thought dogs were not clean."

This knowledge, so soon acquired, would seem to be a menace to family
unity; but it is not--even in homes in which the three generations are
living together. The children know what their grandparents wished for
their parents; they know what their parents wish for them; but, most of
all and best of all, they know what they wish for themselves. It is not
what their parents had, nor what their parents try to give them; it is
"what other children have."

Perhaps all children are conventional; certainly American children are.
They wish to have what the other children of their acquaintance have,
they wish to do what those other children do. It is not because mother
wanted a bracelet, and never had it, that the little girl would have a
bracelet; it is because "the other girls have bracelets." Not on account
of the rules that forbade father's dog the house is the small boy happy
in the nightly companionship of his dog; he takes the dog to bed with
him for the reason that "the other boys' dogs sleep with them."

Even unto honors, if they must carry them alone, children in America
would rather not be born. A little girl who lives in my neighborhood
came home from school in tears one day not long ago. Her father is a
celebrated writer. The school-teacher, happening to select one of his
stories to read aloud to the class, mentioned the fact that the author
of the story was the father of my small friend.

"But why are you crying about it, sweetheart?" her father asked. "Do you
think it's such a bad story?"

"Oh, no," the little girl answered; "it is a good enough story. But none