and boys running
races, and trying how far they could throw a big heavy hammer and a big
iron ball. Isaac didn't quite understand what they were doing, but they
were not trying to hit any one, and not trying to catch one another, and
there was no thought at all of a fight. The boy who ran fastest got a
prize, the boy who threw the hammer farthest got a prize. And there were
a great many other prizes for jumping and all kinds of things. And," she
continued, redoubling the concentration in her eyes, "did Isaac tell you
how those boys were dressed?"

A gasp and a shiver swept through Room 18.

"Well, if he didn't, I will. They wore the very lightest clothes they
could get. They wanted to be free and cool. They couldn't run fast or
jump far with all their heavy every-day clothes on. Exercise makes
people very warm, you know. It was a great help to those boys to be
dressed in cool white clothes.

"I was at the games," she continued, "as I was telling some of the boys
yesterday afternoon, and I enjoyed them ever so much. I was just wishing
that you were all there too. The girls could have sat with me, and the
boys could have run in the ring. I've watched you all playing in the
yard, and I know what good runners some of you are. And then when they
gave you prizes we, the girls and I, would have waved our flags and
cheered just like the ladies Isaac told you about. Now wouldn't that be
grand?" she cried, and the First Readers vociferously agreed with her,
though Yetta Aaronsohn, the hypochondriacal, was still of the opinion
that "wind on the legs ain't healthy for nobody."

Cold indeed would be the heart of any masculine First Reader who could
see, unmoved, the picture conjured up of Teacher's words. They were well
accustomed to impromptu races, run on a course all thick beset with
push-carts, ash cans, and humanity. Other tests of physical strength,
with the exception by an occasional hand-to-hand conflict, neither
determined, scientific, nor conclusive, were practically unknown. But to
run on a prepared course surrounded by a stationary and admiring
audience, of which Miss Bailey and the feminine First Readers formed an
important part, was quite a different thing. Then, too, "prizes" was an
alluring word. Teacher had shown it to mean articles of price and
great attractiveness. The "clean-hands-for-a-week" prize, won by
Sadie Gonorowsky, with Isidore Applebaum as a close second, had
been a little clasp pin of the American