eople mean who speak of the
"revolt of the ego."

CHAPTER X

BEEFSTEAK

I am just now quite in the mood to join the band; I mean the
vocational-education band. The excitement has carried me off my
feet. I can't endure the looks of suspicion or pity that I see on
the faces of my colleagues. They stare at me as if I were wearing a
tie or a hat or a coat that is a bit below standard. I want to seem,
if not be, modern and up-to-date, and not odd and peculiar. So I
shall join the band. I am not caring much whether I beat the drum,
carry the flag, or lead the trick-bear. I may even ride in the
gaudily painted wagon behind a spotted pony and call out in raucous
tones to all and sundry to hurry around to the main tent to get their
education before the rush. In times past, when these vocational
folks have piped unto me I have not danced; but I now see the error
of my ways and shall proceed at once to take dancing lessons. When
these folks lead in the millennium I want to be sitting well up in
front; and when they get the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow I
want to participate in the distribution. I do hope, though, that I
may not exhaust my resources on the band and have none left for the
boys and girls. I hope I may not imitate Mark Twain's steamboat that
stopped dead still when the whistle blew, because blowing the whistle
required all the steam.

I suspect that, like the Irishman, I shall have to wear my new boots
awhile before I can get them on, for this new role is certain to
entail many changes in my plans and in my ways of doing things. I
can see that it will be a wrench for me to think of the boys and
girls as pedagogical specimens and not persons. I have contracted
the habit of thinking of them as persons, and it will not be easy to
come to thinking of them as mere objects to practise on. The folks
in the hospital speak of their patients as "cases," but I'd rather
keep aloof from the hospital plan in my schoolmastering. But, being
a member of the band, I suppose that I'll feel it my duty to conform
and do my utmost to help prove that our cult has discovered the great
and universal panacea, the balm in Gilead.

As a member of the band, in good and regular standing, I shall find
myself saying that the school should have the boys and girls pursue
such studies as will fit them for their life-work. This has a
pleasing sound. Now, if I can only find out, somehow, what the
life-work of each o