The whole matter is crystal clear; for happily, where the protection of children is concerned, there is not any free-trade side to the argument. We need the public kindergarten educationally as the vestibule to our school work. We need it as a philanthropic agent, leading the child gently into right habits of thought, speech, and action from the beginning. We need it to help in the absorption and amalgamation of our foreign element; for the social training, the opportunity for coöperation, and the purely republican form of government in the kindergarten make it of great value in the development of the citizen-virtues, as well as those of the individual. I cannot help thinking that if this side of Froebel's educational idea were more insisted on throughout our common school system, we should be making better citizens and no worse scholars. If we believe in the kindergarten, if we wish it to become a part of our educational system, we have only to let that belief--that desire--crystallize into action; but we must not leave it for somebody else to do. It is clearly every mother's business and father's business,--spinsters and bachelors are not exempt, for they know not in what hour they may be snatched from sweet liberty, and delivered into sweeter slavery. It is a lawyer's business, for though it will make the world better, it will not do it soon enough to lessen litigation in his time. It is surely the doctor's business, and the minister's, and that of the business man. It is in fact everybody's business. The beauty of this kindergarten subject is its kaleidoscopic character; it presents, like all truth, so many sides that you can give every one that which he likes or is fitted to receive. Take the aggressively self-made man who thinks our general scheme of education unprofitable,--show him the kindergarten plan of manual training. He rubs his hands. "Ah! that's common sense," he says. "I don't believe in your colleges--I never went to college; you may count on me." Give the man of esthetic taste an idea of what the kindergarten does in developing the sense of beauty; show him in what way it is a primary art school. Explain to the musician your feeling about the influence of music; show the physical-culture people that in the kindergarten the body has an equal chance with mind and heart. Tell the great-hearted man some sad incident related to you by one of your kindergartners, and as soon as he can see through his tears, show him your subscription book. Give the woman who cannot reason (and there are such) an opportunity to feel. There is more than one way of imbibing truth, fortunately, and the brain is not the only avenue to knowledge. Finally, take the utter skeptic into the kindergarten and let the children convert him. It commonly is a "him" by the way. The mother-heart of the universe is generally sound on this subject.