Rock Island daily Argus. (Rock Island, Ill.) 1886-1893, 1889-01-04
THE WILD BOY NUISANCE.
MANNER IN WHICH YOUNG ROUGH9
AND LCAFERS ARE DEVELOPED.

Noisy Gang which Infest the Street Cor
ners-Aprarent Failure of Well Inten-
toned Peopie-The Trials of the Lady
School Teacher.
All our cities are infested by gangs of wild
boys, who make the evening and the Sunday
hideous To veil disposed people. The news
papers occas ionally relate their misdeeds, and
we see them for ourselves grouped upon their
favorite corners, ladies going around the
block tn avoid passing them. Nor can we
claim the wild boy nuisance is peculiar to
great cities In many pleasant country towns,
and even in remote villages. there are boys
rough, lawiess, unfeeling, untaught-who
nave con:ri"ed to escape the sedate civiliza-
tion Of the native place In their course
from babyl ood they have learned little ex-
cept how to make life torment and a
shame to their mothers and a terror to their
neighhorhood.
As we pass these idle, ugly, defiant groups
we may very naturally wonder how they
have come to exist, considering the number
or seductive traps good people have set to
catch the W ID 10y ard mako decent human
being of hiIl; our vast school system, for ex-
ample, uclldiug the evening school, the
Sunday school, the truant officer, the reform
school and the inviting rooms of various
Young rcn'i associations.
Let us sec how this unhappy creature is
evolved Any one may observe the process
who will take the trouble to study closely
ono large public school of boys. There he sits
listless and discontented, chewing gum, his
mouth already disfigured by the odious
habit a center and source of disorder to his
quarIer of the school room. He remains
lanSuid and quieSccnt only so long as no
chance of II ischief presents itself; but when
It Goes, lie shows some cunning and prompt
ness III avai ing himself of it. 1t was not in
the school room however, that he became a
wild boy. lie begins his days progress in
the bad way at home, in his hurried, disor-
DERBY hroa fast, from which he goes to
school, hal nourished, to devour whatever
indigestible substance he can find. And there
he sits, with his dirty hands and unclean
clothes, an incipient wild boyl If there are
hundred hnys in the schoolroonl, there are
usually half dozen of his kind. The school
room is pre- sided over by young lady, in
lovely white apron, her hair done to nicely,
and she tries every hour to tame these few
young sava res by all the arts of persuasion
at her conn iand. She is secretly afraid of
the Wild boz, and he knows it. She knows
will not bc the teacher who will gain tie vic
tory, and So they live in condition of de-
moralizing compromise Tommy she says,
In her sweetest note at the beginning of
school, II see you have brought that auger
to school again. Don't you think you had
better take it out into the entry, or let me
put it into my desk2' --
Tommy does not think so. and the gentle
lady knows well that, if she were to proceed
from advice to command, and command TO
compulsion, there would be q scene in the
schoo,room, from which her soul recoils with
horror. SIZE could expel him The law gives
her this power Why does she not use itP
Because she is q gentle and good woman, and
knows this boy, and perhaps his widowed
mother also, and all that mothers vain efforts
TO reform hun, and she knows Sat expulsion
would simpy mean his precipitation into the
career of wild boy
Sooner OF later, however, the school srstem
loses its hold upon him, and he develops
rapidly into a rufiian of the streets
No one can hold in more grateful regard
than | do the patient, much enduring ladies
who form so important n portion of the
teaching force of this country. Tho benign
influence OF good women is needed in every
school, and in no kind of school SO much as
in a school of boys. When the school is
large enough to have at its head a strong
able man, to whom in cases of difficulty and
rebellion the ladies of the CORPS can appeal,
all goes well They seldom need to appeal
Tho mere knowledge tha1 tho man is there
with his strong arm and his possible stick, is
usually deterrent that sulIicos But when
Te place n lady i'll charge of school in
which there are boys heavier and stronger
than herself, and leave her there to fight it
out with them alone, day after day, with no
resource against persistent disorder, which is
n confession of defeat, we do something
which Is extremely likely to result in the de-
veloDmcut 1f wild BOYS
1t is surprising how well many OF our
gentle and resolute ladies manage, unsup-
ported rs they are by visible force But out
Of every fifty boys there are likely to be as
many rs five who will defy the teacher, if
not totally conquer and frustrate her, TO the
extent of naking her life daily renewal of
bitterness and shame. II we place a lady
over lot of lively and vigorous boys, we are
bound to supplement her. We must arrange
it so that, at any moment of need, she can
summon by telephone or otherwise a super
II selectman, a trustee, with stout
policeman accompanying him, we'll provided
with the means of subduing the rebel. He is
always coward. Let him but know that
his gentle teacher has this resource and it
will usually keep him in order.
As people, / fear we are little too soft
and sentimental about childhood. We might
caress it a little less and
study it much more. Children, like other
musical instruments, give forth music only
when they are played upon by askillful hand.
| often think Of school as resembling great
organ full of pipes, trumpets and flutes.
When q m Ister touches the keys and works
the petals, the mighty instrument fills all the
region with harmony. 1t is wofully other
wise when an unskillful or insufficient player
fills the or5anist's seat.
A well governed child, that is, q child that
has learned reasonable obedience without loss
OF natural vivacity, is the most enchanting
object in The universe 1t graces and cheers
every home of which it is part. Every eye
rests upon it with pleasure and benediction
But alas! an ungoverned or misgoverned
chilli can easily become something hideous
and terrific No creature eau be more cruel
In my life have known two or three in
stances of cruelty to children from parents
and teachers, but it seems to me l have
known hundred cases of the most savage
cruelty CO nmitted by children upon parents,
teachers and one another. They are cruel
because they arc young A proper considera-
tion for the rights and feelings of others is
not naturally a trait of childhood; it belongs
to maturity. It comes with knowledge of
life and experience of suffering. Hence the
necessity Of children being instructed in ele-
mentary morals, and Of their being COM
PEELED, if necessary, by the strong hand, to
respect OF ler peoples rights
In truth, stable virtue in all its forms be-
longs to maturity, while vice is n thing
green, raw, mindless, stupid, immature In
our schools and colleges it is the crude, pro-
vincial minds that give trouble, and when we
visit one Of our prisons, we find that three
fourths of the criminals there are little more
than wild boys in a cage.-James Parton in
Boston Herald.