Abuse of the Brain. ever be able to know of. They may have got tired out physically, but it was a great rest for their brains. During the time of the festivities their minds were entirely removed from business thoughts and troubles. Another cause of the nervousness of Americans is that they keep their brains working in too narrow a channel. They don't seem to develop it enough. They keep working along in the same groove all the time; of course, I am speaking of the majority. The man of business, the merchant or the broker, studies chiefly the market in which most of their transactions occur, and lets other subjects go by. Children's minds are not developed properly, in my estimation. They want to have a wide range of study, and they want to have that study made as easy as possible for them. Their brains are not as strong as those of an adult. They must be trained carefully, and their studies should be made just as light as possible. Another great mistake that Americans make is in their diet. They take as adults too much of a vegetable and a farinaceous diet; they drink too much beer, and eat too many sweets. Children should have more farinaceous food, and adults should eat more meat, and take more of an animal diet. Meat produces hysteria when eaten by young girls, and when taken by young boys is likely to produce convulsions. Insomnia and other nervous diseases are due to insufficient exercise, misuse of the brain and abuse of food; such as eating hot bread and hot cakes for breakfast. Adults want more meat than the average American adult eats. This climate demands that the inhabitants of the country eat a more nutritious food than is eaten elsewhere; then again Americans are much less fitted to take stimulants than foreigners are, on account of the climate in which we live. I think that foreign vices are responsible in a very large degree for American nervousness. The habit of taking alcoholic drinks before meals is one of these bad vices; and very few know the tremendous amount of harm and injury that one drink before breakfast in the morning causes. The foreign habit of drinking absinthe, liqueurs and cordials, is another very bad one. Brain food is a misnomer. Many people claim that fish is a brain food because phosphorus is found in fish to a very large extent. This is not so. A great many advertisements set forth the advantages of cereals as brain food. These are also mistakes. The best brain foods are cold fats and vegetable oils. I consider one of the most important articles of diet that we can Abuse of the Brain. possibly have in this country to be cotton seed oil. It is one of the best fats, and much more healthful than lard. If persons would use more olive oil they would be a great deal better off. There are lots of ways in which they can take olive oil without its being unpleasant for them. I consider oleomargarine much more healthful than butter. Butter may contain, during its manufacture, products of decomposition, and unless the butter is of the best possible quality it may often do a great deal of harm. Wheaten food or cereals taken to the exclusion of all else is very injurious to the brain and to the nervous system. It is unwise for anybody to live on a cereal diet to the exclusion of animal diet. If Americans would live more quietly, would not be in such a constant state of rush and excitement, and would eat more food that contained some nourishment rather than living on fancy dishes, there would be a great deal less nervousness, insomnia and general nervous disorders than there are at the present day. This nervousness has only come of late years comparatively, and it is caused by the whirl of excitement in which Americans, and especially inhabitants of large cities, will live. They keep on the go from early in the morning until late at night, when half of that time should have been given up to rest and recreation. They try to crowd in a short space of time all the work they possibly can in order to gain the almighty dollar, and by doing so ruin their health and constitution. Men should rise early in the morning, eat a good breakfast that contains a certain amount of nourishment, and discard all such items as toasted muffins, corn bread, wheat cakes or anything of the kind; rest a little after their breakfast, go through the day's business with as little worry and as little excitement as they possibly can, and after their work is finished in the evening, say from four to six o'clock, according to the time when their business hours close, they should have their dinner, eat slowly and comfortably, and then give themselves up entirely to rest and recreation. They should try to develop other parts of their brain than those which are exercised in following their daily avocations. And then they should go to bed early and get a good night's rest. Attempting to work without proper rest at night is a mistake, and if a man is troubled with insomnia at all he should consult a physician, and have it remedied before any dangerous result arises from it." School Sanitation. SCHOOL SANITATION. Frequent report is made that children have gone home from school and been taken with diphtheria or scarlet fever, or some other contagious disease, and the inquiry is made whether or not the schools should be closed, as well as other public places. Experience and observation have demonstrated that unless the disease exists in the form of an epidemic that it is better, safer not to close up the schools. Children as a rule