With seven years' experience, the city officials having the work
in charge express unqualified satisfaction with the method. Eighiy-
two individual children have been boarded between the years 1878
and 1886, and the success with which at twelve years of age they
pass into satisfactorj' self-support is reported by the agent of the
Overseers of the Poor to be most gratifying.
The visitation of the city's wards is by a system of regular volun-
tary service of women, as well as by the agent of the Overseers of
the Poor.
The comfortable home life now opened to the young dependent
I children of city and State by the boarding-out system is elevating,
and affords the best practical training that can be given. There is



PREVENTIVE WORK l6l

little difficulty in securing all the privileges demanded for them by
the State. Their health is protected, attendance at school regular.
Being made presentable by suitable dress, they are received pleas-
antly by the children of the neighborhood at cfiurch and social gath-
erings. All of which is quite unlike the placed-out self-supporting
child, too often overworked, with school and social privileges cur-
tailed to the minimum.
It is accepted as true that a poor home is better for the rearing of
a child than an institution ; but it is also true that the better the
home, the better the chances for the child's future well-being.
To accomplish the best results in preventive work, the fact must
not be overlooked that character and habits in the young are not so
dependent upon parentage and heredity as upon daily impressions
received.
STATE AID TO PRIVATE INSTITUTIONS.
BY JUDGE RICHARD PRENDERGAST.
