But with our parents and teachers all this counted not the least. The very fact that we wanted to do things seemed ample reason why we should not. I venture to say that at least nine-tenths of our requests were denied; and when consent was granted, it was given in the most grudging way. The one great word that always stood straight across our path was “No,” and I am sure that the first instinct of our elders on hearing of our desires was to refuse. I wondered then, and I wonder still, what would happen if our elders and the world at large should take the other tack and persuade themselves to say “Yes” as often as they could! Every child was told exactly what he ought to do. If I could only get a printed list of the rules given for my conduct day by day, I am sure they would fill this book. In arithmetic and grammar I always skipped the rules, and no scholar was ever yet found who liked to learn a rule or could tell anything about it after it was learned. I well remember what a fearful task it was to learn the rule for partial payments in the old arithmetic. I could figure interest long before I learned the rule; and although I now have no trouble in figuring interest,—and if I have, some creditor does it for me,—still, to save my life, I could not now repeat the rule for partial payments. When was there ever a boy who knew how to do a sum, or parse a sentence, or pronounce a word, because he knew the rules? We knew how because we knew how, and that was all there was of the matter. Yet every detail of conduct was taught in the same way as the rules in school. I could not eat a single meal without the use of rules, and most of these were violated when I had the chance. I distinctly remember that we generally had pie for supper in our youthful days. Now we have dessert for dinner, but then it was only pie for supper. Of course we never had all the pie we wanted, and we used to nibble it slowly around the edges and carefully eat toward the middle of the piece to make it last as long as possible and still keep the pie-taste in our mouths.