cant get over the fearful shyness of it.

LORD SUMMERHAYS. Shyness?

TARLETON. Yes, shyness. Read Dickens.

LORD SUMMERHAYS _[surprised]_ Dickens!! Of all authors, Charles
Dickens! Are you serious?

TARLETON. I dont mean his books. Read his letters to his family.
Read any man's letters to his children. Theyre not human. Theyre not
about himself or themselves. Theyre about hotels, scenery, about the
weather, about getting wet and losing the train and what he saw on the
road and all that. Not a word about himself. Forced. Shy. Duty
letters. All fit to be published: that says everything. I tell you
theres a wall ten feet thick and ten miles high between parent and
child. I know what I'm talking about. Ive girls in my employment:
girls and young men. I had ideas on the subject. I used to go to the
parents and tell them not to let their children go out into the world
without instruction in the dangers and temptations they were going to
be thrown into. What did every one of the mothers say to me? "Oh,
sir, how could I speak of such things to my own daughter?" The men
said I was quite right; but they didnt do it, any more than I'd been
able to do it myself to Johnny. I had to leave books in his way; and
I felt just awful when I did it. Believe me, Summerhays, the relation
between the young and the old should be an innocent relation. It
should be something they could talk about. Well, the relation between
parent and child may be an affectionate relation. It may be a useful
relation. It may be a necessary relation. But it can never be an
innocent relation. Youd die rather than allude to it. Depend on it,