The Evening Star. PUBLISHED DAILY AT FOUR P.M. Resurrexi. FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 16, 1883.

Thames Star, Volume XIV, Issue 4406, 16 February 1883, Page 2

The Evening Star. PUBLISHED DAILY AT FOUR P.M. Resurrexi. FRIDAY, FEBRUARY 16, 1883.

It is only a few days since the parent of a boy twelve years 5 old appeared in the Police Court and stated tbat his son was beyond his control, and it is a not unfrequent occurrence in the Courts of .the colony to see a parent making a similar complaint. This is a very lamentable condition of things, the source of which is easily traced. The earlier lives of the youth of. the colony, is—through the ignorance, laziness, or carelessness, or a combination of two of those faults on the part of the parents—left uncared. for as far artheir training is concerned, and'boys and girls are allowed to roam about in. the „ streets daring the day and night at their own sweet will, their parents being utterly regardless as to what company they 1 may mis'with and what mischif they may get into. Putting aside the danger arising from evil companionship, the absence of- control inculcates a wildness, which, if it once take root, it is Tery difficult to eradicate. The early training of a child is responsible for a great deal of his life, and where nature is allowed full swing in the midst of corrupting associations, the damage done to a child is incalculable and irretrierable. Last '' night, outside the circus there were about forty children whose ages ranged, from eight years to fourteen, and up to the time of our tearing—after eleven o'clock—a great number of them remained. One boy about ten years of age was asked by another, not older, what time he was going home, and he replied, " Oh ! not for half an hour or so." The parents or guardians of those children most hare a peculiar idea of the responsibility devolving uyon them in the matter of bringing up their children. It is a crying shame that fathers and mothers will not see to the care of their offspring. It is such negligence as this that helps to fill our reformatories and training schools,' and helps to swelL the iists of the criminal classes. Even in the day time, boys and girls of tender age mixing indiscriminately leads to sad results, and the danger atJ tached to unlimited freedom at night time lis rery much greater. We desire to urge upon parents the necessity of keeping their children at home, more especially at night, and exercising very great care in allowing their young ones to select their companions. They should not allow their progeny out at all at night unattended by adults. In many instances the parents are glad, for peace sake, to have their childreu out of their eight until their bedtime arrives, but if they foresaw what is in store for them when the young ones grow a little older, and want to add little by little to the liberty they are granted, they would not so heedlessly let the youth of both sexes hare so much of its own way. Then, for the sake of their children and of their children's children—if they are too selfish to consider society in general—they should exercise a greater control over their offspring, and by so doing rear up a useful, industrious, and respectable peo-

pie, prevent many young lives being wasted, and in many instances being entirely thrown away.