ll the time. A great
many of the men who are shut up in prisons would not have been sent
there if they had never learned to drink.

~13. A Legacy.~--Do you know what a legacy is? If your father should die
and leave to you a fine house or farm, or money in the bank, or books,
or horses, or any other kind of property to have for your own, it would
be a legacy. When a person gets anything in this way from a parent we
say that he inherits it.

~14.~ We inherit a great many things besides houses and lands and other
kinds of property. For instance, perhaps you remember hearing some one
say that you have eyes and hair the same color as your mother's, and
that your nose and chin are like your father's. So you have inherited
the color of your hair and eyes from your mother and the shape of your
chin and nose from your father.

~15. The Alcohol Legacy.~--The inside of a boy's head is just as much
like his parents' as the outside of it. In other words, we inherit our
brains just as we do our faces. So, if a man spoils his brain with
alcohol and gets an alcohol appetite, his children will be likely to
have unhealthy brains and an appetite for alcohol also, and may become
drunkards. Is not that a dreadful kind of legacy to inherit?

~16.~ A child that has no mind is called an idiot. Such a child cannot
talk, or read, or sing, and does not know enough to take proper care of
itself. This is one of the bad legacies which drunken parents sometimes
leave to their children.

~17. Effects of Tobacco on the Brain and Nerves.~--The effects of
tobacco upon the brain and nerves are much the same as those of alcohol.
Tobacco, like alcohol, is a narcotic. It benumbs and paralyzes the
nerves, and it is by this means that it obtains such an influence over
those who use it.

~18.~ The hand of a man or boy who uses tobacco often becomes so
unsteady that he can scarcely write. Do you know what makes it so
unsteady? It is because the cells which send nerves to the muscles of
the hand are diseased. When a person has a trembling hand you say he is
nervous. If you feel his pulse you will find that it does not beat
steadily and regularly as it ought to do. The heart is nervous and
trembles just the same as the muscles do. This shows that the tobacco
has poisoned the cells in the brain which regulate the heart.

~19.~ Wise physicians will tell you that one reason why tobacco is bad
for boys is that it hurts their brains so that they cannot learn we