ernment to the people, in rotation in office, in democratizing all forms of society.

Readings.

For the politics of the period from 1845 to 1865 see Schouler's and Rhoades' Histories. Schouler's pictures of politicians and statesmen are clear, keen, and unsparing. There are too many lives of Lincoln for me to enter here; that by Hapgood is short and strong.

Andrews' Last Quarter Century of American History is valuable for last decades. See also volume II of El

son's Side-lights on American History.

The biographies of the great men of this second half century furnish very important material: Greeley, Seward, Grant, Tilden deserve inquiry for political matter.

For the politics of the civil war Rhoades' History as above is invaluable. See also Grant's Memoirs.

Consult the references in McLaughlin's History of the American Nation and in Channing's Students' History of the United States.

Consult Poole's Index to Magazines: Compromise of 1850, Webster's 7th of March Speech, Emancipation Proclamation, Resumption of Specie Payment, Sherman Act.

At best we can only skim the surface of American Politics. See Johnston's book with that title. Goldwin Smith's Outlines of American Political History, pp. 210301 is the most readable single account.

Questions.

1. What was the great element in Polk's character? 2. In what condition did he leave his country the result of his administration?

3. What were the causes of Taylor's election?

4. Was Fillmore a leader?

5. What were the opportunities of Pierce?

6. What was Buchanan's one great effort?

7. In what respect was the Southern Confederacy the result of a conspiracy?

8. What ends were aimed at by the leaders of the Confederacy?

9. What was the political philosophy that led to the movement for a new nation in the South?

10. In what way was American democracy itself responsible for the civil war? Was the war inevitable? 11. What was the foundation of the character of Lincoln?

12. What were the great qualities common to Jackson, Lincoln, Johnson, and Garfield?

13. Was Lincoln a politician?

14. What were the principles of the Republican party? 15. What was the quality of Lincoln's mind?

16. Explain the enmity inspired against Johnson. 17. Was Grant a successful president?

18. How did Hayes become president?

19. What was Garfield's preparation for the presidency?

20. Was Arthur a successful chief executive?

21. Characterize Cleveland.

22. Why was Harrison defeated for re-election?

23. Was the second half century of our history full of great names?

24. Why do we remember Douglas?

25. What was Seward's achievement?

26. What have been the political services of Blaine? Tilden? Bryan?

The discipline of the elementary school builds up in a very powerful manner the sense of individual responsibility. Each child feels that he is responsible not only for what he does intentionally, but what he neglects to do in the way of performing school duties. This is the most powerful influence which a well-disciplined school exercises towards the production of character. The child subdues his likes and dislikes, adopts habits of regularity, punctuality, silence, and industry. His industry takes the form of two kinds of attention: first, the critical attention to the work of the class and the criticisms of the teacher; and second, to the mastery of his own set task by his unaided labor.-WILLIAM T. HARRIS.

Art Studies.

Several of the best known masterpieces have been selected for careful study in this department. Some account will also be given of the famous galleries in which the original paintings are preserved.

I

Study of famous Pictures.

By FREDERICK WILLIAM COBURN.

N most progressive schools of to-day a great deal of attention is being paid to picture study. It is rightly felt that an appreciation of the masterpieces of painting, sculpture, and architecture is an assistance to the formation of habits of good taste.

Naturally such study, if undertaken at all, ought to be serious and along right lines. There are certain things that every person who really knows anything about art has learned to look for in a painting or statue, certain laws in accordance with which it has been executed, if it is good art. To discover a few of these laws thru their exemplification in some of the masterpieces, and in the course of such discovery to suggest ways of studying a work of art is the object of this series of articles. All Good Art is Beautiful.

