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<br /> school lots. On the most convenient parts of these lots the houses i sense of the town will not allow a single inch of this lot to be
<br /> were placed, and the usual unattractive concomitants were put in disposed of, or, for the paltry sum of five dollars per year, allow
<br /> conspicuous places in the rear, without a fence separating the yards, any portion of it to be used as a pasture. We need the whole lot
<br /> or screen of any kind, to relieve the unsightliness or publicity. for the use of the school,and five dollars is but a drop in the
<br /> Beyond this nothing seems to have been originally done. balance against the good to be obtained .by the boys and girls of
<br /> We have endeavored to improve matters a little by removing that school in a single five minutes' run on the grass, free from the
<br /> rubbish,and by building fences separating the rear yards and screen- , annoyance of cows and pasture obstructions. Allowing this lot to
<br /> ing the outbuildings from the streets. These buildings we have be used for such a purpose, is the result of the same thoughtless-
<br /> tried to make less obnoxious by keeping them well cleaned and by nes which permitted a vote to be taken at a town meeting last
<br /> removing much that chalk, pencil, and the destructive jack-knife year, to erect a pound on the same lot—a calamity which a second
<br /> had made pernicious. We feel, however, that these old buildings sober thought averted. Our scholars do not need the lessons
<br /> should be entirely removed and suitable ones erected in proper which pounds and pastures teach.
<br /> places; and these should be carefully watched and the teachers held The old tow4 house was, during the year, put into our pos- .
<br /> responsible for their condition. session;and by vote of the town was called the High School House.
<br /> Our teachers should feel that a careful supervision of the school f We immediately set about putting it into a condition suitable for a
<br /> property every day, is a part of their work, and should promptly schoolroom,—an expense which should not properly be charged to
<br /> attend to the slightest trespass or injury. They-have for the most our special appropriation for repairs, and which exhausted half of
<br /> part done well in this particular, but they can do much more in it. Three weeks of continued scrubbing only in part removed the
<br /> their work of instruction by keeping the yards and floors scrupu- accumulations of tobacco filth from the cracks and crevices, and
<br /> the accretions of dust and dirt from the walls, windows and blinds.
<br /> lously clean, and by attending to little things about the school
<br /> rooms; by keeping their own desks in good order and insisting to We had the room sheathed three feet from the floor, black-boards
<br /> that each scholar shall keep his so; by keeping the maps .and cur- constructed, the walls whitened, and the wood work and blinds
<br /> tains hanging true, and not awry as they are much of t°he time; by painted, and thus made the room quite presentable. We did,
<br /> insisting that chalk, erasers, pointers, and other apparatus shall however, only that which decency demanded, and much more
<br /> be kept in their proper places; and a thousand,other little matters, ought to be done. The floor, always a poor one, is in a splintered
<br /> which will occur to every wide-awake teacher. condition, and, in some places, nearly worn through; and the
<br /> Whether the work of improving our school lots should be one ` i furniture, owing to its frequent removal for town meetings, and
<br /> of private outlay, or should be done by a vote of the town, we storing.in a damp cellar, is hardly in a condition to stand alone.
<br /> will not now discuss, but will add,that in addition to the benefit to The ventilation of this building,as of all the other school buildings
<br /> be derived from it as an educator, no better investment can be made in town, seems to have been almost wholly unprovided for, except
<br /> by the people of a neighborhood or town, than by expending even so far as windows and doors would answer the purpose. Nothing
<br /> a large sum for this purpose. Strangers passing through,or visiting strikes us so unpleasantly,in our frequent visits among the schools,
<br /> a town, cannot avoid impressions from the condition of the school as the foul'air which the children are obliged to breathe. We do
<br /> property. i not wonder at the disorder, dullness and sloth so apparent, when
<br /> In this connection, we cannot refrain from referring to the we think how grossly the physical laws of our being are there vio-
<br /> proposition to sell some portion of the High School lot. It is a lated. If a draft of fresh air is let in at a window, some child is
<br /> matter of much surprise to us, that any one should entertain for likely to suffer, and at the best, only a slight change of air is the
<br /> an instant,such a suggestion, and we do not believe we need give it result. The poisonous gases thrown from the lungs, and lurking
<br /> more than this passing notice. We are confident that the good in different parts of the room, are not expelled by it.
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