The editor still encouraged, and the total ran into the hundreds of thousands, until during the last year, before the service was finally stopped by the Great War in 1917, the yearly correspondence totalled nearly a million letters.
[Illustration: The Grandmother, who counselled each of her children to make the world a better and more beautiful place to live in--a counsel which is now being carried on by her grandchildren, one of whom is Edward Bok.] The lack of opportunity for an education in Bok's own life led him to cast about for some plan whereby an education might be obtained without expense by any one who desired.

He finally hit upon the simple plan of substituting free scholarships for the premiums then so frequently offered by periodicals for subscriptions secured.

Free musical education at the leading conservatories was first offered to any girl who would secure a certain number of subscriptions to _The Ladies' Home Journal_, the complete offer being a year's free tuition, with free room, free board, free piano in her own room, and all travelling expenses paid.

The plan was an immediate success: the solicitation of a subscription by a girl desirous of educating herself made an irresistible appeal.
This plan was soon extended, so as to include all the girls' colleges, and finally all the men's colleges, so that a free education might be possible at any educational institution.

So comprehensive it became that to the close of 1919, one thousand four hundred and fifty-five free scholarships had been awarded.