This sounds like "Honesty is the best policy" or some similar truism, does it not? We can safely keep metaphysics in the background for a while. But how about The Angelus by Jean Francois Millet here shown? Is this beautiful to you? If so, why? If not, why not? This is the beginning of our quest. You have got to present perhaps this very picture, certainly some one of Millet's, to your pupils. Frankly now; do you like this picture well enough to bring it to the class-room and dwell on it lovingly, if you didn't have to; if it were not in the course of study? That is the test. Those who are studying EDUCATIONAL FOUNDATIONS in a club will find it profitable to compare notes frankly, honestly, as to each one's present feeling regarding The Angelus. No one need be ashamed of not caring for it. They are good company. The writer has heard Prof. Charles

Eliot Norton, the head of the fine arts department at Harvard university, depreciate it.

Beauty and Prettiness.

Well, suppose you are one of the people who do not care for it. Let us have a searching question: Is not your failure to appreciate due to the fact that you like pretty things rather than beautiful things? There is a difference. A pretty object may also be beautiful, but, like as not, it is quite lacking in real beauty.

"What is beauty?" you ask. No, we are not going to be side-tracked on that issue. Let us be content with admitting that The Angelus is not exactly pretty, while maintaining dogmatically that it is beautiful-not perhaps so beautiful as "The Sower," "The Gleaners," or "The Man with the Hoe" by the same artist, pictures which you ought to have by you while dwelling upon this; yet undeniably in the judgment of good critics one of the most beautiful pictures of the world. You know it sold for some fabulous sum a few years ago-$116,000 if I remember rightly. People do not spend that amount of money to put a blot on their walls.

Did you ever meet a young girl who was exceedingly pretty-"pretty as a picture," was your mental comment on being introduced to her? She seemed a vision of loveliness. Yet as you became acquainted with her, you discovered a shallow, vapid mind, a selfish, ungracious disposition, and in general a lack of staying qualities. Such a young girl does not seem to you to be beautiful after you know her, tho she remains as pretty as ever. Perhaps you have also met some young person whose style was less taking at first, less fresh and dainty, who, as you grew in acquaintance, never offended either by anything in external appearance that jarred or in conduct that suggested narrowness and meanness. Such a person you would rightly call beautiful. Such a person you are always glad to see.

Of course the analogy is plain. It will be understood even in the third grade class. The Angelus is like the person we are always glad to see-that is, those of us who have become really well acquainted.

The question you would be inclined to put to your

class, calling for answers, would be: "Why are we glad always to see The Angelus?" And the probability is that the answers would be for the most part mere guesses. The reasons why we, most of us, like certain people and certain works of art, are many and complex. A few of these reasons will have to be brought out more or less satisfactorily in this class of ours.

Sentiment in Art.

One point is to be made in this lesson with especial emphasis in regard to The Angelus: It is a picture of sentiment. This has given it its marked place of popularity among Millet's pictures. Let us consider what sentiment in a work of art means.

Perhaps you are an amateur photographer. Now some people say the photograph has no sentiment. As a rule it has not; but you can put a little sentiment even into photography. Suppose on a given evening you are filled with a deep sense of peace. Will your state of mind not influence your choice of subject? Assuredly it will. You will be led away from the harsh rocks and scraggly trees of Bear hill down to Flag meadows where the long sweeping lines of the sky and of the clouds floating overhead suggest the feeling of peace you have at heart. Your photograph of "Sunset on the Meadows," is to a limited extent a work of art, for it is to a limited extent an expression of your feeling; and the more thoughtfully you search out subjects that will express what you feel the more closely your work in photography approaches the realm of fine art.

Yet it can never become fine art of a very high order, simply because the quantity of feeling that can go into a photograph is necessarily very small. The photograph is primarily a record of fact; any sentiment that gets into it is incidental and almost accidental. But in a picture like The Angelus the sentiment is the first thing. Nothing gets in there without the artist's intending to put it there and everything helps to convey the feeling the artist had when he started to paint the picture.

"What is the sentiment of The Angelus?" you ask. Well, you can, perhaps, by searching thru your vocabulary, find some phrase that will hit it more or less ade