at such a
juncture an expression of fixed and pleasant attention upon every
countenance in school. All will be intent, all will be interested. Boys
love order, and system, and acting in concert, and they will obey with
great alacrity such commands as these if they are good-humoredly, though
decidedly expressed.

The teacher observed in one part of the room a hand raised, indicating
that the boy wished to speak to him. He gave him liberty by pronouncing
his name.

"I have no pencil," said the boy.

A dozen hands all around him were immediately seen fumbling in pockets
and desks, and in a few minutes several pencils were reached out for his
acceptance.

The boy looked at the pencils and then at the teacher; he did not
exactly know whether he was to take one or not.

"All those boys," said the teacher, pleasantly, "who have taken out
pencils, may rise.

"Have these boys done right or wrong?"

"Right;" "Wrong;" "Right," answered their companions, variously.

"Their motive was to help their class-mate out of his difficulties; that
is a good feeling, certainly."

"Yes, sir, right;" "Right."

"But I thought you promised me a moment ago," replied the teacher, "not
to do any thing unless I commanded it. Did I ask for pencils?"

A pause.

"I do not blame these boys at all in this case; still, it is better to
adhere rigidly to the principle of _exact obedience _ when numbers are
acting together. I thank them, therefore, for being so ready to assist
a companion, but they must put their pencils away, as they were taken
out without orders."

Now such a dialogue as this, if the teacher speaks in a good-humored,
though decided manner, would be universally well received in any school.
Whenever strictness of discipline is unpopular, it is rendered so simply
by the ill-humored and ill-judged means by which it is attempted to be
introduced. But all children will love strict discipline if it is
pleasantly, though firmly maintained. It is a great, though very
prevalent mistake, to imagine that boys and girls like a lax and
inefficient government, and dislike the pressure of steady control. What
they dislike is sour looks and irritating language, and they therefore
very naturally dislike every thing introduced or sustained by means of
them. If, however, exactness and precision in all the operations of a
class and of the school are introduced and enforced in the proper
manner, that is, by a firm, but mild and good-humored au