fiction to prohibit the publication of all those that are objectionable. We might prescribe certain tests by which worthless books might be detected; but the majority of readers would not take the trouble to apply the tests, and even if they did, by that time the objectionable works (if they were objectionable) would have been read and the evil would have been done. The only cure is to do what physicians do in so many cases of bodily weakness, namely, to raise the general tone of the system. We would propose, therefore, when the patients are young, to stimulate and elevate the tone of the mental system. This we would do in three ways:

1. We would cultivate the imagination of young people when they are at school. We would say to the teacher: The remedy of this great evil of indiscriminate novel-reading is in your hands. Get rid of the notion that the human mind is a mere bag to be filled with knowledge. Get rid of the notion that a boy is an ingenious automaton, that may be made to go through certain motions to please Her Majesty's Inspector at the end of the year. Recollect that he has an imagination that is hungering to be fed

E

Develop and

with stories about his fellow-beings. nourish this faculty with narratives from history, biography, and general literature. Do not be content with giving (as is generally done) the mere husks of the subject—names and dates. Give him the very kernel, the very spirit. Throw your whole being into the subject, place yourself in fancy among the circumstances you are describing; be, for the time, the character you are representing, and make the whole lesson as life-like as possible. If you can do this, your success is certain. Surely there is enough of thrilling incidents in history, surely there is enough of striking characters in biography, surely there is enough of delightful passages in English literature, to charm the very dullest intellect.

2. But if this plan does not succeed, and if young people will still read novels indiscriminately, there is still another remedy in reserve. We should meet novel-readers on their own ground. We should say, 'Well, if you will insist upon reading novels, we will read them along with you.' We should invite them to hear a course of lectures on the chief novelists of the present century.

The lecturer,

besides having a thorough grasp of the subject, should not be a dry man, but should be able to make everything he touches clear and interesting. Taking up each of the principal novels in turn, he should tell the plan graphically and vividly, describe the principal characters dramatically, bring out the individuality of each, read illustrative extracts, and point out the merits and defects of each work. If this were done properly, young people would scarcely fail to appreciate standard works of fiction, and appreciating them, would not fall back upon those that are worthless.

'Could they on this fair mountain leave to feed,
And batten on this moor.'

Give an ass the run of a clover field, and he will wish no longer to feed upon thistles.

3. There is still another remedy. Young people should never be allowed to idle away their time. Idleness is the soil from which almost every wickedness grows. When we are idle, both our bodies and our minds soon become morbid. Being morbid, we look at everything and everybody with a

jaundiced eye; and the people of everyday life seem insipid, tiresome, and even hateful. We take refuge

in novels, and devote our interest and our affections to the shadowy beings of an ideal world. The disease grows with what it feeds on, and the result is unhealthy sentiment and passion, which not infrequently end in scandalous deeds. To all young people, therefore, we would say: Have something to do. Whether you are rich or poor, have some useful employment. And let it be some fixed task which you cannot shirk at a moment's notice. Carlyle compares the work of this world to an immense hand-barrow with innumerable handles, of which there is one for every human being. But there are some people, he says, so lazy that they not only let go their handle, but they jump upon the barrow and increase the weight. Don't let go your handle. There is abundance of work in this busy world for every one who has a human heart.

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CHAPTER III.

BIOGRAPHY.

BOUT the year 1725, in રી wood near
Hamelin, in Germany, a wild human being
It was a boy,

was descried by some hunters.

seemingly about fifteen years of age. ran swiftly on his hands and feet,

He was naked,

swung himself

from tree to tree like a monkey, and devoured moss and grass. He was caught and brought to England, but he tore off the clothes that were put on him, and preferred to devour his food raw. He was placed by the King under the tuition of the great scholar and wit, Dr. Arbuthnot; but although he lived till he was seventy, he never learned to talk. This hapless solitary, known in literature as Peter the Wild Boy, is a striking instance of humanity sunk to the level of the brutes.

Such would be the deplorable state of every one