The lack of a normal emotional outlet is of consequence, and as a result astute physiognomists often recognize what they term the “institution look.” Maggie, an intelligent girl, who has since given abundant evidence of spontaneity and spirit, spent a short time in an excellent orphanage. She told me the other day, and wept as she told it, that she had met no unkindness there, but remembered with horror that when they arose in the morning the “orphans” waited to be told what to do; and that feeling was upon her every hour of the day. In fact, Maggie had stirred me to make arrangements to take her out of the institution because, when I brought her for a visit to the settlement, she stood at the window the entire afternoon, wistfully watching the children play in our back yard, and not joining them because no one had told her that she might. One is reluctant to speak only of the disadvantages of institutional life, for there are many children rescued from unfortunate family conditions who testify to the good care they received, and who, in after life, look back upon the orphanage as the only home they have known. For some children, doubtless, such care will continue to be necessary, but the conservative and rigid administration can be softened, and the management and their charges delivered out of the rut into which they have fallen, and from the tyranny of rules and customs which have no better warrant than that they have always existed. Perhaps these illustrations are not too insignificant to record. Happening to pass through a room in an asylum when the dentist was paying his monthly visit, I saw a fine-looking young lad about to have a sound front tooth extracted because he complained of toothache. No provision had been made for anything but the extraction of teeth. An offer to have the boy given proper treatment outside the institution was not accepted, but it needed no more than this to insure better dentistry in his case and in the institution in future. The reports stated that corporal punishment was not administered. When a little homesick lad displayed his hands, swollen from paddling, a request for an investigation, and that I be privileged to hear the inquiry, put a stop, and I am assured a permanent one, to this form of discipline. These are the more obvious disadvantages of institutional life for the child. The more subtle and dangerous are the curbing of initiative and the belittling of personality.