[Sidenote: Why meals should be at least four hours apart] It takes about four hours for your stomach to dispose of what you give it at a single meal. If you eat your breakfast at eight o'clock, your stomach is going to be kept busy to get rid of it by noon. Of course you expect to give it more work to do at noon; that is, you expect to eat a good luncheon. It will be after four o'clock by the time your stomach has finished the task you put on it at noon, and there will be only about an hour and a half for the stomach to rest before you will be ready to give it another four hours' task, digesting your supper. This means that your stomach cannot go to sleep until ten o'clock. If you eat three meals a day, you will give your stomach just about two hours' rest between eight in the morning and ten at night. If you let it rest from ten at night until eight in the morning, it is not likely to give you any trouble. [Sidenote: When and why candy eating is harmful] Some people will not let their stomachs rest at all. Often boys and girls give their stomachs extra work to do by eating sweetmeats in the middle of the morning while their stomachs are still busy with breakfast. Then, as soon as school is out in the afternoon, they want to eat more cake and candy, and thus take away from the stomach the little rest it has a right to expect before it goes to work on supper. Then suppose they go to a party and eat again about midnight. How much time will the stomach have to rest before breakfast? [Sidenote: When candy eating is not harmful] Now, I have not said that boys and girls must not eat candy; and what is more, I am not going to say any such thing. You may go home and tell your mother that candy is good for girls and boys and that they like it so well they ought to have it--no, not all the time. Here is the part that some of you will not like. Girls and boys ought to have all they want just after eating luncheon or dinner. If you have eaten a hearty meal, it is entirely safe for you to eat candy then; you will not be giving extra work to your stomach, for the candy will be taken care of along with the rest of the meal. =Questions.= 1. Why should we all take exercise? 2. How much rest is needed each day? 3. Name some of the effects of overwork. 4. How do children overwork their bodies? 5. Why should children have their parties in the afternoon? 6. Why should meal hours be regular? 7. When and why is candy eating harmful? 8. When is candy eating not harmful? =Remember.= 1. Proper rest is necessary to health. 2. Rest from play is as necessary as rest from work. 3. You must give the stomach rest by having regular meal hours and by eating nothing between meals. CHAPTER XIII CARE OF THE EYE AND EAR [Sidenote: The loss of sight]