are characteristic of normal social life, it
is unreasonable to suppose that rural young people will be contented
to vegetate. If they cannot have legitimate opportunities to realize
their impulse to associated activity, they will provide less
satisfactory unconventional opportunities. One of the best means for
promoting sociability and providing an outlet for youthful energy in
concert has been found in the use of music. The old-fashioned
singing-school filled a real need and its passing has left a distinct
gap. Where musical gatherings have been revived experience has shown
that they are a most effective stimulus to a new community
consciousness. The country church choir has long been regarded as a
useful social as well as religious institution, but the community
chorus is far more effective. It is possible to uncover latent talent
and to cultivate it so that it will furnish more attractive
entertainment for the people than that which is imported at far
greater expense from outside. Among the foreigners who are finding
their way into rural localities, there is sometimes discovered a
musical ability that outranks the native, and no other method of
approach to the immigrant is so easy as by giving his young people a
place in the social activities of the community.

173. =Continuation Schooling.=--A further use for the community house
is educational. The older education of the district school was
defective, and the new education is not enjoyed by many a farmer's boy
or girl, because they cannot be spared in the later years of youth for
long schooling. An adaptation of the idea of continuation schools for
rural young people so that they may apply the new sciences to country
life is greatly to be desired. The local school principal or county
superintendent or an extension teacher from a State institution may be
found available as director, and it belongs to the community to
provide the necessary funds. For older people some of the same courses
are suitable, but they should be supplemented with lectures of all
sorts. It has been demonstrated many times that popular lecturers can
be secured at small expense in different parts of the country,
especially in these days when there are so many agencies to push the
new agricultural science, and other subjects over a wide range of
interests will not fail to find exponents if a demand for them can be
created.

174. =Community Leadership.=--In the last analysis the prime factor in