THE AVONDliRS OB' THE SHORE. 45 



men whose bodies were developed, and their lungs 

 fed on pure breezes, long before they brought to 

 work in the city the bodily and mental strength 

 which they had gained by loch and moor. But it 

 is not so with their sons. Their business habits 

 are learnt in the counting-house ; a good school, 

 doubtless, as far as it goes : but one Avhich will 

 expand none but the lowest intellectual faculties ; 

 which will make them accurate accountants, 

 shrewd computers and competitors, but never the 

 originators of daring schemes, men able and will- 

 ing to go forth to replenish the earth and subdue 

 it. And in the hours of relaxation, how much of 

 their time is thrown away, for want of anything 

 better, on frivolity, not to say on secret profliga- 

 cy, parents know too well ; and often shut their 

 eyes in very despair to evils wliich tliey know not 

 how to cure. A frightful majority of our middle- 

 cla.«s young men arc growing up eilcniinate. 

 empty of all knowledge but what tends directly 

 lo the making of a fortune; or ratlier, (o sj)c;ik 

 correctly, to the keeping up the fortunes which 

 their fathers have made for them ; wliiK; of tlic 

 minority, wlio arc indeed thinkers and readers, 

 how many women as well as men liave we seen 

 wearying their kouIs witli study undirected, often 



