He wrote the name; but he did no more.  When the pencil dropped to the floor he would not touch it again.  Nothing could have induced him to do so.  He would have fought a duel sooner than have picked it up.  His real self, so weak and so nearly dead, shrank back, exhausted by its single effort, and his bad nature took control of him again.

But Mr. Bright finished the work at the board, and then went up the aisle.  He stooped and picked up the pencil, took the slip from the desk, with a courteous “Thank you,” and moved on to his own table.  He had tallied one point.

I wonder if he did this all by himself, or if there was another hand behind it all.  Certain it is this man did not plan all this campaign that ended so successfully.  He had not counted on the boy’s refusing to write his name.  It was like a flash, that it came to him to answer “Dodd’s” refusal as he did.  Nor did he really intend to put the pencil into the boy’s hand when he offered it to him.  But, somehow, he did just that, and it was the saving fact in the case.  Had he laid the pencil on the table, “Dodd” would never have picked it up.  Much less would he have reached for it, or taken it from Mr. Bright’s hand.  But, with the pencil in his hand, he wrote.

We say Mr. Bright did as he did “instinctively.”  That may be a good word for it.  But I wonder if such “instinct” as this doesn’t reach away over to the other side, even into the realm of inspiration, whose fountain head is the spirit of the great “I am.”

Be this as it may, though, Mr. Bright had won.  He was thankful for his victory—­thankful, but not proud.  Perhaps this is another thing that goes to show that there was help from without that made for him in the fight.

“Dodd” was disappointed that Mr. Bright did not compliment him on his writing, for he had written very well and knew that he had.  But this, Mr. Bright took as a matter of course, and gave no word of commendation for it.  It was not time for that yet.  “Dodd’s” starved real self, if fed with what might once have been wholesome food for it, would have been choked, perhaps to death, by a bit of praise, just then, and a wholesome sense of merit would have been changed into a detestable conceit.

A teacher has to be so careful about these things.

Mr. Bright seated himself at the table, transferred the name to his register, then took another bit of paper and began writing on it, remarking as he did so: 

“You will please occupy the seat in front of you this afternoon, and hereafter.  I have written a list of the books you will need,” he added, picking up the strip he had just been writing on, “and you will please procure them this afternoon.  You will recite with the entering class in this room, according to the programme that is on the board behind my desk.”

But “Dodd” did not move a muscle while Mr. Bright spoke.  He did not look up, even when reference was made to the programme.  He made no response when assigned his seat, or to his place in school.  He sulked and frowned and stood out against everything, and was sullen and malicious to the last degree.