for the day, the week, the year, the whole of life. Out of school these occupations cannot usually rotate in successive hours, as they do in Gary, but it is well to remind ourselves that every normal day of every life should have in it for everybody some study and some play, with a due portion of work and rest-and prayer-all planned and made habitual that it may run smoothly; an hour for retiring, an hour for rising, a regular period for work, another for study, including Bible study with prayer; all these, so far as possible, planned out ahead and taken in fellowship with others.

FATHER. And all of us must see to it that mother gets her share of play, and not more than her share of "work." Many boys and girls seem to think "study" and "work" and even "prayer” interfere with happiness, and that the only really pleasant things are "rest" and "play." Do boys and girls really think lazy people who cut school and work and prayer are happier than those who pray, and learn all they can, and do useful work? Are the loafers happier than the workers? Are those who gamble and drink and run wild really happiest in the long run? And how about the happiness of their mothers and wives and children? Is it not wrong-doing that makes sickness, and shortens life, and gives people a bad reputation, and breaks the hearts of friends? Good people sometimes look very serious but they know what Jesus meant when he said, "My peace I give unto you.

And now let me sum up a manly, happy, useful life from the best book I ever saw written especially for boys from 15 to 17 years of age, "Handbook for Comrades,"

2 The Round Tables are arranged on many different plans to suggest a great variety of ways the facts in this book and material from Government and welfare agencies can be used in homes and schools and clubs as the basis for banquets, forums and conferences.

3 Take it from one still working at top speed in the 56th year of his profession that in above guides to health one of the most important is, "Drink (water) copiously." The benefits people get at great cost at far-off "springs"

which seems to me just the course into which Boy Scouts should graduate, especially if they are connected with churches, for this book, with many woodsy and sporty programs for the body, and quickening programs for the mind, has also inspiring programs of devotion and citizenship, essential to full-orbed manhood, all arranged winsomely by a big group of men who have been boy leaders for twenty-years. The book shows "to what ideals American boys will respond as they prepare to become the leaders of America and the world."

DARE TO BE YOURSELF-CHEERFUL CONSCIENTIOUS, BRAVE.

From "Comrades' Handbook," by permission

This chart is set to music in two poetic pictures of David, the shepherd boy, one by Browning in "Saul" (that would start a boy to hunting Browning's poems for more of the same):

they can get from good water at home if they will drink in the same way, namely: two or four glasses of plain water (not iced) a half hour or more before breakfast, with a good walk; then two glasses at a time two hours after each meal. This book quoted, "Comrades' Handbook," teems with illustrations that would delight boys. It is sold at 90 cents, postpaid, by the Association Press, 347 Madison Ave., New York, N. Y. Another similar book for boys 12 to 14, same price, is called "Pioneer's Handbook." The Association Press also publishes a $1 book entitled, "Poems of Action," of which many would be welcome readings at these home and school banquets, and they would create a taste for good poetry.

O the wild joy of living, the leaping from rock unto rock; The wild rending of boughs from the fir trees, the cool silver shock

Of a plunge in the pool's living water!
How good is man's life, the mere living,
How fit to employ all his heart and his soul
And his senses forever in joy!

The other picture of David, the shepherd boy is by himself and it shows that God's watchcare is a big part of his gladness. Let us all say the best known chapter of the Bible, the 23rd Psalm: "The Lord is my Shepherd, I shall not want."

NEW

RESPONSIBILITIES OF GIRLS IN
THE UPPER TEENS

(For "Inner Circles" of High School and College Girls, to follow up Chapter I.)

It may seem presumptuous for a "mere man" to attempt to talk to up-to-the-minute 20th Century girls on their new responsibilities, but only a little while ago, in a tour of the South, I spoke to four women's colleges, on matters of special concern to girls, and two of the colleges encored me, and so I shall venture to suggest for the consideration of this "inner circle" of girls some things that a preacher who has specialized for half a century in speaking and writing for young folks thinks that some man who is in full sympathy with the young and knows present day conditions should bring to their attention.

Formerly a preacher might have talked to parents and teachers as to what girls should and should not be permitted to do. Today we must face the fact that most of

the teen age girls in the United States are not waiting for 21 or even 18 as the date when they shall become masters of their own fate. It is like the countries that were recently kingdoms and have suddenly become republics before they were ready. We have got to deal with them as republics even if they are somewhat reckless, and must try to get their "inner circles" of leaders to persuade the more reckless girls to take their new responsibilities seriously, since not only their own lives but the future of the human race also depends on the wisdom or folly of the girls of today.

As the new leaders of the Sunday school movement, basing their plans for teen age pupils on psychological studies of adolescence, urge that in many cases the best teachers for the lower teens may be the most intelligent and spiritual in the upper teens, so in counteracting the new perils of girls, on the negative side, and in preparing girls for their supreme duty to the nation and the world, on the positive side we summon you who are eighteen or nearing that age of girl maturity to accept the responsibility not alone for being "little mothers" to little girls in physical care, but especially for being "big sisters" to girls just entering the perilous teen years, when they should not only be protected against unprecedented present perils but prepared to be successful home makers by and by.

The precocity of American girls in plans for home making was strikingly illustrated in a party I gave in New York, when a pastor, to the children who had regularly attended morning church for a year and written the texts of my seven-minute sermons to children in little "text books." There were games and "eats" and a prayer and a bit of talk on the joy of goodness, and all went their way. A little girl of four invited in from next door

went back to her mother and said, "I would marry any of those little boys, for they are all going to be good." The story not only reminds us that girls not yet through with their dolls are thinking of "beaus" and even husbands, but also that many moron girls, who are only nine years old mentally though nearly twice that by the birth record, apparently think they can trust themselves to any boy or man at any hour, anywhere, because they all talk "good."

No girl under sixteen should be even thinking, much less talking, about mating. It is the time for study and play, with no distractions. But parents and teachers and pastors and you big sisters should tactfully protect and prepare them for a great, glad future. Girls of fourteen are more in need of guardian angels, visible and invisible, than even babies and young children, who have less at stake. At most you can only kill the little ones—you cannot corrupt and curse them.

Centuries of experience and thousands of heartbreaks have led to the establishment of certain safeguards for girls and women for their own sake, and for the sake of the race, whose health and purity are necessarily more dependent on women than on men. That girls may not sell or give away their own property till 18 years of age goes with the laws worked out through centuries that they may not marry under that age, or some other named in the laws, without the consent of parents. It has been found that certain safeguards of reputation and character are needed. These were not set up suddenly by anybody to spite the girls but only to save them from perils older people know full well.

It is surprising that any fairly intelligent girl allows herself or anybody else to persuade her that such protection is restriction; that she is wiser than the parents that love her better than their own life; that a girl can