taste for jewelry with a passion
for candy. He combines a penetration into the motives of others
with an infantile indifference to exposing them at inconvenient
times. He has an adult decision in his wishes, but he has a
youthful shamelessness in seeking their fulfilment. One of his
most exasperating peculiarities is the manner in which he
querulously harps upon the single string of his wants. He sits
down before the refusal of his mother and shrilly besieges it. He
does not desist for company. He does not wish to behave well
before strangers. He desires to have his wish granted; and he
knows he will probably be allowed to succeed if he insists before
strangers. He is distinguished by a brutal frankness, combined
with a cynical disregard for all feminine ruses. He not seldom
calls up the blush of shame to the cheek of scheming innocence;
and he frequently crucifies his female relatives. He is generally
an adept in discovering what will most annoy his family circle;
and he is perfectly unscrupulous in avenging himself for all
injuries, of which he receives, in his own opinion, a large
number. He has an accurate memory for all promises made to his
advantage, and he is relentless in exacting payment to the
uttermost farthing. He not seldom displays a singular ingenuity
in interpreting ambiguous terms for his own behoof. A youth of
this kind is reported to have demanded (and received) eight
apples from his mother, who had bribed him to temporary
stillness by the promise of a few of that fruit, his ground being
that the Scriptures contained the sentence, "Wherein few, that
is, eight, souls were saved by water."

The American small boy is possessed, moreover, of a well-nigh
invincible _aplomb_. He is not impertinent, for it never enters
into his head to take up the position of protesting inferiority
which impertinence implies. He merely takes things as they come,
and does not hesitate to express his opinion of them. An American
young gentleman of the mature age of ten was one day overtaken by
a fault. His father, more in sorrow than in anger, expressed his
displeasure. "What am I to do with you, Tommy? What am I to do
with you?" "I have no suggestions to offer, sir," was the
response of Tommy, thus appealed to. Even in trying
circumstances, e