible to attend adequately to the children's manners; many of them were using their fingers, and there appeared to be considerable waste of food.
(f)—Centre, visited October, 1913.
This is another centre for Jewish children. The dinner was served in a large, dreary parish hall, to some 200 or 300 children. There was one supervisor and four servers, while tickets were taken by the caretaker. Order was well preserved, but only by means of the frequent ringing of a bell, and by the enforcement of absolute silence. The supervisor said that if the children were allowed to talk the noise would be unbearable. Before being given their food, the children were told to hold up their hands if they were "big eaters," the margin of waste being minimised in this way. Although the manners and behaviour of the children could not be said to be bad, the whole effect was singularly unattractive—the bare room, the large numbers, and the frequent shouted commands and rebukes of the supervisor leaving no scope for humanising and educational influences.
CHAPTER IV
THE EXTENT AND CAUSES OF MALNUTRITION
"Defective nutrition," Sir George Newman points out, "stands in the forefront as the most important of all physical defects from which school children suffer."[[456]] Malnutrition, 'debility' and other physical defects in childhood "are the ancestry of tuberculosis in the adult. They predispose to disease, and are, in a sense, both its seed and its soil."[[457]]
It is impossible to give any figures as to the extent of this defect, since nutrition is not a condition which can be measured by any definite standards. The weight of the child is, of course, a most important matter to be noted, but there are other points—"the ratio of stature to weight; the general appearance, carriage and 'substance' of the child; the firmness of the tissues; the presence of subcutaneous fat; the development of the muscular system; the condition of the skin and redness of the mucous membranes; the expression of listlessness or alertness, apathy or keenness; the condition of the various systems of the body; and, speaking generally, the relative balance and co-ordination of the functions and powers of digestion, absorption and assimilation of food."[[458]] Each observer adopts a different standard of what constitutes good nutrition, and hence the statistics given in the reports of the School Medical Officers cannot be used for comparative purposes. According to the latest figures, as quoted by the President of the Board of Education, 10 per cent. of the elementary school children of England and Wales suffer from defective nutrition.[[459]] Many of the School Medical Officers, however, have obviously adopted a low standard and Mr. Arthur Greenwood, who has made a careful enquiry into this subject, is of opinion that, "taking the country as a whole, not merely 10 per cent., but probably a number approaching 20 per cent., show perceptible signs of malnutrition."[[460]]
Unfortunately, there is reason to believe that the degeneration is progressive. In an enquiry conducted by Dr. Arkle at Liverpool, 2,111 children from three elementary schools were compared, as to height and weight, with 366 children from secondary schools. The results (see accompanying table) showed that at practically every age the heights and weights of the children varied directly with the class from which they were drawn, and the deficit increased out of proportion to the rate of growth. "These figures," he points out, "are rendered all the more striking when one considers that one is talking of children and not of full-grown men. A difference of a stone in the weight of two men may not be a very great matter, but when the investigation shows such a discrepancy between two groups of boys of eleven, it means that one of the groups is deficient to the extent of one-fifth of the whole body weight, and the decadence is so progressive that the deficiency has by fourteen years of age almost reached a quarter of the whole body weight."[[461]]
This malnutrition is to be attributed to many causes besides actual lack of food. Improper food and hurried methods of eating account for much malnutrition. So much has been written on the subject of the wrong feeding of children that it seems unnecessary to labour this point. One can, indeed, hardly open a report of a School Medical Officer without finding this evil deplored. In the poorest homes there are frequently no fixed meal times; the children are given "a piece" when they are hungry, and this is often eaten in the street or on the doorstep. Bread and tea figure largely in the dietary. Supper is frequently the principal meal of the day, with resulting indigestion for the children.