r not far from border-line. F. H. has always had the best
of school advantages and has been promoted to the seventh grade.
Is really about equal to fifth-grade work. Fairly rapid and
accurate in number combinations, but cannot solve arithmetical
problems which require any reasoning. Reads with reasonable
fluency, but with little understanding. Appears exceedingly
good-natured, but was once suspended from school for hurling
bricks at a fellow pupil. Played a "joke" on another pupil by
fastening a dangerous, sharp-pointed, steel paper-file in the
pupil's seat for him to sit down on. He is cruel, stubborn, and
plays truant, but is fairly industrious when he gets a job as
errand or delivery boy. Discharged once for taking money.

F. H. is generally called "queer," but is not ordinarily thought
of as feeble-minded. His deficiency is real, however, and it is
altogether doubtful whether he will be able to make a living and
to keep out of trouble, though he is now (at age 20) employed as
messenger boy for the Western Union at $30 per month. This is
considerably less than pick-and-shovel men get in the community
where he lives. Delinquents and criminals often belong to this
level of intelligence.

_W. C. Boy, age 16-8; mental age 12; I Q 75 (disregarding age
above 16 years)._ Father a college professor. All the other
children in the family of unusually superior intelligence. When
tested (four years ago) was trying to do seventh-grade work, but
with little success. Wanted to leave school and learn farming,
but father insisted on his getting the usual grammar-school and
high-school education. Made $25 one summer by raising vegetables
on a vacant lot. In the four years since the test was made he
has managed to get into high school. Teachers say that in spite
of his best efforts he learns next to nothing, and they regard
him as hopelessly dull. Is docile, lacks all aggressiveness,
looks stupid, and has head circumference an inch below normal.

Here is a most pitiful case of the overstimulated backward child
in a superior family. Instead of nagging at the boy and urging
him on to attempt things which are impossible to his inferior
intelligence, his parents should take him out of school and put
him at some kind of work which he could do. If the boy had been
the son of a common laborer