liant are lavished on page after page with a
recklessness of expenditure that argues unlimited wealth,--conversations
between the Boy and his father, between the Boy and his mother, between
the Boy's father and mother, between the Boy's neighbors about the Boy,
in which his numerous excellences are set in the strongest light,
exhortations of the Boy's teacher to his school, play-ground talk of
the Boy and his fellow-boys,--among whom the Boy invariably stands head
and shoulders higher than they. We fear the world of boys has hitherto
been much demoralized by being informed that many distinguished men were
but dull fellows in the school-house, or unnoticed on the play-ground.
But we have changed all that. The Bobbin Boy was the most industrious,
the most persevering, the most self-reliant, the most virtuous, the most
exemplary of all the boys of his time. So was the Ferry Boy, and the
Pioneer Boy so. "Nat"--we blame and protest, but we join in the plan of
using this undignified _sobriquet_--Nat was the one that swam three rods
under water; Nat astonished the school with the eloquence of his
declamation; it was Nat that got all the glory of the games; it was of
no use for any one to try for any prize where Nat was a competitor. And
as Nat's neighbors thought of Nat, so thought Abe's--we shudder at the
sound--Abe's neighbors of Abe, the Pioneer Boy. Of what Salmon's
neighbors said about Salmon we are not so well informed; but we have no
doubt they often exclaimed one to another,--

"Was never Salmon yet that shone so fair
Among the stakes on Dee!"

Nor are the Boys backward in having a tolerably good opinion of their
own goodness.

"Never swear, my son," says Abe's mother to the infant Abe.

"I never do," says Abraham.

"Boys are likely to want their own way, and spend their time in
idleness," says the mother of a President, upon another occasion.

"I sha'n't," responds virtuous Abraham.

"Always speak the truth, my son."

"I do tell the truth," was "Abraham's usual reply."

"When a boy gets to going to the tavern to smoke and swear," says Nat's
mother, "he is almost sure to drink, and become a ruined man."

"I never do smoke, mother," replies Nat, pouring cataracts of innocence.
"I never go to the stable nor tavern. I don't associate with Sam and Ben
Drake, nor with James Cole, nor with Oliver Fowle, more than I can help.
For I know they are bad boys. I see that the worst scholars at school
are those w