"Here comes a candle to light you to bed

And here comes a hatchet to cut off your head."

And then the sudden grasp of four strong little arms, and a pleasing thrill of terror at a danger which was no danger, only a shadow and a remembrance of some dim horror in the past, living for generations in the unbroken traditions of play.

I have wandered unduly from the wrongs of parents to the rights of children, an easy and agreeable step to take. But the children have many powerful advocates, and need no help from me. The parents stand undefended, and suffer grievous things in the way of counsel and reproach. It must surprise some of them occasionally to be warned so often against undue severity. It must amaze them to hear that their lazy little boys and girls are suffering from overwork, and in danger of mental exhaustion. It must amuse them if they have any sense of humor to be told in the columns of a weekly paper "How to Reprove a Child," just as they are told "How to Make an Apple Pudding," and "How to Remove Grease Spots from Clothing." As for the discipline of the nursery, that has become a

clever collaborateur, allows, however, what she terms "natural punishment," or "natural retribution," which appears to be something like the far-famed justice of the Mikado, and is represented as being absolutely satisfactory to the child. This is a gain over the old methods which the child, as a rule, disliked; and it is also a gain over the long-drawn tests so urgently commended by Helen Hunt, whose model mother shut herself up for two whole days with her four-year-old boy, until she succeeded, by moral suasion, in inducing him to say G. During these two days the model mother's equally model husband was content to eat his meals alone, and to spend his evenings in solitude, unless he went to his club, and all her social and domestic duties were cheerfully abandoned. Her principle was, not to enforce obedience, but to persuade the child to overcome his own reluctance, to conquer his own will. With this view, she pretended for forty-eight hours that he could not pronounce the letter, and that she was there to help him to do it. The boy, baby though he was, knew better. He knew he was simply obstinate, and, with the delicious clear-sightedness of children, which ought to put all sentimental theorists

to shame, he actually proposed to his parent that she should shut him in a closet and see if that would not "make him good!" Of course the unhallowed suggestion was not adopted; but what a tale it tells of childish acumen, and of that humorous grasp of a situation which is the endowment of infancy. The dear little sensible, open-eyed creatures! See them dealing out swift justice to their erring dolls, and you will learn their views upon the subject of retribution. I once knew a father who defended himself for frequently thrashing an only and idolized son who amply merited each chastisement — by saying that Jack would think him an idiot if he didn't. That father was lamentably ignorant of much that it behooves a father now to acquire. He had probably never read a single book designed for the instruction and humiliation of parents. He was in a state of barbaric darkness concerning the latest theories of education. But he knew one thing perfectly, and that one thing, says Sir Francis Doyle, is slipping fast from the minds of men; namely, "The intention of the Almighty that there should exist for a certain time between childhood and manhood, the natural production known as a boy."

AUT CESAR AUT NIHIL.

THERE is a sentence in one of Miss Mitford's earliest and most charming papers, "The Cowslip Ball," which has always delighted me by its quiet satire and admirable good-temper. She is describing her repeated efforts and her repeated failures to tie the fragrant clusters together.

"We went on very prosperously, considering, as people say of a young lady's drawing, or a Frenchman's English, or a woman's tragedy, or of the poor little dwarf who works without fingers, or the ingenious sailor who writes with his toes, or generally of any performance which is accomplished by means seemingly inadequate to its production."

Here is precisely the sentiment which Dr. Johnson embodied, more trenchantly, in his famous criticism of female preaching. "Sir, a woman's preaching is like a dog walking on its hind legs. It is not done well, but you are surprised to find it done at all." It is a senti