the earth in his bones. It
is not only the humanizing influence of the garden, it is its
democratizing influence too.

"When Adam delved and Eve span
Where was then the gentleman?'

You can get on terms with the lowliest if you will discuss gardens."

CHAPTER XXVIII

SUMMER COLONIES FOR CITY PEOPLE

(Condensed from the Annual Report of the U. S. Department of the
Interior of the Commissioner of Education. Vol. 2, now out of
print.)

BERLIN has not been boastful of a new sociological feature which it
has developed within the last fifteen years, a feature so
revolutionary in its bearing upon education and upon the general
health of future generations, that it should be made known to the
world. As yet little has been said about this new agency. It may be
because it is not a governmental institution, but the result of
self-help and of the recognition of a plain necessity. It may be
assumed that if the summer colonies had been instituted by the
government for the great majority who are poor it would not have
succeeded so well as it has.

The teachers, seeing that the horizon of their pupils was limited by
brick and mortar (for open park spaces are rare in Berlin), came to
the conclusion that only by giving their pupils opportunity to live
in the open air could they lay a sound foundation of knowledge of
natural objects and processes as a basis for school studies. The
teachers of themselves, however, could apply only palliative
remedies, such as having sent to them, from the botanical gardens,
thousands of specimens of plants, twigs, flowers, fruit, etc., for
nature study in the schoolroom; planting flower beds around the
schoolhouses; also, brief excursions into parks, and hanging up
before the class colored pictures of landscapes and rural scenery.

While in many cases, especially in large cities, the necessity was
recognized of getting the children out of the great desert of brick
and mortar into the open air and into companionship with life in the
field, the garden, the brooks, and the woods, it had nowhere
resulted in a systematic effort to aid the children of an entire
city in that way until it was tried in Berlin. Of course it is well
understood, not only abroad, but in New York and in other large
cities of this country, that something must be done to alleviate the
want of space and fresh air, and so recreation piers and roof
gardens are provided, excursions of schools into parks are
undertake