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The Two Magicians and the April Rains: April: Uncle

And our Uncle Sam, wise old uncle that he is, is having a good deal to say about it. Among other things--just listen now--he says: "In cities, unless the space available is so small that planting is out of the question, it is not uncommon to find school grounds carefully laid out, with a good arrangement of grass-plots, flower-beds, and shade-trees, and in towns and villages are many examples, but in the country an improved school ground is rare. And this is almost as true of wealthy as of less prosperous communities." Then he goes on to tell how, during winter gales, even with the fire kept roaring hot, the best the teacher can do is to keep shifting the pupils about so that they can take turns at the most endurable spots in the rooms. With a temperature hovering around zero and a howling blizzard--just imagine! Why, do you suppose, is this sort of thing allowed to go on? Because many people think if trees were set out to protect the building and make the grounds attractive, the children would be constantly breaking them, in their play or in mere wantonness, and tramping the ground around them so that they wouldn't live! "You're wrong," says Uncle Sam. "Wouldn't it be strange, now, if children in the country who are used to trees and grass and flowers at home, wouldn't, if given the opportunity, find the same pleasure in protecting and beautifying the school grounds that children do in towns and villages? Experience in the comparatively few country schools where such as opportunity has been given amply demonstrates that they do."

Moreover, since the wood-lot, as we saw in January, can be made such an important part of the farm, the value of the practical application, under the teacher's guidance, of such things as we have been learning in this book, can hardly be overestimated.