[uestion so much. The public is now prepared for it and this is a reason why I believe we can get the necessary legislation.

MRS. HIGBEE: I wish to thank Mr. Jacobson for what he has said; it is helpful, and I think we women deserve all that he says we have been, but I think you should all hail this new impulse on the part of the women, and the fact that we are becoming more interested in the girls when they go in proves that we are very likely to be interested in them when they come out, and to do far better in our personal work among them than we have ever done; certainly Mr. Jacobson's suggestions are wholesome, helpful and wise. I am told, that at least 1,000 girls in this state should be in training. This does not necessarily mean that they would all be in restraint at one time; there would be a large proportion of them out on parole. The Wisconsin school has about 230 girls at this time; there was that number last week; that is three times as many as ours. They have also hundreds out on parole. The idea of the cottage system is that we may get that home influence which Mr. Jacobson refers to, but all depends on the quality of this school. If we have a motherly woman in a cottage with only an ordinary family of girls, even 50 girls (altho 20 is far better) she can exert an influence over them which is more personal and helpful; but it will be necessary to see that the right person is there. Then the classification, you see, removes nearly all the dangers of the school; the younger are not learning from the older girls; if they are segregated, if they are kept by themselves, there is much danger avoided.

Now, the danger has been spoken of their acquaintances after they leave the school, which is a most serious matter. Even if they are not acquainted with each other's features, which they usually are, there is a mutual acquaintance with the officers of the school, with the location, and there is plenty to talk over which draws them together as the pupils of any other school are drawn together. To avoid disgrace and discouragement we wish to have this called the Girls' Industrial School. Remove the stigma so that they may come out and take honorable places in society as far as possible. That is the reason it must never be connected with a women's reformatory. We must escape that which Indiana has just passed through. They have been for years trying to separate their girls' school from the women's reformatory. This year they are building a reformatory. It is just as bad to have in view women who have been successful in crime, as to have the boys in view. If the girl can be rightly placed in a training school it far exceeds in helpfulness any home she is likely to have. Some of them live in places in the worst districts in the city, and they cannot go in and out to school without the greatest danger; we would not expect our girls to retain their virtue one week, situated as some of the girls in St. Paul are. If we can get them out of such surroundings and place them in schools and have them carefully trained in the family system, and have them stay there long enough to have an impression made on their moral character, it will be of great benefit to them. Character is not built in a day, and they must stay long enough to get some hold on the better things and take up life on right lines.

THE ORPHAN ASYLUM.

MRS. A. R. COLVIN, SECRETARY PROTESTANT ORPHAN ASYLUM, ST. PAUL.

While Orphan Asylums, in the strict sense of the word, may have largely outgrown their usefulness, the need of a place where parents temporarily unable to provide for their children, can take their little ones and know they can have them back again at any time, is something that is proving its value every day. If a child is a full orphan, or has parents not fit to care for it, for the state then to step in and find it a good home and keep it under supervision, is admirable and necessary. But the basis of that arrangement

is that the child is given over to the guardianship of the state, the natura guardians resigning their rights.

The State and the Home Finding Societies assuming these functions hart almost completely altered the character of our work. The Protestant Orphan Asylum of St. Paul was organized as an asylum, a home for orphans, and for a time it did this as its legitimate work, but the State Public School at Owatonna and the State Children's Home Society have caused us to alter our rules. At this moment we have only two real orphans in the institution. One child has a grandmother living, but she will be unable to provide for it; the other has had a guardian appointed by the probate court. The majority of the children have been deserted by one parent, usually the father, or have one insane parent. If it is the mother who is insane, it is often impossible for the father to continue working and keep a house full of little children in order. We have, on several occasions, taken these children, the father paying us a monthly sum for their keep, and have given him time to readjust his life, where he can resume his responsibilities with the help of others; or sometimes through the recovery of the mother, the home is re-established.

Again, women left widowed or deserted are unable immediately to support a family of small children, and yet it is certainly not right that they should give them up permanently. It has been our experience that these mothers, if given a helping hand by relieving them of the care of the children for a time, will get work and take up their burdens again. We have not yet had a child deserted by its mother after being put with us. Of course each case is carefully examined to see it a real necessity exists before

We admit the children.

