The Omaha Sunday Bee Magazine Page
WakingChildrenPerfect;
Lady Constance
Richardson, the
Titled Dancer,
Gives Her
Unusual Rules
for the
Ail-Around
.99
Development
of Boys and Girls
By LADY CONSTANCE RICHARDSON
I AM bringing up my three sons to bo perfect
men. It I am bo fortunate aa to have
other children I will bring them up In lie
. same way, be they boyB or girls. I am glad
to bring to the attontlon of Intelligent Ameri
can mothers my plan for rearing perfect men.
It they adopt It I believe one branch of
eugenics will have taken a long stride in
America.
Bringing up children Is a striving toward an
(deal. Before I begin telling, you how I am
training those HttlCLjnen of mine I would
better tell you what is my Ideal of the perfect
man.
The perfect man Is one whoso brain and
body and character are equally strong. The
perfect man Is Nature's best example of bal
ance. His body la strong and handsome, with
no muscle developed at the expense of others.
His brain is active and well trained without
the extreme intellectual activity that makes
an overdraft upon the body. His character Is
clean and fine and immovable as to principle.
Such is a harmonious Individual, a perfect
man.
went upon tho stage for one sole reason
to educate my boys according to my Ideas. .
My hdsbaad and, I lave Very little money, and' "
1 ..t.Mt.V. JVI. ..liu.1 t - 4 'i
aim, .for ten boys, including my own, will
require aa Income of 5,000 a. year. Whon I
have earned that I shall retire permanently
from the Btage. I hope to retire In two years
at most and give all my time to bringing up
my boys.
The school will be n the country, near our
home, a beautiful spot In the. Highlands of
Scotland. There I shall have carried out on
a larger scale the Ideas embodied Irt the pres
ent education of my three little lads Rory,
nine; Hamtab, six, a&4 Torqull, four yean
old.
make my boys taue exercise every morn
ing for fifteen minutes In a perfectly nude
state, so that the air and sunshine may
directly reach their vital organs. "Whenever
the season will permiand that is from eight
to nine months a year, for my boys are not
afraid of the health giving, roses-in-cheeks-produoing
Scotch mists, I send them straight
from their beds to the garden, There they
Lady Richardson's Three Sorts at Their Home In Scotland. Exercise Every Morning In a Perfectly
Nude State Is Part of tho Novel Training Their Mother It Giving Them.
the soulpture and paintings in tho
Louvre and othor groat galleries of
tho world. If I lot them look at tho
ploturo books It is only aftor I havo
gone carefully through them and
scissored every one that shows tho
human figure as other than porfoct.
Also I cut out every picturo that
shows killing. My boys havo never
soon pictures of Jack the Giant Kill
or, nor have they hoard the story,
nor the picture and story of the hid
eous witch riding a broomstick.
I am as careful In the seloctlon of
fairy stories for my children as I am
of the ploturos they see. I tell or
read them only such stories as deal
I base my children! education
upon religion. Not In the sonso In
which we usually think ot religion,
for I nover go inBldo a church. But
I toach thorn a religion that rests
upon a profound faith in Qod and a
Eonso of roiponsiblllty to othor hu
man beings. I teach them that It Is
tholr duty and pleasure to make poo
plo about them as happy as thoy can,
that they must never make the world
harder for any one.
I toach them to respect the human
body and be unconscious of It, save
to koop it clean. I do not bollove
In giving the body unduo promlnonce
In llto by excosslve athlotlcs. I am
training my boys only to be athletlo
enough to bo hoalthy. But I train
thorn away from box consciousness.
I toach thorn that It Is wlckod to de
grado tho human body to tho level of
tho bodroom,
sorl's method Is the natural one. J,
am doeply intoreated in It.
I have planned that my horns
school shall be a small one, so that
evory child shall havo special atton
tlon according to his particular bent.
I do not caro especially what my
boys loam. Beyond the mere rudi
ments I Bhall only see that they are
trained well in whatever most inter
ests them and In what naturally fol
lows, that from which they derive
most pleasure. It one sings well J
One of the Poset with
Which Lady Rich-
ardoH Is Earning
the Price of Malrfsg
Her Boy Perfect
go through with J. p. Mul
ler's fifteen methods of exer
cise. I have no favorite exer
cise. Unless ono gets through
the entire system one muscle
will be developed more than
another, and the purpose of
the perfect man Is defeated.
I like the Muller system. It
Is tho best system of exercises
I know. But I should dis
card any artificial system of
exercise It I were sure that
my boys would always like In
the country. In that caie
, their natural play and work
would be enough. I hope they
Will, hut T mftn n nran.
inem for the unfortunate emergency
of living In town. In that case
system of exercises, perfectly learned,
with the habit of following them
fixed, will be better than a million
dollars to their credit in the Bank ot
England.
Ordinarily fifteen minutes ot pXay
in their nakedness Jn the garden is
enough. Children's instinct for play
k an unerring guide. They do not
loiter at their play. Instead they
run about as playfully and tease each
other as persistently as puppies.
I never excuse my boys from this
a f teen minutes ot naked play unless
they are seriously ill. I have trained
them to believe that thoy are as nec
essary a part of their day's pro
gramme as brushing their teith tha
f IB? kMora.evj
Miss Edith Welsh Climbing a Per-
Bendicular Wall Nearly 8,000 Feet
:igh in the Swiss Alps.
