he supply of straw was cut off, and the
tale of bricks was to remain the same as before. It could not be helped.
And though things came right at last, the immediate consequence was that
the Hebrews turned in bitterness on their intending deliverer, and
charged their aggravated sufferings upon him. Now, my friend, if you set
yourself to the discomfiture of a bully, see you do it effectually. If
needful, follow up your first shaking. Find out his master, find out his
parents; let the fellow see distinctly that your interference is no
passing fancy. Make him understand that you are thoroughly determined
that his bullying shall cease. And carry out your determination
unflinchingly.

I frequently see the boys of a certain large public school, which is
attended by boys of the better class; and judging from their cheerful
and happy aspect, I judge that bullying among boys of that condition is
becoming rare. Still, I doubt not, there yet are poor little nervous
fellows whose school-life is embittered by it. I don't think any one
could read the poet Cowper's account of how he was bullied at school,
without feeling his blood a good deal stirred, if not entirely boiling.
If I knew of such a case within a good many miles, I should stop it,
though I never wore a glove again that was not split across the right
palm.

But, doubtless, the greatest cause of the sorrows of childhood is the
mismanagement and cruelty of parents. You will find many parents who
make favorites of some of their children to the neglect of others: an
error and a sin which is bitterly felt by the children who are held
down, and which can never by possibility result in good to any party
concerned. And there are parents who deliberately lay themselves out to
torment their children. There are two classes of parents who are the
most inexorably cruel and malignant: it is hard to say which class
excels, but it is certain that both classes exceed all ordinary mortals.
One is the utterly blackguard: the parents about whom there is no good
nor pretence of good. The other is the wrong-headedly conscientious and
religious: probably, after all, there is greater rancor and malice about
these last than about any other. These act upon a system of unnatural
repression, and systematized weeding out of all enjoyment from life.
These are the people whose very crowning act of hatred and malice
towards any one is to pray for him, or to threaten to pray for him.
These are the people