1 to 2, at dinner. 2 to 5, 5 to 5, 6 to 7, in school; various tasks. tea. preparing to go out; dressing, or reading, or playing in school. walking, generally arm-in-arm, on the high road, many with their books in their hands, and reading. "Two days in the week they do not walk in the evening at all, being kept in for dancing; but, by way of amends, they go out on two other days, from 12 to 1, and then they miss writing. It is to be remarked, that they never go out unless the weather is quite fine at the particular hours allotted for walking. They go to church all the year round, twice every Sunday, on which day no other exercise is taken. From 7 to 8, for the older girls, reading or working in school (this is optional), and then prayers; for the younger, play in school, and prayers. At 8, the younger go to bed. From 8 to 9, the older, reading or working, as before. "The twenty-four hours are, therefore, thus disposed of: In bed (the older 9, the younger 10), In school, at their studies and tasks, Hours. 9 9 In school, or in the house; the older at optional studies or work, the younger at work, At meals, Exercise in the open air, "The above account was taken from a second or third-rate school, and applies more particularly to the season most favourable for exercise,-summer. It is to be remarked, that the confinement is generally greater in these than in schools of a higher order. That the practical results of such an astounding regimen are by no means overdrawn in the preceding pages, is sufficiently evinced by the following fact, a fact which we will venture to say may be verified by inspection of thousands of boarding-schools in this country. We lately visited, in a large town, a boarding-school containing forty girls; and we learnt, on close and accurate inquiry, that there was NOT ONE of the girls who had been at the school two years (and the majority had been "Younger only two hours and a half.” as long), that was not more or less CROOKED! Our patient was in this predicament; and we could perceive (what all may perceive who meet that most melancholy of all processions-a boarding-school of young ladies in their walk) that all her companions were pallid, sallow, and listless. We can assert, on the same authority of personal observation, and on an extensive scale, that scarcely a single girl (more especially of the middle classes) that has been at a boarding-school for two or three years, returns home with unimpaired health; and for the truth of the assertion, we may appeal to every candid father, whose daughters have been placed in this situation. Happily, a portion of the ill health produced at school is in many cases only temporary, and vanishes after the return from it. In the schools in which the vacations are frequent or long, much mischief is often warded off by the periodical returns to the ordinary habits of healthful life; and some happy constitutions, unquestionably, bid defiance to all the systematic efforts made to undermine them. No further proof is needed of the enormous evil produced by the present system of school-discipline, than the fact, well known to all medical men, that the greater proportion of women in the middle and upper ranks of life do not enjoy even a moderate share of health; and persons, not of the medical profession, may have sufficient evidence of the truth, by comparing the relative powers of the young men and young women of any family in taking bodily exercise, more particularly in walking. The difference is altogether inexplicable on the ground of sex alone." We agree with Dr Barlow in thinking that popular ignorance and prejudice are among the chief bars to the removal of the monstrous evils here described. "By the foregoing statements," says he, "we do not mean to cast the slightest reflection on those by whom these seminaries are superintended. We have ever found them most solicitous for the health of their pupils, sedulous to preserve it, and, when disease arose, unremitting in devoted attentions. But the system is faulty; and for this they are not accountable. By the influences and prejudices which uphold that system, they, like others, are chained; and until the system itself yield to increasing knowledge, juster views of the animal economy, a more correct conception of mental energies, and of the injuries which their over-excitement occasions both to themselves and to the bodily frame, and a firm resolution not to barter health for vain accomplishments;-in other words, until both mental and physical education undergo considerable reformation, and be founded on more rational principles, the evils must exist to an extent which no superintendent of a seminary can control. We are sorry to be compelled by truth to add, that we have often found the same pernicious regimen car ried to as great a height, although on a smaller scale, in private families, under the eye of a fashionable governess, and a fond but injudicious mother." Our extracts from this excellent article shall be concluded with a paragraph on female clothing, a subject most deserving of attention: The clothing of young females is far from what reason would sanction. It is oftentimes deficient in the necessary warmth, the materials being too slight to yield protection against the vicissitudes of a variable climate, and too much of the person being wholly exposed. Errors of this kind, however, are much more common, and carried to much greater lengths, at the period when education, in its usual sense, may be said to be completed; that is, when the young lady passes from the restraints of the school-room to the dissipations of fashionable life. As, however, this change usually takes place before the body has attained its full vigour, the following remarks on the dress and conduct of females, on first leaving school, belong properly to our subject. If the errors of dress are less signal in the attire worn by day, they reach their acme when the evening rout or midnight ball is to be attended. At these seasons the tightly laced stays, exposed chest, and thin draperies, furnish a combination of influences, the continued effects of which no constitution could withstand; while to these is yet to be added that