formed a decorative frieze for the long hall, and the dear little alligators and crocodiles). Then we visit Harvard College; it is vacation, of course, but the very air is rich with centuries of learning and culture. We glance at the plain old buildings and the handsome new ones, and hurry to beautiful Gore Hall, the library. We enter with rapturous anticipations of the bookworm's delight in a wilderness of books, but alas! the library is inhospitable. One entire wing is cut off with the chilling inscription, "Visitors are not allowed to pass this door," and in the other wing, every alcove which our longing eyes explore has a bar across it with this legend, "Visitors are not allowed to pass this bar, or to take books from the shelves without permission," A very salutary and needed restriction, no doubt, but how could one draw a single free breath of delight in its presence? Up stairs there are some things we may look at, and wonderful things they are. Here, for instance, is Eliot's Indian Bible. Here is a map of the world in 1508, with Greenland as a part of coast of Asia, and the West Indies and the western coast of South America nestling cosily up to Java and Farther India; and here is a table loaded with the great folio volumes of Audubon's "Birds of America" with its hundreds of life-sized bird portraits in their natural hues. We linger in the noble Memorial Hall till the hour of closing. What splendid honors are heaped on these Harvard boys, no nobler or braver than the volunteers from every Western hamlet, with this grand building and Lowell's grander Ode, to hold them in everlasting remembrance!

We see the sights of historic interest, of course. Faneuil Hall and "Brimstone Corner," the Old South Church and the church where the light was hung for Paul Revere, Dorchester Heights and Bunker Hill Monument. The Monument, which does not show off well in a picture, is satisfyingly impressive when you see it in its granite massiveness. Of course every true patriot ascends the winding stair which climbs its dark interior and "views the landscape o'er" from its top. We did it, by a modern, short-cut, spelling-reform, royal-road-to-learning method. That is to say, we went to the top of the magnificent marble palace where the Equitable Life Insurance Co. dwelleth, via the elevator! It is pretty nearly as high as the monument, and a great deal easier! Mr. Bicknell of the N. E. Journal most kindly acted as our guide in the ascent, and pointed out the things we wanted to see. And here comes our opportunity to say that one of the pleasantest episodes of our trip was

our visit to his office, and our chat with him and Mr. Sheldon of the Primary Teacher. We never find anybody else quite so genial and cordial and pleasant as the educational editors.

But we must leave Boston, with one parting word of advice to every fellow-seeker for the rebate. It is very easy to find your way about Boston. Look out for a street-car that bears the name of the place you want to visit, and board it with unfaltering confidence. The street-cars always know the way. They are inscribed all over with the names of the places they pass, and the man who organized the system of their routes must have the brain of a Von Moltke.

Home over the Pennsylvania Railroad. We cross New York Harbor by night, passing between the towering piers of the Brooklyn bridge, on whose summits hangs the frailest and airiest of structures, like the debris of a broken cob-web. We enjoyed the fairy spectacle of the great cities with their long array of glittering lamps and the swift ferry-boats darting back and forth, jeweled masses of many-colored light. We reach Philadelphia in time for a twohours street-car trip through its streets. How great the change! Were it not for the traditional white shutters and white marble steps, the placid, Pennsylvania-faced women, and the comfortable, easy-going, leisurely horses, we might imagine ourselves in Chicago -a phenomenal Chicago that is keeping Sunday. It is a Tuesday, but one feels it impossible to believe it is anything but Sunday. We return to our seats in the Pullman, and are whirled on through the beautiful valleys of the Susquehanna and Juniata and over the broad backs of the Alleghanies, a republic of mountains, where everybody is so nearly on an equality with his neighbor that nobody seems very high up in the world. The distant view we had of Mt. Mansfield in Vermont, veiled in light and dominating the smaller hills, seemed more like a mountain than anything here.

Just at dusk we pass through the Valley of the Shadow; a vast gulf of smoke and darkness, lurid with gusts of flame from the tops of dimly-seen towers. Sometimes, close to our windows, we see a great, formless building, seemingly full of liquid fire and flitting demoniac forms. It looks like the entrance to the infernal regions, but it is, in fact, only the suburbs of Pittsburgh.

We get to Chicago for breakfast, stay over one night to get the sugar in the bottom of our cup of pleasure by attending the Theodore Thomas concert, and then come home to the babies and the NORMAL MONTHLY. After all, it is quite the nicest place we have found.

SOME DEFECTS POINTED OUT.

There is undoubtedly much slip-shod work still done in our schools, and those who hope to see a pedagogic millennium ushered in will probably be doomed to disappointment. That there is a steady and sure advance all along the line there can be little doubt, but there are still many prevalent defects, some of which Supt. Seerley of Oskaloosa referred to in a recent address as follows:

If you ask the teachers of Iowa what standard of pronunciation is enforced in their schools, you would be told, Webster or Worcester. Go and visit their schools, hear the reading of the pupils, observe the language of the teacher, and you will be compelled to admit that there is no authority there except that of name, while they are a law unto themselves. Ask, task, &c., dog, coffee, &c., duty, tune, &c., laugh, laundry, &c., are not pronounced according to accepted authorities. Teachers do not always like to follow authority when it does not suit them, preferring ordinary usage to the highest authority of the land. As long as the school pronounces God like gawd so long will we hear it from the pulpit. Such words as Caucasian, Apalachian, squalor, can't, shan't, raillery, bronchitis are daily mispronounced by those professing to teach a pure language. It is the duty of the teacher to so serve the people as to correct and improve the spoken language.

