Sufferings of Little Children from Cold, Heat, and Filth.

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SUFFERINGS OF LITTLE CHILDREN FROM COLD, HEAT, AND FILTH

One superintendent says, “Could parents witness, as I have, the sufferings of their children from cold, I am sure no other appeal would be needed. Some of those buildings, I am confident, would be considered by a systematic farmer, who regarded the comfort of his stock, as an unfit shelter for his Berkshires.”

Another states, that in some cases the schoolhouses are small and overheated. Then the teacher throws open the door, and a current of cold air pours on to the children. The reeking perspiration is suddenly stopped, and “a cold” is the result, which is often the precursor of fevers and consumption. When no such results follow, the parents say, “It is only a cold;” when diseases and death follow, it is called a dispensation of Providence! A physician of extensive practice stated to this superintendent, that a large part of his consumptive cases originated from colds taken at school.

Another describes one of the schoolhouses in his county as too small, too low, the seats too high, half the plastering fallen off and piled in one corner, and the house warmed by a cook-stove unfit for use. Six sevenths of the panes of glass were gone, and two windows boarded up. Going to attend the annual school meeting at this house, he met two citizens coming with a candle and firebrands, and picking up sticks along the road for a fire, because there was no wood provided at the schoolhouse.

Another thus describes some of the schoolhouses in his county. It is very common to see cracked and broken stoves, the door without hinges or latch, and a rusty pipe of various sizes. Green wood, and that which is old and partially decayed, either drenched with rain, or covered with snow, is much more frequently used than sound, seasoned wood. Thus it is difficult to kindle a fire, and the room is filled with smoke much of the time, especially in stormy weather. Sometimes the school is interrupted two or three times a day to fasten up the stovepipe.

The extent of these evils may be perceived from the report, which says of one county about as well supplied as any, out of eighty-seven districts only twenty schoolhouses have provided means for keeping their wood dry.

Another says, “At the commencement of the winter term of our schools, some one of the trustees generally furnishes a load of green wood, perhaps his own proportion. The teacher proceeds till this is exhausted, and he is compelled to notify his patrons of the entire destitution of wood. After meeting his school, and shivering over expiring embers till the hope of a supply is exhausted, he dismisses the school for one, two, or three days, and sometimes for a week, before any inhabitant finds time to get another load of green wood. With such wood it is impossible to keep the schoolroom at a proper temperature. The scholars, at first, crowd around the stove, suffering extremely with cold, and then are driven as far off as they can get, in a high state of perspiration, and almost suffocated with heat. Our schools in this country suffer much from such methods of procuring fuel. The time which is lost in school hours by the use of green wood, I think will include near one fourth of the whole time.”

Another says, “The teacher found abundant employment in stuffing the old stove with green birch and elm, cut as occasion required by the teacher and the boys. A continual coughing was kept up by nearly seven-eighths of the children, and the teacher apologised for want of order by saying, ‘they could not usually do much in stormy weather till afternoon, when the fire would get a going.’ On this occasion, one trustee and two of the inhabitants of the district were present an hour, when, getting frozen out, they asked to be excused, and left the children to suffer, saying, ‘We did not think our house was so uncomfortable. Some glass must be got, and a load of dry wood’” Some of the statements of these superintendents, as to the order and neatness of their schoolhouses, are no less lamentable. One remarks, that “some of them, as to neatness, resemble the domicil for swine.” Another describes one schoolhouse as “having the clapboards torn off, the door just ready to fall, an aperture in the roof where the chimney once was, slabs with a pair of clubs at each end for legs, and so high no child could touch foot to the floor, rickety desks falling to ruin, the plaster torn off, and the whole covered with dirt, and as filthy as the street itself.” But this is not all. “This house is situated in a district of wealthy farmers.”

Another says, “It is a startling truth, that very many of our schoolhouses furnish no private retreat whatever for teacher or scholar. Thus is one side of the schoolhouse, and, in some instances, the doorstep, rendered a scene more disgusting than the filth of a pig-sty.”

Another says, “Schoolhouses, generally, are not furnished with suitable conveniences for disposing the outer garments of the children, their dinner-baskets, and other articles. Sometimes there are a few nails in an outer entry where clothes and dinners may be put, but in such cases the door is left open for rain and snow to beat in; the scholars, in their haste to get their own clothes, pull down many more, which are trampled on. Moreover, the dinners are often frozen, or eaten by dogs, and sometimes even by hogs.”

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