Year: 1871

4


By A BOY.


j cannot pick up a newspaper
without advice to Boys" stares me
in the face. Old men write it ]
s'pose, Nobody else is capable OF
giving any advice to boys, of course
not! They know all about us, they
do, cause they've been there. Ad-
vice is a good thing to have, no
DOUBT, and no family should be
without it, but a feller don't want
to be crammed with it all the time
to the exclusion of all other diet.


Now, old men need advice occa-
sionally, but in looking through the
newspapers I don't see as they get
it. So just thought I would write
a little Advice to Old Men myself,
if I am not presuming too much,
las Aunt Chloe says, and I pre-
sumo I am.


In the first place, you old chaps
ought to get over telling how much
smarter boys were when you we're
young than boys are now. You be-
lieve it yourselves, of course, cause
you've told it so many times, but
we boys can't see it. We have a
notion that boys are boys, pretty
much, Except some that are girls, J
the world over. and one generation
of them don't lay over another gen
Grafton to any alarming extent.


Only let you tell it, and you could
out-run, outjump, out-wrestle, and
out anything else the rising genera
tion of to-day, when you was a boy.
Grandfather, who has got the gout
and half a dozen different kinds of
rheumatism, is always saying that.
heard him singing the other day,
81 would I were a boy again" I
would he were too. If / couldn't
beat him running, jumping, and
wallow him all over the back yard,
I don't want a cent.


1 wouldn't go so far as to say,
parents, obey your children" but
L would suggest to fathers that they
give us a hearing occasionally on
matters in which we are the ones
most interested. Don't make us
go and slide down hill when we
want to skate, and don't try to make
preachers of us when we much pre-
fer to run a saw mill. This is figu-
rative, but I guess you know what
I mean.


After giving US boys sage advice
about our conduct, and how TO be-
have, you old men ought to be care
full how you relate your boyish
scrapes to each other and laugh at
them before we are out of earshot.
The other day grandfather read me
a long lecture about the rights of
property, temperance and Sabbath
breaking. That night an old crony
of his'n came to visit him, and they
had a glass Of punch together
They thought 1 was asleep on the
sofa, and the way they did run on
about the fun they had when they
were boys together! They told all
about robbing Capt. Lyman's mel
on patch, and it turned out it was a
Sunday night, too! When 1 went
to bed they were taking their third
glass of punch, and I don't know
how many they had after that. l
know grandfather's rheumatism
was a great deal verse the next day
and he complained about his liver.
Old men ought to be careful about
taking too much punch.


/ have seen old men hate to give
up that they can't stand as much as
they used to, or as young men can.
They get mad if feller like me
hints that they can't. But what's
the use of fooling yourselves?-
We've all got to play out tsome day,
and when a man feels he is losing
his grip why not come down grace
fully and acknowledge the corn?


Now, in the above remarks, I
don't mean any disrespect. / like
old men in their place, but ] don't
want so much of their advice
Give the hoys chance.