There are some parts of arithmetic that are pre-eminently practical so far as the Iowa schools are concerned. A banker once said to me, "Teach your pupils addition every day they are in the school." The school can heed this criticism. It can bring it about that the pupils are more accurate and rapid in the ordinary calculations. Knowledge is to-day too often left after the how is taught and before the matter taught has become practical and reflex.

Similar statements can be made concerning the school work in teaching grammar. The old methods of defining, parsing, analyzing have been too slavishly followed, while every-day grammar has received too little attention. If letter-writing is to become an important factor of every one's business life, then a great deal of attention should be devoted to it and a practical knowledge should be acquired.

In the ranks of the best class of teachers there is too much base ignorance, and too much indifference to improvement. When the certificate is obtained, further effort seems unnecessary, as the ambition has been satisfied. It is unnecessary for teachers to retrograde, their calling demands that they be in the advance. The field of literature is almost unknown and unheard of by the great multitude of teachers. Intelligence can not spring from ignorant indifference, It is, therefore, necessary that the judgment be exercised on more matters than the routine work of the school room. It is self-preservation to be something outside of the sphere of activity. All educators should realize that they owe duties to society, to morality and to humanity that they should perform.

PRACTICAL GRAMMAR.

SECOND PAPER.

The machinery of the English language is so simple that there would seem to be no excuse for any one's not mastering it. As compared with Greek and Latin it is a model of simplicity, and as compared with the Teutonic and Romance languages of modern Europe it is as the streets of Philadelphia to the streets of Boston. We have great reason to be thankful that we are not troubled with variations of the article corresponding to the different persons, numbers, genders and cases of the nouns which it limits, as is the case with German and Greek. Then, too, we are not burdened with troublesome case endings, and we have scarcely any trace of grammatical gender, one of the most vexatious and irrational devices for the complication of language which our remote ancestors have handed down to our fellow-Aryans. Mark Twain, in his delightful literal translation, "Tale of the Fishwife, and its Sad Fate," which we print elsewhere, gives an amusing but faithful representation of the complexities of gender in the German tongue.

The principal inflections of nouns left in the English are the plurals and the possessives, and as no one can write the language correctly without an accurate understanding of these, they should be dwelt upon till understood. It is certainly as important to know how to spell the plural of a noun as its singular, and carelessness can be the only excuse for the general disregard of the possessive forms. We shall have space to speak only of the formation of plurals in this article, leaving the possessives for another issue.

The general rule given in the grammars to the effect that the plurals of nouns are usually formed by adding s or es to the singular is all well enough, but unless it is impressed upon the mind of the pupil by a thorough DRILL it might as well be stated in Greek. Be sure that your scholars know when to add only s and when es is required. Our method is to dictate long lists of nouns, commencing with the simplest and gradually introducing the more irregular, requiring the class to write both the singular and plural. Thus:

boyboys, horse............. ..horses,

dog.........dogs,
house......houses,

Cow.cows, name......names.

Having drilled on nouns requiring only s we pass to those requiring es, as:

From an extended drill on words of these classes the pupils are led to comprehend the general fact that nouns ending in ch (soft), s, sh, or x require the addition of es.

The most difficult lesson to master in regard to the use of s or es in the plural termination is that class of words ending in o preceded by a consonant. Our experience has been that the only safe way is to have scholars learn the lists of words requiring s or es as they would at a regular spelling lesson.

For the convenience of teachers, we give a short list of the more common of these words, which they may find useful in their work:

Domino, grotto and portico have either form.

In the use of nouns ending in y a careful drill must be given. In this case as in most others, let the statements of the text-books be first studied. It is one of the principal objects of the recitation to see that these statements are themselves understood. Let the teacher pronounce a few words in which y is preceded by a vowel, as day, boy, bay, &c., and then enquire of the pupils why they write them days, boys and bays instead of daies, boies and baies. Then let him give a list of words in which the final y is preceded by a consonant, as lady, story, mercy, &c., and then inquire, in case they have not made mistakes, why they have changed the y into i and added es. It would be well at this point to impress the fact that proper nouns are not an exception to the rule, according to Webster's dictionary-that the proper plurals of Henry, Mary, Lucy, &c., are not Henrys, Marys and Lucys, but Henries, Maries and Lucies. See page 66 of the introduction to Webster's latest dictionary.) It is necessary also at this point to impress the fact that nouns ending in ey form their plurals by adding s only-that the plurals of money, attorney, valley, &c., are moneys, attorneys, valleys, NOT monies, attornies and vallies as they are so often improperly written.

Unless a special drill is given on the compounds with the word full, it will be found that the average boy and girl will give on ex