Pot-pourri from a Surrey garden

For a boy of seventeen, I believe it to be a very wise thing, as an introduction to life, that he should be given a latch-key. He is then proud of the privilege and much less likely to abuse it than if only given to him when he is much older. To deny it altogether to young men who are living at home seems to me both irritating and ridiculous. So many of the serious sorrows and troubles of life come from ignorance, rather than from wickedness, that it is advisable to send the boy of about this age to some friendly, worldly-wise, intelligent doctor, asking him beforehand to give the boy as much advice and instruction as a man of twenty-four might have learnt from bitter experience. One of the most useful things a boy can be taught at home is the value of money. With a well- trained sensible boy a half-allowance for clothes should be begun at twelve years old (by a half-allowance I mean an allowance that includes pocket-money and is sufficient to buy every article of dress except cloth clothes), and at four- teen the allowance should cover all clothes and pocket- money. When allowances are first given, be sure that the boy starts fair with a sufficient stock of clothes, so that he should not be handicapped from the beginning. The best way to manage the allowance, having fixed the sum, is for the father or mother to be the banker. The amount of the yearly sum should be clearly made known to the boy, and he should draw the money himself when he requires it, as he would, later in life, from a real banker. This gives the parent a certain control over dispropor- tionate expenditure. Accounts should not be insisted upon, nor even, I think, strongly urged, and, above all, never looked at. What is desirable is constantly to recommend the purchasing of useful things first, and to watch a little that everything is paid for with ready money, and the bills kept. So long as the world lasts, the 264 POT-POURRI FROM A SURREY GARDEN prodigal by nature — not from mere want of training — and those who spend rather more money than they have, will always be more fascinating than the careful ones. The rash, the impetuous, and the thoughtlessly generous, must ever prove the heart-winners ; and yet those who abet them are the first to turn on them when they are at the bottom of the hill or in a ditch by the roadside. Because of this, parents should force themselves to be more willing to kill the fatted calf for the saving child than for the prodigal. This should be impressed upon the sons from their earliest years. In the case of a parent really wishing to pay an extravagant son's bills, the hardship of it will be brought home to the son if the parent obliges himself to give an equal sum to the other children who have not got into debt. I am told that giving allowances to young boys is extremely rare. I consider it of fundamental importance in their education. Where it fails, it is an indication of character that is full of anxiety for the future, a serious evil to be faced, like hip-disease or a crooked spine. As a rule, everything is provided for boys till the most dangerous time in their lives, and then people are surprised that young men don't know how to proportion their expenditure to their means, which practice is the only wise one for rich or poor. Everyone is rich who has a margin, and everyone is poor who spends more than he has.