are safer when going to school than during vacation. In the former case they have not time for social and close intervisitation, while in the latter not only the inclination but the opportunity for such visits is greatly increased. The fact that children are taken with such a disease at school is no evidence that the disease was contracted there. The exposure leading to the attack quite as likely, if not a good deal more so, occurred outside of the school room. Still, there are dangers from exposure in the school room that need to be pointed out and remedied so far as possible. The dangers to be apprehended are from contaminated water; sewer gas; over crowding and improper ventilation; the deposit of contaminated sputa upon the floor; the poisoning of the air from exhalations from pupils with diseased throats, nostrils or lungs; and by personal contact. The water may be contaminated principally by being too near a cess pool, privy vault, defective sewer, or to yards or sheds where animals are kept. Should any discharges from parties hav. ing typhoid fever or diphtheria find their way into the water supply they would certainly, even in the most dilute form, produce in those using the water like diseases. This, of course, applies equally to other public buildings, or to private residences. Even should such personal excretions not find their way into a water supply, other diseases are caused by impure water, and the system is rendered much more susceptible to any infectious disease. Hence, the water supply of the school building should be carefully guarded, and if a well furnishes the water, it should be cleaned out at least twice a year, and should in no case be nearer than two hundred feet to any possible source of contamination. School Sanitation. Sewer gas in cities is a frequent source of danger in our school buildings. Not only the air breathed, but water drank may, by absorption of poison germs, be productive of sickness. The plumbing should be the best and most improved kind, and should be frequently looked after. Over crowding and improper ventilation are among the most frequent sources of air pollution; and this danger is as great in the village and country as in the city school house. Every school room that is to be occupied for six hours of each day should afford at the very least two hundred and fifty cubic feet of air per hour for each pupil; and in addition at recess, noon, and after dismissal in the evening, should have the doors and windows thrown open so far as possible consistent with the preservation of a proper temperature. There is no disinfectant more valuable than an abundance of pure air. Children and their parents often conplain of the school room being too cold, or of windows being thrown open so that cold currents of air passed freely over them. A little tact on the part of the janitor or teacher would obviate any such complaint. A window or door, in cold weather, so far as possible, Showing manner of ventilating by inserting strip of wood beneath lower sash of window. should never be thrown open School Sanitation. If a child should be in the school room with pulmonary consumption, or with the sore throat found in diphtheria, scarlet fever, whooping cough, or measles, there is always danger from the sputa (the expectorated matter) that is thrown off, and from the air that is poisoned in its passage from and over these diseased tissues. As a matter of course, such children should not be admitted to the school room where it is known that these diseased conditions exist. There is always some danger, however, from the possibility of the presence of such. Under such circumstances the ventilation, and sufficient air capacity above referred to, would be invaluable. In addition, however, to this, the school room floor should each evening, the windows being thrown wide open, be liberally covered with saw dust freely saturated with a strong solution of carbolic acid, and then carefully swept up and the sweepings should be thrown into the stove or furnace and burned. This saw dust and the careful sweeping would gather up all the dust and sputa on the floor, and prevent its diffusion subsequently through the room by drying. Spitting on the floor should be prohibited in a school room. Occa The proper temperature of a school-room is 65° to 70° Fahr. To determine the temperature a thermometer should be hung not more than four feet above the floor, and away from the stove. sionally the floor air should be tested. Keep the floor warm. If a coal stove is used, when the door is opened close the draft at the bottom to prevent the escape of gas into the room, which causes dullness and headache. If the school-room was known to have had in it a case of infectious disease the school should at once be dismissed, and the room thoroughly disinfected by fumigation with sulphur, and by subsequent free ventilation. For this purpose, it would not be necessary to close the room for more than one session. The danger from personal contact may be greatly lessened by having a seat for each individual scholar. In many school houses the seats are so arranged that the pupils sit in pairs, and are thus during the entire session thrown quite close together. Such seating not only subverts the best discipline, but is very objectionable from a sanitary point of view. Should any infectious disease exist in the one, the companion would be most likely to contract the disease if at all susceptible. The teacher, if affected with any |