dren. Thus, instead of
principals, teachers, and physicians taking the place of mothers (which
they nowhere have succeeded in doing), they do succeed in harnessing
mothers to the school programme. It may take two, three, or ten visits
to get a particular mother to do the necessary thing for her child, but
when once convinced and once inspired to do that thing, she will go on
day in and day out doing the right thing for that child and for all
others in her home. It may take a year to convert a police magistrate
whose sympathy for delinquent parents and truant children is an active
promoter of disorder; but a magistrate convinced, efficient, and
interested is worth a hundred volunteer visitors. To get things done in
this way for a hundred thousand children costs less in time and money
than to do the necessary things for one thousand children.

CHAPTER XVIII

COOePERATION WITH DISPENSARIES AND CHILD-SAVING AGENCIES

Scientists agree that the human brain is superior to the animal brain,
not because it is heavier, but because it is finer and better supplied
with nerves. As one writer has said, the human brain is better "wired,"
has better organized "centrals." A poor system of centrals will spoil a
telephone service, no matter how many wires it provides. An independent
wire is of little use, because it will not reach the person desired at
the other end. The ideal system is that which almost instantly connects
two persons, no matter how far away or how many other people are
talking at the same time on other wires.

The school that tries to do everything for its pupils without using
other existing agencies for helping children[10] will be like the man
who refuses to connect his telephone with a central switch board, or
like a bank that will not use the central clearing house. As one
telephone center can enable scores of people to talk at once, and as
one clearing house can make one check pay fifty debts, so hospital and
relief agencies enable a teacher who employs "central" to help several
times as many children as she alone can help.

[Illustration: ADEQUATE RELIEF RECOGNIZES THE FAMILY AS THE
UNIT]

It seems easier for a teacher to give twenty-five cents to a child in
distress than to see that the cause of the misery is removed. In New
York City there are over five hundred school principals, under them are
over fifteen thousand teachers, and the average attendance of children
is about six hundred thous