the material to be taught and the best method of presenting it. For example, a two-day institute may devote practically all of its time to the subject of reading, another to supervised or directed study, another to spelling, and so on. Such meetings are now the rule.

Directed reading The supervisor may make a valuable contribution to his primary purpose by directing the reading and study of his staff along those lines that bear directly on his program for supervision. To do this successfully, requires more than a professional library in the superintendent's office and carefully prepared bibliographies. These are necessary, it is true, but the need of self-improvement through directed reading must be brought closer to the teachers. Raise questions that must be answered. Create situations that require reading before they can be solved. Occasionally tell a teacher frankly her method or practice is erroneous and then tell her where to find a full treatment of the subject, or better still, furnish her with the book or magazine giving the necessary information. Teachers will study and read when placed in situations that demand help. The need of such activity by the teacher must arise from the work of the supervisor. Many of our supervisory officers are proceeding as here suggested with splendid results.

Judging the teaching staff-Judging the members of the teaching staff is one of the difficult responsibilities devolving upon the supervisor. So far no emphasis has been placed upon any objective means of arriving at judgments. Training, education, growth, personality, conduct, and general teaching ability have been and are still the factors that govern in forming this judgment. Score cards and the measured results of instruction have been used to a limited extent as a basis for judging teachers. While fully recognizing the merits of score cards and educational tests we must question the advisability of using either or both in judging teachers. Any supervisor who does so systematically will have but little time for more urgent duties. Educational tests should be used to measure the achievement of pupils, teaching situations, and the like.

These seven activities constitute the program in Louisiana for instructional supervision adopted for guidance in 1919. Under the direction of the State Department of Education, these factors have been emphasized during this period. Fortunately, our school machinery is centralized in two units, the parish (county) and the State. This is a con

dition that admits of the adoption and rapid execution of any educational program that may be agreed upon.

Summary of accomplishments-The accomplishments in terms of the seven activities employed may be summarized as follows:

1. Teachers and supervisory officers coöperate fully.

2. A new course of study has been prepared and is in use. In this work supervisors and many teachers took part according to their abilities. It represents an effort to place in the hands of teachers a document that contains the best material, method, and bibliographies method, and bibliographies bearing upon the several subjects taught. 3. The effort to place supervision on an objective basis has progressed to such a point that supervisory officers hesitate to talk of the accomplishments of their schools in terms of personal judgment. Instead, they refer to the standing of their schools as measured by this or that test. Tests are now commonly used over the State to measure classroom results. Educational and mental tests must be given high rank in our plan for supervising schools. Nothing is quite so stimulating as an interpretation of the results of a test. It places the teacher and pupils in a situation where excuses are useless-as a result, they work zealously to meet the objective standard set.

4. No activity in the schools is bringing such pronounced results in the improvement of instruction as the demonstration of good teaching through demonstration lessons. Under the leadership of the members of the Department of Education, many of the supervisory officers over the State are now giving demonstration lessons in the presence of teachers. Such lessons are carefully planned and usually represent sound pedagogy and well-organized material. Our experience proves that the demonstration lesson is effective in breaking down the barriers of suspicion and prejudice often exhibited by teachers. It commands respect and attention and wins sympathy and confidence. It invites the teachers to join in constructive criticism and stimulates and directs them into a more thorough study of their problems. 5. The inspirational, theoretical, "saltand-pepper" institute has been supplanted by the type whose programs are built around the materials and methods of the several subjects taught.

6. Under the stimulus of this program and the suggestion of selected bibliographies, supervisory officers are now readers of several of the best National journals and many of the best

books of recent publication. Many teachers are following their lead.

en

7. Supervisory officers are not couraged to use any objective method in judging teachers. The time may come later when methods of this kind can be recommended.

Who are the supervisory officers and why can the educational forces of a whole State become actively engaged in the execution of a program in so short a time? First, the leadership of the State superintendent is wise and forceful, and his assistants are active in field work over the entire State in carrying out the policies of the Department. Second, the parish superintendents and supervisors, a competent, trained group of school people, have accepted the program and are energetically and enthusiastically engaged in its execution.

Experience has demonstrated that organizing and presenting a program for the guidance of the school interests is essential to the success of instructional supervision on a state-wide basis. A supervisor without a program has no point of departure and no destination.

