All this puts you out of patience, and it is intelligible that, for a young gentleman of intellectual habits and somewhat ardent temperament like yourself, it must be at times rather trying to have an AUTHORITY at hand ever ready to settle all questions in a decisive manner. To you I have no counsel to offer but that of unconditional submission. You have the weakness to enter into arguments when to sustain them you must assume the part of a teacher. In arguing with a person already well-informed upon the subject in dispute, you may politely refer to knowledge which he already possesses, but when he does not possess the knowledge you cannot argue with him; you must first teach him, you must become didactic, and therefore odious. I remember a great scene which took place between you and your mother concerning the American War. It was brought on by a too precise answer of yours relatively to your friend B., who had emigrated to America. You mother asked to what part of America B. had emigrated, and you answered, "The Argentine Republic." A shade of displeasure clouded your mother's countenance, because she did not know where the Argentine Republic might be, and betrayed it by her manner. You imprudently added that it was in South America. "Yes, yes, I know very well," she answered; "there was a great battle there during the American War. It is well your friend was not there under Jefferson Davis." Now, permit me to observe, my estimable young friend, that this was what the French call a fine opportunity for holding your tongue, but your missed it. Fired with an enthusiasm for truth (always dangerous to the peace of families), you began to explain to the good lady that the Argentine Republic, though in South America, was not one of the Southern States of the Union. This led to a scene of which I was the embarrassed and unwilling witness. Your mother vehemently affirmed that all the Southern States had been under Jefferson Davis, that she knew the fact perfectly, that it had always been known to every one during the war, and that, consequently, as the Argentine Republic was in South America, the Argentine Republic had been under Jefferson Davis. Rapidly warming with this discussion, your mother "supposed that you would deny next that there had ever been such a thing as a war between the North and the South." Then you, in your turn, lost temper, and you fetched an atlas for the purpose of explaining that the southern division of the continent of America was not the southern half of the United States. You were landed, as people always are landed when they prosecute an argument with the ignorant, in the thankless office of the schoolmaster. You were actually trying to give your mother a lesson in geography! She was not grateful to you for your didactic attentions. She glanced at the book as people glance at an offered dish which they dislike. She does not understand maps; the representation of places in