hurch there could be no
doubt, and doing it in a way to make it once more a living issue among the
poor.

The rector of old St. George's, which under his pastorate has grown from a
forgotten temple with empty pews to be one of the strong factors in life
on the crowded East Side, with Sunday congregations the great building can
hardly contain, roughly outlines his plans for work among the children
this way, which with variations of detail is the plan of all the churches:

"Get as many of the very little children as possible into our
kindergartens, and there let them have the advantage of Christian
kindergarten training, before they are old enough to go to the public
schools. Keep touch of those same children and get them into the infant
departments of the Sunday-school. Then take the little fellows from these,
and see that in one or two nights in the week we reach them in our boys'
clubs; and then, when they are fourteen years old, they are eligible for
admission to our battalion. There, by drills, exercises, etc., we hold
them till they can enter our Men's Club."

The Sunday-school commands the approach to the club, but does not obstruct
it. It stands at the door and takes the tickets. Anyone may enter, but
through that door only. Once he has passed in, he is his own master. The
church is content with claiming only his Sundays when the club is not in
session. The experience at St. George's on the home-rule question has been
eminently characteristic. The boys could not be made to take a live
interest in the club except on condition that they must run it themselves.
That point yielded, they promptly boomed it to high-water mark. At present
they elect their officers twice a year, to give them full swing, and one
set is no sooner installed than wire-pulling begins for the next election.
Once, when some trouble in the Athletic Club caused the clergy to take it
in hand and appoint a president of their own choice, the membership fell
off so rapidly that it was on the point of collapse when the tide was
turned by a bold stroke. The managers announced a free election. The boys
returned with a rush, put opposition tickets in the field, and amid
intense enthusiasm over three hundred and fifty out of a total of four
hundred votes were cast. The club was saved. It has been popular ever
since.

The payment of monthly dues was found at St. George's to be equally
essential to success. "The boys know that they have to pay," said the