thus giving more time for each study." Now by concentrating the work upon a few studies, the pupils come to have a more extended and consequently a more practical knowledge of the branches pursued

And thus in general does the science teacher of to-day conduct his classes. Call the process what you may, a method or no method at all. It certainly is not mere routine work which the word "Method" too frequently signifies. It stands as far opposed to routine work and "Grind Methods" as night does to day. And look at the results obtained! Compare them with that science teaching wherein the teacher does all the doing, all the originating, four-fifths of the seeing, nineteen twentieths of the thinking and about thirty-ninefortieths of the talking! With the latter it is all TEACHER, with the former it is PUPIL, first and last and all the time.

TEACHING ENGLISH LITERATURE.

ANNA C. BRACKETT.

About thirty years ago English Literature began to take a definite place among the studies of our secondary schools, It is true that Milton's Paradise Lost had been used before this time as material for parsing, and lines in it were committed to memory or copied as punishment for offences or omissions of duty, but the most persistent Dryasdust can hardly have the face to maintain that such uses of the great epic constituted a study of literature. The first definite work in Literature in our schools was along the line of biography. We used compendiums, from which we learned faithfully the dates. of births and deaths of all our authors, those two events being the only two probably in their lives for which they had no responsibility. We then struggled to remember whether they went to Oxford or Cambridge or nowhere. We learned lists of their works, and committed to memory somebody's criticism upon their writings. Thus fully prepared, we passed the examination with high honors, astonishing the audiences who gathered to hear us recite, by our "thorough and comprehensive knowledge." When these compendiums were very excellent, they contained scrappy selections from some of the works of the authors. So we went "through English literature."

This went on for a while, till some one suggested that possibly what we had been studying was not Literature at all, and then by degrees the schools swung over to what may be called the analytical stage. Dates and universities were dropped and a class was given, say Scott's Lady of the Lake as a text book. They read it aloud and to themselves. They read it right side up and upside down. They hunted out all the examples of metaphor and metonymy and looked up derivations. They counted the number of syllables in lines, and marked the accent. They drew a map of the region referred to and located every place, and they spent three months or more on this poem. This certainly had the appearance of thoroughness, but it was not studying English Literature in any very wide sense, or gaining much taste for it. These students also passed examinations with marked success. They recited passage after passage, and illustrated by maps, etc., in a way that was really astonishing. I myself once heard a class who had been studying Gray's Elegy, examined in one of the large schools of Boston, in this wise: The committee were requested by the master to mention some word, any word in any part of the poem. When this had been done, the first boy at once recited the whole stanza in which that word occurred, and so on with another word, another boy and another stanza. The excellence of the work in this branch having been thus tested by the committee, a hush of admiration ran through the room, as every boy promptly reeled off the four lines containing his word.

One trouble with the first method was that we got nothing whole. The trouble with the second was that we got one very whole thing of one author, but nothing more. But we were improving, and in course of time the publishers came to our aid and undertook to publish in cheap form the principal works of the principal authors. At last we began to see light, to believe that some good might arise even from publishers' catalogues. Any school study of Literature is a vain thing if it do not cultivate the artistic taste of the pupil and leave him hungry for more. The two methods above referred to had done neither of these things. It is now possible to do both. It seems to me that many teachers have too much reading done in the class. I find much better results when there is a definite portion given to be read at home by the pupils, or when a certain time is allowed for the reading of one work. The recitation time can then be devoted to probing the home work by judicious and searching questions, such questions as cannot be answered by a pupil who has

not read his author with some degree of thoroughness. These questions should not be upon the text directly, for such may be answered by possibly one reading. They should not be upon words or figures of speech. They should go deeper, and by their character show the student how thoroughly he ought to read, and with what aim in view he ought to read. Without such reading as may be thus given, the most conscientious student may do a great deal of reading with not much real profit to himself, because he does not know what to look for. Questions involving comparisons of different passages are of value, questions which start a different view of the subject from that which the author has taken; also questions as to the use of a certain word in that particular place. In reading dramas, questions as to the characters of the persons represented, and whether those characters are consistently maintained in every utterance or action of the person, are most excellent. The character itself may not be of any great value, but the amount of careful and persistent reading and re-reading which the pupil will have to do to make up his mind, and to defend his position by quotations is of immense value.

In passing, it may not be amiss to suggest that such work as this in the Literature class will furnish unlimited material for essays to the teacher of English in the same school; and no school is deserving of the name where the teachers of such related branches do not in this way play into each others hands.

It has occurred to me that it might be of value to some teachers to give the list of such cheap reprints as we are at present using for our Literature classes, in the order in which we are using them and with the publishers' names.* I give the list going backward in time, as we use it, though of course some teachers may prefer to use it the other way. There are valid reasons for both methods:

Irving, Selections from Sketch Book.

Bryant, Thanatopsis and Miscellaneous Poems.

Webster, Bunker Hill Orations.

Tennyson, Elaine and Miscellaneous Poems.

Emerson, Self Reliance, &c., Lovell, 14 and 16 Vesey St., N. Y. Carlyle, Hero as Prophet.

Ruskin, Selections from "Modern Painters."

*With the exception of Emerson, Spencer and Chaucer, the editions used are those published by Clark & Maynard, 771 Broadway, New York.

Scott, Lady of the Lake.

Byron, Prisoner of Chillon.

Burns, Cotter's Saturday Night and other poems.

Keats, Eve of St. Agnes.

Coleridge, Ancient Mariner.

Wordsworth, Excursion, Book I.

Cowper, Task, Book I.

Goldsmith, Deserted Village.

Gray, Elegy and Bard.

Addison, Sir Roger de Coverley.

Pope, Essay on Criticism.

Dryden, Alexander's Feast, &c.

Milton, Comus, Paradise Lost, Book I.

Bacon, Essays.

Shakespeare, say 3 plays.

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66

Spenser, Fairie Queen, Book I. Macmillan, 112 4th Ave., N. Y. Chaucer, Prologue, Knight's Tale, The pupils do all their reading at home. They bring note books to class in which they have, as they read, written answers to certain points. They also generally come ready to give from memory some quotation which has particularly struck them in what they have read. The recitation, of course, under the skilful leading of a mature mind, will open several new points of view, develop new beauties in the author, and will furnish a guide to the student as to how he is to read. The points above referred to are at present the following; others may be added at any time as the work develops:

of

Lists to be made in note books for each lesson assigned I. New words.

2. Historical, biographical or geographical names.

Any passages not understood to be marked in text-book for questions.

Favorite passages on account of beauty of thought or expression to be marked.

Characteristics of style to be noted; as in

Prose,

Sentences

1. Long or short.

2. Complicated or simple.
3. Wordy or condensed.

Choice of words.

Poetry.

Versification, smooth or otherwise.

Use of alliteration.

Kind of rhymes.

Choice of words.

I have only to add that this kind of work has stood the test of two or three years in class-room, with satisfactory results. The recitations are not recitations in Biography or English Grammar, nor are they exercises in Reading, but really lessons in a fine art. The pupils. are interested and do gain some idea of the author as an individual artist. They become anxious to read more from the same sources, and they really acquire a growing taste for good literature. This seems to me the end of such a study, and I am therefore hopeful that we are on the right track. With this confidence we shall follow on in it, but seeking constantly for new light and better ways, for nothing is as fatal to any method of teaching as crystallization. That process belongs to a lower stage of being than the human mind, and any method which seems in danger of that satisfied result, needs a vigorous shaking.

"For us, oh friends, no barriers be,

For us no sluggard rest;

Each street leads downward to the sea,

Or landward to the west."

And when they cease to do so, we had better stop teaching.