N

TO THOUGHTFUL MAN ever came to the end of his life and had time and a little space of calm from which to look back upon it, who did not know and acknowledge that it was what he had done unselfishly and for others, and nothing else, that satisfied him in the retrospect, and made him feel that he had played the man. That alone seems to him the real measure of himself, the real standard of his manhood. And so men grow by having responsibility laid upon them, the burden of other people's business. Their powers are put out at interest, and they get usury in kind. They are like men multiplied. Each counts manifold. Men who live with an eye only upon what is their own are dwarfed beside them-seem fractions while they are integers. The trustworthiness of men trusted seems often to grow with the trust. From Woodrow Wilson's When a Man Comes to Himself.

PROMOTE, THEN, as an object

of primary importance, institutions for the general diffusion of knowledge. In proportion as the structure of a government gives force to public opinion, it is essential that public opinion be enlightened. Washington's Farewell Address, 1792.

To

The Boston Public Library

FRANK H. CHASE

Reference Librarian, Public Library, Boston, Massachusetts

O TEACHERS who visit Boston next summer the Boston Public Library will be one of the chief points of interest. Teachers will wish to see the Library because it is said to be the first free public library in the United States maintained by taxation and the first library built at public expense. They will wish even more to see it because of its architectural and artistic significance. There are numerous artistic details that might be mentioned but this sketch is devoted to outstanding features which should be of interest even to the person who does not have an opportunity to visit Boston-the mural decorations by Abbey and Sargent.

THE

HE CENTRAL LIBRARY building, fronting Copley Square on the southwest, was opened to the public in 1895. Its architect, Charles Follen

age of 225 feet and a depth of about 300 feet, is constructed of Milford granite. On the platform in front of

three seals sculptured by Augustus St. Gaudens; in the spandrels of the window arches are carved the marks of thirty-three famous printers.

The vestibule, of Tennessee marble, is adorned by Frederick MacMonnies' bronze statue of Sir Harry Vane, Governor of the Massachusetts Bay Colony in 1636, and by three double bronze doors designed by Daniel Chester French. Each door contains an allegorical figure

from a number of famous European buildings, including the Bibliothèque de Ste. Geneviève in Paris and the Palazzo della Cancelleria in Rome. The exterior of the building, which has a front

the building are two heroic bronze figures representing Science and Art. In the round arch above the main entrance are

in low relief; from left to right these figures symbolize Music, Poetry, Knowledge, Wisdom, Truth, and Romance.

The low entrance hall, Roman in feeling, has its vaults decorated with mosaics bearing the names of Boston's most famous sons. The floor is inlaid in brass with the signs of the Zodiac and the seal of the Library. On the right of the entrance hall are the Information Office, the Open Shelf Room, and the Government Document Service. Beyond this group of rooms are the Newspaper Room and the Periodical Department, which receives about fifteen hundred current periodicals and contains in addition about twenty-five thousand bound volumes of periodicals for reference. Beyond the Periodical rooms one reaches the interior court, perhaps the finest architectural feature of the building. It is designed in early Italian Renaissance and is surrounded by a beautiful marble arcade. From the entrance hall opens the great stairway, with walls of Sienna marble. At the principal landing are two great lions carved from Sienna marble by Louis St. Gaudens, each a memorial to a Massachusetts regiment in the Civil War.

The upper part of the walls of the staircase and the main corridor at the head of the stairs is filled with mural decorations by Pierre Cécile Puvis de Chavannes, the great French mural painter. The main decoration in the corridor represents the nine Muses in a grove of laurel and olive which overlooks the sea, arising to greet the genius of enlightenment; the artist entitled it "The Muses of Inspiration hail the Spirit, the Messenger of Light."

As one looks out over the stairway from between the beautiful yellow columns above it, the eight arched panels, viewed from left to right, represent the following subjects: Philosophy-Plato talks with a disciple in the Academy at Athens; the Acropolis rises behind; Astronomy-The Chaldean shepherds observe the stars; History-A Muse commands the partly buried Doric Temple to yield its secrets; Chemistry-A fairy watches three winged spirits tending a retort; Physics-The spirits of Good and Bad Tidings float above the telegraph wires; Pastoral Poetry-Virgil visits his beehives; Dramatic PoetryAeschylus gazes at Prometheus bound to his crag; Epic Poetry-Two figures. representing the Iliad and the Odyssey wait upon blind Homer seated by the roadside.

