“But remember, you can’t eat piles of doughnuts and you can’t smoke if you ever want to do anything in athletics. Rich food puts your digestion out of commission, and smoking goes straight to your heart—and that’s what you can’t stand when you’re playing. They make you fall behind in your lessons, too, and then you’re not allowed to play on a team. I never smoke, and the other fellows that do anything in athletics or debating don’t either. We can’t; we know better. “Now, I hope this spring you fellows will all get out and get some good training in baseball and track, because when we’re gone we want to hear that the high school is keeping up her old record; and it’ll depend on you fellows that are coming on. You can do as well as we have or better, if you just will.” Miss Hardy’s plan did work. It worked because she substituted a good ideal for imitation instead of a poor one. The poor one had been presented to her boys without her consent; she had to make an intelligent effort to get the fine one vividly before them. She did not arouse opposition by making her cause too obvious, by forcing the didactic tone; it appeared as one part of an attractive program—but it was made clear that it was an indispensable part. She followed up the talks with suggestions that fostered the organization of baseball teams in the spring, the regular coach coöperating with suggestions and occasional instruction. Her boys seemed to have forgotten that they ever thought it smart to smoke. When she left at the end of the year, the coach told her that he was certain that not one of her boys was a user of cigarettes. ILLUSTRATION 2 [Sidenote: Remove Temptation] Miss Hardy was succeeded the next year by a young man fresh from the training department of a great university, who was enthusiastic and keenly analytical. The non-smoking eighth grade boys had now gone into the high school, and he was met by the same problem that had defeated Miss Steele. He realized that while Miss Hardy’s plan had worked with her boys, still the evil existed in the community as a constant menace, and he resolved to reach the root of the trouble if possible. There seemed to be several roots: the smokers in the high school, the Station Store where the boys loafed, the indifferent parents, the shops where the boys were sold, contrary to law, the materials for their cigarettes. The story of how these elements in the problems were reached is too long to recount here; but it was done by arousing the interest of the parents, who were stirred into action by a rather lurid talk given by the new eighth grade teacher, and who organized for the definite purpose of removing the temptations to smoke.