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Show f , A FRENCH SCHOOLBOY GRIEVANCE. GRIEV-ANCE. American boys will have a special sympathy with their contemporaries of the French public schools, or "lycees," in their indignation at the Minister of Public Instruction. It appears that one feature of the sports to be organized organ-ized at Vincennes in connection with the Exposition is to be a series of athletic ath-letic contests between the Paris schools. No competitions of similar importance im-portance and interest have ever hoon held in France before, and as a matter of course even the coddled lycees took a great interest in them. But now M. Leygues, in his capacity of guardian of these wretched little fellows, comes out with an order forbidding them to take any part in the contests. This is because be-cause "racing is detrimental to the health." It had already been arranged ar-ranged that no boy should enter without with-out having the written permission of his parents, a certificate from a doctor and another from his professor of gymnastics. gym-nastics. It might seem that these precautions pre-cautions should be enough to keep out boys physically incapacitated for the exertion; but they order this matter differently, if not better, in France When we hear of things like this we do not wonder that the zealous M De-molds' De-molds' ideas and their embodiment in his school are meeting with a growing favor among the thoughtful in France, and that the methods he is trying to introduce are popular with the boys who aro allowed a taste of American manliness and independence. M. Demotes- will be remembered- as the. Frenchman who published a book some years ago on the superiority of the Anglo-Saxon race over the Gallic, and j the causes of it. He found a good many causes one of them receives a signal illustration in the recent action of the Minister of Public Instruction. To say nothing of the things taught and the methods of teaching them in the schools. M. Demolins objected strenuously to the whole spirit of the French "lycees." The boys are coddled; cod-dled; they are spied upon; they are eiac'ouraged in tale-bearing; their recreations recre-ations are nothing but chattering promenades; prom-enades; there is little or no sympathy between them and the masters. Healthy, vigorous rivalry is unknown. There is nothing to inculcate manly independence. in-dependence. It all leads directly to that feeling of dependence upon the state that M. Demolins inveighed so vigorously against as one of the alarming weaknesses of modern French life. Most Frenchmen graduated from lycees and universities look as a matter of course toward obtaining a place in the government service where they may vegitate comfortably the rest of their lives. The nation is growing more and more to be a race of public functionaries. function-aries. The keen edge df ambitious young manhood is dulled; the initiative impulse is weakened. Of this the French view of school athletics is at once a symptom and a contributory cause. Sport, in the true spirit of sportsmanship, in England and the United States is not only phys ical training, but almost officially a part of the educational system, as an introduction to the "strenuous life." It may not do all that some of its advocates advo-cates claim for it, but it does a great deal. Neither may the impotent French way be so demoralizing a count in M. Demolins' indictment as he affirms it to be. It certainly is enough to arouse a saddened sympathy in free-born American boys. But this daring Frenchman is so convinced of its importance im-portance that he has made the reform of athletics a prominent feature in his experiment toward the regeneration of the French nation. He has established a school as nearly as he can on the best English lines on better lines, in some respects, but he has brought sport to the forefront. He has already reported report-ed a vastly improved tone in the life of his school, and if His enthusiasm can be made sufficiently contagious he may be able to stop what many observers think to be the undoubted degeneracy of the French people. It will be a sign of progress if at the next Exposition 'the "lyceens" are allowed to race. .A. . |