or granted.  They very wisely chose the latter plan, and the Study Card was constructed and put up, to mark the times of free communication and of silent study.  The card was at first down every half hour for one or two minutes.  The scholars afterward thinking that their intellectual habits would be improved and the welfare of the school promoted by their having a longer time for uninterrupted study, of their own accord, without any influence from me, proposed that the card should be down only once an hour.  This plan was adopted by them by vote.  I wish it to be understood that it was not my plan, but theirs; and that I am at any time willing to have the Study Card down once in half an hour, whenever a majority of the scholars, voting by ballot, desire it.

You will find that this system of having a distinct time for whispering, when all may whisper freely, all communication being entirely excluded at other times, will at first give you some trouble.  It will be hard for you, if you are not accustomed to it, to learn conscientiously and faithfully to comply.  Besides, at first you will often need some little information or desire to ask for an article which you might obtain in a moment, but which you can not innocently ask for till the card is down, and this might keep you waiting an hour.  You will, however, after a few such instances, soon learn to make your preparations beforehand, and if you are a girl of enlarged views and elevated feelings, you will good-humoredly acquiesce in suffering a little inconvenience yourself for the sake of helping to preserve those distinct and well defined lines by which all boundaries must be marked in a large establishment, if order and system are to be preserved at all.

Though at first you may experience a little inconvenience, you will soon take pleasure in the scientific strictness of the plan.  It will gratify you to observe the profound stillness of the room where a hundred are studying.  You will take pleasure in observing the sudden transition from the silence of study hours to the joyful sounds and the animating activity of recess when the Study Card goes down; and then when it rises again at the close of the recess, you will be gratified to observe how suddenly the sounds which have filled the air, and made the room so lively a scene, are hushed into silence by the single and almost inaudible touch of that little bell.  You will take pleasure in this; for young and old always take pleasure in the strict and rigid operation of system rather than in laxity and disorder.  I am convinced, also, that the scholars do like the operation of this plan, for I do not have to make any efforts to sustain it.  With the exception that occasionally, usually not oftener than once in several months, I allude to the subject, and that chiefly on account of a few careless and unfaithful individuals, I have little to say or to do to maintain the authority of the Study Card.  Most of the scholars obey it of their own accord, implicitly and cordially.  And I believe they consider this faithful monitor not only one of the most useful, but one of the most agreeable friends they have.  We should not only regret its services, but miss its company if it should be taken away.