hint that it is readily accessible. One does
not leave the candy box open beside the baby even if the infant has
received the most explicit instructions as to the probable effect of too
much sugar upon its tiny kidneys. Moreover, the knowledge of the
prevalence of certain vices suggests to the youthful mind that what is
so universal must also be rather excusable, or at least natural.

It seems to me that, while there is at present a greater popular
knowledge of the high cost of sinning, there is at the same time a
greater tolerance for sin itself. Certainly this is true among the
people who make up the circle of my friends. "Wild oats" are regarded as
entirely a matter of course. No anecdote is too broad to be told openly
at the dinner table; in point of fact the stories that used to be
whispered only very discreetly in the smoking room are now told freely
as the natural relishes to polite conversation. In that respect things
are pretty bad.

One cannot help wondering what goes on inside the villa on Rhode Island
Avenue when the eighteen-year-old daughter of the house remarks to the
circle of young men and women about her at a dance: "Well, I'm going to
bed--_seule_!" The listener furtively speculates about mama. He feels
quite sure about papa. Anyhow this particular mot attracted no comment.
Doubtless the young lady was as far above suspicion as the wife of
Caesar; but she and her companions in this particular set have an
appalling frankness of speech and a callousness in regard to discussing
the more personal facts of human existence that is startling to a
middle-aged man like myself.

I happened recently to overhear a bit of casual dinner-table
conversation between two of the gilded ornaments of the junior set. He
was a boy of twenty-five, well known for his dissipations, but,
nevertheless, regarded by most mothers as a highly desirable _parti_.

"Oh, yes!" he remarked easily. "They asked me if I wanted to go into a
bughouse, and I said I hadn't any particular objection. I was there a
month. Rum place! I should worry!"

"What ward?" she inquired with polite interest.

"Inebriates', of course," said he.

I am inclined to attribute much of the questionable taste and conduct of
the younger members of the fast set to neglect on the part of their
mothers. Women who are busy all day and every evening with social
engagements have little time to cultivate the friendship of their
daughters. Hence the girl just coming