On the right of the staircase corridor one passes through the Pompeian Lobby into the Delivery Room, designed and decorated by the late Edwin Austin Abbey, R. A. This room, handsomely paneled in oak and adorned by a massive mantel of Rouge Antique, is famous for the series of paintings illustrating the Quest and Achievement of the Holy Grail, which occupies the upper portion of its walls. The series, beginning at the southwest corner of the room, consists of fifteen panels, as follows: The Vision-The infant Galahad in the arms of the nun to whose care he has been committed, lifts his hands to greet the Holy Grail brought before him by an angel; The Oath of KnighthoodThe youthful Galahad keeps his vigil in the convent chapel while Sir Lancelot and Sir Bors attach his spurs; The Round Table-Sir Galahad is conducted by Joseph of Arimathea to the Seat Perilous while King Arthur rises in recognition and the knights greet Galahad by raising the cross-shaped hilts of their swords; the hall is surrounded by angels who are invisible to the knights; The Departure-The knights, about to set forth on the Quest

of the Holy Grail, receive the episcopal benediction; Sir Galahad bears his Red Cross banner; The Castle of the GrailGalahad stands dumb beside the couch of the sick King Amfortas while the procession of the Grail passes unquestioned among the spellbound inmates of the castle; The Loathly Damsel-The Damsel, riding upon a mule, upbraids Sir Galahad with his failure to break the spell by asking what the procession means; The Seven Sins-Sir Galahad breaks his way into the Castle of the Maidens by overcoming the Seven

ONE OF AMERICA'S most celebrated and beloved citizens-Benjamin Franklin, born in Boston in 1706.

Knights of Darkness, who typify the Seven Deadly Sins; The Key to the Castle-Sir Galahad receives the key from the porter monk; The Castle of the Maidens-Sir Galahad is welcomed by the host of beautiful maidens, typifying the virtues, who have been imprisoned in the castle; Blanchefleur-Sir Galahad, bade to marry his first love, repents of his intention and leaves her on the wedding morning to continue his quest; The Death of Amfortas-Sir Galahad, having returned to the Castle of the Grail and asked the Question, tends the aged King Amfortas in his dying moments while an angel bears the Grail from the Castle to the city of Sarras; Galahad the Deliverer-Sir Galahad rides forth with the blessings of those whom he has delivered from the spell; Solomon's Ship-Sir Galahad, accompanied by Sir Bors and Sir Perceval, is wafted across the seas to Sarras;

the Grail, carried by an angel, guides the ship; The City of Sarras-Across the view of the city lie the sword and Red Cross shield of Galahad, its king; The Golden Tree-His life work accomplished, Sir Galahad builds a Golden Tree upon a hill at Sarras; Joseph of Arimathea, with a company of redwinged seraphs, appears before him with the Grail, now no longer covered.

In this remarkable series of paintings the artist has dealt with the story somewhat freely; he has rearranged some of its incidents and has combined the story of Galahad with certain elements from the legend of Perceval.

By the window of this room stands an ancient railing from the Guildhall of Boston, England, before which, in the year 1607, some of the Pilgrim Fathers stood for trial.

Through the Venetian Lobby, decorated by Joseph Lindon Smith, near the entrance to the Children's Room, one approaches the stairway leading to Sargent Hall, the main corridor of the upper floor of the building. All the decoration of this room is the work of John Singer Sargent, R. A. Its four sections illustrate the thought and technique of the artist during a period of nearly thirty years. The general subject of the paintings is the Triumph of Religion as it depicts the various phases through which religion has passed from

Paganism through Judaism to Chris

tianity.

The lunette at the north end of the hall shows the Children of Israel kneeling beneath the yoke of Egypt and Assyria; their hands are raised in supplication to Jehovah, whose face is screened by the red wings of seraphim. On the vaulting in front of the lunette are represented the pagan divinities whom the Israelites were tempted to worship. Here the background is formed by the black form of the Egyptian Neith, Goddess of the Heavens; above the cornice on one side towers the savage figure of Moloch, balanced by the beautiful but sensuous figure of Astarte, Phoenician Goddess of Love, on the other hand. Below the lunette is the well-known Frieze of the Prophets, with the massive sculptured figure of Moses in the center. The Prophets on the right point forward in expectation of the Messiah.

