lucated, incompetent nurse-girl or eak-willed governess to be a good ent to your boy while you give yourup to the social whirl or the affairs he Nation." But, if I were to give true answer frankly, the parent ld rise in offended dignity, withdraw boy from our school, and put him ewhere where the masters have more in dealing with the real problems boy's life-the parents.

n these more extreme cases the only g to do is to work indirectly through boy. Instead of saying, "You are easy-going with your boy," I say, our boy expects too much of the ld; he is too easy on himself; we t make him feel his responsibility e keenly." This the parent readily ees to generally, and the process of ting upon the children the sins of father begins. The boy is allowed o to the movies only once a week. is required to study an hour more a day until he becomes such an effiit student during school hours that loes not need the extra hour. He is t to bed at eight or half-past instead en, and is waked at half-past six or en instead of eight. His pocket ey is cut down from five dollars a k to fifty cents a week. A provision closer co-operation between parents teachers is arranged. Or something is done, aimed ostensibly at the F, but really at his parents. But in the less extreme cases it is sible to be more frank. For instance, hother-a good mother-has a boy is two years behind his class. Why? ply because of two things: he canread fluently enough to study his ks, and he cannot spell correctly ugh to write his exercises.

question the boy, and find that he es books but hates to read them. I him about his spelling, and he says the " never could spell."

'ASE OF TOO MUCH AND TOO LITTLE

turn to his mother, and she admits t she and he," being great pals," have erally read books together, which ans that she has read to him, books of own choosing, which she can make cinating by her manner of reading, twhich are far beyond his own powers. e tries repeatedly to have him take turn in the reading, but she finds at he hates it and begins to lose inest in the masterpiece of literature ich they are reading. So she does e work, and he loves it. His taste for erature is two years ahead of his age, d his ability to read is two years bead his age. The conclusion is obvious d twofold: the mother must stop ading to the boy, and must give him me real boy books which have no her merit than that they are exciting d harmless. When he has learned to ad these simple books fluently, let her oose some that have a content value, d gradually draw him back into the

range of books that she used to read to him. It can be done. It has been done more than once.

I ask the same lady about the boy's spelling, and I get the same reply that I had from the boy: "It has always been hopeless. He never could spell." But she adds something further: "His father was always a bad speller, and is a bad speller to this day." So is his grandfather or his great-uncle. It seems to run in the family. So the matter of spelling is looked upon as hopeless. Yet the actual truth is that most bad spellers are poor readers who do not read unless they have to. These things go together to such an extent that it is fair to say that the one is the cause of the other. The boy does not read; he has no word pictures in his mind's eye, and therefore he cannot spell the words that he wishes to use in his writing. I first explain this point of view, and get a dubious assent. Then I give the boy a lesson in spelling and prove to him under his mother's eye that he can learn at least the common words. We then arrange certain mechanical matters, such as the books for the boy to read and the special time for intensive work on spelling, and the boy's problem is in a fair way to be solved, because the mother sees her fault, acknowledges it, and co-operates in correcting it.

PERHAPS PAST TEACHING HAS FAILED

At other times-in almost every case it is the mother that finds the time to look after her boy-the parent herself begins to tell me the things that she has done which she ought not to have done, and the things which she has left undone that she ought to have done. She had a tutor, perhaps, to whom the boy was devoted, and she thought the boy was doing well; but she finds that the tutor, who was a young college boy, spent more of his time taking the boy to the zoo and playing with his fascinating mechanical toys than he spent in teaching him to read and write and cipher. She was deceived by the man's charming personality and the boy's love for him. Or perhaps she sent the boy to the same school that his sister went to, and took it for granted that it would be all right, when as a matter of fact the school was run by two dear old maiden ladies who had a way with girls and who could not understand a lively boy at all. The boy walked all over them, of course, and learned nothing but the habit of scattering his forces. In cases like these it is only necessary politely to admit the rightness of the parent's self-criticism, and work out certain definite plans for making the boy feel that he has come into another world, where real responsibilities are thrust upon him, and where he must subordinate his individual will to the necessities of the community in which he finds himself.

Sometimes the fault is hardly chargeable to negligence or oversight. It may be due to a purely mechanical thing, such as a change of schools due to a change in residence. Wherever such a change occurs the boy finds himself facing the difficulty of differences in the courses of study, both as to ground covered and methods of teaching. The school to which he goes is also faced with a dilemma. Shall it put him where his actual scholastic achievements naturally place him? Or shall it broadmindedly put him where his mental ability fits him to go on working? The more progressive schools do the latter in most cases.

