Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1872-04-26

S. c.. Kendall says some very true and
suggestive things about 1.-The Boy John"
in the April number of Scribner's. We
quote as follows:
John is young. His tastes are uniformed.
His feelings are very far from being rein
cd. In fact lie is n little gross in his sym
pathies. He wants amusement. Every
bone in his body aches for recreation, for
play, fun, laughter. He does not care-he
has never been taught to care-what the
fun is, if only it will give relief to the hdS-
ct that stings him. Not at all refined, lie
will go for what he wants whore others go.
And going where others go, he finds the
hunger of his nature coarsely met-just as
the tainted meat will fill the hunger of a
starving man-in the low revelry, vile sto-
ries, unclean mirth of drinking-cellars and
saloons. The boy does not discriminate
very closely, and TO the longing of his
crude appetite the entertainment OF these
places is infinitely better than any he ever
could find in that place which he had been
taught to speak of as home. For eating
and sleeping and getting his clothes mend
ed. be feels that no place can lie equal to
Christian home but fora good time for
passing dull evening hour, for learning
something new, for words of cheer, for pro-
fessions Of sympathy, for those genial ways
which a boy does love, and which any boy
but Uriah IIcep must love, John will tell
even the minister to his face that home is
nothing to a street corner, ora blliard-room
with the attachment of beer-shop.
We'll, 10y and by, just before the clock
strikes ten, the father wakes from his doze,
the spcctaclcs falling and the paper sliding
upon the floor, and looking round with
bewildered gaze, asks, "where is John?'
Where is he? Why, for want of better
instruction, he is out practising our mod
ern plan of training himself up in the way
he likes TO go, having no thought that
when he is old he will care to depart from
it. But the father who has inquired for
his boy ru lbs his eyes, looks out into the
darkness and listens; but he hears him
not He wishes that his boy would not go
out so of nights; but then he does 90 cut.
He wonders that John cannot sit down at
home like other boys. What other boys
| And then, with very feeling remark that,
"Ir John does not do better and become
steady, he will make a miserable shirk OF
| himself" the father goes to bed. The
mother waits till her boy comes. BY and
| by he does come in-his restlessness blown
| of, the uneasy fdget of the carly evening
| spent in relaxations which, of some kind,
a boy must have,-and then at last the
house is quiet. Sleep and rest prepare the
| household for another day and evening like
| these.
And when that other evening comes, out
goes the boy again and the father again
wonders, and wishes that John would be
steady aud stay at home, and very feelngly
predicts that, "If he does not change his
course, he will very likely come to mis-
cradle end"
But, good father, why should your boy
spend his evenings at home? What is there
at home for him9 What pleasant recrea-
ton, what happy plan for Willing away
the hour, does he find inviting him there,
or would invite any boy there? What
have you done to make home attractive
and winsome to him as Johns home? lie
would disbursements suited to his young,
restless, trimming nature; how much real
thought and care did you ever give in
schemes, devices, plans, efforts, with q
view to meeting this passionate yearning
of his mind? How much do you play with
him, tell stories with him, make riddles
with him, talk with him of what you have
done and seen, of what your father did and
saw? What games, what sports, what Of
forts at skill with slate and pencil, will
knife, saw and gimet, have you devised
for him, while your look and action wer,
saying, "My boy, / want you to love youi
home more than any other spot on earth p