quite through their estates but a little beyond the time when they should have been first put into possession of them, and who have lost all respectability of character at a period when they should be only commencing their career of active life. If these unfortunate victims of parental folly—may I not say, wickedness—_then_ open their eyes to their real situation, it will often be only to shut them again in utter despair, and plunge into all the fathomless depths of dissipation and vice, as their only refuge from the hopeless misery, the inextricable ruin in which they too late perceive that they have involved themselves. Hasty, inconsiderate marriages are often found to cap the climax of all this wretchedness, by adding helpless women and children to the number of sufferers, and thereby immeasurably augmenting the miseries of a condition which, without _this_, would seem to admit of scarcely any farther aggravation. A similar catastrophe often befals our girls who have had the deadly misfortune to be subjected to this hot-bed system. With unformed constitutions, and still more unformed minds, they are hurried into situations where they have to act the parts of _women_, before they are rid of the dispositions, inclinations, and follies of _children_. They not unfrequently marry and become mothers, while yet distant from the age of maturity, and thus have to fulfil the all-important duty of forming the hearts, minds, and principles of children, when, in fact, they are little more than children themselves. Loss of life is, in many instances, the forfeit paid for such premature marriages. But should they escape this awful sacrifice, they rarely fail to have their constitutions broken down, their powers of useful exertion greatly impaired or irrevocably lost; and an early grave, often—alas! too often, closes the heart-rending scene over these poor, unfortunate victims of parental mismanagement, at a time when probably they would just have reached the meridian of mature life, had they been properly prepared for all the momentous duties of wives and mothers, before they were compelled to fulfil them. Their helpless offspring are thus bereft of maternal nurture, when the parent was just beginning probably to understand what it ought to be—and how holy, how sacred she should esteem her obligations, to fulfil it most unremittingly to the children of her bosom. The same forcing process is then applied to the innocent little survivors; and _they_, in their turn, are to be married, if possible, when they should still be at school—to have the care of children before they know how to take care of themselves—and often to die, when they should be just beginning to live as the mistresses of families. Boys and girls have thus to act the part of instructers, while they themselves should yet be pupils; and the elementary education of their offspring, which is by far the most