red the basis of expression, which is to my mind so
important. Paper-cutting is external to English, of course. Its only
connection is in its power to correlate different forms of expression,
and to react on speech-expression through sense-stimulus. But playing
the story is a closer relative to English than this. It helps,
amazingly, in giving the "something to say, the urgent desire to say
it," and the freedom in trying. Never mind the crudities,--at least, at
the time; work only for joyous freedom, inventiveness, and natural forms
of reproduction of the ideas given. Look for very gradual changes in
speech, through the permeating power of imitation, but do not forget
that this is the stage of expression which inevitably precedes art.

All this will mean that no corrections are made, except in flagrant
cases of slang or grammar, though all bad slips are mentally noted, for
introduction at a more favourable time. It will mean that the teacher
will respect the continuity of thought and interest as completely as she
would wish an audience to respect her occasional prosy periods if she
were reading a report. She will remember, of course, that she is not
training actors for amateur theatricals, however tempting her
show-material may be; she is simply letting the children play with
expression, just as a gymnasium teacher introduces muscular play,--for
power through relaxation.

When the time comes that the actors lose their unconsciousness it is the
end of the story-play. Drilled work, the beginning of the art, is then
the necessity.

I have indicated that the children may be left undisturbed in their
crudities and occasional absurdities. The teacher, on the other hand,
must avoid, with great judgment, certain absurdities which can easily be
initiated by her. The first direful possibility is in the choice of
material. It is very desirable that children should not be allowed to
dramatise stories of a kind so poetic, so delicate, or so potentially
valuable that the material is in danger of losing future beauty to the
pupils through its present crude handling. Mother Goose is a hardy old
lady, and will not suffer from the grasp of the seven-year-old; and the
familiar fables and tales of the "Goldilocks" variety have a firmness of
surface which does not let the glamour rub off; but stories in which
there is a hint of the beauty just beyond the palpable--or of a dignity
suggestive of developed literature--are sorely hurt in thei