We have had fathers who had deserted their families, leaving them penniless, to come back and resume their duties, and we believe that the fact that the children are in an asylum often hurts the pride of a man, and the knowledge that if willing to work for them he can get them back, is often an incentive to sober up and do his proper work in the world. Last-but not least-we have one case that we can point to with pride, where a disconsolate widow and a consolable widower met while visiting their children, and now one happy family is the result. We admit children from the ages of two to twelve and never depart from that rule, not admitting them under or over those ages, but we have kept them after twelve. We have a girl of fourteen now. Her father is not very competent to care for her. She is delicate and really in need of watching and not of overworking. She helps in the nursery, and our school-teacher gives her special work in the schoolroom. A boy of thirteen has no proper home to go to and wishes to grow up to be our man-of-all-work. He is a very valuable assistant now. We have a kindergarten for the little children, and a primary school for the older children. There are morning and afternoon sessions, as in the public schools. In the summer we employ a sewingteacher to come twice a week to give the older children instructions in all kinds of sewing and crocheting. It is the ambition of the board to establish industrial training, but we have not been able to afford it as yet.

ther

Of course there is more or less of institution life in these homes, but if that is not carried too far nor for too long a time, it is difficult to see that it is detrimental to the child. The habits of obedience, order and cleanliness are good ones to acquire early in life, and are not common in the homes these children came from. Each child when. old enough has some duty to attend to and so learns to work and help. Having them leave at such an early age as twelve keeps them from becoming dependent and helpless.

We have done little indenturing of children for some years, most of them going back to their homes before the age that would oblige them to leave the asylum. There are special circumstances, as already indicated, which make us keep the boy and girl, and when they do go they each have a home to which they can go. The Sheltering Arms and, I believe Washburn Home in Minneapolis, and all Catholic asylums do similar work to ours and of course there are others of like nature, although it seems some of them do considerable indenturing. It is not the fact that such places exist that I wish to emphasize, but that there is a need for such homes. Our experience being that deserted or widowed mothers come sometimes in a few months and sometimes not for a year or two, and take back their children into their own homes, certainly proves to us that it would be harmful to separate them permanently. It is an education to the parents to see how the children improve under proper and systematic care. The condition of the children brought in is often pitiful. Before a man deserts he has generally brought his family very low, and the mother from worry and hard work is desperate and for a time is attracted by the thought of being relieved from the care of her children. But in almost every case that soon passes and even the least conscientious mother will at some time wish she had her children back. It may be only an impulse, but it is the one that should be gratified unless it is actually harmful, as we all agree that the child's own home, even if there is great poverty and a certain amount of neglect, is better than any other kind of home that could be procured. Such an asylum does a valuable work in the community, and the broader it can be made, the more it can be made to fit the needs of each child, the better will be the result. Trained service is a great help in this work. As the trained eye is accustomed to judging differences in individuals and opposed to looking at human beings in the mass, it can produce quite a different child from the one turned out from the old asylum, where all the little children were dressed alike, taught the same things, were drilled like automata and turned out helpless to face a world where nothing ever happens the way they expected it to.

THE COUNTY HOSPITAL AND THE DISTRICT NURSE.

