"Fred," whispers the dear woman at my side, breaking in upon my
cogitation, "what were you like as a boy--er--a young man, I mean?"
Her words are the answering echo to my own secret thought. Like myself
she is groping for light and counsel. May not the cleverest man and
woman fitly quail before the soul-hunger of eager adolescent youth?
And I do not profess to be clever.
"What were you like as a young woman?"
"I was afraid you would make that answer," she murmurs, reproachfully.
"Oh, I have forgotten!"
"And if we could remember, Josephine, it would not help us very much.
Each generation finds the world a virgin field. Somehow, though, I had
fancied that when we had seen them through the scarlet fever and landed
them in college, it would be plain sailing. We have to begin all over
again, though, and the second half promises to be the most difficult."
"I know it. And think how we worried, or rather tried not to worry,
over them when they were little things, and how we fancied there were
no problems to compare in difficulty with supplying them with proper
food and proper masters. In the last fifteen years they have had
everything--chicken-pox, measles, whooping-cough, mumps, and scarlet
fever. And they've collected everything--postage-stamps, minerals,
butterflies, coins, and cigarette pictures.
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