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nasia, vacation and evening schools, concerts, free lecture courses neighborhood meetings, parents' clubs, etc. " with the ultimate aim of infusing the whole scheme into the regular educational system and making it an integral part thereof."
In the schools where attempts to put this policy into practice have been made, the results seem to be most encouraging. In two of the public schools great inter- est has been aroused in literary, dramatic, and art societies, and in cooking, sewing dressmaking, printing, and stenography classes. In the Ghetto a People's Edu- cational League has held weekly meetings, which have been both popular and educational. The talents of the neighborhood are freely drawn upon in arranging these meetings, and the diverse accomplishments of the polyglot population give them a special interest and character. Men and women who almost never leave their cramped homes attend, and their eager faces, as well as the fact that it has been necessary to turn away as many again as could be admitted, bear signifi- cant witness to the possibilities of such meetings. In fourteen other schools par- ents' and citizens' clubs have been organized.
The greatest difficulty met with at present is the rates which the board of education requires for the use of school buildings. As soon as the finances of the board will permit it, a reduction will prove of immense help in the movement. By means of meetings, addresses, reports, and exhibitions, the Society for School Extension hopes to spread abroad the knowledge of what is being thought and done along the line of school extension. The Commons (Chicago), February, 1904.
E. B. W.
The Belgian Labor Colonies. The problem of the unemployed is in large measure a problem of the unemployable. The present tendency in industry is toward a high average standard of wages and efficiency, which those whom a weakness for drink, a lurking shiftlessness, or inferior physical or mental powers handicap cannot attain to. Employers cannot be expected to make it a part of their business policy to employ such inefficient laborers as an act of philanthropy, nor it is wise or just to treat as criminals those members of this class who take to vagrancy or begging. Belgium, in her system of labor colonies, has, for a generation past, been employing a vastly better system.
Near Antwerp there are three great colonies for men, the largest numbering from four to five thousand, while at Bruges there are two similar institutions for women. The key to the success of the system in Belgium is found in the power conferred by law upon the Juges de paix to order the detention of the person found to be unwilling or unable to maintain his place in the ranks of industry. But although by this compulsory feature, the system avoids the weaknesses of voluntary colonies, yet, on the other hand, every care is taken to avoid treating the colonists as criminals. They are not closely guarded, and if a man escapes and succeeds in establishing and maintaining himself in normal economic relations to society, he is left undisturbed. If such a runaway should resume his former ways and should again be sent to the colony, any further attempt at escape would be punished by the director of the colony. The work and the discipline maintained have had a most beneficial effect upon the colonists ; they are cheerful and efficient, and lead a fairly comfortable life, free from the peculiar temptations and the com- petition which they have been unable to withstand in the twentieth-century world of industry outside. The aim is to make the colonies self-sufficing, and to this end the number of industries carried on is determined by the needs of the colonies themselves. Practically everything consumed is grown or manufactured within their limits.
Long terms, varying from one to five years, are found necessary in order, to insure any degree of success in the work of reformation. Habits of idleness and shiftlessness cannot be exchanged for industry and technical skill in a few months. In order to stimulate interest, a very small money wage is paid in addition to the maintenance of the workmen. If personal and religious influences were brought to bear, probably even greater results could be achieved.
From the financial standpoint, the cost to the state is about six-pence a day for every " able-bodied " man in the largest of these colonies, and a shilling for the
