It is a common mistake of parents to suppose that if a child has a special endowment of sense in any particular direction, it will manifest such strong inclinations in that direction, that these natural inclinations may be taken for a guide. Sometimes this is true, but oftener it is not the case, so that the natural inclinations of children are by no means safe guides in the choice of a profession, occupation or trade. When the circus is in town, the natural inclination of every healthy boy is to be a clown or bareback rider, but it does not follow, that if his inclinations are gratified, it is the best course he can pursue. Some of the most magnificent talents, on the other hand, lie dormant until they are carefully called out and trained by the teacher. There are also periods in the life of every boy and girl when new faculties seem to be awakened, and for a time engage the entire attention; and the watchful parent is apt to mistake one of these periodical outbreaks for the manifestation of a talent deciding the destiny of a child. At one period of a boy's existence he may manifest great fondness for tools and working in machinery; at another, for music; at another, for trading and merchandizing; while comparatively dormant may lie a masterly ability to grapple with the problems of philosophy and science, which in later years marks him as a genius in literature and scientific investigation. Sometimes a talent manifests itself at an early age, but the parent does not realize its scope and value, or the full character of the child, and he is placed in an occupation far inferior to his actual merit, or the measure of his capacity. A father brought his son to me exclaiming with pride, "This boy is a genius, and I am going to make a first-class carpenter of him, unless you can suggest something better, and prove that he has talent for it. He can take a pen-knife and a board, and carve out anything he may desire to make. He certainly has a genius for mechanical work." "Yes," I said, "this boy will make a first-class carpenter; he will succeed well in carving boards and in doing delicate joining, and as a foreman, or as the owner of a planing mill, he will make a good living; his wages may run up to five or ten dollars per day; but such an occupation is beneath his capacity. This boy has, in addition to his mechanical genius, a wonderful endowment of intellectual ability and scientific proclivities; and if you will send him to a first-class medical college and make a surgeon of him, his mechanical skill will have a higher field to display itself and he will _carve men_ at fifty dollars per day." The old gentleman hadn't thought of that, but he wisely acted on my suggestion, and his boy is to-day one of the brightest young surgeons in the state in which he lives, and he carves men, instead of boards, at higher prices.