Another very general and deeply rooted fault in parents, is, the readiness with which they believe and act upon the complaints of their children, often without taking the smallest pains whatever to ascertain whether these complaints may not be at least exaggerated, if not entirely unfounded. The humorous author of Peter Plymley's letters has said—“that a single rat in a Dutch dyke is sometimes sufficient to flood a whole province.” The idea intended to be conveyed by this, is eminently true, especially in relation to female seminaries, where only one gossipping, talking girl, although free, perhaps, from malicious intent, is quite enough to destroy an entire school. Were it possible for teachers before hand, to know the propensities of such little bipeds, they should exclude them as carefully as the Dutch attempt to do the small, apparently impotent quadrupeds, that do them so much injury. But suffer me to cite some instances to sustain my opinion. Let us suppose, for example, that the grievance complained of is partial treatment. To say nothing of the difficulty of proving a negative, or of disproving, even when heard, a charge which covers so much ground, and which is rarely suffered to reach the teacher's ears—it is perfectly easy to demonstrate, that it _may_, and often _will_ be made, without the shadow of truth. When to this is added, its utter incompatibility with that portion of common sense, which all instructers, who are not miserable drivellers, must possess, and which they, of course, will exercise, in comparing their infinitely small and doubtful gains, with their great and certain loss by such injustice towards the complainants, (putting all principles of honor and public pledges out of the question,) the accusation ought to appear in most cases, past all rational credibility. But let us return to the proof, that the charge of partiality _may_ and _will_ often be made without the shadow of truth. It is a thing which deeply concerns _all schools_, and is therefore a subject of common and vital interest—both to them and to the public. None have so little experience as not to know, that among the scholars of every school there will be irregularities of conduct with corresponding inequalities in talent, application, and acquirement, and that the old adage, that “one man can carry a horse to water, but that four and twenty can't make him drink,” is equally true in a figurative sense as to children at school. Hence, some pupils go on very successfully, without punishment of any kind, while others not unfrequently require it in all its most effective forms. This equitable and obviously necessary difference in treatment, between offenders and non-offenders, is always sensibly felt by the culprits themselves—often deeply resented; the true cause of it, rarely well understood, and still more rarely acknowledged or explained, especially to parents and guardians: for self-accusation is least apt