Perhaps the most disturbing thing about the blunder in _Foes_ was the fact that there was no necessity for it. The Christian religion, which was the religion of Alexander Jardine, provides for reconciliation, indeed, it exacts it. There was the way for Miss Johnston to bring her foes together. Of course, it would not have been intellectually so exciting. But there is such a thing as emotional appeal, and it is not always base; there are emotions in the human so high and so lofty that it is wiser not to try to transcend them.... The appearance of part of the foregoing in _Books and the Book World_ of _The Sun_, New York, brought a letter from Kansas which should find a place in this volume. The letter, with the attempted answer, may as well be given here. The writer is head of the English department in a State college. He wrote: 20 “I hope that the mails lost for your college professors of English subscribers their copies of _Books and the Book World_ [containing the foregoing observations on _Book Reporting_].... College professors do not like to be disturbed--and most of us cannot be, for that matter. The TNT in those pages was not meant for us, perhaps, but it should have been. “When I read _Book Reporting_ I dictated three pages of protest, but did not send it on--thanks to my better judgment.... Then I decided, since you had added so much to my perturbation, to ask you to help me. “We need it out here--literary help only, of course. This is the only State college on what was once known as the ‘Great Plains.’ W. F. Cody won his sobriquet on Government land which is now our campus. Our students are the sons and daughters of pioneers who won over grasshoppers, droughts, hot winds and one crop farms. They are so near to real life that the teaching of literature must be as real as the literature--rather, it ought to be. That’s where I want you to help me. “I am not teaching literature here now as I was taught geology back in Missouri. That’s as near as I shall tell you how I teach--it is bad enough and you might not help me if I did. (Perhaps, in fairness to you, I should say that for several years never less than one-third of those to whom we gave degrees have majored in English, and always as many as the next two departments combined.) “Here’s what I am tired of and want to get away from: “1. Testing students on reading a book by asking fact questions about what is in the book--memory work, you see. “2. Demanding of students a scholarship in the study of literature that is so academic that it is Prussian. “3. Demanding that students serve time in literature classes as a means of measuring their advance in the study of literature. “Here’s what I want you to help me with in some definite concrete way: (Sounds like a college professor making an assignment--beg pardon.) “1. Could you suggest a scheme of ‘book reporting’ for college students in literature classes? (An old book to a new person is news, isn’t it?)