Denmark was the first European state to introduce physical training into its schools as an essential part of the course, and to prepare teachers of that subject by offering systematic instruction in theory and method of gymnastics. The leader in this movement, and its director for more than forty years, was Franz Nachtegall (1777-1847), the son of a Copenhagen tailor. His early education was received in a private school, and he had begun the study of theology in the university; but the death of his father prevented him from taking the final examination for his degree and threw upon him the support of an invalid mother. For a time he gave private lessons in Latin, history, and geography, but the small pay necessitated such long hours that his health began to suffer. From boyhood he had been interested in forms of physical activity, and as a university student gained considerable proficiency in fencing and vaulting. Inclination, therefore, and the reading of GutsMuths’s “_Gymnastik für die Jugend_”[139] started him upon what was to become a life-work. He began to teach gymnastics, first to some students at his own home, and then, early in 1798, to a club of university students and tradesmen which he organized and directed. This brought him, a year later, an invitation to give lessons in the private school which Court Chaplain Christiani had opened in May of 1795, in accordance with the philanthropinistic ideals of Basedow and his followers. A rival institution, the Schouboe school which Nachtegall had himself attended as a boy, soon secured a share of his time for the same purpose. Other schools in the city, public as well as private, followed the example of these two, so that by 1805 at least nine were furnishing instruction in gymnastics to their pupils.