CHRISTOPHER IN HIS SPORTING JACKET 



of his own species; or that peccadilloes are the pro- 

 genitors of capital crimes. Nature allows to growing 

 lads a certain range of wickedness, sans peiir et sans 

 reproche. She seems, indeed, to whistle into their ear, 

 to mock ancient females — to laugh at Quakers — to 

 make mouths at a decent man and his wife riding 

 double to church — the matron's thick legs ludicrously 

 bobbing from the pillion, kept firm on Dobbin's rump 

 by her bottom, ''ponderibus librata suis,'''' — to tip the 

 wink to young women during sermon on Sunday — 

 and on Saturday, most impertinently to kiss them, 

 whether they will or no, on high-road or by-path — 

 and to perpetrate many other little nameless enor- 

 mities. 



No doubt, at the time, such things will wear rather 

 a suspicious character; and the boy who is detected in 

 the fact, must be punished by pawmy, or privation, 

 or imprisonment from play. But when punished, he is 

 of course left free to resume his atrocious career; nor 

 is it found that he sleeps a whit the less soundly, or 

 shrieks for Heaven's mercy in his dreams. Conscience 

 is not a craven. Groans belong to guilt. But fun and 

 frolic, even when trespasses, are not guilt; and though 

 a cat have nine lives, she has but one ghost — and that 

 will haunt no house where there are terriers. What! 

 surely if you have the happiness of being a parent, 

 you would not wish your only boy — your son and 

 [23] 



