“I first went to the blackboard, uncertain, soft, full of whimpering. ‘THAT LESSON MUST BE LEARNED,’ he said, in a very quiet tone, but with a terrible intensity and with the certainty of Fate. All explanations and excuses he trod under foot with utter scornfulness. ‘I want that problem. I don’t want any reasons why I don’t get it.’ “‘I did study it two hours.’ “‘That’s nothing to me; I want the lesson. You need not study it at all, or you may study it ten hours—just to suit yourself. I want the lesson. Underwood, go to the blackboard!’ “‘Oh! yes, but Underwood got somebody to _show_ him his lesson.’ “‘What do I care _how_ you get it? That’s your business. But you must have it.’ “It was tough for a green boy, but it seasoned him. In less than a month I had the most intense sense of intellectual independence and courage to defend my recitations. “In the midst of a lesson his cold and calm voice would fall upon me in the midst of a demonstration—‘_No!_’ I hesitated, stopped, and then went back to the beginning; and, on reaching the same spot again, ‘_No!_’ uttered with the tone of perfect conviction, barred my progress. ‘The next!’ and I sat down in red confusion. He too was stopped with ‘No!’ but went right on, finished, and, as he sat down, was rewarded with, ‘Very well.’ “‘Why,’ whimpered I, ‘I recited it just as he did, and you said No!’ “‘Why didn’t you say _Yes_, and stick to it? It is not enough to know your lesson. You must _know_ that you know it. You have learned nothing till you are _sure_. If all the world says _No_, your business is to say _Yes_ and to _prove it_!’” The other helper of this period was John E. Lovell. In a column of the _Christian Union_ of July 14, 1880, devoted to “Inquiring Friends,” appeared this question with the accompanying answer: “We heard Mr. Beecher lecture recently in Boston and found the lecture a grand lesson in elocution. If Mr. Beecher would give through the column of ‘Inquiring Friends’ the methods of instruction and practice pursued by him, it would be very thankfully received by a subscriber and student. / / / / / / E. D. M.