The record-union., 1891-04-26

not grow on the hedges. But they exist;
and If the orphans they take in hand are
sound at the heart they need never, with
such guardianship, feel the lack of
mother. The turbulent DAYS of their
spolllng will soon pass, and discretion
will come in the morning, long ere they
have sinned irretrevably against them
selves and their chances in the world.
The average orphan in the world is
much like the average novice in public
school. AT first it is very disagreeable:
He is dreadfully puzzled, plagued and
distressed. There seems meaning no
where. He is but little pallid leaf,
drifting before the wind, severed ere its
time from the parent tree. Goodness
knows whittier the wind will carry the
leaf 1t may get jerked into the brown
creek over the way, with the white ducks
in it, tail upwards, looking so very ridic-
ulous. Then it will soon get clogged with
the dirty water, and so it will go the bot
tom, and there will be an end to its indi-
viduality. At the best, it may fall softly
into the roadway, there to be trodden un-
der one foot after another until it is de-
composed, and lives again by metempsy-
Ghosts in some other form.
Nothing is more remarkable than the
development of the public school boy
from the timid little creature who sets
foot upon the threshold of the school. His
own mother would hardly know him at
bare to her the manifold notions and as
pirations which have in the meantime
come upon him.
/ am inclined to think it is better to let
plant run wild a little and blossom out
IN its own way, rather than trim and
prune it after a fashion of ones own.
| The much-besnipped myrtles and box
trees of Dutch and Italian gardens are
curious enough; but they seem to have
little grace or beauty compared to the
| tree growing in the open, with its twigs
ever unmutilated by shears. 1t is not
! quite the same with children, or else
King Solomon has misled US. NeVerthe-
| less, give me the hearty, willful orphan
! boy, who follows his hearts desire, even
though with 100 much zeal, rather than
the child sempiternally kept in subjection
to the will of a parent with hard-and-fast
ideas of what boy ought to be, and a
stern determination to bring his boy into
conformity with such ideas.
1t is, doubtless, going too far to say that
the majority of men who have become
| distinguished i'll the more active walks of
life had the advantage to begin life as
orphans. Yet there is something genu-
inc in the suggestion. The orphan is not
trammeled with inherited responsible
! ties. He has no father, with an ambition
to couple his sons name with his in the
bacon or tobacco business which he has
so carefully fostered from a very small
| beginning. He has no scruple to hinder
him from trying his various faculties and
inciinations, to see which it suits him
best 10 make the sheet-anchor of his
livelihood. If he has a desire to see the
world, there are many ways open to him;
and the reproaches of no one for whom
he need care inordinately stand in his
path as obstacle. No matter if he comes
to grief here and there in his "prelimi-
nary canters." While he is young he
can not help being buoyant; and each
''cropper'' does but teach him how in the
future TO avoid repetition Of such disas-
ter.
The paternal authority is good when the
"pater'' himself is a good and wise man.
But even then prejudiceS will OCCASION
ally interfere with the fathers wisdom.
1t is altogether distressing to the grown
man to be told by STRIPPING, for exam
pie, that he-the stripling-has an ire
sistible impulse to become an artist or an
author. Probably in nine cases out of
ten, at the very least, the elder does. well
to set down the heavy foot of his author
ity upon the youngsters hopes in the
matter. Still, there is the tenth, for whose
disappointment the success of the nine in
other ways cannot be said to atone.
So with the orphan. 1t is hardly quite
true that he is an Ishmael in the world,
But it is little less than providential that
he should be led, as he is often, to fancy
that every ones hand is against him. and
that, therefore, it behooves him to keep
himself braced and ready to act on the
defensive. Thus forewarned by his inn
agination, he is not to be caught mapping
| like the boy used to the paternal shield
! and buckler, but quite unused to the
! shocks and Sights which assail the man
who stands alone.
| / call to mind the career of an orphan
whom 1 knew from the beginning of his
! no q a hich 1nd q
wretch when he entered the somewhat
select preparatory school, which proffered
about forty of Us our initial step up the
ladder of life. For year or so he was
despised by every one, and the butt of
innumerable jeers, which would have
| Oughbred orphan. But all the time he
was advancing upon us by leaps and
! bounds. Though he had no mother
! to make him neat and clean, he had his
mother wit. 1 suppose he had the small
est money allowance of any of US. But
! he had genius for finance; and so it
! transpired anon that he got half of us
into his meshes in our various moods of
| lavish expenditure. Having thus ac-
| quired a definite ascendancy, he quickly
rose above US in other ways also. He
had good abilities; and he did not mind
exercising them now. Before, it would
have been as much as his piece of mind
!
worth. But, having got US in his tolls
he could do as he pleased.
The boys success followed him from
this little school to the greater school in
which he finished his education. He was
now masterful fellow, q leader IN every
reckleSsneSs, that gained him the admira-
ton of his juniors. He was handsome,
too, in fortuitous manner. / mean that
! he was not good-looking, and nothing of
a dandy, but owed his attractiveness to
the free vigor of his mind. Yet all the
while he kept the bride upon his i'm
pulses; he had learned enough of the
wisdom of the world to know that, with
slillful management, it is possible to
please at the same time parties who may
be said to be in mortal opposition to each
! other. And so he remained until he left
school, and went to London to see how he
and the law could become friends. But he
had not been a student in Gray's Inn
more than two years when word passed
that he had married ward in chancery.
1t was clandestine affair, and there was
some peril about it. But he had taken
the measure of the peril beforehand with
fair exactitude. Now he is a country
magistrate of fame, with as sterling fu-
ture before him as any man could wish
for. The ward in chancery-a pretty girl,
by the way-has brought him four stout
boys. as well as an excellent estate OF
pounds, shillings and pence.
1t may really be said that mother and
father are to some of us luxury that
tend to enervate us. and make US less able
to carve out our fortune than we would be
were we thrown on our own resources.
However, not every orphan may hope
to show extraordinary pluck and self
confidence; nor would it, upon the whole,
be well that those of us who begin life
| without certain of the advantages Of an
orphan should, for the sake of the expert
ment, cut ourselves adrift from our pro-
| mnnitnrS with little anna rent relII