The examination of the mental condition of children in elementary schools presents many difficulties, the foremost being lack of time, owing to the large number of routine physical inspections which have to be completed within the limit of school hours, rarely allowing so much as ten minutes for each child; however, in the smaller rural schools, when it is impossible to get to another school within the same session, owing to distance, there often is sufficient time to enable one to make a detailed examination of some of the mentally defective, and dull and backward children.