the growth of the sod will be much more rapid in such a soil; and the whole should be thickly sown with red-top grass, with a little admixture of white clover. The front space, where such an area is reserved distinct from the playground, may be treated differently by planting with trees, particularly evergreens and flowering shrubs, only taking care that no tree of any kind is allowed to stand at a less distance from the schoolhouse than twice its own natural height when fully grown. The good effect of trees is reversed by allowing them to stand too near a building.

Lighting. The essential consideration which should determine the orientation of the schoolhouse proper absolutely, without reference to street lines or grades, is the lighting of the several rooms. We know that the sun rises in the east, is at its highest point in the south, and sets in the west; we know also positively the good and bad effects of different kinds and degrees of lighting and varying amounts of sunshine upon the eyesight and health of children; hence we can deduce plain rules for laying down the lines of the rooms which they are to occupy, and these rules cannot be violated in deference to a real or supposed necessity, without detriment to the usefulness of the building.

It is agreed by all authorities that the most comfortable and wholesome light for the eyes is that coming from one side of the room, without interfering crosslights from windows in the opposite side or from front or rear, and it is furthermore desirable that the light should come from a group of windows, or a single one, rather than from a succession of them separated by wide piers, which cast annoying shadows.

For writing or drawing, the light should come from the left, not exactly at the side, but a little in front; then neither the head, the right hand, nor the pen will cast a shadow on the paper. For reading, the light may come from either side, indifferently, but should be a little back, that it may shine brightly on the page. For any purpose, the window must

not be far off, or the light will be too dim, even though it may come from the right quarter.

In arranging the more important schools, containing four or more class rooms on a floor, only two modes of lighting are practicable: one, by windows in two adjacent sides; the other, by windows in one side only.

Of these two alternatives, the latter should always be chosen. The confusion of crosslights at right angles to each other and the shadow of the head thrown forward are injurious to the eyes, and the slight advantage to be gained for ventilation by windows in the adjacent sides of a large room is not sufficient to weigh against the defectiveness of the lighting so obtained.

The openings in the one illuminated side should be numerous and large, otherwise the more distant portions of the room will be too dark; and the seats should be arranged in such a way that the light in each room will fall upon the left side of the pupils.

Under this arrangement, with lofty rooms and large openings, the comfort of the eyes is at its highest point, and it is therefore compulsory in all German schools of every grade, and has become a common requirement in planning the better class of school buildings in this country.

For our climate, however, it may be seriously questioned whether, in small houses of one or two rooms, the value during the hot weather of the cross ventilation obtained by opening windows in two opposite walls should not compensate for the inferior quality of the lighting.

Some French schools have endeavored to meet the difficulty and combine good light with ventilation by piercing two opposite walls with windows and then concealing those on one side by permanent screens, like blinds, which allow the air to pass, but not the light.

This expedient answers for high and well-lighted rooms, but there is a further difficulty in the fact that in our lowstudded district and ungraded schools it is impracticable to

admit from a single side sufficient light to supply the needs of the scholars.

The minimum approved proportion of window opening for a schoolroom is set down at one sixth of the floor area, most authorities demanding much more. In one of our average rooms, 30 by 40 feet, the necessary window area would thus be 200 square feet. Unless this amount of glass surface is provided, the pupils in the parts of the room farthest from the windows will suffer from insufficient light, which is far worse for the eyes than any possible crosslights.

Now, a simple calculation will show that, supposing the ceiling to be 12 feet high and the windows to extend from a line 4 feet above the floor to within a foot of the ceiling, to obtain the amount of opening demanded would require a succession of windows, say 3 feet each in width, occupying the entire length of the longest side of the room, with piers between, only 12 inches wide.

It is plain that such a construction, though not impossible, is very different from anything which has ever been seen in our country schoolhouses; yet nothing short of this would give the remoter parts of the room even a bare sufficiency of light, and not that, if any darkening by shades or blinds were permitted.

From these reasons it follows, we think necessarily, that whatever may be the best practice in large buildings, whose high stories admit the requisite surface of glass without reducing the piers to an impracticable slenderness, and where artificial or forced ventilation keeps the air fresh. without effort, small buildings of cheap construction can, as a rule, be neither properly lighted nor efficiently ventilated without windows in two walls, and these walls should be those on the right and left of the pupils as seated.

By this arrangement ample window space can be easily given, with allowance for partial darkening by blinds at times. The light, though less comfortable to the eyes of perhaps half of the pupils than would be that from a single

direction, will be more comfortable to the remaining half, and far more so to all, teachers included, than would be the case with windows in two adjacent walls; while the advantage of being able to change the air of the room in a few moments by opening windows in opposite sides, or by the same means to maintain a current in hot weather, is, in our climate, of very great importance.

Adopting, therefore, the principle of lighting by opposite windows, it is necessary to consider the most advantageous aspect for these windows; in other words, presuming that the openings will be made in the longer side of the parallelogram which constitutes the plan of the main schoolroom, the proper direction of the longer axis of the room is to be determined with reference to the effect of sunshine in the room at different times of the day.

So far as the comfort of the eyes is concerned, the north light is preferable, as it is comparatively unvarying, and through windows so directed there will be no sunshine during school hours, and therefore no need of shades or blinds, which are always to be avoided if possible. But the health of children in other respects suffers very seriously from the deprivation of the sun's direct rays, so that steadiness of light must be sacrificed to the necessity for admitting them. Even the German rules recognize this, and require that while no room shall have windows on two sides, only drawing class rooms shall face the north.

Next to the north aspect, the steadiest light, as well as the greatest amount of sunshine, is derived from one due south; and while a south window receives the sun nearly all day the year round, the angle at which it enters is so great that the annoyance from it in hot weather is infinitely less than from the horizontal rays which stream through an east or west window at certain times. For this reason, a south exposure is both cooler in summer and warmer in winter than an eastern or western one; and while it secures the largest possible aggregate of sunshine, a south window

needs less shading with blinds or curtains than any other except one facing north.

On the whole, therefore, although some authorities hold a different opinion, the writer believes that the main room or rooms in small school buildings will be best placed with the longer axis directed due east and west, and lighted by windows in the north and south sides only.

With windows in the east and west walls, as some advise, the sun's rays will indeed traverse the room from side to side, but only at the times when their purifying and lightgiving quality is at its least and their power of annoyance at its highest.

Such a room is unendurable in summer afternoons without much pulling down of shades and closing of shutters-processes as disturbing to the quiet of the school as they are injurious to the eyes of the scholar—while at the same time the summer breeze is shut out together with the sunlight.

In winter a room so lighted is chilled on either side alternately, according as the northwest winds of March or the easterly gales strike upon the exposed surface of glass, making the room difficult to warm unless by using two furnaces one or the other to be used, according to which side may be the cold one for the time being.

With north and south lighting, all these difficulties vanish. The condition of the room in relation to the furnaces will in winter be always the same, the north side being constantly cold and the south side warm, so that a single stove or furnace placed near the north wall will at all times diffuse its heat uniformly through the room. In summer, the north windows will never need shading and those on the south side only to a small extent. In winter the range would be much greater, though the annoyance would at that season be far less. In any case, the shading of a small fraction of the window surface will cut off all the rays which can possibly shine upon any desk, while a west window can be effectually