Lady Constance Richardson, Whose Ideas on the Propel
Rearing of Children Are as Advanced as Her Dances.
they wouldn't be clean without them.
In the milder months they' take those
exercises before the bath. In the
midwinter they take their exercises
in doors and after the bath, first
warm, then cool, then warm, then
cool again the famous Scotch baths,
A very important part of the edu
cation of my children is teaching
them a love of beauty. If they love
the beautiful they seek to become
beautiful. We think of what is about
us and we become like what we
think about, so it is most necessary
to see only beautiful objects. Keep
ing this principle in mind I am most
careful about the selection of my
children's toys. I never allow them
tojiee anything that is maimed or
distorted. Before I came to this
country last month I went shopping
in London to buy my children toys.
To my surprise and disgust I found
that the six or seven leading toys
were all hideous distortions of human
or animal bodies. Be sure my chil
dren received none of those toys. I
never give them anything like your
BUllkins and Kewpies and your Mex
ican idol dolls that have huge abdo
meats and little legs and heads too
large or small for the body. Your
Teddy bears are not bad because they
look like bears. But many animal
toys are horrible travesties ot the
real animal.
My boys have never seen anything
Copyright. 1913,
A Particularly
Alluring Mo
ment in One
of Lady Richardson's Clauio
Dances.
maimed. 80 clear a picture do they
have ot the perfect body that when
my oldest son, Rory, saw a picture of
the Venus de MIlo he said, "I don't
like Jt." The arms were missing and
he thought her imperfect. He gave
the same criticism ot the Winged'
Mercury.
Their picture books are copies of
1 prig ' x tM'm taHH? 1 never punish mychlldren except IjbiiHbiiiiiiibiW
Sm .t .MMMK d0 anything unworthy I say: "don- mlLmf
mfc? (FMMK tlemen, don't do that I don't wish HftKLfjK
ft(am iuoui' ,D
Mif'allV
$f:j3.i aWsW epect I am as to who teaches my fsiiW WQ&r
i niii" -iran i sbbbbbbbbbbbbbtsbbbbbbbbbbbt iKissiBsiBsiBsr swssm
Mmmm r Wm, they say, "Yes, madam," and I find Jf WA
ijMHuflKf WJ&W. afterward they haven't the faintest AI Mm7
MsSJlW rh.rt ideas. What most teachers lack Is JmSmrJ WT
JLLWLW IBM ,y WMirr ih .TilHt nf fldnrnMnn. Thnv know .jJlWLW
.4HH11V GftBKB V. ,dBHWF
V I
with beautiful thomes. I go back to
mythology for them. My children
like the story of Tbesus and Andro
meda, for ' instance. And I draw
many stories from our every day life
for thorn, stories which they quickly
understand and slyly recognize.
I never punish aychlldren except
by not speaking to thesa. Whea they
do anything unworthy I say: "Gen
tlemen, don't do that I don't wish
to know you' and for any tlmo from
a day to a week I do sot speak to
them. It is effectual.
More careful than in any other re
spect I am as to who teaches my
children. I am discouraged about
the governesses and the teachers ws
can employ. I explain my ideas and
they say, "Yes, madam," and I find
afterward they haven't the faintest
notion about how to carry out the
ideas. What most teachers lack is
the spirit of education. They know
what is to be taught, but they
haven't the faintest idea ot how to
teach it. I should have the teaching
force weeded out and only those who
love children and those who have the
spirit ot education would be allowed
to remain. They must not only iovo
ihildren, but they must understand
.hem. There should be a course In
child nature in every school and
evory teacher should havo a year ot
probation. After that, It she falls,
she should not be allowed to teach
our children nor any one's else. Sbo
should tako up her livelihood-earning
in another way. Madame Montres-
Lady Richardson as She Appear
at the Start of HerDaace.
will havo him trained to sing very
welL It he paints well I will have
htm trained to paint good pictures.
But I will not have their talents
trained to the abnormal point of ge
nius. Better that they should be
farmers than Cabinet Ministers. They
will be far happier leading their sim
ple lives In the country. Far better
that they should be good than great.
Lift Your Hat and Bow When You Meet a Statue
ONE of the strangest societies in existence
has lately been organized in London. It
Is called the Courtesy League. It has no
headquarters, requires no entrance or membership
fees, holds no regular meetings and has neither
rules nor badge.
The distinguishing mark of a member ot the
league is that whenever he passes a statue he
stops and faces the e&lgy, lifts his hat and makes
a low bow,
This is being done consistently by the league's
by the Star Company, Great Britain Right Reserved.
membership, which is confined exclusively to
men. Tho result of this action is invariably to
attract a good-sized crowd. As it gathers tho
league member mounts the curb or a nearby
night of steps and proceeds to deliver an ad
Jress on the virtues tho league Is endeavoring to
restore to popular favor.
Tlieso virtues are three-fold: Reverence for the
great of all ages and all climes; respect for the
dead, and honor for the living.
"Discourtesy is a far greater evil than miebt
appear to the casual mind," says a charter mesa,
ber of the organization.
"It negatives all tho virtues ot courtesy. II
persistently followed, courtesy invariably results
in calmness of thought, equipoise of mind la
times of difficulty, patience and general strength
of character. All these things are being lost
through a decadence of courtesy, and it is to
arouse tho community to a sense of the import
ance of this loss that we are following what may
seem to borne the senseless custom of lifting eur
bats and bowing to statues."