The Democratic press. [volume] (Ravenna, O. [Ohio]) 1868-1901, 1884-11-06
Short Talks with the Boys.

around the house is good enough for him
and he IS continually threatening to run
away. / don't know what to do with him.
Do you?"
Thus writes father whose letter is
dated from a town in Indiana. His boy
is probably no worse than the average
lad of that age. Has the father ever
got right down to hard-pan to discover
whether the fault lies with him or his
son? Has he made study of the boy
to learn how he should be handled?
When a man buys horse he grants
himself certain length of time to learn
the animals nature, whims and tricks.
Isn't it of as much Importance to study
a boy? While no two boys are alike,
nearly all fathers seek to govern ON the
same principle. They boss and order
and imagine that settles the case.
Now, to begin with, boy from IS to
20 years of age is a queer animal to
handle. He is full of the most absurd
whims and notions and false ideas. You
may partly convince him of this by ar
gument, but you can make an impress
ion by scolding or pounding. l believe
the better way is to let his ma
MIA wear itself out, like a fever.
The boy of forty years ago wasn't
as bad as the boy of to-day, but
may be explained that he hadn't the
chance to be. Where women had only
one bonnet year at the outside, and
men sat in the village church in their
shirt sleeves, what boy would have
dared ask for collar and necktie? To
have wanted better clothes would have
been to exhibit base ingratitude. To
have refused to wear cOwhide boots and
to black them with lard and lampblack,
would have been to accept the alterna-
tive and go barefoot. Clothes were
made at home, and after almost any
fashion. If shirts had collar of the
same material it was something to be
proud over. The boys feelings were
not to be consulted in such cases, and
it was rarely that one lad would criti-
else what another wore. Pride in boy
would have been denounced almost a
crime, and tanning" would have
certainly followed.
But the years have made great
change. We seek to govern our child
rem in a different way, and fashion is
consulted in every corner of the land.
We expect more of our boys than was
expected of us. and we cultivate pride
instead of crushing it. If we have a
sen from l3 to 20 years of age we real
ize that he must be kept on an equal
footing with his boy friends or he will
feel degraded. Show lfe boy of Ii,
in village or city, whose family have
any social standing, who can be coaxed
or bribed to wear a pair of pants patch
ed at the knee. He will argue that the
whole town will stop business to gaze
at that patch. If one of his boots is
out at the toe, that settles the case with
him. If there's rip in his coat, or a
button off, he can't take a minutes 8
comfort on the street.
The boy of to-cay has got all these
whims, and you must consult them and
bear with him. No matter what tail
or measures him, you can expect a
complaint that his pants are too long
or too shnrt-tOO tight or too baggy.
He didn want mo such coat and
the vest doesn't fit him within a mile
His necktie doesn't suit; his collars
are horrid, and the complaint will even
include his bootlegs. Pound him if
you will, but you will only make him
hate you. Argument and reason will
smooth over most of his troubles. Has
the Indiana farmer tried this method
Ii a man doesn't vote our ticket or at
tend our church-if he believes the
world to be flat instead Of round-if he
drinks too mIich-if he scouts at stand
ard facts in science or natural philos-
ophy, do we knock him down or argue
with him? Don't we give him three
times the show that we do a boy, whose
false notions will disappear with age?
EgOtism should be scorched until a
blister effects cure, but the parent
who seeks to crush the natural pride
in a boy is playing a dangerous game.
The same natural pride that makes
him find so much fault with his clothes
must be depended on to keep him out
Of degrading company and unfit asso-
Citations. Pound it into him that any
thing is good enough for him and ht
will find it easy to wear old clothes anC
train with loafers.
Have yOu as a man walked the street:
dead-broke for single day? You fell
cheap and ashamed of yourself. A boy
might not feel it quite so keenly, bu
he feels it sufficiently to mortify hi
pride. don't say that you should
hand out dollar after dollar to your sol
and take no heed how he spends it
but mingle common sense with the
transaction. Let him know that yol
disapprove of smoking, chewing, beer
drinking, betting, gambling and bill
lizards. He wants money for score o
things that seem foolish to you, but h
is boy. If he has a dollar in his purs,
he feels certain pride in the knowl
edge, and will waste less than if yol
doled him out dime at time. Whel
one boy applies the term stingy to an
other it means more than you realize
1t means boy too mean to associate
with. If he is stingy he is supposed t.
be a cheat and liar as well. Give you
boy twenty-five cents for the Fourth o
July or to go on an excursion in tn,
company of lads who have been fur
nished a dollar apiece and you cal
snap your fingers at all the comfort h,
takes. He feels sense of inferiOrity
not only financially, but in all other re
spects, and this degrades him. Ha
the Indiana farmer reasoned in thi
way?
For the last two or three years l hav,
been watching father spoil his son
The great object seems to be to keel
the lad hard at work when out o
school. He is put to digging and hoe
ing and saving and wheeling, and Al
hour of this work, instead of ''givin:
him an appetite" eNhausts him anC
gets his temper on edge. He is mad
to don his old clothes after school hour
and the knowledge that he looks like
scare-crow annoys and degrades him
He has no allowance of money and i
therefore deprived of the society o
other boys. He isn't allowed to visi
a circus or the theatre, and has neve
been fishing or hunting, has no boy
books or amusements, and his father
way of addressing him is:
''Now, young man, you git for tha
wood-pNe or I'll wallop you within al
inch of your life!'
The chances are ten to one that tina
| boy regards his father as his morta
enemy Before he is 20 years old h
will run away, and his freedom vii
result in excesses. If it should so hap
pen that he does not go to the bad, h
will still bear such a grudge agains
his parent as will make him feel lik
denying kinship.
There is any amo unit of weeping an
wailing over spoilt boys. If but a tent