learn
is that all wealth comes out of the earth. The babies play in the
meadows and learn the names of flowers and birds. The heritage of
childhood is the out-of-doors. I heard of some children in the city
who found a mouse and thought it was a rabbit. But when the city-born
children come to Mooseheart they come into their own. They trap rabbits
and woodchucks, fight bumblebees' nests, wade and fish in the creek and
go boating and swimming in the river and the clear lake.

When a boy gets old enough to leave the kindergarten and start in the
primary school he mixes agricultural studies with his books. First he
plants a small garden and tends it. Then he is taught to raise chickens.
Next he learns swine husbandry and then dairying and the handling of
horses. The girls learn poultry-raising, butter-making, gardening,
cooking, dressmaking and millinery.

After the boy has had a general course in all the branches of
agriculture he is permitted to specialize in any one of them if he wants
to. He can make an exhaustive study of grain farming, dairying, stock
breeding, bee culture, horticulture and landscape gardening.

After this grounding in agriculture, which all the boys must have,
the student gets an introduction to the mechanical trades. Then he may
select a particular trade and specialize. The usual grammar-school and
high-school courses are taught to all the students, also swimming and
dancing and music, both vocal and instrumental. The kindergarten has a
babies' band, and both the girls and boys have their own brass bands and
orchestras.

Students are graduated when they are eighteen. Up to that time they are
permitted to stay and learn as many trades as they can. Learning comes
easy in such a school as Mooseheart, and many of the boys go out with
two or more finished trades. Music is one of the trades that the boys
double in. We have graduated many fine musicians, but none who didn't
know a mechanical trade as well and, on top of it all, he knew how to
run a farm. Such a boy can serve his country in peace or war. Before men
can eat they have to have food, and he knows how to raise it. To enjoy
their food they must have a house to live in, and he knows how to build
it. After a house and food comes music. This lad can play a tune for the
cabaret.

One of Mooseheart's earliest graduates made a high record in his
academic studies and mastered the trade of cook, pastry cook,
nurseryman, cement modeler, cornetist, s