n bed, and that Egeria--the only
available member of the staff--was detained by one of the managers
for half-an-hour on her way to school. The school was thus left
without a teacher. On entering it, Egeria found all the children in
their places and at work. They had looked at the time-table, had
chosen some of the older scholars to take the lower classes, and had
settled down happily and in perfect order. This incident proves to
demonstration that the _morale_ of the school has somehow or other
been carried far beyond the limits of what is usually understood by
discipline. I have seen historical scenes acted with much vigour by
some of the children in the first class, and applauded with equal
vigour by their class-mates, while all the time the children in the
second class, who were drawing flowers in the same room, never lifted
their eyes from their desks. Yet no children can laugh more merrily
or more unrestrainedly than these, or make a greater uproar when it
is fitting that they should do so.

And if there is no need for punishment, or any other form of
repression, in this school, it is equally true that there is no need
for rewards. To one who has been taught to regard competition in
school as a sacred duty, and the winning of prizes as a laudable
object of the scholar's ambition, this may seem strange. But so it
is. No child has the slightest desire to outstrip his fellows or rise
to the top of his class. Joy in their work, pride in their school,
devotion to their teacher, are sufficient incentives to industry.
Were the stimulus of competition added to these, neither the zeal nor
the interest of the children would be quickened one whit, but a
discordant element would be introduced into their school life. Happy
as he obviously is in his own school life, it would add nothing to
the happiness of the Utopian to feel that he had outstripped his
class-mates and won a prize for his achievement. So far, indeed, are
these children from wishing to shine at the expense of others, that
if they think Egeria has done less than justice to the work of some
one child, the rest of the class will go out of their way to call her
attention to it. If some children are brighter, cleverer, and more
advanced than others, the reward of their progress is that they are
allowed to help on those who lag behind. This is especially
noticeable in Drawing, in which the pre-eminence of one or two
children has again and again had the effect of lifti