Another highly important factor is the presence of the teachers at the meals. Fully 90 per cent of the teachers use the canteens more or less regularly, though there is absolutely no compulsion in the matter. They prefer to do so on account of the cheapness and wholesome character of the meals. I have myself sat down to a three-cent dinner in the company of a well-known member of the Chamber of Deputies, a Professor of Languages, and several teachers, each one of us having gone through the little box-office and bought his ticket in exactly the same manner as the most ragged urchin. All the children are provided with cheap paper napkins, and the presence of the teachers is a sort of practical education in table manners. The canteen serves, therefore, as a great educational and ethical force as well as a remedy for one of the worst evils arising out of the national poverty problem. The _cantine scolaire_ is a great institution, well worthy of careful study. If, as the evidence gathered by Mr. Hunter seems to show, we have at least two million underfed children in the public schools of the United States, victims of physical and mental deterioration, the time must come, and the sooner the better, when we must deal with the problem. Some of the Utopians among us would doubtless like to see the all-embracing compulsory system of Vercelli adopted, but it is most likely that we shall find the French methods better suited to our needs. NOTE.—I am indebted to the publishers of my _Underfed School Children—The Problem and the Remedy_, Charles H. Kerr and Company, of Chicago, for permission to reproduce the foregoing paper in this volume. APPENDIX B LETTER TO THE ROYAL ITALIAN AMBASSADOR AT WASHINGTON FROM THE CHIEF OF THE BOARD OF EDUCATION OF THE MUNICIPALITY OF VERCELLI, ITALY, DESCRIBING THE SCHOOL-MEALS SYSTEM NOTE.—I am indebted to the Italian Ambassador at Washington, his Excellency Mayor des Planches, for permission to use the following letter. The translation was made for me by Mr. Teofilo Petriella, of Cleveland, Ohio, an Italian journalist.—J. S. VERCELLI, September 13, 1905. The school year, 1904–1905, just over, was the _fifth_ since the school lunch (_refezione scolastica_) was introduced in our City Elementary Schools, _at the complete expense of the Municipality_. The school lunch is distributed every day during the whole school year. Limited, at the beginning, only to the city schools, it has been extended, since the school year 1901–1902, to the suburban and rural schools. To-day, therefore, all the male and female pupils of all the classes of all the elementary schools, in both city and suburbs, take part in the lunch. There are 65 schools with 91 classes, attended by an average of 2500 boys and girls.