Vermont watchman and State journal. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1836-1883, 1881-09-21

Spoken by Master Willie Bennett, colored
boy, at the Normal school exhibition in Fisk
University, Nashville, Tenn, April 29.]
Boys are a very important part of the hu-
man family, and yet they are very much
abused. The girls say, " You horrid boyl"
The grown folks say, " You are the noisiest
boy | ever saw" and yet they are very will
ling to have the boys around when they want
them to do anything for them.
| appear to defend this innocent but
greatly slandered class. / agree with the
boy who, when asked, "What are boys fit
for ?" replied, They are good to make men
Of" That was a boy after my own heart. 1t
is good for boy to take good while to
grow up to be a man. The only man who
never was boy made good deal of trouble
in the world. That was Adam.
Eve was the only woman who never was a
girl, aud between them they made pretty
mess of it, But | am not here to find fault
with Adam and Eve. They were not to
blame for never having been children, and
besides we have enough sins of our own TO
look after
Every one of the most celebrated men of
history was boy once. Caesar was boy
once, genuine Roman boy, as full of pluck
and noise as an egg is of meat. | have no
doubt that he made mud pies on the banks
of the Tiber and "thrashed the other boys
in many hardfought battle. This babit
Of thrashing" other folks he kept up after
he became man. That was because the
"child is father to the man." But Caesar
was, am sure, good student when bog,
| for he could write Latin better than most of
us can write English.
| George Washington is another case of
great man who was once boy. AT one
time in his life he was just as old as am.
In that respect am like George Washing
ton. Hence, there is room for me to become
the father of my country. In that case
George Washington would be the grand
father Of his country 1t is about time that
that happened. If it doesn't, we shall soon
get so big that one man can't manage so
| large family. 1t is true that George
Washington was brought up in the back
woods among the Indians, and that he did
not know nearly as much as one of your
modern boys, your regular young Americans.
He never saw steamboat, nor a telegraph,
nor locomotive; he never heard the tele-
phone, nor the photograph nor the jubilee
singers. He knew nothing of woman's
rights or the spelling reform, or the tonic
sofia. And yet, although he was so igno-
rant, he was one of your broad-breasted,
square.shouldered, clean-faced, clear-eyed
boys. George Washington had three good
things in boy he had Ratchet, he told
the truth, and he loved his mother. He
hacked his fathers cherry tree with his
Ratchet but he told the truth about it. He
was too noble boy to tell lie. Such
boy could not help making noble man.
Thus l might go on and show by many
examples that every great man was once
boy and that the boy made the man.
The boys that make great and good men
and all Of us boys intend to be great and
good men-are not your mean, sneaking,
lazy youngsters who haven't got spirit enough
to make a first-class noise but your wide
awake, wrestling, running fellows who have
so much energy that they do not know what
to do with it and let it off sometimes, when
they ought not to-that is in the house and
when the old folks are about. They are
above doing mean things, such as peeping
body's lesson papers, or plaguing the girls,
or making themselves general nuisances in
any way.
Boys stand up for your rights the right
to be honest and true the right to be gentle
and loving; the right to be noisy on the
playground, but polite and considerable at
home; the right to be an upright, down
right, straightforward boy, full of vigor, full
of hope, and full of courage for the work of
life. Then the boy that you are will not be
ashamed of the man that you become.
! Then the boys of this age will not be
unworthy successors of those grand boys of
the past who have done so much for the
country, Washington, Lincoln, Sumner and
| Garfield