ons of the city of Boston, for one
teacher to take charge of two classes or schools, each for an hour in
the forenoon and an hour in the afternoon. This arrangement would apply
only to the younger pupils; yet I am aware that parents and the public
would be solicitous concerning the manner of employing the time that
would remain. In the cities this question is one of magnitude, and there
are strong reasons for declining any proposition to reduce the school
day full one-half, which does hot provide occupation for the children
during the remainder of the time. It is only in connection with such a
proposition that projects for gymnastic training are practicable. When
children are employed six hours in school, it is not easy to find time
for a course of systematic physical education; and physical education,
to be productive of appreciable advantages, must be systematic. When
left to children and youth, or to the care of parents, very little will
be accomplished. Children will participate in the customary sports, and
perform the allotted labors; but in cities these sports and labors are
inadequate even for boys, and in country, as well as city, girls are
often the victims of neglect in this respect. Availing ourselves, then,
of the light shed by recent experience upon the subject of primary
instruction, it seems possible to diminish the length of the school day
with a gain rather than a loss of educational power. This change may be
followed by the establishment, in cities and large towns, of public
gymnasiums, where teachers answering in moral qualifications to the
requisitions of the laws shall be employed, and where each child, for
one, two, or three years, shall receive discreet and careful, but
vigorous physical training. After a few years thus passed in
corresponding and healthful development of the mind and body, the pupil
is prepared for admission to the advanced schools, where he can submit,
with perfect safety, to greater mental requirements even than are now
made. The school, as at present constituted, cannot do much for physical
education; and it must, as a necessity and a duty, graduate its demands
to the physical as well as the intellectual abilities of its pupils. But
I am satisfied that it is occasionally made to bear a weight of reproach
that ought to be laid upon the customs and habits of domestic, social
and general life.

Assuming that the principal work of the primary schools, after moral and
physical cult