H. A. TOMLINSON, M. D., SUPERINTENDENT OF THE ST. PETER STATE HOSPITAL,
ST. PETER.

In the history of the world those agencies of philanthropy that have been most conspicuous, on account of their success in contributing to the welfare of humanity, have been the ones that had for their object the healing of the sick; and, because in the early history of civilization, disease was believed to be the result of the influence of a malevolent spirit, or the determination of an offended deity, to heal the sick was the chief function of the representatives of religion. Even down to the middle ages the priest was also the physician, and the communities of the church were the first hospitals. The development of the hospital resulted from the appreciation of the necessity to have the sick person in a place where he would be free from all sources of danger, under the control of those who had his welfare in charge, and where the facilities for his care and treatment might be most conveniently had. It is not surprising then, that even in our own times, the care of the sick should continue to occupy so much of the attention and interest of the church, and the different agencies of philanthropy. The modern hospital is but the elaboration of the shelter provided in the religious houses of Europe in the middle ages, and even now most of the private hospitals in this country, and many of the public ones in Europe, are maintained by or in charge of religious organizations. Besides, in the large cities, many church organizations have their own dispensaries, and maintain some method of keeping track of the welfare of those who are ill in their own homes. Along with the shelter and care given to the sick in the monasteries and convents, went the visitation of those who were ill at home; thus utilizing the knowledge and skill gained in the experience of the hospital, to give, along with the consolation of religion, advice and assistance as to the proper care of the patient. As the result of the differentiation of these two functions, in the division of labor in the social economy, there has developed the trained nurse, who uses her knowledge and skill, gained in her hospital experience, for the benefit of those who are ill and cared for in their own homes. Again, out of the necessity to provide skilled nursing for those who are not able to provide it for themselves, has grown the provision of the so-called district nurse; which is, in a great measure, a return to the method of visitation of the religious sisterhoods, except that it has to do entirely with the physical welfare of the individual.

It used to be said that it was only the very rich and the very poor who had the best medical attendance; the rich because they could pay for it, and the poor because it was provided for them. This is not true now, because many hospitals exist whose advantages are available for the ordinary family in moderate circumstances. However, not every family wants to take advantage of hospital facilities; and they could not if they would, because the hospital accommodations are limited. Besides, most people like

to care for their own sick at home, if it is possible, even among the very poor. Now, when it is considered that, in the average household, there is so little sickness that its members have practically no opportunity to become expert in the care of the sick, or even to attain ordinary familiarity with the details of sick nursing, they can not be expected to be competent to properly care for their relatives who may become ill. Unfortunately, too, most people do not regard their want of knowledge and skill as a disadvantage, but believe that the desire to do is all the preparation that is necessary; and that sympathy and interest in the welfare of the patient endows the care taker, in some mysterious way, with the capacity to do everything that ought to be done. In caring for the sick, too many people mistake their own feelings for the welfare of the patient, and believe that because they want to do a thing, that is the right thing to do. For this reason the welfare of the sick person is often jeopardized by officious, and uninformed effort in his behalf. Among the well to do these difficulties are being obviated by the ability to employ the trained nurse; but among the poor, who can not employ skilled nursing assistance, there is a greal deal of unnecessary suffering and death, and philanthropic effort should devise means to aid them. This need has been met in the large communities by the provision of the visiting nurse. She takes the place of those who, in other times, combined the functions of spiritual adviser and nurse, and the lessons she may teach during her ministrations have a value outside of the necessities of the welfare of the sick person, because she is instructing those about her in the art of caring for the sick; showing them the advantage of order and method, and, above all, teaching them the futility of unnecessary effort, and the harmfulness of methods based only on domestic tradition and superstition. The advantage that accrues from having a properly trained nurse to care for the sick, or a member of the family who has some knowledge of the art of nursing, is two fold. The patient is not only made more comfortable, and the dangers of his illness lessened, but the elements of doubt and uncertainty are largely eliminated. In most disease conditions the mental element is an important factor; not necessarily because it creates mental disturbance, but it usually becomes sufficiently dominating to produce more or less serious depression, and interfere not only with the immediate welfare of the patient, but also seriously with his convalescence; so that everything that can be done to eliminate this mental element is of advantage. The environment of a properly conducted hospital, or well ordered sick room in a private house, with the feeling of inspiration that comes from the confidence of every one in the measures to be used, in the sureness of their accomplishing the results anticipated, and even the regime of system and order, all have the effect of stimulating the person who is ill, and allaying his anxiety. Besides, the absence of all care of the conditions in his own home that might irritate and disturb him, aid materially in bringing about his recovery.

If there could be established in each county in the suburbs of its largest town, a hospital, and an infirmary cottage for each sex, it could not only care more advantageously for its poor, but would be in a position to take