oughly incompetent to administer to the cause of education, are among the abundant remains of a past glory that has failed to keep up with the progress indicated in other great world activities.

I had started out to boss the schoolboard but concluded to manage it, and for the accomplishing of this I determined to make for myself invincible allies, and these were the daughters of the community. A month following the reconstruction of my girls I called a meeting of the older girls for

4 P.M.

At this meeting I made a proposition to the girls that I would buy the material if they would make the curtains for the windows on their side of the school

room.

The first one to respond was Mollie. She gave it out plainly enough that she would help make no curtains, and if it had come to pass that the school board could not fix up the old schoolhouse, and that strangers had to come in and pay for things, she surely would quit school and stay quit.

The daughter, who had helped me out with her father on the morning of the second day, and who was always a good girl, backed by Mollie, condemned the board and their methods of not doing their duty, before I could interpose an objection. There was real rebellion threatened. This time it

was the board who was about to be attacked, and I found the objective attitude easy to assume.

I talked to those girls in a way that increased their activities without giving offense. It was all right for those girls to censure their parents, but it would have been ruinous to the cause had I said one derogatory word.

I tried to show the girls that while the building was horribly out of repair, they must not censure their fathers. Their fathers were very busy men, and besides they might feel that the people in the district would not like for them to incur such expense as would be necessary. This divided the responsibility, and each girl seemed to feel that her father ought to help fix up the schoolhouse.

On the Sunday following, at the close of the sermon, William Constad, who was, as he said, not as long on church as some of his neighbors, arose and asked permission to make a few remarks.

Mr. Constad had been the object of prayers for years. He was the annual " stumbling block," "the clog in the wheels of religious progress," and his rising to speak caused quite a little flutter, but he did not keep them long in suspense. He simply announced: "The school board will meet in this house to-morrow night and it wants all the men in the district to turn out."

Mr. Constad possessed a fair amount of humor and enjoyed, as I afterwards learned, "a little satire." He was fond of saying that women should not be allowed to vote at school meetings, that they did not pay taxes, and that they knew nothing about running schools, and therefore should stay away from such places as school meetings. Consequently his invitation to the men to turn out was understood by everyone to include the women.

CHAPTER VIII

THE COMMUNITY MEETING

ON Monday evening, "pursuant to call," the men of the district met with the school board, and with these men and school board met twenty women, and it was evident from the first that there was a unanimity of purpose among the women. But with the men it was different. Every man had an opinion and it was entirely different from anyone else's. One man thought the plastering should be patched, and another thought it should all come off and that a new coat should be put on. One was in favor of painting and another was against painting, but everyone believed something ought to be done.

The meeting was called to order. The deplorable condition of the entire premises was thoroughly discussed, but it was finally suggested that nothing could be done without money, and that the expense of improvement would mean an increased tax levy.

Mr. Constad, who had expressed no opinion, arose and made, as he said, "a few remarks." His remarks ran about as follows:

"I am getting mighty tired of this school business. Every year we have to pay a tax and then we do not get much. You men are just like me; you'll

pay a thousand dollars for a good brood animal and think you are using good business sense. You come here and vote the lowest tax possible for running this school and you think that's good business sense.

"We use this building for church, for elections and all other kinds of public meetings, and yet as my girls said to-night it's the poorest building in this part of the country. Half the time people call this school the Constad School, just because I live nearest to it, and I am getting tired of having my name stuck onto a shack that I'd tear down if it were my own. Now, what you have said about not having any money is true, and we all know why we have no money. We come here every year and instead of voting all the money we need, we vote the lowest amount possible. I spend more money every year on improvement of cattle than we all spend on education. We are just the same way about our church. We pay the lowest possible price for a preacher and then kick because he isn't all right.

"This schoolhouse is going to be fixed up to look as well as the average house in this neighborhood, and the outhouses are going to be set farther apart, straightened up, painted outside and inside; this school yard is going to be fixed up to look as well as my feed lots, or Bill Constad is going to get off this board.”

This was a great speech for William Constad.