Welsh Journals

children." As a matter of fact, Froebel began his work with elder boys first as a tutor and afterwards at Keilhau. He continually refers to handwork and the value of it to the boy-it is play with things rather than persons-but it is still using play in its best sense and, indeed, as Mr. Curtis himself uses it. The play of the child does not correspond to the recreation of the adult, but to the work of the adult. Play is the most serious activity in which the child engages." Through handwork we seek to develop the child, and throughout we treat it as a means of expression the co-ordination of joy and activity found in play is present also in educative handwork as distinct from technical handwork. Mr. Curtis begins by a slight description of the three main theories of play. Apparently he accepts Dr. Stanley Hall's Recapitulation Theory, since this theory alone escapes criticism, but the author satisfies himself with little more than a statement of bare fact; indeed, it is the number of bare facts which are mentioned that leads to a certain monotony experienced by the reader when he attempts to read the book as a whole. From the English standpoint there is a certain interest in that the author is American, and gives a truly American view of play. He deals with different types of games, and devotes a couple of chapters to a slight comparison of play in various countries. It is a pity that in Chapter VI, which deals with play in English schools, he identifies the Girls' High Schools with Public Schools for boys, and then cites as an example, Rodean which is not a High School, but is a school for girls, which approximates to a Public School for boys. Later, in the same chapter, Mr. Curtis professes that he knows nothing of women playing athletic games at Oxford and Cambridge, and consequently presumes that they still feel too strange there to do anything to bring them into such prominence." It is surprising that as Mr. Curtis is presenting us with such a compendium of know- ledge he does not take the trouble to verify his facts with regard to English play, for he would quickly find that his presumption was groundless, and that athletics flourish in the women's colleges as much as in the men's. Mr. Curtis pays a tribute to English play in his chapter dealing with the Training of Play Teachers, when he says There is no regular training for play positions in England because the masters have already had the training in their own school days which enables them to play the games successfully with their pupils. The range of activities in these English playgrounds is not as wide as it is in ours, but within their own limits, the English masters are undoubtedly the best trained play-leaders in the world. They are skilful in the games, have imbibed the spirit of sportsmanship and love to play. They have developed the good comradery in play which is essential to real success." That seems to be the crux of the matter. The English play because they love to do so, they inherit the sporting spirit and the whole tradition of the nation encourages the development of it. The Americans lack this sporting element, and in their play they are in such deadly earnest that the sporting spirit dies many of them, such as Mr. Curtis, are fully alive to the educational value of play, but de- tract from it by over organisation and systematisation. It is true that directed play does not necessarily mean the absence of spontaneity, but play which is too closely guarded and too highly organised usually becomes spiritless and artificial. Perhaps it would have been fairer to compare the training of the English games mistress with that of the American, for the training of the former is of comparatively recent date and is more organised than is that of the ordinary Public School master. Even in this case the result would be similar, and it would be found that the English woman is superior to the American teacher chiefly because she does not play because she must, but because she would like to do so she starts on her training in the true play spirit because her whole soul is in it and it is worth doing well. Such an attitude begets an enthusiasm that the most careful and thoroughly planned organisa- tion suggested by Mr. Curtis could never achieve, so that if his purpose is, as he appears to claim, to arouse the American public to enthusiasm it may be doubted whether he will succeed in his object just because of his too elaborate systematisation and lack of imagination. The book has some use for purposes of reference to the student, but it is hardly sufficiently inspiring to arouse a nation to the value of play as a means of education. H. Gavin. The Adventures of Seumas Beg. The Rocky Road to Dublin." By James Stephens. Macmillan & Co. Pp. 86. 3s. 6d. net. Everyone who has read the Crock of Gold will read everything James Stephens writes if they can lay hands on it. But as there may be those who know neither the Crock nor the Charwoman Daughter nor yet Here are Ladies, we must tell them there is a poet come out of Ireland, magical, whimsical, humorous, pitiful, who can sing the dreams of little children and the thoughts of grown men. One