The opposite end of the hall presents the central dogmas of Christianity. Above are seated the three figures of the Trinity, their faces all cast from a single mold. The middle of the wall

is occupied by a crucifix in high relief, with the bodies of Adam and Eve bound to that of Christ and holding cups in which to catch the sacred blood for the

gazing outward with clear vision; between her knees is the figure of the dead

Christ; about her head are grouped the symbols of the evangelists.

is occupied by figures of angels bearing the crown of thorns and other instruments of Christ's passion.

The niches at the right and left of the end wall contain two representations of the Virgin Mary; that on the right

shows the happy Mother with her child. OU

crowned by angels; that on the left Our Lady of Sorrows, conceived as a statue behind a row of altar candles, with seven swords thrust into her heart. Upon the vaulting above these niches. are depicted the events in the life of Christ and of the Blessed Virgin collectively called the Fifteen Mysteries. On the left are the Joyful Mysteries, centering about the birth of Christ; on the right the Sorrowful Mysteries, culminating in his death; and in the center, in high relief, the Glorious Mysteries, including the Resurrection, the Ascension, and the Assumption of the Virgin.

Above the side walls of the hall are six lunettes. The central lunette of the east wall is entitled The Law, and represents the Hebrew people, conceived as a child crouching between the knees of Jehovah and protected by the scroll of the Law. The lunette on the left is called the Fall of Gog and Magog and pictures the final moment when all things earthly shall perish; altar and temple, chariot and horses, false gods and their symbols, are tumbling through space. The lunette at the other end of this wall presents the Dawn of the Messianic Era, in which a child leads humanity through the Gates of Paradise, swung open by beautiful youths. The three lunettes on the opposite side of the hall present The Judgment, in a single composition. In the center an angel weighs the souls of men, called up from the grave for the purpose. The good soul is welcomed into the Celestial Choir on the left; at the right, the lightweight soul is scornfully dragged away to a frightful Hell, where a green monster crams souls of the doomed into his jaws.

In the frames above the stairway are the two panels last painted by Mr. Sargent. They represent the mediæval conception of Church and Synagogue. The Synagogue, on the left, is typified by a haggard woman, blinded and fallen, clutching a broken scepter. The Church, on the right, is a majestic seated figure

UR STATE Department is very greatly hampered by our National ignorance regarding other countries. Not often is great constructive world leadership, such as characterized the work of the American delegation at the Washington Conference, possible because "the people are not ready." The "New Day" in international affairs will "New Day" in international affairs will die at dawn unless public opinion in all countries and particularly in our own, which should lead-sets about becoming enlightened upon world problems. It cannot be reiterated too often that our public schools must teach a great deal about Europe and Asia that is not in textbooks on geography or history. Most of all, if the spirit of the Washington Conference is not to fade, a new international goodwill must be fostered in us from childhood. President Harding and Secretary Hughes have done and are doing their part nobly. Will our teachers do theirs? I believe so.

suc

The Washington Conference ceeded because we were ready for limitation of armaments. Greater success in the solution of the problems of the Orient could have been achieved if the peoples of the world had known more about China. A Chinese secretary, on being asked what the chief obstacle to constructive results seemed to be, replied without hesitation: "The fact that no one knows anything about China." We need to know more about Europe if we are to help solve-as we must eventually do-the problems that make chaos there now.

Germany the key-Economists agree that the key to European reconstruction and to world rehabilitation is the recovery of Germany. The depreciation of her currency is such that she cannot buy the wheat, wool, cotton, and other commodities which stuff our warehouses. Violent fluctuations in the value of the German mark make the granting of credit too risky a venture for all except gamblers. Normally worth nearly a quarter of a dollar, today it is worth but half a cent. To

morrow it may be worth a third of a cent or perhaps a cent. Who knows?

The results are curiously contradictory. Wages range from ten to thirty cents a day. This underbids the world's labor market and factories hum there. while England's workers walk the streets and our tariff-makers are puzzled by an abnormal condition which they do not know how to meet. On the other hand, German wages will not buy imported articles. A servant girl must spend three months' pay for a pair of shoes and a laborer a month's pay for a pair of trousers. A can of condensed milk is an incredible luxury. Even street cars are an extravagance. The salaried classes freeze or starve, or both. The rich make fortunes by means of the cheap labor. Their employees wear the clothes they had in 1915 or sell furniture to get the means of purchase.

