Who will write the natural history of the boy? One of the first points
to be taken account of is his clannishness. The boys of one neighborhood
are always pitted against those of an adjoining neighborhood, or of one
end of the town against those of the other end. A bridge, a river, a
railroad track, are always boundaries of hostile or semi-hostile tribes.
The boys that go up the road from the country school hoot derisively
at those that go down the road, and not infrequently add the insult of
stones; and the down-roaders return the hooting and the missiles with
interest.
Often there is open war, and the boys meet and have regular battles. A
few years since, the boys of two rival towns on opposite sides of the
Ohio River became so belligerent that the authorities had to interfere.
Whenever an Ohio boy was caught on the West Virginia side of the river,
he was unmercifully beaten; and when a West Virginia boy was discovered
on the Ohio side, he was pounced upon in the same manner. One day a
vast number of boys, about one hundred and fifty on a side, met
by appointment upon the ice and engaged in a pitched battle. Every
conceivable missile was used, including pistols. The battle, says the
local paper, raged with fury for about two hours. One boy received
a wound behind the ear, from the effects of which he died the next
morning. More recently the boys of a large manufacturing town of New
Jersey were divided into two hostile clans that came into frequent
collision. One Saturday both sides mustered their forces, and a regular
fight ensued, one boy here also losing his life from the encounter.
Every village and settlement is at times the scene of these youthful
collisions When a new boy appears in the village, or at the country
school, how the other boys crowd around him and take his measure, or
pick at him and insult him to try his mettle!
I knew a boy, twelve or thirteen years old, who was sent to help a
drover with some cattle as far as a certain village ten miles from his
home. After the place was reached, and while the boy was eating his
cracker and candies, he strolled about the village, and fell in with
some other boys playing upon a bridge. In a short time a large number of
children of all sizes had collected upon the bridge. The new-comer was
presently challenged by the boys of his own age to jump with them. This
he readily did, and cleared their farthest mark. Then he gave them a
sample of his stone-throwing, and at this pastime he also far surpassed
his competitors. Before long, the feeling of the crowd began to set
against him, showing itself first in the smaller fry, who began half
playfully to throw pebbles and lumps of dry earth at him. Then they
would run up slyly and strike him with sticks. Presently the large
ones began to tease him in like manner, till the contagion of hostility
spread, and the whole pack was arrayed against the strange boy. He kept
them at bay for a few moments with his stick, till, the feeling mounting
higher and higher, he broke through their ranks, and fled precipitately
toward home, with the throng of little and big at his heels. Gradually
the girls and smaller boys dropped behind, till at the end of the
first fifty rods only two boys of about his own size, with wrath and
determination in their faces, kept up the pursuit. But to these he added
the final insult of beating them at running also, and reached, much
blown, a point beyond which they refused to follow.
The world the boy lives in is separate and distinct from the world
the man lives in. It is a world inhabited only by boys. No events are
important or of any moment save those affecting boys. How they
ignore the presence of their elders on the street, shouting out their
invitations, their appointments, their pass-words from our midst, as
from the veriest solitude! They have peculiar calls, whistles, signals,
by which they communicate with each other at long distances, like birds
or wild creatures. And there is as genuine a wildness about these notes
and calls as about those of a fox or a coon.
The boy is a savage, a barbarian, in his taste,--devouring roots,
leaves, bark, unripe fruit; and in the kind of music or discord he
delights in,--of harmony he has no perception. He has his fashions that
spread from city to city. In one of our large cities the rage at one
time was an old tin can with a string attached, out of which they
tortured the most savage and ear-splitting discords. The police were
obliged to interfere and suppress the nuisance. On another occasion, at
Christmas, they all came forth with tin horns, and nearly drove the town
distracted with the hideous uproar.
Another savage trait of the boy is his untruthfulness. Corner him, and
the chances are ten to one he will lie his way out. Conscience is
a plant of slow growth in the boy. If caught in one lie, he invents
another. I know a boy who was in the habit of eating apples in school.
His teacher finally caught him in the act, and, without removing his eye
from him, called him to the middle of the floor.
"I saw you this time," said the teacher.
"Saw me what?" said the boy innocently.
"Bite that apple," replied the teacher.
"No, sir," said the rascal.
"Open your mouth;" and from its depths the teacher, with his thumb and
finger, took out the piece of apple.
"Did n't know it was there," said the boy, unabashed.
Nearly all the moral sentiment and graces are late in maturing in the
boy. He has no proper self-respect till past his majority. Of course
there are exceptions, but they are mostly windfalls. The good boys
die young. We lament the wickedness and thoughtlessness of the young
vagabonds at the same time that we know it is mainly the acridity and
bitterness of the unripe fruit that we are lamenting.