208 FARM HOMES, IX-DOORS AXD OUT-DOORS. 



or amusement, or to some expected good thing to which 

 he was looking forward. Such a punishment is felt all 

 through, is well remembered, and need not occur but 

 rarely. 



Never put children into dark closets or cellars as a 

 means of punishment. Nervous children have been per- 

 manently injured by such stupid cruelty. Spare them as 

 far as possible, all ghost-stories, practical " scares " and 

 evil shocks of all kinds. 



Finally, since we cannot be perfect in any of the offices 

 to which we are "elected" in this life, since with earnest 

 effort, and hour-by-hour striving, we can only not repeat 

 the blunders and short-comings of yesterday, and try to 

 make fewer to-day, let us be as just and gentle as we 

 know how to be to the children who are with us now. 

 And when moments come in which we almost forget our- 

 selves, and give way to impatience and anger, and harsh 

 vengeance that will leave their ugly shadows upon us, let 

 us think how swiftly the years are bearing our children 

 away ! let us think how surely the time will come when, 

 in the still, orderly autumn of life, we will be yearning 

 to give all our possessions for one of those same hard- 

 working, noisy, nerve-trying blessed old days with " THE 

 CHILDREN." 



CHAPTER XV. 

 RULES FOR RIGHT LIVING. 



1. Keep the body clean. The countless pores of the 

 skin are so many little dram-tiles for the refuse of the 

 system. If they become clogged and so deadened in 

 their action, we must expect to become the prey of iU- 

 health in some one of its countless forms. Let us not 



