[Sidenote: Destructiveness]
Charles and Henry are in the principal’s office. “Did you boys visit the
tower last night and write your names on the hands of the clock?” The
boys assent. “Did you know that that door is kept locked so as to
prevent people from going up in the tower?” Again the boys say, “Yes.”
“Let’s see! You boys have been in here several times, haven’t you? You
got a whipping for fighting. Again I punished you for playing ball in
the neighbors yards. And after that you were punished for repeatedly
abusing the apparatus in the gymnasium. At another time you two went
with a basket ball team contrary to my plan. What do you think is to
come of all this? Do you like the whippings?”
The boys are very quiet until the last question. Charles answers: “I
don’t think we have been bad, and—”
“Well, that’s not left for you to decide. We are trying to make
something of you, and all this rough treatment is brought on by your own
reckless disregard for the rules and orders in force in the school. You
will each bring in twenty extra problems in algebra and also pay for the
repairing of the tower clock. If I catch you in the tower again you will
both get a much more severe punishment. Do you understand?”
After the boys left, Mr. Elsworth remarked to one of his teachers:
“When I come to school in the morning I never feel quite sure that I
shall not have to whip one or both of these boys for some foolish,
thoughtless scrape. I quite dread seeing either Charles or Henry. I may
have to expel Charles.”
Charles has suffered occasional floggings all through the grades. When
another pupil reports to Charles the principal’s remark about expulsion,
he becomes alarmed. He is doing fair work in school; and has not failed
in winning promotion at the end of each year. His power over Henry is
irresistible; they are constant chums. Their escapades never have
provoked the severest penalties. They shared punishments because both
joined in accepting equal responsibility. They rarely lied about their
misdeeds and timed them so as to avoid cumulative indignation until the
last incident.
Charles is bold, venturesome, knows the country roads well all about
town, has some taste for animal study and easily takes the lead, but has
not been cultivated in this particular. He is just approaching his
fifteenth birthday.
The penalty method has failed. Only one aspect of it has had any
considerable influence with the boys—the possibility of expulsion.
The principal has let the matter drag along in a heedless fashion, with
no clear policy in mind.