"'Then girls should be allowed to run wild--to become as rude as boys, and grow up into romps and hoydens!' exclaims some defender of the proprieties. This, we presume, is the ever-present dread of schoolmistresses. It appears, on inquiry, that at Establishments for Young Ladies noisy play like that daily indulged in by boys is a punishable offence; and we infer that it is forbidden, lest unladylike habits should be formed. The fear is quite groundless, however. For if the sportive activity allowed to boys does not prevent them from growing up into gentlemen, why should a like sportive activity prevent girls from growing up into ladies? Rough as may have been their play-ground frolics, youths who have left school do not indulge in leap-frog in the street, or marbles in the drawing-room. Abandoning their jackets, they abandon at the same time boyish games, and display an anxiety--often a ludicrous anxiety--to avoid whatever is not manly. If now, on arriving at the due age, this feeling of masculine dignity puts so efficient a restraint on the sports of boyhood, will not the feeling of feminine modesty, gradually strengthening as maturity is approached, put an efficient restraint on the like sports of girlhood? Have not women even a greater regard for appearances than men? and will there not consequently arise in them even a stronger check to whatever is rough or boisterous? How absurd is the supposition that the womanly instincts would not assert themselves but for the rigorous discipline of schoolmistresses! "In this, as in other cases, to remedy the evils of one artificiality, another artificiality has been introduced. The natural, spontaneous exercise having been forbidden, and the bad consequences of no exercise having become conspicuous, there has been adopted a system of factitious exercise--gymnastics. That this is better than nothing we admit, but that it is an adequate substitute for play we deny." The pendulum has indeed swung across from those days to these of the hockey-girl, not to mention the girl who throws a cricket-ball and bowls very creditably overhand. There can be no doubt that this state of things is vastly better than that was, yet, as one has endeavoured to insist, this also has its risks. Apart from the question as to the particular game or form of exercise, we must be guided in each case by the first signs of anything approaching undue strain. We must look out for lack of energy, for a lessening of joy in the exercise and of spontaneous desire therefor. Fatigue that interferes with appetite, digestion, or sleep is utterly to be condemned.