Are we spoiling our Boys who have the Best Chances in Life? Henry van Dyke. SCRIBNER'S MAGAZINE. October, 1909. How to civilize the Young Savage. Dr. G. Stanley Hall. _Mind and Body_, June, 1911. CHAPTER III _THE RURAL HOME AND CHARACTER DEVELOPMENT_ That the farm home is an ideal place in which to build up the lives of growing boys and girls has become almost a trite saying. But that rural parents are yet failing to realize the child-nurturing possibilities of such a place may be exemplified in thousands of instances. When we point to the farm home as being the best possible place for rearing children, we mean that it contains all the crude materials for such work, and that there must be in charge of that work some one who is conscious of the many aspects of the problem. So we hope to show the fathers and mothers of the farm community, not what they might do if they were differently situated, but as specifically as possible what there is in the present rural home situation that can be made directly available in the construction of the lives of their children. WHAT AGENCIES BUILD UP CHARACTER? First of all, we must ask, What are the ordinary forces which need to be brought into service in the development of children? At the head of the list, we should name play, as furnishing a great variety of instructive activities; then, work and industry; after that, the recreation that comes properly after the performance of work. So, we have with all their implied meanings the three great child-developing agencies: play, work, recreation. Now the question naturally presents itself, Can the ordinary farm life be made to furnish in right amount and proportion these three essential elements of character development? 1. _Play._--The necessity of indulging and training properly the play instinct of the child is becoming so fully appreciated of late that many of the state legislatures, and even the national Congress, have seen fit to make it a matter of deep concern. In order that all children may have full exercise of the divine, inherent right to play and to learn through play, many so-called child labor laws have been passed. These enactments have prescribed conditions under which children will be permitted to work at gainful occupations, and in the majority of cases they have strictly forbidden such child labor below the ages of fourteen to sixteen.