[Sidenote: Physical Culture]

As for physical culture, if your school is without it, your barn, your
parlor, and your lawn may supply it in some sort. In the barn may be a
trapeze; there is already the ladder and the hay-loft; on the lawn may
be a swing, trees to climb, and the tennis court. In your parlor may
be a little home dancing school, where for a half an hour or so, the
children march, skip, or two-step to music of your making. In the wood
shed may be a carpenter's bench with real tools, where he may work and
get some of the good of manual training.

[Sidenote: Showy Accomplishments]

Accomplishments, meaning thereby showy things that children do for
the edification of guests, are of doubtful value. It is pleasant, of
course, to have your little girl play a piece or two on the piano to
entertain your visitors, but it is not nearly so important as health
and strength, and a cheerful temper. Sometimes all three of these are
sacrificed to the two or three hours' practice a day. Often, too, this
extra work after school hours--work full as monotonous and nervous
and uninteresting as the school work itself--is just what is needed
to transform a healthy young girl into a nervous invalid. This is
especially true, if she undertakes, as she usually does, to study
music when she is about thirteen years old--the very time when, if
wise physicians could regulate affairs to their liking, she would be
taken out of school altogether and required to do nothing more than a
little light housework every day.

[Sidenote: Natural Talent]