mpty hand. It means a holiday
taken with an eager mind, with eyes keen in their delight and knowledge,
with hands capable of some beauty or some use. All of us have leisure
to think, but not all of us think. Some of us, if friends come in
unexpectedly, will quickly pick up something and pretend to be busy.
When Watt sat by the fire watching the steam from the teakettle lift the
lid, he was not precisely idle. The powerful, indispensable steam-engine
was the result. One reason, aside from all religious considerations, why
we need a quiet Sunday, is that we may have that sense of freedom which
feeds mind and body, and even the crumbs of whose profitableness have
made the world rich in great inventions, in great pictures, in wonderful
books.

IX

THE OUTDOOR RUNWAY

After Nebuchadnezzar came in from eating grass there had taken place in
that potentate a great change for the good. One of the factors in this
betterment may have been the grass itself. The grass-cure has always
been popular and always will be, for it is just as good for the tired
mind as it is for the tired body. Nowadays every big school and every
college provide a grass-cure for students who are out at elbows with
their nerve sleeves, or who have not sufficient muscle to make them fit,
or who are overworking or need toning up in any way. There is more and
more recognition of the fact that a school course which is taken at the
expense of health is not worth having. And side by side with this
wholesome admission has come a great awakening in the last fifteen years
to the curative value of the _outdoor runway_, whether that runway be a
field track, energetic walking in a park or campus, or a cross country
run.

Some girls--and there are more girls of this type than there are
boys--put in their outdoor life as a stop-gap. It is inconceivable that
this should be true, yet it is true. Apathetically the students have
exercised sixty minutes, considering this minimum quite sufficient. Not
a particle of zest do they reveal in the exercise taken. They do not
seem to know or they do not care that the fields and woods should be
full, not only of health and all that goes with it, including success,
but also of the best of friends who all have their good points worthy of
notice and imitation, in quick leap, cheerful voice and blithe song.
What are sixty minutes in this great outdoor runway? Not a tithe of the
twenty-four hours and at best only half of what th