any more; he has only five, and cannot part
with another. The second boy, however, duns him. He even acts the
hypocrite, and puts into play many of the worst artifices of human
nature, which we so often see in daily practice, and he gains his
end. But he is not yet satisfied; he wishes another. The first boy,
however, will on no account give him more. He again tries all his
arts, but in vain. Seeing he cannot by art or entreaty gain another,
he has recourse to violence. He snatches one out of his companion's
hand and runs off with it. The first boy is irritated at such conduct,
he pursues the fugitive, overtakes him, and gives him a blow on the
face. The second boy is as great a coward as he is a thief. He comes
up and makes his complaint to the master. The master then has a trial
by jury. He does not knock one head against the other according to the
old custom, but he hears both plaintiff and defendant, and having got
the facts, he submits to the children themselves whether it was right
in the one boy to take with violence What was not his own, and shews
them which is the more to blame. Then they decide on the sentence;
perhaps some one suggests that it should be the utmost infliction
allowable, a slight pat on the hand; while a tender-hearted girl says,
"Please, sir, give it him very softly;" but the issue is, a marked
distinction between right and wrong;--appropriate expressions of
pleasure and disapprobation:--and on the spot, "a kissing and being
friends." I am, indeed, so firmly convinced, from the experience I
have had, of the utility of a play-ground, from the above reasons,
and others, elsewhere mentioned, that I scruple not to say, an infant
school is of little, if any, service without one.

Where the play-ground is ornamented with flowers, fruit-trees, &c.
(and I would recommend this plan to be invariably adopted,) it
not only affords the teacher an opportunity of communicating much
knowledge to the children, and of tracing every thing up to the Great
First Cause, but it becomes the means of establishing principles of
honesty. They should not on any account be allowed to pluck the fruit
or flowers; every thing should be considered as sacred; and being
thus early accustomed to honesty, temptations in after-life will be
deprived of their power. It is distressing to all lovers of children,
to see what havoc is made by them in plantations near London; and even
grown persons are not entirely free from this fault,