Most persons, when they face an audience or feel at all embarrassed, think in phrases, in broken sentences. Hence exercises designed to cultivate the habit of thinking in sentences are very valuable. Franklin’s plan of rewriting the thought of a book like “The Spectator,” and then comparing his own sentences with those of a master-mind, can be followed with great advantage, because it lifts the burden of correction from the teacher’s shoulders and throws it upon the pupil, giving the latter the full benefit of the exercise. Moreover, it cultivates in the pupil the habit of watching how thought is expressed by standard authors. The teacher’s interest in the thought side of language often makes him forget that the correct use of capitals, punctuation marks, sentences, and paragraphs is a matter of thinking quite as much as invention and the arrangement of materials. These externals of the process of composing must at some time be made the object of chief regard. The reason so many pupils do not learn their use is found in the fact that teachers hate the drudgery of correcting papers, and they expect the pupils to acquire this knowledge incidentally. The right use of books obviates the necessity for much of this drudgery, and secures the desired end with a minimum expenditure of time and effort. Skill in the use of capitals and punctuation marks is best acquired when the attention is not absorbed by the elaboration of ideas or by the labor of composing. The externals involved in putting sentences upon paper can claim the chief attention in the dictation of standard selections from a school reader. This exercise enables the pupil to make his own corrections, and is worth a dozen in which the teacher makes the corrections, only to be cast aside after a momentary glance by the pupil. The exercise may be varied by copying a selection from a standard author upon the black-board, covering it with a screen or shade (on rollers) during the dictation, and exposing it to view only while the corrections are made. If each one of the punctuation marks is made an object of special attention in a particular grade, there are enough grades to cover them all before the pupil reaches the high school.