ve you a grand treat with them when they were ripe. But for
the sake of planting your miserable beans there, you killed my melons
after they had actually sprouted; and there are no more to be had. You
have done me more harm than you can remedy, and you have lost the
pleasure of tasting some delicious melons."

JEAN JACQUES. "Excuse us, my good Robert. You put into them your
labor, your care. I see plainly that we did wrong to spoil your work:
but we will get you some more Maltese seed, and we will not till any
more ground without finding out whether some one else has put his hand
to it before us."

ROBERT. "Oh well, gentlemen, you may as well end the business; for
there's no waste land. What I work was improved by my father, and it's
the same with everybody hereabout. All the fields you see were taken
up long ago."

EMILE. "Mr. Robert, do you often lose your melon-seed?"

ROBERT. "Pardon, my young master: we don't often have young gentlemen
about that are careless like you. Nobody touches his neighbor's
garden; everybody respects other people's work, to make sure of his
own."

EMILE. "But I haven't any garden."

ROBERT. "What's that to me? If you spoil mine, I won't let you walk
in it any more; for you are to understand that I'm not going to have
all my pains for nothing."

JEAN JACQUES. "Can't we arrange this matter with honest Robert? Just
let my little friend and me have one corner of your garden to
cultivate, on condition that you have half the produce."

ROBERT. "I will let you have it without that condition; but remember,
I will root up your beans if you meddle with my melons."

In this essay on the manner of teaching fundamental notions to children
it may be seen how the idea of property naturally goes back to the
right which the first occupant acquired by labor. This is clear,
concise, simple, and always within the comprehension of the child.
From this to the right of holding property, and of transferring it,
there is but one step, and beyond this we are to stop short.

It will also be evident that the explanation I have included in two
pages may, in actual practice, be the work of an entire year. For in
the development of moral ideas, we cannot advance too slowly, or
establish them too firmly at every step. I entreat you, young
teachers, to think of the example I have given, and to remember that
your lessons upon every subject ought to be rather in actions than in
words; for chi