German reparations-The size of German reparations is at the bottom of this situation. The sum imposed at Paris was recognized as apparently impossible by the American financial advisers but in the hope that the impossible might be achieved it was acquiesced in. England at that time was as insatiable as France. The normal way of meeting the indemnity would be by the excess of exports over imports. This has been altogether insufficient. Consequently, the printing presses of Germany have been making paper money to meet the demands of the Allies with the resulting depreciation of value referred to and disruption of international trade. It is only fair to Germany to add that this has been done with the approval of the Allied Reparations Commission which is a kind of super-government in all the economic affairs of Germany.

England's attitude towards Germany-The depressed wages of Germany, combined with the resulting diminution of her purchasing power, have laid industry low in England. Her workmen cannot overcome by increased productiveness the vast differ

ence between their daily pay and that of the workmen beyond the Rhine; nor if this obstacle were surmounted, could goods be produced at a price that Germans could pay. The only hope for recovery in English industry is the return of the mark to a value nearer normal and, for the benefit of international credit, its stabilization.

This can come about only when the printing presses stop turning out paper money. The printing presses must run to pay the indemnity and the cost of the army of occupation. Therefore England is anxious to cut the indemnity and the costs of occupation provided Germany will make her budget balance, stop the presses from printing paper money, and thus make possible normal. international trade once more.

The attitude of France-France can be understood in her European relations only if you start with the realization that she is seeking to "reap the fruits of victory," as her spokesmen often declare. The point of view is one that all of us easily appreciate. How best to do it is puzzling her politicians increasingly.

If only Germany would stay put! The payment of the full sum of the indemnity, whether possible or impossible, is essential to French finance, which has boldly made its slogan for three years, "Germany will pay." In these three years since the war the French debt has doubled despite the payments Germany has made; yet the policy has continued unimproved. Debts pile up still with reckless improvidence. The army is big and expensive.

Far more ominous than the debt in the eyes of Poincaré and his party is the thought that a few years hence Germany will be as strong as ever. Then how shall France maintain her present supremacy on the continent? How shall she keep Germany from winning back her Alsace-Lorraines-Danzig, Upper Silesia, the Saar basin, perhaps AlsaceLorraine itself? How shall she keep Germany and Russia apart? How shall she reap the fruits of victory when Germany "comes back"?

The ideal fate of Germany from the French point of view would clearly be that she should pay her debt in full and then disintegrate. Since one cannot have all one's desire in this world, French policy has vacillated between the two objectives. All that the other Allies would permit was detached from Germany by the Versailles Treaty. Then an effort was made to start an

independent Rhine republic. America refused to countenance this intrigue. Bavaria was stirred to revolt, but this failed also. Finally the military party in France took the ground that the indemnity was doubtful at best while the recovery of Germany was dangerously sure, and seizure of the Ruhr Districtthe coal and iron heart of German industry-on the first pretext regardless of the economic consequences of the resulting German paralysis, would be the only way to insure permanent victory.

This coup has been prevented once by the vigorous opposition of all the Powers. Poincaré still threatens it. It would

Hungary, Rumania, and Poland are likely to wield considerable influence at the Conference. France has been cultivating them and arming them, partly against Germany and partly against Russia. They constitute her hegemony. Poland is her vassal, bought and paid for with the munitions furnished for the Russian war. The others are likely to see more advantage in siding with her than with England in the clash of interests between the two great powers at the Conference.

For the spirit of goodwill and cooperation that prevailed at Washington and made the recent Conference different from others is hardly to be expected at Genoa. Jealousies are too keen. Interests are too divergent. Poincaré, is too implacable. Though nominally a conference on economic questions, there will be much playing for political advantage between England and France, between France and Germany, between Russia and all of the rest, with the smaller states as pawns in the struggle. Russia-And

what about Russia? Russia requires an article by itself. This may come later. As far as her relation to the European Conference is concerned, and to all future European conferences for that matter, it is clear when one looks at the map of Europe that she has to be present if conclusions are to be reached. As well leave the United States out of an American Conference as ignore Russia's position in Europe.

The salient facts regarding Russia are, first, that Lenine is more firmly seated than the head of any other European state; secondly, that he has abandoned communism for a modified capitalism; third, that Russia, though now starving, will recover more rapidly than the rest of Europe because of her predominantly rural population; and fourth, that the world is so intimately bound together that Russia, like Germany, is as necessary to the general welfare as the other nations are to hers. Isolation has become impossible for any nation. Every nation henceforth must. for its own good, contribute generously to the family life of the world.