, 1885-03-20
LIKE CLOCK WORK.
ExTRaoRotnsay scENEin THF PLAY.
GROUND OF A coLoRED scHooL-
A Single Tap ON n Bell aud Fifteen
Hundred Children Beeome Instantly
1fotlonisss otiAer Examples
Of Marvellous discipline.


when strike this ball, said S-uperintend-
ent Doty, OF the Morris Street colored school.
when / was inspecting his branch of the
public school system OF charleston the other
day, "the noon recess Il over. and every one
Of our 400 Toys and girls is In duty bound
to become motionless, preserving whatever
attitude he may happen to be in at the time
of the bell-stroke. You may bs Interested to
watch the effect
SO saying, he struck II button. The loud,
sharp note Of an alarm-bell responded to the
pressure. and l stepped quickly to the win
dow.
The assortment Of grotesque positions to
be witnessed below beggars description.
Here a boy had a ball raised In midair, while
over yonder stood another lad with hands
extended ready TO catch the ball. In one
place some youngsters we're playing at leap
frog. There a couple Of lads were locked in
a seeming death-grip, having been caught by
the signal in the act Of wrestling. In one
place an automatic game OF tag was ~illustra-
ted. In another a girl had her arms ex-
tended in the process of ~rope-skipping.
"Pompeii without the debris, I" l remarked.
This Is Of course only a feature of tho
discipline which we try to preserve" ex-
planned Mr.. Doty. "Once 1 rang this pre-
liminary signal and then walked l~eisurely
from window TO window to SEQ how it had
been obeyed. From the last window i dis
covered n lad literally standing on his head
with his feet resting against the fence,
where he had been for two or three minutes.
i rang the second bell in haste, and from
that day prohibited the fine art Of posing on
the head. But that incident illustrates the
prompt and iron-clad adherence to the very
letter of tho law which Is cultivated here.
This second stroke OF the bells forms the en-
tire school into professions"
A fkf-I .f~o1-o ~r1 -. - - ---t.~. l..
machinery doors flew open in every part OF
the large room. Still another stroke, and
in marched the files, a class at a time.
through each opening. Every boy and girl
was exactly in line, the distances between
pupils was invariably uniform, and there
was a graduation Of heads in each class nc
cording 10 the height Of the pupils. During
the exercise of a whole hour thai followed
there was not the slightest deviation from
rigid military order. Never a head turned
once, never a hand stirred 10 rub a tickling
ear or nose, and never a suggestion Of a mis-
take occurred in the complicated e~volutions
OF the hour.
After all the classes had In some inexpli-
cable way found their respective quarters,
twenty monitors marched up, ten ON ono
side Of the principals desk and ten on the
other. These class monitors submitted their
reports Only two had failures 10 chronicle.
and those failures were of the smallest posi-
Die Importance. amounting to lack OF sufii-
cient promptness in obeying the first bell.
"Are these children really alivef' l said
under my breath. at all seems like some
ingoniously contrived mechanical puppet-
show on a vast scale
And yet there was no bored, automatic
expression en- this bright faces before ne.
Evidently the pupils reveled in the very
rigidity OF the discipline to which they were
subjected. l think perhaps the personal
magnetism OF Superintendent Doty Lad
something to do with securing such superb
system. Certainly | never saw anything in
the north which even Appropriated the
matchles8 discipline of these Morris street
colored children. The effect was beautiful
beyond M power to express.
a will order a special exercise In singing
said Mr.. Doty. But he didn't say anything.
More b~ell-taps, and more doors flew open,
more children filed into the hall from the
adjoining recitation rooms, and the room
was full. A single verso followed from each
of half "A dozen selections, embracing I 9
chief styles Of classic music. Here again
everything went like clock-work- There was
no announcement Of the piece to DO sung save
that involved in the opening bars as playel
ON a piano; and every darky lads voice was
heard. as al % every girls. while all eyes
were fixed ire vocably straight ahead. AMI
all hands were clasped and motionless ON
the edge Of the desk in front.
In company with Mr.. Doty ! then took a
cruise through the building.
The same unalterable system was evident
everywhere. Sometimes l would think,
"Surely we will talks this room una wares
an8 discover some impropriety." But We
never did. Every class preserved strict mil
ifarv order In DassiuV to and from recffa-