e spring by which the trap works before they will touch the bait. It
is a pity to set traps, because it destroys confidence, and children's
confidence in such matters as lessons is hard to win.

The question of aids to study by stimulants is a difficult one. On the
one hand it seems to some educators a fundamental law that reward should
follow right-doing and effort, and so no doubt it is; but the reward
within one's own mind and soul is one thing and the calf-bound book is
another--scarcely even a symbol of the first, because they are not
always obtained by the same students. This is a fruitful subject for
discourse or reflection at distributions of prizes. Those who are behind
the scenes know that the race is not to the swift nor the battle to the
strong, and the children know it themselves, and prize-winners often
become the object of the "word in season," pointing out how rarely they
will be found to distinguish themselves in after life; while the steady
advance of the plodding and slow mind is dwelt upon, and those who have
failed through idleness drink up the encouragement which was not
intended for them, and feel that they are the hope of the future because
they have won no prizes. It is difficult on those occasions to make the
conflicting conclusions clear to everybody.

Yet the system of prize distributions is time honoured and traditional,
and every country is not yet so disinterested in study as to be able to
do without it; under its sway a great deal of honest effort is put out,
and the taste of success which is the great stimulant of youth is first
experienced.

There is also the system of certificates, which has the advantage of
being open to many instead of to one. It is likewise a less material
testimonial, approaching more nearly to the merited word of approval
which is in itself the highest human reward, and the one nearest to the
heart of things, because it is the one which belongs to home. For if the
home authorities interest themselves in lessons at all, their grown-up
standard and the paramount weight of their opinion gives to one word of
their praise a dignity and worth which goes beyond all prizes. Beyond
this there is no natural satisfaction to equal the inner consciousness
of having done one's best, a very intimate prize distribution in which
we ourselves make the discourse, and deliver the certificate to
ourselves. This is the culminating point at which educators aim; they
are all agreed tha