Buchanan County bulletin. [volume] (Independence, Iowa) 1869-1891, 1877-11-16
About Boys.

If we may believe testimony, there
was formerly race of boys who work
ed; who got up at an incredible hour in
the morning to light the kitchen fires
and do the chores; who hoed corn for
three weeks for the chance of going fish
ing on rainy day; who eschewed the
vanities of marbles and base ball except
on rare occasions, and went through a
days work as if the eight hour law had
never been dreamed Of. The testimony
of their existence comes from the faith
ers who entertain their incredulous sons
with "When l was of your age, sir, |
could do as much work in one day as a
man, and my father made me do it,
Johnny turns his toast over to butter
the other side, and wonders why his
father does not make him do it, and
then asks for twenty-five cents to join
base ball club and gets 1.-THE boy
must have some exercise. Meantime
the father and mother are honestly puz-
zled. The father having been brought
up to hard work, has vague impress
sion that boys need some such disci-
pline, but he does not see how it can be
secured The legitimate object of a
boys life used to be to chop wood; but
anthracite coal cannot be sawed and
split, and he can hardly afford farm or
keep cow in city lot. So the boys
loaf and lounge, and make work for
their mothers, and get into mischief, and
live through vast amount OF frettlng
and fault-inding, until some day they
are turned loose in working world to
give and take hard knocks and learn to
acorh.
This is the very thing they should
have learned at home-the working is
not of half so great Importance as the
learning how. No healthy boy was ev-
er lazy until he was trained to it. From
the tips of his fingers to the ends of his
toes he is full of that restless, vigorous
irrepressible something which makes the
difference between boy and girl. You
can never delude the mother of boy
with all your theories that it is all a
matter of education. She knows it is
in the grain, and if she be wise woman
makes provision for it's healthy direc-
ton and development.
Give the boys knives and saws and
hammers and nails, and let them, even
if you have to shut your eyes when you
see the soft little fingers struggling with
the dangerous blades. There must be q
beginning, and multitude of boys have
carried their full complement of fingers
up to manhood Who is it that says
Providence always takes care OF boys il
people do not interfere?
There are plenty of uses for boy in
house. Chairs get shaky for lack OF
glue; hinges loosen and need only the
tightening of a screw; the normal con
dition of the door fastenings is found te
be out of order, but lock with two
knobs is as simple bit of mechanism
as can be made, and any boy ought to be
able to take one off and put it in order
Out of your boys play you get skill and
training which you may draw upon, and
others may thank you for all his life
Work in itself is not an actual good, but
only valuable for it's results either tc
ourselves or others, and the market val
ue of boys work in dollars and cents
is no fair measure of its worth.
1t is paying Investment to furnish
boys with tools and material for theil
use Twenty-Five cents in waste boards
from a planning mill, or the odds and
ends of finished lumber, bits of mold.
ings, shingles, ETC., to be obtained for a
trife from housebuilders, or load OF
boxes from a grocery, will make a boy
as rich as a millionaire, and give min
hours of healthy enjoyment. The Cir
can draw for the wardrobe of her Deepen
dent family upon the constantly increas-
ing stores of the rag-bag, and those odds
and ends Of femanine attire in the shape
of ribbons, laces and bits of gay stutfs
but in the average home boards are not
found lying loose, especially if there be
an avaricious female in the kitchen, to
appropriate everything larger than 8
toothpick for kindlings.
The rat-traps which scare the rats
from their neighborhood, the bird
in which the birds judiciously decline te
build, the rabbit-pens which precisely
suit the rabbits, whatever maledictions
thry may provoke from the gardener
the ships, and windmills, and blow-guns
and cross-bows, may not be eminently
successful from mechanical stand
point, but they are invaluable as educa
tors, and as furnishing substantial rec
reation-a thing far above amusement