nicely. I waited a moment or two, and then said: "What is that out there?" She replied, "That's the lake." "Oh, yes;" said I, "a very pretty lake; but what lake is it?" "Why," she said, "that is just the Lake." There was this bright little girl, born and brought up on the shores of Lake Erie who had bounded for me New York State as glibly as you please "on the west by Lake Erie, Niagara River, and Lake Ontario," and didn't know what that lake was!

Recently I went into a class in the high school and listened to a recitation in Geometry. The class had developed unusual efficiency in demonstrating the theorem, "To erect a perpendicular at any given point to a line." They did it very well. They had their diagrams worked out well, and were able to demonstrate the theorem in prefect style. Finally, the teacher asked if I would care to ask a question. I said, "Yes, I would; I have just one question to ask, Boys, how many of you play baseball?" Five of the boys said that they were on the high school baseball nine. I said, "That is fine. I have a little problem for I have a little problem for you. Pretty soon, now, after the marble season is over, you will be wanting to fix up a baseball diamond out there. We will assume that just a little, beyond that big tree, is home plate. After you have run a line down there to third base and have measured off the proper distance, how would you go about it to locate first base?" That stumped them. That same group had demonstrated very glibly the theorem, "To erect a perpendicular at any given point to a line," but when it came to a baseball diamond, the thing they were interested in, the connection appeared to be lost.

One more story, in the hope that my point may be more clear. I dropped into a physics class last week. The pupils were at laboratory tables with their apparatus and direction books before them, performing experiments. I stepped up to one of the boys who was apparently getting along very well, stood there for a moment, and finally said to him, "Well, son, what are you doing?" He thought a minute, and finally he replied, "Darned if I know!" He was working at the familiar experiment of the fulcrum, weight and power, and as far as any personal experience of his was con

cerned, that experiment was separated from it as the east is from the west.

The burden of my thought, the crux of my argument is that we are going to teach boys and girls in terms of country life, in terms of their experiences hourly and daily, in school and out of school. I believe there are agencies in our communities, like the farm bureau, the boys' and girls' club work, as it is called in Massachusetts, with the various school officers for supervision, that can and will aid the teachers in building up this kind of instruction to the end that the activities of the community may be made an integral part of the instruction in the rural school. I can testify from experience that the degree to which the work will be vitalized, and the degree to which our schools will stop uneducating farmers, will be more than gratifying.

How To Keep The Mill-Town Child In School

JOSEPH J. REILLY, SUPERINTENDENT OF SHOOLS, WARE, MASS. ❖❖NCE upon a time a very busy teacher assigned to a

class of students, as a subject for a composition, "A Description of a Baseball Game." Willie Brown didn't do it. The teacher kept him after school, and told him that she would give him forty-five minutes in which he would have to produce the composition or take the dreadful consequences. Willie stayed after school (he had to!) and the clock ticked by as it is ticking now, and Willie didn't produce anything. He gazed at the ceiling, at the floor, at his fingers, at his feet, and then put his red head into his hands and sat stolid and immovable. The clock ticked on, the time went by, and the teacher said: "There are only five minutes left, and you have got to produce something, or you know what will happen to you." Four minutes more went by; one minute was left. Whereupon Willie plunged his pen into his inkwell and wrote something hastily across the paper just as the minute was up, and laid the paper on the teacher's desk. The teacher gave him time to get out, for human curiosity is curbable. Then she looked at the paper, and this is what she read: "Rain— wet grounds-no game!" I don't know whether Willie got 100 for that piece of work; at least, his work had the merit of brevity. I will try to imitate Willie.

This question of determining what to do to keep children in school is indeed a pressing one. Practically all of Ware is dependent upon the mills, and when they shut down things happen that are not pleasant. The mortality, particularly in the sixth grade, as has been suggested by Mr. Wright, is very large, and the question, How can we get the children to remain at school? is giving us much serious thought. Sometimes the children are anxious to get to work. I have a case in mind, a child who announced on the second day of school last September that on the thirty-first day

of the coming May he would be old enough to get out. Think of it! You know how much work that boy is doing in school-none. He is just marking time and watching the clock. There are other cases where the parents are anxious to drive to the mill a child who prefers to remain in school. I have a letter here that will be simpler to read than to comment upon. The facts contained in it are all stolen. The letter which I will read was sent out to every parent who had a child in the sixth grade and up, on the 9th day of January. A similar letter was printed at the same time, in order to save money, and dated the second day of this coming June, having a slightly different heading from the present one, and reminding the parents of the letter sent them in January. This will give them an opportunity to have the matter under consideration during the summer.

"Dear Mr. Blank:

Every day boys and girls are leaving school to go to work. Many of them are scarcely fourteen years of age. They face life with very little education, and as a result they will probably never succeed in doing much more than making a bare living.

Today, more than ever before, a good education is necessary for

success.

The boy or girl who hopes to accomplish something in life can start with nothing less than a high school education.

What will a high school course do for boy and girls? First, it will help to give them good judgment, self-reliance, and perseverance. Secondly, it will tend to develop their best qualities and make them broad and keen. Thirdly, it will strengthen their thinking power, just as the right kind of exercise will strengthen their muscles. It is the thinking power, made strong and keen in the high school, which enables the high school graduate to achieve greater things in life than others. Fourthly, a high school education is the best of financial investments. As a proof of this, consider the following figures issued by the United States Bureau of Education: At twenty-five years of age, the boys who go to work at fourteen earn on an average $12.75 per week. The boys of

age of

the same classes who took a high school course earn, at the twenty-five, $31.00 a week. Forty years is estimated as the earning period of a man's life that is, from the time he is twenty until he is sixty years old. Let us assume that the earning power remains absolutely the same after the age of twentyfive; counting fifty weeks to the year, the average boy who goes to work at fourteen will earn $25,500 in a lifetime. The average boy with a high school education will in the same length of time earn $62,000. The time spent in securing a high school education is forty months. Forty months of high school study, then, will increase the earning power of the average boy $36,000. Thus to a boy of average ability, a high school course is worth $45.00 per day, or $900 per month to him while going to high school.

Figures for girls will show a slight variation, but with the same ratio of earning power.

Whatever chance boys and girls may have to secure a high school education exists right now, while they are in school. A similar opportunity will never come again, because once a child leaves school, it is almost impossible to return after one or more years and pick up the threads once more.

You have a first-class high school in Ware, which offers excellent courses in Mathematics, French, Latin, English, History, and Commercial subjects (bookkeeping, shorthand, typewriting, and commercial arithmetic.) Your boys and girls have a golden opportunity to get an excellent education which should make their lives better, happier, and more livable in the future. The Ware School Department urges you strongly to do your best to let your children have these advantages."

(Signed by the Superintendent.)

I believe that an appeal like that may have some effect. On the other hand, it is only economy that leads me to acknowledge that it may have no effect except to furnish fuel for the stove. The pulpit is still a powerful means of reaching people, and so I made a personal appeal to the clergymen who represent the eight different religious sects in Ware, asking them to make an appeal