tly. But I have witnessed the signal failure of such an appeal to
the honor of the bumpkins of a country school. I was once present at the
examination of such a school, and remarked carefully how the boys
acquitted themselves. After the examination was over, the master
proposed, very absurdly, to let the boys of each class vote the prize
for that particular class. The voting began. A class of about twenty was
called up: I explained to the boys what they were to do. I told them
they were not to vote for the boy they liked best, but were to tell me
faithfully who had done best in the class-lessons. I then asked the
first boy in the line for whom he gave his vote. To my mortification,
instead of voting for a little fellow who had done incomparably best at
the examination, he gave his vote for a big sullen-looking blockhead who
had done conspicuously ill. I asked the next boy, and received the same
answer. So all round the class: all voted for the big sullen-looking
blockhead. One or two did not give their votes quite promptly; and I
could discern a threatening glance cast at them by the big
sullen-looking blockhead, and an ominous clenching of the blockhead's
right fist. I went round the class without remark; and the blockhead
made sure of the prize. Of course this would not do. The blockhead could
not be suffered to get the prize; and it was expedient that he should be
made to remember the occasion on which he had sought to tamper with
justice and right. Addressing the blockhead, amid the dead silence of
the school, I said: "You shall not get the prize, because I can judge
for myself that you don't deserve it. I can see that you are the
stupidest boy in the class; and I have seen reason, during this voting,
to believe that you are the worst. You have tried to bully these boys
into voting for you. Their votes go for nothing; for their voting for
you proves either that they are so stupid as to think you deserve the
prize, or so dishonest as to say they think so when they don't think
so." Then I inducted the blockhead into a seat where I could see him
well, and proceeded to take the votes over again. I explained to the
boys once more what they had to do; and explained that any boy would be
telling a lie who voted the prize unfairly. I also told them that I knew
who deserved the prize, and that they knew it too, and that they had
better vote fairly. Then, instead of saying to each boy, "For whom do
you vote?" I said to each, "T