occur in the particular Indian story I had chosen for that night,
namely, "The Tiger, the Jackal and the Brahman."[3]--at a proper
distance, however, lest the audience should class him with the wild
animals. I then went on with my story, in the course of which I
mentioned a buffalo. In spite of the warning I had received, I found
it impossible not to believe that the name of this animal would be
familiar to any audience. I, therefore, went on with the sentence
containing this word, and ended it thus: "And then the Brahman went a
little further and met an old buffalo turning a wheel."

The next day, while walking down the village street, I entered into
conversation with a thirteen-year-old girl who had been in my audience
the night before and who began at once to repeat in her own words the
Indian story in questions. When she came to the particular sentence I
have just quoted, I was greatly startled to hear _her_ version, which
ran thus: "And the priest went on a little further, and he met another
old gentleman pushing a wheelbarrow." I stopped her at once, and not
being able to identify the sentence as part of the story I had told, I
questioned her a little more closely. I found that the word "buffalo,"
had evidently conveyed to her mind an old "buffer" whose name was "Lo,"
probably taken to be an Indian form of appellation, to be treated with
tolerance though it might not be Irish in sound. Then, not knowing of
any wheel more familiarly than that attached to a barrow, the young
narrator completed the picture in her own mind--but which, one must
admit, had lost something of the Indian atmosphere which I had
intended to gather about.

4. _The danger of claiming cooperation of the class by means of
questions_ is more serious for the teacher than the child, who
rather enjoys the process and displays a fatal readiness to give any