Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1858-12-25
From the Independent, November Al
WHAT is TO BE DONE WITH OUR
CHARLEY
BY HARRIET BEECHER STOWE.

bed. While he is asleep there our souls have
rest-we know where he is and what he is about,
and sleep is q gracious state but then he wakes
up bright and early, and begins footing, pound
ing, hammering, singing, meddling, and asking
questions: in short, overturning the peace of
society generally for about thirteen hours out of
every twenty four
Everybody wants to know what to do with
him-everybody is quite sure that ne can't stay
where they are. The cook can't have him in
the kitchen, where he infests the pantry to get
flour to make paste for his kites, or melt lard in
the new saucepan. If he goes into the wood
shed, he is sure to pull the wood-pie down up
on his head. If he be sent up into the garret,
you think for a while that you have settled the
problem, till you find what a boundless field for
activity is at once opened amid all the packages,
boxes, bags, barrels, and cast-off rubbish there.
Old letters, newspapers, trunks of miscellaneous
contents, are all rummaged, and the very reign
of chaos and old night is instituted. He sees
endless capacities in all, and he is always ham
mering something, or knocking something apart,
or saving, or planning, or drawing boxes and
barrels in all directions to build cities or lay
railroad tracks, till everybodys head aches
quite down to the lower floor, and everybody
declares that Charley must be kept out of the
garret.
Then you send Charley to school, and hope
you are fairly rid of him for few hours at least
But he comes home noiser and more breezy
than ever. having learned of some twenty other
Charleys every separate resource for keeping up
a commotion that the superabundant vitality of
each can originate. He can dance like Jim
Smith-he has learned to smack his lips like
Joe Brown-and Will Briggs has shown him
how to NEW like cat, and he enters the prem
ises, with new war-whoop learned from Tom
Evans. He feels large and valorous: he has
learned that he is boy, and has general i'm
preston that he is growing immensely strong
and knowing, and despises more than ever the
conventionalities Of parlor life; in fact, he is
more than ever an interruption in the way of
decent folks who want to be quiet.
1t is true, that if entertaining persons will
devote themselves exclusively to him, reading
and telling stories, he may be kept quiet; but
then this is discouraging work, for he swallows
story as Rover does piece of meat, and looks
at you for another and another, without the
slightest consideration, so that this resource is
of short duration, and then the old question
comes back; What is to be done with him?
But after ALL Charley cannot be wholly shirk-
ed, for he is an institution-a solemn and awful
fact; and on the answer to the question, What
is to be done with him dependsA future.
Many hard, morose, bitter man has come
from Charley turned off and neglected; many
parental heart ache has come from Charley
left to run the streets, that mamma and sisters
might play on the piano, and write letters in
peace. 1t is easy TO get rid of him; there are
fifty ways of doing that. He is a spirit that
can be promptly laid, but if not laid Alright will
come back, by and by q strong man armed,
when you cannot send him off at pleasure.
Mamma and sisters had better pay little
tax to Charley now. than terrible one by-and-
by. There is something significant in the old
There you have the w06fh&ic w06fh&icb agr Scriptures
think more than twice before you answer the
question; "What shall we do with Charley?"
For to-day he is at your feet to-day you can
make him laugh, you can make him cry, you
can persuade, coax, and turn him to your pleas
ure; you can make his eyes fill and his bosom
swell with rccitals of good and noble deeds in
short, you can mould him if you will take the
trouble.
But look ahead some years, when that little
voice shall ring in deep bass tones when that
small foot shall have mans weight and tramp;
when rough beard shall cover that little, round
chin, and the wilful strength of manhood fill
out that little form Then you would give
worlds for the key to his heart, to be able to
turn and guide him to your will but if you
will lose that key he is little, you may search
for it carefully, with tears, some other day, and
never find it.
Old housekeepers have a proyerb, that one
hour lost in the morning is never found all day.
1t has significance in this case.
One thing is to be noticed about Charley. that,
rude, and busy, and noisy as he is, and irksome
as carpet rules and parlor ways are to him, he
is still social little creature, and wants to be
where the rest of the household are. A room
ever so well adapted for play, cannot charm him
at the hour when the family is in reunion; he
hears the voices in the parlor, and his play-room
seems desolate. 1t may be warmed by fur
mace and lighted with gas, but it is human
warmth and light he shivers for; he yearns for
the talk of the family, which he so imperfectly
comprehends, and he longs to take his play
things down and play by you, and is incessant-
ly promising that of the fifty improper things
which he is liable to do in the parlor, he will
not commit one if you will let him stay there.
This instinct of the little one is Natures
warning plea-God's admonition. o. how many
mother who has neglected it because it was
irksome to have the child about, has longed at
twenty five to keep her son by her side and he
would not! Shut out as little Arab; con-
stantly told that he is noisy that he is awkward
and meddlesome, and plague in general, the
boy has found at last his own company in the
streets, in the highways and hedges, where he
runs till the day comes when the parents want
they are scared at the face he brings back to
them, as he comes all foul and smutty from the
companionship to which they have doomed him.
Depend upon it, if it is too much trouble to
keep your boy in your society," there will be
places found for him-warmed and lighted with
no friendly fres-where he who finds some mis-
chief still for idle hands to do, will care for him,
if you do not. You may put out tree and it
will grow while you sleep, but son you cannot
you must take trouble for him, either little
now or a great deal by-and-by.
Let him stay with you at least some portion
of every day; bear his noise and his ignorant
ways. Put aside your book or work to tell him
a story; or show him picture; devise still par
lor plays for him, for he gains nothing by being
allowed to spoil the comfort of the whole circle.
A pencil sheet of paper, and few patterns
will sometimes keep him quiet by you for an
hour, while you are talking, or in corner he
may build block-house annoying nobody. If
he does now and then disturb you, and it costs
you more thought and care to regulate him
there, balance which is the greatest evil-to be
disturb by him now, or when he is a man.
OF all you can give your Charley, if you are
good man or woman, you presence is the best
and safest thing God never meAnt him IN do