But sometimes both school and parent fail in a duty just here. The boy ought to be provided with a tutor who really knows his business, who will delve intelligently into the boy's mind, observe his mental processes, and find out how much of a breach the change of schools has made in the boy's scholastic life, and how much needs to be made up. Even the best school cannot do this adequately if the breach is of any account. The teachers have a great many boys to watch over all the time, and it is only too natural to take the past for granted. Therefore a tutor should be hired to overhaul the boy's intellectual machinery. He should be a man of sympathy and experience, and for such a man the parent must pay a good price. But only such a man can do the right thing by the boy.

This overhauling of the boy's mental machinery is a very illuminating process; and every teacher should try to do some of it each year, for it will help him with other boys to anticipate difficulties. I remember being immensely surprised to discover that a boy whom I was tutoring for sixth-grade work in frac tions could not do long division and had never heard of short division. But still greater was my surprise to find that there were some twenty or thirty addition combinations that he could not remember; 8+6 meant nothing to him until he had counted on his fingers; and, having counted on his fingers once, he was no better off for the next time, but had to do it over again. It was the same with his tables of multiplication. This meant that he could not subtract or divide either, because the same tables are involved. After the boy had learned his tables he became a good mathematician. Another boy could not read 3.56.2. The sign of division indicated division to him, but did not tell him which number should be put into the other number. He followed the principle of dividing the larger by the smaller, which worked with whole numbers practically all the time, but which was hopeless with decimals. Cases like this could be multiplied endlessly.

We teachers are constantly discovering too late by chance the things that

HE American circus is the most

T

imposing show in the world. I have never seen sucha large arena, such an enormous troop of actors, and a whole herd of so many different kinds of animals together. It reminds one of the ark of Noah. And lights! Every color of the rainbow. When I saw it all for the first time, I was dazzled, overwhelmed, humbled. I felt like a mouse in a cathedral.

When I return to Russia and tell that there are sometimes five big rings in your circus, that the performance is going on in every one of them at the same time, people will think it tourist lies. If I try to deal with statistics and say on my lecture tours how many hundreds of actors take part in one performance, I will lose the confidence

of my audience; and how shall I dare to tell about the dozens of elephants, all performing their tricks together? Nobody would believe me save children.

But I should not tell it to our children. There has been always among them an epidemic of running to America (the consequences of the badly translated Fenimore Cooper). Certainly that epidemic would grow after they heard all the miracles which I have seen in the American circus. No, I mustn't demoralize the childhood of my country.

You see now how lonely is the poor greenhorn in America, with her soul full of wonderful impressions and no hope of sharing them with her fellowcountrymen. Russia is far away and full of doubters; perhaps Americans will listen to me sympathetically.

I adored your circus for the first half of an hour; then I became restless; then I felt unhappy and depressed. I had to watch a sweet young girl, who held a rope in her teeth, with two huge athletes hanging on the end of it; the gang of wild horsemen from Texas; the dancing crowd of multicolored girls; monkeys and policemen, clowns and Japanese jugglers-all together! And two dozens of grown up elephants in addition to all that! No, that was too much for my Slavic

nerves.

The circus manager in America must have a definite purpose to dazzle you, to blind you, to deafen you, and make you as helpless as possible. Did he ever think about the psychology of an ordinary human being? Did he not know that a person may concentrate his attention on only one performance at a time? It is a heavy crime against psychologythese five rings I have seen in the New York circus.

Especially harmful it must be for children; their tender brains are shaken pitilessly within a few hours when they try to watch attentively this dazzling show. It is very tiresome for grown-up people also. Every one leaves the circus with a heavy head. It is true that all the disagreeable thoughts leave you after that thundering diversion, but the psychological price of it is too high.

circus. And not only because it da you, but because it wrecks your nerve There are features in it which ought be prohibited; for instance, the exhi tion of human freaks and monster. is inhumane.

An ugly and savage-looking wo of the Bushman tribe dancing shim A monkey and a colored man in same cage. The man with three le The "fattest woman in the world" ting next to the smallest one-a lone dwarf, who must feel so loneso among normal people, who stare at be smilingly as if she had no soul, no fe ings, no craving for love, motherbo and other forms of happiness da her forever. And-half of a woman creature without legs and hands! A a blue giant, a man with skin colu by some disease or, maybe, poison. H can any one enjoy a display of s human misery any one with a science and compassion for huma fering?

