he astonishment of the friend the girl who
had looked "lazy and logy," lying flat on her back during the
rest-time, was the most active of the players, and really saved the
game.

When the game was finished the woman said to her friend with surprise
in her voice: "How did you see through that, and understand what that
girl was aiming for?"

The answer was: "Well, I know the girl, and both she and I have read
Kipling's 'The Maltese Cat.' Don't you remember how the best polo
ponies in that story, when they were off duty, hung their heads and
actually made themselves looked fagged, in order to be fresher when the
time came to play? And how 'The Maltese Cat' scouted the silly ponies
who held their heads up and kicked and looked alert while they waited?
And don't you remember the result?"

"No, I never read the story, but I have certainly seen your point prove
itself to-day. I shall read it at once. Meanwhile, I want to speak to
that clever girl who could catch a point like that and use it."

"Take care, please, that you do not mention it to her at all," said the
friend. "You will draw her attention back to herself and likely as not
make her lose the next game. Points like that have got to be worked on
without self-consciousness, not talked about."

And so the women told the child they were glad that her side won the
game and never mentioned her own part in it at all. After all she had
only found the law that the more passive you can be when it is time to
rest, the more alert you are and the more powerful in activity. The
polo pony knew it as a matter of course. We humans have to discover it.

Let us, just for the interest of it, follow that same basket-ball
player a little more closely. Was she well developed and evenly trained
in her muscles? Yes, very. Did she go to gymnasium, or did she scorn
it? She went, twice a week regularly, and had good fun there; but there
was just this contrast between her and most of the girls in the class:
Jane, as we will call her, went to gymnasium as a means to an end. She
found that she got an even development there which enabled her to walk
better, to play better, and to work better. In gymnasium she laid her
muscular foundation on which to build all the good, active work of her
life. The gymnasium she went to, however, was managed in an unusual way
except for the chest weights, which always "opened the ball," the
members of the class never knew what work they were to do. Their minds