THE COUNTRY SCHOOL 179 



their call, and realize the need of developing their own deepest life. 

 And in this it is only needed that they begin low enough and gradually 

 rise to the mastery of their mission. In this the schools are indispen- 

 sable. But to do its legitimate work the school must be manned with 

 teachers who feel a divine call to service. That, in turn, calls for a 

 school board with imagination and vision. Here the dearth is deep. 

 The rural school is in poor condition to render much service, while the 

 service demanded is great. The task of the teacher is to open new 

 visions, to arouse deeper energies in the pupils, and through them to 

 lift the ideals of the community, and to make the people hear the call 

 of the times. The men must be shown how much possible energy, of a 

 high order, right within their own district limits, is lost to the com- 

 munity and to the world because the boys and girls are not made to 

 realize the value of more and better training, or kept in school long 

 enough to find themselves. 



This school is suffering sadly from social heredity. Thirty years ago 

 I taught the winter school in a rural district down by the sea. It was 

 in the proverbial red schoolhouse, in the center of the district, being a 

 mile from the nearest inhabitant, in a grove of spruces through which 

 the sunlight, save in little streams and eddies, never came, and directly 

 opposite the village burying ground. A gloomier spot, or one less fit 

 for a schoolhouse, it would be difficult to imagine. At the opening 

 there were sixty-five pupils, ranging in ages from four years up to 

 twenty-five. There were about as many classes, from the infant class 

 learning their letters to the big boys studying navigation. The work 

 went on according to the old customs and therefore was voted right. It 

 could not have been very efficient. Three years ago I visited that school 

 again. The schoolhouse, still red, stood in the old grove of spruces, 

 sunless and damp, still fronted the north pole, the graveyard was still 

 across the road, and not yet any sign of playground in sight. Some 

 things had changed. They were having three terms of school instead 

 of two, and all were taught by a woman. The pupils would not average 

 as old as mine, emphasizing the growing tendency to drop out early, and 

 there was no real attempt at grading, least of all any effort to put the 

 school on a basis where it could better serve its own peculiar community. 

 The lads, who, through the season, hauled lobster traps and seined 

 mackerel, or cut stone in the great island quarries, were learning nothing 

 about the sea, or the fish, or the stone formation of the island, albeit 

 many of them had already chosen one of those lines of work for a life 

 calling. The old class in navigation had dropped out. Twenty-seven 

 years had marked few changes and no real advance. 



And this is not an extreme case, either. Quite every rural school is 

 failing in plan and purpose to exploit the vital needs of the community. 

 I have examined a great many rural schools, making careful note of the 