The cage with the Bushman is to a giraffe. The platform with th limbless woman next to the giantes And the poor "fattest woman in world," with her tag, "fat, fair, a frivolous," was side by side with a noceros as if provoking the offending comparison. Have we the right to al humanity civilized after that?

And the idea-to take children look at all that! Children lang gayly into the face of the limbless man, who will never have children d her own. I call it supreme cruelty. It ought to be prohibited.

There are other less startling but less painful things in the circus. Th ridiculous five-ring system breeds pr fessional jealousies. The circus work ers constantly try to over-jump and over-cry each other, to turn the atten tion of the restless audience to their tricks and jokes. It isn't easy when you work in such a crowd.

66

Your circus-goers don't notice that; they become accustomed." "If you beat a rabbit it will eat even mustard," said casually one of our Russian humorists; it will become accustomed to it."

66

"mustard" in big doses. Noisy, dazzling shows become a necessity for them. And the worst of them is your

roar

the greatest addition to the salary of a gymnast. They are starving forever as real actors for the fame of which

are often robbed by dogs or isn't fair. Each of the skillful ers of the arena would receive his of the applause and interest the nce much more if he was for ile the center of the show. But it be done in the present chaotic Frmance.

hat the American circus lacks is unity. Its performances are so stematized! The artists are pred separately, like samples in a nan's suit-case. Here is a piece of nderful equilibristic skill," and to it "the wildest cowboy scene," fairy on the cobweb," "miraculous patic cycle-riding" and "the Ausin axman." Your mind must just from one amazing thing to an; the ever-changing and ever-interg impressions neutralize one anand leave your brain blank. The gers of the circus think that one cle following another, with an interof a minute, will give you lots of 1. They are quite ignorant of psygy. They forget that while a few "chosen dishes make a good dinner, zen of them produce acute indiges

1

ne circus diet is the most indigestifall. This is the reason that after leave the circus you don't visit it in until the next year. Only people very low intelligence or those who in love with some one in the cast go be this stupefying show frequently. might not be so. The circus might

the same audience night after it, as the best plays do. There! be such a prospect would attract attention of some circus manager to reformer's complaint.

have heard that half of the whole ense is to bill the circus. Then the ense troupe of actors and animals

have to travel from State to State, because the circus would not be filled day after day in the same city. The managers admit that the circus exhausts the interest of the audience in a few weeks. Now, if the circus performance was a shadow more intelligent, more organized, it would enable the circus to stay in a city for the whole year. Here are practical suggestions: why not stage in the circus a specially written circus play in which all the skill of the gymnasts, tight-rope walkers, clowns, and bareback riders would take an essential part I mean essential to the plot? Just think how much more interesting would be the skillful rope climbers if they used their skill for rescuing a heroine in danger, instead of sliding aimlessly up and down the rope. The animals also should have their definite place in the plot. Here is an illustration: I have seen in Russia a circus play for children in which a princess receives a wedding-cake. Her courtier

Circus plays will be successful not only for juvenile audiences. I believe that with historical dramas staged in it the circus may become the school of history and lifehistory and life-a national institution, a temple of great art, as it was in ancient times, instead of being just a casual entertainment. It may thrill not only our senses but our souls.

Even under present conditions of "art for profit" the circus might be changed for the better if it adopted plays. A similar thing was done at the Hippodrome. Just a slight resemblance of a play, with a tiny plot superficially uniting the flock of pretty chorus girls, and the Hippodrome has been full for months. The circus might do the same thing, instead of giving to the audience the fragments of art, the so-called "circus numbers." It would certainly cost much less to order now and then a good circus play than to wander over the country exploiting the same pack of old tricks under the present "five-ring system."

I think many a good dramatist would gladly write a play unifying the circus forces. Such an unusual work, such a rare opportunity! To quench the individual envies, to make each artist work for the success of the whole performance instead of worrying that a dancing dog may overshadow him. Every circus artist would get his important part in the play, every gymnast and every horse-rider would be the center of attention at least once in a while. They would have parts, as in a real theater, not numbers like the freaks of nature in a museum.

These would be the immediate results of the reform: greater profit for

"THE VERY SMELL OF THE MENAGERIE EXCITES US. DOGS, HORSES, ELEPHANTS -EVERY FORM OF ENERGY IN FLESH THAT ENLIVENS OUR LITTLE EARTH-THIS

SEEMS MORE INTERESTING THAN THE DISPLAY OF THE MECHANICAL ENERGY OF THE MOST POWERFUL AND COMPLICATED

MOTORS"