Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851.Various
History
Harper's New Monthly Magazine, Volume 2, No. 12, May, 1851.
Various
American literature -- Periodicals; Civilization -- Periodicals; Culture -- Periodicals
There is a grave side to Harry's lot now, happy as he is. He looks
serious and hurt at times, though his health has much strengthened, his
earnings are sure, his wages are raised, his Sunday dress is like that
of a gentleman, there is meat on his table daily, and he has had the
comfort of assisting his parents. Notwithstanding all this, a cloud
comes over his face at times. As his sister says, "he feels the _injury_
of his want of education." His mind is opening very rapidly. At any
spare quarter of an hour he lectures Miss Foote on industry, temperance,
duty to parents, and other good topics. The moral discoveries he has
made are wonderful to him. He has attended church all his life; but
truths come with new force into his mind when they enter through the
spirit of hope and the medium of success. He says "it was wonderful the
ideas that come into a man's mind when he sets himself a-thinking over
his work, and there is no care to take up his thoughts." Hence the
brightened countenance which the neighbors remark on: but hence, too,
the bitter regret at his wasted years of school life--at "the _injury_
of his want of education." What might he not hope to be and do now,
Susan says, if he had but the knowledge that every man may be said to
have the right to be possessed of? Yet, the good fellow has raised his
family to a point of comfort. A gentleman who heard of his merits, as a
first-rate laborer, wrote to the same parish officers, to inquire if
there were any brothers. There was Tom; and Tom is now in a happy
situation, highly esteemed by his employer, and earning 14_s._ a week.
The employer, finding that Tom sadly missed intercourse with his family,
and knowing that he could neither read nor write letters, sent for the
sister, Lizzy, to be under-nursemaid in the family. In another way Harry
has done a deeper and wider good. Miss Foote's friends tell her that his
example is beginning to _tell_ in the neighborhood; his example, not
only of strenuous and skillful labor, but by integrity, temperance, and
disinterested attachment to his employer.
All this is well--very pleasant to contemplate--but a disturbing
question arises in the midst of it: What can society say to these
excellent young men in excuse for their deprivation of family life? And
again, what is at best their prospect for old age?
(From Bentley's Miscellany.)
A CHAPTER ON WOLVES.
BY THE AUTHOR OF "LORD BACON IN ADVERSITY," ETC.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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