a junior inspector called to-day. his subject was handwriting, and he had theories on the subject. so have i. we had an interesting talk.

his view is that handwriting is a practical science; hence we must teach a child to write in such a way as to carry off the job he applies for when he is fourteen.

my view is that handwriting is an art, like sketching. my view is the better, for it includes his. i am a superior penman to him, and in a contest i could easily beat him. i really failed to see what he was worrying his head about. what does the style matter. it is the art that one puts into a style that makes writing good. i can teach the average bairn to write well in two hours; it is simply a matter of writing slowly. i like the old-schoolmaster hand, the round easy writing with its thick downstrokes and thin upstrokes. i like to see the m's with the joinings in the middle. the times copy-book is the ideal[pg 46] one—to me. but why write down any more. the topic isn't worth the ink wasted.

* * *

i picked up a copy of a popular educator to-day. much of the stuff seems to be well written, but i cannot help thinking that the words "low ideals" are written over the whole set of volumes. its aim is evidently to enable boys and girls to gain success ... as the world considers success. "study hard," it blares forth, "and you will become a whiteley or a gamage. study if you want wealth and position." what an ideal!

let us have our shorthand classes, our cookery classes, our typewriting classes, but for any sake don't let us call them education. education is thinking; it should deal with great thoughts, with the ?sthetic things in life, with life itself. commerce is the profiteer's god, but it is not mine. i want to teach my bairns how to live; the popular educator wants to teach them how to make a living. there is a distinction between the two ideals.

the scotch education department would seem to have some of the educator's aspirations. it demands gardening, woodwork,[pg 47] cookery; in short, it is aiming at turning out practical men and women.

my objection to men and women is that they are too practical. i used to see a notice in edinburgh: "john brown, practical chimney sweep." i often used to wonder what a theoretical chimney sweep might be, and i often wished i could meet one. my view is that a teacher should turn out theoretical sweeps, railwaymen, ploughmen, servants. heaven knows they will get the practical part knocked into them soon enough.

* * *

i have been experimenting with drawing. i have been a passable black-and-white artist for many years, and the subject fascinates me. i see that drawing is of less importance than taste, and i find that i can get infants who cannot draw a line to make artistic pictures.

i commence with far-away objects—a clump of trees on the horizon. the child takes a bb pencil and blocks in the mass of trees. the result is a better picture than the calendar prints the bairns see at home.

gradually i take nearer objects, and at length i reach what is called drawing. i[pg 48] ignore all vases and cubes and ellipses; my model is a school-bag or a cloak. the drawing does not matter very much; but i want to see the shadows stand out.

i find that only a few in a class ever improve in sketching; one is born with the gift.

designing fascinates many bairns. i asked them to design a kirk window on squared paper to-day. some of the attempts were good. i got the boys to finish off with red ink, and then i pasted up the designs on the wall.

i seem to recollect an inspector who told me to give up design a good few years ago. i wouldn't give it up now for anyone. it is a delightful study, and it will bring out an inherent good taste better than any branch of drawing i know. drawing (or rather, sketching) to me means an art, not a means to cultivating observation. it belongs solely to aesthetics. sketching, music, and poetry are surely intended to make a bairn realise the fuller life that must have beauty always with it.

i showed my bairns two sketches of my own to-day ... the tolbooth and the whitehorse close in edinburgh. a few[pg 49] claimed that the whitehorse close was the better, because it left more out. "it leaves something to the imagination," said tom dixon.

* * *

when will some original publisher give us a decent school reader? i have not seen one that is worth using. some of them give excerpts from dickens and fielding and borrow (that horrid bore) and hawthorne (another). i cannot find any interest in these excerpts; they have no beginning and no end. moreover, a bairn does like the dramatic; prosiness deadens its wee soul at once.

i want to see a reader especially written for bairns. i want to see many complete stories, filled with bright dialogue. every yarn should commence with dialogue. i always think kindly of the late guy boothby, because he usually began with, "hands up, or i fire!" or a kindred sentence.

i wish i could lay hands on a century reader i used as a boy. it was full of the dramatic. the first story was one about the burning of moscow, then came the tale of captain dodds and the pirate (from[pg 50] reade's novel, hard cash, i admit. an excerpt need not be uninteresting), then a long passage from the deerslayer ... with a picture of indians throwing tomahawks at the hero. i loved that book.

i think that dramatic reading should precede prosy reading. it is life that a child wants, not prosy descriptions of sunsets and travels; life, and romance.

i have scrapped my readers; i don't use them even for spelling. i do not teach spelling; the teaching of it does not fit into my scheme of education.

teaching depends on logic. now spelling throws logic to the winds. i tell a child that "cough" is "coff," and logic leads him to suppose that rough is "roff" and "through" is "throff." if i tell him that spelling is important because it shows whence a word is derived, i am bound in honesty to tell him that a matinee is not a "morning performance," that manufactured goods are not "made by hand." hence i leave spelling alone.

at school i "learned" spelling, and i could not spell a word until i commenced to read much. spelling is of the eye mainly.[pg 51] every boy can spell "truly" and "obliged" when he leaves school, but ten years later he will probably write "truely" and "oblidged." why? i think that the explanation lies in the fact that he does not read as a growing youth. anyway, dictionaries are cheap.

* * *

to-night i sat down on a desk and lit my pipe. margaret steel and lizzie buchan were tidying up the room. margaret looked at me thoughtfully for a second.

"please, sir, why do you smoke?" she said.

"i really don't know, margaret," i said. "bad habit, i suppose ... just like writing notes to boys."

she suddenly became feverishly anxious to pick up the stray papers.

"i wonder," i mused, "whether they do it in the same old way. how do they do it, margaret?" she dived after a piece of paper.

"i used to write them myself," i said. margaret looked up quickly.

"you!" she gasped.

"i am not so old," i said hastily.

[pg 52]

"please, sir, i didn't mean that," she explained in confusion.

"you did, you wee bissom," i chuckled.

"please, sir," she said awkwardly, "why—why are you not—not-m-married?" i rose and took up my hat.

"i once kissed a girl behind the school door, margaret," i said absently. she did not understand ... and when i come to think of it i am not surprised.

* * *

to-day was prize-giving day. old mr. simpson made a speech.

"boys," he said, "study hard and you'll maybe be a minister like mr. gordon there." he paused. "or," he continued, "if you don't manage that, you may become a teacher like mr. neill here."

otherwise the affair was very pathetic: the medallist, a girl, had already left school and was hired as a servant on a farm. and old mr. simpson did not know it; i thought it better not to tell the kindly soul. he spoke earnestly on success in life.

i hate prizes. to-day, violet brown and margaret steel, usually the best of friends, are looking daggers at each other. [pg 53]to-morrow i shall read them the story of the judgment of paris. and what rubbish these books are! there isn't a decent piece of literature in the bunch—matty's present, the girl who came to school. jerusalem!