a child belonging to one of these passes
his day. As soon as he is up, the indispensable condition, and the
only one of his admission to the school, that of clean face and hands,
is enforced, and the mother, in order to be relieved of the care of
him during the, day, is obliged to have him washed. He then leaves the
abode of filth and intemperance, and squalid poverty, and ill-temper,
for a clean, airy place, pleasant in summer, warm and dry in winter;
and where he sees not a face that is not lighted up with the smile of
kindness towards him. His whole day is passed in amusing exercises, or
interesting instruction; and he returns at evening-tide fatigued and
ready for his bed, so that the scenes passing at his comfortless home
make a slight impression on his mind or on his spirits."--_Edinburgh
Review_.

CONTENTS.

CHAPTER I.

RETROSPECT OF MY CAREER.

_Days and scenes of childhood--Parental care--Power of early
impressions--School experience--Commencements in business--Sunday
school teaching and its results--Experiment on a large
scale--Development of means and invention of implements--Heavy
bereavement--Propagation of the system of education in the
neighbourhood of London, and ultimately in most of the principal
places in England, Wales, Ireland, and Scotland--Misapprehension
and perversion of the principles of infant education--Signs of
advancement--Hope for the future_

CHAPTER II.

JUVENILE DELINQUENCY.

_Teachers of theft--Children the dupes of the profligate--An effort at
detection--Afflicting cases of early depravity--Progress of a young
delinquent--Children employed in theft by their parents--Ingenuity of
juvenile thieves--Results of an early tuition in crime--The juvenile
thief incorrigible--Facility of disposing of stolen property--A
hardened child--Parents robbed by their children--A youthful
suicide--A youthful murderer_

CHAPTER III.

CAUSES OF EARLY CRIME.

_Degraded condition of parents--Dreadful effects of
drunkenness--Neglect of children inevitable and wilful--The tutorship
of wicked companions--Tricks of pantomines injurious--Mischiefs
arising from sending children to pawnbrokers--Fairs demoralizing--All
kinds of begging to be repressed_

CHAPTER IV.

REMEDY FOR EXISTING EVILS.

_Means long in operation important--Prisons awfully
corrupting--Deplorable condition of those released from
jail--Education of the infant poor--Its beneficial results--Cases
of inviolable h