of respiring for hours a heated and vitiated atmosphere, and after this, of passing, when relaxed and exhausted, into the cold currents of a frosty night air. So far from wondering that many suffer from these egregious imprudences, our surprise should be that any escape; and instead of the inherent delicacy so often imputed to the constitution of females as explanatory of their peculiar ailments, we have ample proof, in their powers of resisting such noxious influences, that they possess conservative energies not inferior to those of the most robust male. Were men to be so laced, so imperfectly exercised, so inadequately clothed, so suffocated, so exposed, their superiority of bodily vigour would soon cease to have any existence *. "Defect of clothing, though most signal in the chest and shoulders, is not confined to the upper part of the body. The feet require warmth, which subservience to fashion prevents. They cannot be compressed, but at the cost of much suffering, some distortion, and the infliction of positive disease. Fashion also permits the legs to be covered with only the thinnest materials. Thus the capillary circulation of the feet, rendered sufficiently languid by the general weakness, becomes farther im * Dr Paris has aptly bestowed on the ball-room the denomination of "Death's antechamber."-Ed. P. J. peded by the pressure of tight shoes, and the debilitating effects of cold. The crippled state, too, thus occasioned, is a further obstacle to efficient exercise, and so adds to the general debility." We have frequently affirmed that Phrenology was quietly but surely making its way among medical men, and that another generation will see a wonderful change in public opinion in regard to its merits: Dr Barlow's article is another confirmation of our statement. It is phrenological throughout, and when he comes to treat of mental activity as connected with physical education, he expressly avows himself a phrenologist, and upholds the importance of the new philosophy. For some years past, Dr Barlow has been an active disciple, and it is gratifying to find him turning his talents to the cultivation of a field so rich in promise as that under consideration. In treating of the influence which the exercise of the mental powers has on the bodily health, he thus publishes his creed. "In the following remarks on this subject, we shall draw freely from an admirable paper published (by Dr A. Combe) in the sixth volume of the Phrenological Journal, entitled On Mental Exercise as a Means of Health; the principles inculcated are of the highest importance, and though emanating in this instance from phrenological views, they have also so sure a basis in established physiology, that they may be beneficially applied even by those who still close their eyes to the truths of a science in which the writer of this article has no hesitation to avow his firm belief; and which, justly estimated, has more power of contributing to the welfare and happiness of mankind, than any other with which we are acquainted." P. 699. Copious extracts follow, but as the essay itself is to be found in our sixth volume, we need not rcpeat them here. The Cyclopædia of Practical Medicine, in which Dr Barlow writes, is a dictionary of medical science now in course of publication in London under the direction of Drs For bes, Tweedie, and Conolly; and as it is ably conducted, and its circulation is understood to be extensive and chiefly among the younger of our established professional men, we have no doubt that Dr Barlow's labours will not be without effect in turning the attention of some of them to a more accurate examination of the science of Phrenology. 5 ARTICLE IV. AN ADDRESS TO THE PUBLIC; particularly to the MEMBERS of the LEGISLATURE of NEW YORK, proposing a Plan for Female Education. By EMMA WILLARD. Mrs EMMA WILLARD is one of the most remarkable women of the present day; remarkable for vigour of thought and action, practical sense, extensive knowledge, and literary talent. In 1819, she wrote the address mentioned in the title, which is so excellent that we shall present the greater part of it to our readers. Mrs Willard is now principal of the Troy Female Seminary, in which nearly two hundred young ladies are educated, and thirteen teachers are employed. She not only manages the whole establishment, and takes a share in the duty of teaching, but has written a number of valuable practical works for the instruction of youth. Her institution is a nursery from which are drawn teachers for female schools all over the United States. The largest of her works is "A History of the United States, or Republic of America; exhibited in connexion with its Chronology and Progressive Geography, by means of a Series of Maps: the first of which shews the country as inhabited by various tribes of Indians at the time of its discovery, and the remainder, its state at subsequent epochs; so arranged as to associate the principal events of the history and their dates with the places in which they occurred; arranged on the plan of teaching history adopted in Troy Female Seminary. Designed for schools and private libraries." It has reached a third edition. In conjunction with Mr Woodbridge, she has produced a System of Universal Geography, combining the greatest extent of useful information that we have ever seen comprised within. the same space in a geographical work. A large space is devoted to physical geography, which is illustrated by numerous wood-cuts. Civil geography, or the geography of states and nations, is next treated of; then follows statistical geography; and the whole concludes with a comprehensive summary of ancient geography and mythology. This work has arrived at a fourth edition. Her sister, Mrs Almira H. Lincoln, formerly vice-principal of the same seminary, has published "Familiar Lectures on Botany," a work which is now in the second edition. Mrs Willard has also published poems, which have been favourably received; and she has at present additional works in the press. In the course of last year, she visited Paris, London, and Edinburgh, and carried to America with her the most accomplished young ladies she could engage as teachers. |