3. Some of the forms in which it comes.

4. Materials of which it is usually made. 5. Some of its uses.

6. Ways in which it may be destroyed, or unfitted for use.

COMPOSITION.

1. The general appearance of paper is that of a thin, light sheet, with a smooth and uniform surface.

2. Its color is various. Sometimes it is white, sometimes pink, sometimes it has a bluish tinge, sometimes it is mottled. Indeed, it may be of any color, but most commonly it is white.

3. Paper usually comes in sheets, and these sheets are of various sizes, such as note-paper, letter-paper, and foolscap. These sheets are put up in small packages called quires, and the quires are put into larger packages called reams. Twenty-four sheets make a quire, and twenty quires make a ream.

4. Paper is usually made of old rags, but I believe it may be made of many other things, such as straw and bark; but I never saw a paper-mill, and, therefore, I cannot say certainly. Linen rags are said to be better than cotton rags for making paper. Men often go round from house to house to buy old rags, which they sell to the paper-makers. These rag-men never buy woollen rags for this purpose; and if the linen rags are sorted out and kept by themselves, they will bring a higher price than other rags. My mother lets me have all the rags in our house, and I keep them put away in a bag, and the money for which they are sold is mine to spend or to put into the missionary-box.

5. Paper is used chiefly for writing and for printing. Compositions are written on paper. Newspapers and books are printed on paper. Bank-bills are made of paper. Paper is used for making boxes and for covering walls. Boys' kites are made of paper; so are men's collars sometimes.

6. Paper is very easily destroyed by fire. It burns sooner than almost anything else. Water also injures it badly. It is not tough like leather, but is easily torn. Paper is damaged by being rumpled. If you want your composition or your letter to look nice, you must take good care of your paper, and keep it smooth and clean. I keep my paper in a portfolio which my father gave me for a Christmas present.

To the Teacher.-In the imaginary composition given above, the pars graphs are for convenience numbered to correspond to the numbers in the outline.

Perhaps, in the first few compositions which a class may write, it may be well for them in like manner to number the topics and paragraphs. After a while, however, the practice should be discontinued.

The plan here adopted, of first making an outline of topics, and then writing something upon each topic, has the important incidental advantage of teaching beginners the difficult art of paragraphing correctly. What is written under each head or topic naturally forms a paragraph by itself, and thus the pupils easily fall into the way of dividing their matter into paragraphs according to the natural divisions of the subject.

Beginners should be encouraged, not merely to state facts on the subjects of which they write, but to mix up their own notions and feelings about these facts, as the writer of the foregoing composition has done at the close of his fourth and sixth paragraphs.

Example.-Subject, WATER.

OUTLINE.

1. Differences between water and wood.
2. Differences between water and air.

3. Effect of extreme cold upon water.
4. Effect of extreme heat upon water.
5. Different kinds of water.

6. Benefits of water.

Note. The teacher should prepare similar suggestive outlines on each subject assigned until the class become familiar with the method, and begin to show signs of being able to make their own outlines. When they thus begin to make outlines for themselves, the teacher will for a while find it necessary to supplement their attempts by suggestions of his own, to be added to theirs. He must exercise his discretion as to how long this help should be continued, and when the pupils should be required to make the entire outline without help.

The preparation of this outline is of the very essence of invention. It sets the pupil at once to thinking-to gathering thoughts, instead of putting together mere words. The outline, therefore, should be a leading portion of the exercise for a long time, and should in each case be submitted to the teacher for inspec tion and comment, before the composition is written.

Note 1.

Children should continue for some time to write on subjects like these natural objects with which they are daily familiar. In writing upon those topics, however, they should be continually stimulated to do something more than merely give a dry, semi-scientific enumeration of the qualities and properties of the object described. Let them, on the contrary, freely mix up their own personality in the matter, telling what particular kind of dolls, or skates, or dogs they like, who was burned by the fire, who fell into the water, and so on. Children will find no difficulty in having something to write, when once they have made the discovery that writing compositions is merely putting upon paper their knowledge of such things as they are acquainted with, and telling what they think about them.

Note 2.- No rule can be given for the length of time which children should be kept upon compositions of the kind already illustrated. It depends a good deal upon the age at which the pupil begins the exercise. If scholars begin to write compositions at the age of nine or ten, they may be kept upon such themes for a year or two, writing as often as once or twice a week. Any teacher of ordinary inventive powers can supply subjects. If, however, as is often the case, the scholar is already considerably advanced in years and knowledge before beginning to write compositions, two or three examples of this kind may be sufficient, before proceeding to those more difficult. The decision of this point must, in each case, be left to the discretion and judgment of the teacher.

For method of correcting compositions, see page 347.

Note. The examples which are given in this chapter, while still occupied mainly with the concrete and the visible, rather than with abstract qualities and relations, yet differ clearly from those in Chapter I. The topics in the first chapter are simply objects. Those now to be given involve what may be called transactions.

Example.-Subject, ON GOING TO SCHOOL.

OUTLINE.

1. The object of going to school.

2. The age for going to school.

3. Behavior at school.

4. Behavior on the road to and from school.

5. Difference between a school and a religious meeting. 6. The usual exercises of a school.

7. School-time.

COMPOSITION.

1. The object of going to school is to learn those things which will be useful to us when we are grown up. One who goes to school, and learns to read well, and to write a beautiful hand, and knows a great many things, is much more thought of than one who cannot read or spell, and who has to make his mark instead of writing his name. An ignorant man, who never went to school, is not much thought of.

2. The proper age for people to go to school is when they are young, before they have to work to get a living. Young boys and girls are not strong enough to do much work, but they can go to

school and study just as well as not, for they have nothing else to do. If they play truant, and manage to get out of going to school, they will be very sorry for it afterwards. Some children go to school when they are only five years old, but I think that is rather too young. Six or seven seems to me a good age to begin. Those who are to be doctors, or lawyers, or ministers, or something of that kind, go to school a great many years. They go first to the common school, then to the High School or the Academy, then to the College and the Seminary, and they do not stop going until they are grownup men. But most persons have to leave school when they get to be fourteen or fifteen. I expect to leave school before I am sixteen. I should like very much to go to College.

3. It is not very easy to behave well in school, so many things happen to make one laugh and to forget all about the rules. The hardest thing of all is to keep from whispering. But it is right for the teacher to forbid it, for if all could talk as much as they pleased, there would not be much study done. There is no excuse for boys and girls playing tricks on each other in school, and watching when the teacher's back is turned, so that they may throw spitballs or do something to make the other scholars laugh. Such behavior is without excuse. If scholars would behave well in school, they would be a great deal happier, for they would enjoy the approbation of their teachers, they would learn much more, and they would not be kept in so often, or be punished so often.

4. Misbehavior on the road to and from school always looks bad. It gives people a bad opinion of the school, and also of the families to which the scholars belong. It looks as if the scholars were very ill-bred, and did not know what good manners are. Besides, when the school breaks up, it makes a large crowd in the street, and if the scholars are rude and unmannerly, they incommode people who are going by. It is wrong for the scholars, while going home from school, to throw stones or snowballs, or anything of that kind, in the street, for they often break people's windows, or hit ladies and gentlemen who are passing.

5. I know that a school is very different from a religious meeting or a church, but I do not know that I can explain the difference very clearly. In the church that I go to, one man preaches or prays or exhorts, and all the rest sit still and listen. But in school, we are divided into classes, and we all read and recite in turn. It is a great deal stiller in church that it is in school, but I suppose school