"You know how rich folk talk at table when the servants are present?" I nodded. "Well, that's the Chief's attitude to teachers; he never says anything of any importance whatever." "But why?" "He is of the old school. He has been inspecting schools for forty years. In the olden days an inspector was a sort of Almighty; teachers quaked before him because with a stroke of his pen he could reduce their money grant. To this day the old man treats teachers as a king treats his subjects--with kindness but with distance." "Has he any views on education?" I asked. Smart shook his head. "None, but he has heaps of views on instruction and discipline. By the way, he thinks that Macdonald's discipline is very good." "And you?" "I think it rotten," he said ruefully, "but what can I do? A junior inspector is a nobody; if he has any views of his own he has to pocket them. I would chuck out all this discipline rot and go in for the Montessori stunt. Take my tip and never accept an inspectorship." "I won't," I said hastily. I liked Smart, and I wish we had more of his stamp in the inspectorate. When we returned to the dining-room Mackenzie looked at me with interest. "I didn't know that you were the _Dominie's Log_ man till Mr. Macdonald told me two minutes ago," he said. "I am delighted to meet you. I enjoyed your book very much indeed. Very amusing." He was quite affable now. Writing a book gives a man a certain standing. I fancy it is the dignity of print that does it, and we all have the print superstition. I find myself accepting statements in books, whereas if someone said the same things to me over a dinner-table I should refute them with scorn. "If it is in _John Bull_ it is so!" Mr. Bottomley is a sound psychologist. When they were departing I said to Smart: "Yes, he's very amiable and all that, but I am jolly glad I had Frank Michie and not him as my chief inspector when I wrote my _Log_." Smart laughed. "My dear chap, Mackenzie would have let you run your school in your own way." "But," I cried, "he doesn't believe in freedom!" "He doesn't, but don't you see that he simply couldn't have jumped on you? He would have thought you either a lunatic or a genius, and he would have feared to condemn you in case you might turn out to be the latter. I know an art critic in London, and, believe me, the poor devil lives in terror lest he should damn the work of a new Augustus John. The Futurists aren't flourishing on their merits; they are flourishing because the critics are in a holy funk to condemn them in case they might be artists after all." I want to meet Smart again. I like his style. * * * * *