“I have observed, too, that boys very generally prefer to see the strict companies, but perhaps they would prefer to belong to the lax ones.”

“No, sir;” “No, sir,” say the boys.

“Suppose you all had your choice either to belong to a company like the first one I described, where the captain was strict in all his requirements, or to one like the latter, where you could do pretty much as you pleased, which should you prefer?”

Unless I am entirely mistaken in my idea of the inclinations of boys, it would be very difficult to get a single honest expression of preference for the latter.  They would say with one voice,

“The first.”

“I suppose it would be so.  You would be put to some inconvenience by the strict commands of the captain, but then you would be more than paid by the beauty of regularity and order which you would all witness.  There is nothing so pleasant as regularity, and nobody likes regularity more than boys do.  To show this, I should like to have you now form a line as exact as you can.”

After some unnecessary shoving and pushing, increased by the disorderly conduct of a few bad boys, a line is formed.  Most of the class are pleased with the experiment, and the teacher takes no notice of the few exceptions.  The time to attend to them will come by-and-by.

“Hands down.”  The boys obey.

“Shoulders back.”

“There; there is a very perfect line.”

“Do you stand easily in that position?”

“Yes, sir.”

“I believe your position is the military one now, pretty nearly; and military men study the postures of the human body for the sake of finding the one most easy; for they wish to preserve as much as possible of the soldiers’ strength for the time of battle.  I should like to try the experiment of your standing thus at the next lesson.  It is a very great improvement upon your common mode.  Are you willing to do it?”

“Yes, sir,” say the boys.

“You will get tired, I have no doubt; for the military position, though most convenient and easy in the end, is not to be learned and fixed in practice without effort.  In fact, I do not expect you will succeed the first day very well.  You will probably become restless and uneasy before the end of the lesson, especially the smaller boys.  I must excuse it, I suppose, if you do, as it will be the first time.”

By such methods as these the teacher will certainly secure a majority in favor of all his plans.  But perhaps some experienced teacher, who knows from his own repeated difficulties with bad boys what sort of spirits the teacher of district schools has sometimes to deal with, may ask, as he reads this,

“Do you expect that such a method as this will succeed in keeping your school in order?  Why there are boys in almost every school whom you would no more coax into obedience and order in this way than you would persuade the northeast wind to change its course by reasoning.”