ertain to
taint the fresh springs of young life with impure knowledge, if not to
foul them with unclean acts, that parents still too often elect to
ignore. The boy, full of eager curiosity, anxious, above all things, to
catch up the ways of the other fellows, afraid, above all things, of
being laughed at for his innocence, and elated at being taken up by one
of the swells in the shape of an elder boy, and at first set-off wholly
ignorant of the motive; exposed to suggestions about the functions of
his own body which he has not the knowledge to rebut as the devil's
lies--what wonder is it that so many boys, originally good and pure,
fall victims? "They blunder like blind puppies into sin," a medical man
who has had much to do with boys' schools exclaimed to me in the
bitterness of his soul. The small house of the young boy's soul, full of
the song of birds, the fresh babble of the voices of sisters, all the
innocent sights and sounds of an English or American home, swept and
garnished till now by such loving hands, but left empty, unguarded, and
unwatched, for the unclean spirit to lift the latch and enter in and
take possession--the pity of it! oh, the pity of it! What can the boy
think? To quote Dr. Dukes again:

"He will say to himself: 'My father knows of all this vice at
schools, and yet has not said one word to me about it. He has
warned me about most things. He told me to be truthful, to keep my
temper, to be upright and manly, to say my prayers; he pressed me
never to get into debt, never to drink, and never to use bad
language; and he told me I ought to change my boots and clothes
when wet, so as not to get ill; and yet he has not said one
syllable about this. My father is a good man and loves me, and if
he wanted me not to do this he would surely have told me; it can't
be very wrong, else I am sure he would have protected me and told
me all about it."

I remember a friend of mine, who had been greatly stirred on the whole
subject, endeavoring, with tears in her eyes, to persuade a father to
warn his boy before sending him to his first public school, and on his
absolutely refusing to do any such thing, she said to him, "At least
promise me that you will give him this book," placing in his hands Mr.
George Everett's excellent little book, _Your Innings_. This he
consented to do. The next morning my friend met him at breakfast, the
boy having been already de