One of the pottery towns in Staffordshire is built on very unfertile clay; there are several potteries in the town belching out smoke, and, in addition, rows of monotonous smoke-blackened houses; almost always a yellow pall of smoke hangs over the whole district, and even where the edge of the country might begin, the grass and trees are poor and blackened, and distant views are seen through a haze. There are almost no gardens in the town, and very little attempt has been made to beautify it, because the results are so disappointing. Beauty, therefore, in various forms must be a large part of the curriculum: already design is a common interest in the pottery museums of the district, and this could be made a motive for the older children; but in the Junior and Nursery School pictures of natural beauty, wild flowers if it is possible to get them, music, painting and drawing, and literature should bulk largely enough to make a permanent impression on the children. In a very remote country village where life seems to go slowly, and days are long, children should be encouraged, by means of the school influence, to make things that absorb thought and interest, to tell and hear stories. Storytelling in the evening round the fire is a habit of the past, and might well supply some of the cravings that have to be satisfied by the "pictures." Most of us have to keep ourselves well in hand when we listen to a recitation in much the same way as when a slate pencil used to creak; it would be very much better if the art of storytelling were cultivated at school, encouraged at home, and applied to entertainments. Indeed the entertainments of a village school, instead of being the unnatural and feverish production of hours of overtime, might well be the ordinary outcome of work both at school and at home--and thus a motive for leisure is naturally supplied and probably a hobby initiated.