'He returned to New York--made application at several different offices for employment, without success. In a few days news came that he had been detected in pilfering goods from the house of his landlord. A warrant was immediately issued for him--he was seized, taken to the police office--convicted, and sentenced to six months' hard labor in the penitentiary. His name being published in the newspapers, in connection with those of other convicts--was immediately recognised by the officer under whom he had enlisted.--This officer proceeds to the city--claims the prisoner--and it is at length agreed that he shall return to the United States' service, where he shall, for the first six months, be compelled to roll sand as a punishment for desertion, serve out the five years for which he had enlisted, and then be given up to the city authorities, to suffer for the crime of pilfering. 'It is thus that we see a young man, of good natural abilities, scarcely twenty-three years of age, compelled to lose six of the most valuable years of his life, besides ruining a fair reputation, and bringing disgrace upon his parents and friends, from the apparently harmless desire of seeing dramatic performances. Ought not this to be a warning to others, who are travelling on, imperceptibly in the same road to ruin?' * * * * * Theatres are of ancient date. One built of wood, in the time of Cicero and Caesar, would contain 80,000 persons. The first stone theatre in Rome, was built by Pompey, and would contain 40,000. There are one or two in Europe, at the present time, that will accommodate 4,000 or 5,000. In England, until 1660, public opinion did not permit _females_ to perform in theatres, but the parts were performed by boys. If theatres have a reforming tendency, this result might have been expected in France, where they have so long been popular and flourishing. In 1807, there were in France 166 theatres, and 3968 performers. In 1832 there were in Paris alone 17, which could accommodate 21,000 persons. But we do not find that they reformed the Parisians; and it is reasonable to expect they never will. Let young men remember, that in this, as well as in many other things, there is only one point of security, viz. total abstinence. SECTION IV. _Use of Tobacco._ 1. SMOKING. Smoking has every where, in Europe and America, become a tremendous evil; and if we except Holland and Germany, nowhere more so than in this country. Indeed we are already fast treading in the steps of those countries, and the following vivid description of the miseries which this filthy practice entails on the Germans will soon be quite applicable to the people of the United States, unless we can induce the rising generation to turn the current of public opinion against it.