y, but Mr. Bullock is the taller man.

[Footnote 317: See No. 179.]

[Footnote 318: Virgil, "Georg." ii. 488 ("In vallibus Haemi").]

[Footnote 319: "Othello," act iii. sc. 4.]

[Footnote 320: "Othello," act iii. sc. 3.]

[Footnote 321: See Nos. 1, 71, 157, 167.]

[Footnote 322: See No. 134.]

[Footnote 323: See No. 4.]

[Footnote 324: See No. 7.]

No. 189. [STEELE.

From _Thursday, June 22_, to _Saturday, June 24, 1710_.

Est in juvencis, est in equis patrum
Virtus; neque imbellem feroces
Progenerant aquilae columbam.
HOR., 4 Od. iv. 30.

* * * * *

_From my own Apartment, June 23._

Having lately turned my thoughts upon the consideration of the behaviour
of parents to children in the great affair of marriage,[325] I took much
delight in turning over a bundle of letters which a gentleman's steward
in the country had sent me some time ago. This parcel is a collection of
letters written by the children of the family to which he belongs to
their father, and contain all the little passages of their lives, and
the new ideas they received as their years advanced. There is in them
an account of their diversions as well as their exercises; and what I
thought very remarkable, is, that two sons of the family, who now make
considerable figures in the world, gave omens of that sort of character
which they now bear, in the first rudiments of thought which they show
in their letters. Were one to point out a method of education, one could
not, methinks, frame one more pleasing or improving than this; where the
children get a habit of communicating their thoughts and inclinations to
their best friend with so much freedom, that he can form schemes for
their future life and conduct from an observation of their tempers, and
by that means be early enough in choosing their way of life, to make
them forward in some art or science at an age when others have not
determined what profession to follow. As to the persons concerned in
this packet I am speaking of, they have given great proofs of the force
of this conduct of their father in the effect it has had upon their
lives and manners. The elder, who is a scholar, showed from his infancy
a propensity to polite studies, and has made a suitable progress in
literature; but his learning is so well woven into his mind, that from
the impressi