Year: 1869

The present generation of young men seen


to have strong aversion to every kind o.


trade. business, calling or occupation that re


quires manual labor, and an equally strong


tendency towards some so-called "yentesl'


employment or profession. The result il


seen IN the superabundance Of elegant reu-


men, bookkeepers and clerks of every kind


who can get no employment, and are wasting


their lives in the vain pursuit Of what is not


te be bad and a terrible overstock of law


yers without practice and doctors without pa


tlents. The passion on the part of the bows


and young men to be clerks, Office attendants.


messengers, anything, so that it is not work


OF the kind that will make them mechanics or


tradesmen, is deplorabe sight to those who


have full opportunities to see the distressing


effects of it in the struggle for such employ


ments. by those unfortunates who have nut i,


out OF their power to do anything else, by ne


glecting to learn some permanent trade or


business in which trained skill! can always be


turned to account. The applications for clerk.
ships and similar positions in large establish


ments, are numerous beyond anything that
would De thought of by those who have no
chance to witness it. Parents and relatives


as we'll as the boys and young men themselves,
seem to be afflicted with the same infstuation.


To all such we say, thatthe most unwise ad-
vice you can give to your bov is to encourage
HIM to be clerk or a bookkeeper. At the
best, it is not a we!l-paid occupation. Very
frequently it is among the very poorest. This
is the case when the clerk is fortunate enough
to be employed; but if he should be out of
place, then comes the weary search, the fear
tul struggle with the thousands of others
looking for places, the never-ending disap-
pointments, the hons deferred that makes the
heart sick, the strife with poverty, the hu-
Mutations that take all the manhood out of
the poor souls. the privations and suffering of
those who depend upon his earnings, and who
have no resource when he is earning nothing
No father, no mother, no relative should wish
to see their boy or kindred wasting their lives
in striving after the genteel positions that
bring such trial and privations upon them in
after life.


How do these deplorably false notions as to
choice of occupation get into the heads of
boys? Why do they or their parents consider
it more "genteel' or desirable to run errands.
sweep out Offices, make fires, copy letters.
etc., than to make hats or shoes, or Law bricks,
or WELD the saw or iack-plane, or handle the
file. or the blacksmith's . hammer +?
We have heard that some of them get these
notions at school. If this be true, it is a cad
perverson Of the means of education proyid-
them useful, as we'll as intelligent members
Of society, and not useless drags and drones.
Should it be 50, that the present generation
of boys get it into their heads that, because
they have more school learning and book ac-
than their fathers had, they
must look down upon the trades that require
skill and handicraft, and whose productions
make up the vast mass of the wealth of every
then it is time for the controllers
and the directors to have the interior walls
Of our school-houses covered with maxims and
notices warning them against the fatal error.
- Philadelphia Ledger.