Let us say, in every school and in every house, the child
must not only learn to read and write, he must learn to draw. We cannot
afford to let our young folks grow up without this power. A new French
book is just now much talked about, with this droll title, "The Life
of a Wise Man, by an Ignoramus." It is the story of the great Pasteur,
whose discoveries in respect to life have made him world renowned. I
turned to the book, eager to find out the key to such success, and
I found the old story--"the child was father of the man." This
philosopher, whose eye is so skilled in observing nature, and whose hand
is so apt in experiments, is the boy grown up whose pictures were so
good that the villagers thought him at thirteen an artist of rank.
Girls should learn the first lesson of hand-craft with the needle; boys
may (and they will always prize the knowledge), but girls must. It is
wise that our schools are going back to old fashioned ways, and saying
that girls must be taught to sew.
Boys should practice their hands upon the knife. John Bull used to laugh
at Brother Jonathan for whittling, and Mr. Punch always drew the Yankee
with a blade in his fingers; but they found out long ago in Great
Britain that whittling in this land led to something, a Boston notion,
a wooden clock, a yacht America, a labor-saving machine, a cargo of
wooden-ware, a shop full of knick-knacks, an age of inventions.
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