The Vancouver independent. (Vancouver, W.T. [Wash.]) 1875-1910, 1877-06-07
The Independent.
THURSDAY, JUNE 2, 1877.
Learn Your Boys to Work.


school with profit, they had better be
put to work at something. Parents do
their boys grest wrong by permitting
them to run in the streets. The first
place for healthy active boy is at
school, the next best place is the work
shop or the farm. They must, by all
means, have employment Of some sort.
If not moral and profitable employment,
it will be of an immoral and unprofita-
BILE character. Whether boy is pre-
disposed to mischief or not, idleness
and evil associations will soon trans
form him into hoodlum. Most, if not
all boys, when left to themselves, will
get into mischief. 1t is an old saying
THAT Satan finds work for idle hands
to do" sorrowfully illustrated in the
case of boys, whose parents have
left them to take care of themselves.
Boys should be early taught to have an
object in life, to which end, redeemlng
the time is the first requisite. An ac-
tive, growing fellow must have out door
exercise and amusement, but give him
plenty of out door work, and his amuse-
ments are apt to be Of the temperate
kind. Some boys have little, if any,
taste for books; they never succeed in
getting up much enthusiasm over their
studies in the school room, and they
are impatient of the restraint imposed
to keep them within bounds at home.
To most parents, such boys are prob
lens, difficult of solution. The ques-
ton, "What shall we do with our
boys" becomes a most serious one. 1t
is an easy thing to answer the question;
it is always easy to give advice, but 1t
is not always easy to convince a parent
that a certain course with his boys is
the true one; and, also, not easy for
parents to carry out, what they feel
must be carried out in the discipline of
boys. Parental lethargy, or laxity of
discipline and control, is where the
great fault lies. The boy who defes
the authority of father or mother will
soon defy the authority of the law, and
it is little use, so far as beneftting the
boy is concerned, to follow him with
the penalties of the law, when home
discipline has failed to do its proper
work. He who violates the law must
be punished, as terror to evil doors,
and to protect society, but usually the
punishment case hardens the criminal
So, as the preacher has said, it is ter
rible thing to put a boy in jail. AT an
early age he is familiarized with the
inside walls of an institution, of which
the bare mention of its name jail,
should have meaning that would chill
the blood, and set the boys face more
steadily toward the goal of virtue and
honesty.
But what is the remedy for hoodlum-
isn't First the scales must be stricken
from the eyes of parents, that they may
more clearly see and appreciate the sit
uation, and second, the boys must have
employment. The school, the garden,
the workshop, the Office, the farm, and
many other avenues are open, or should
be, to receive them as workers. Labor
conquers all things" and it will con-
quer and utilize for good, the untamed
spirit of Young America. Study the
disposition and capacity of your boy,
with view to helping him to do some
thing profitable. Any kind of honest
work is respectable; any kind of idle
ness is unrespectable Play is well
enough at times, amusements boys
must, and will have; like the condiments
at dinner, they are the relishes and sau-
ces. ADJUSTMENTS are useful things to
season labor, but unwholesome and hurt
full As substitutes for labor. Parents,
~>-< l>,,x go, Il 49,. 49,. q. - -