Page:The Spoilt Child.djvu/47

 sweet conversation, kindness and caresses. A child's good behaviour is assured when he distinctly realises that if he does certain things, his mother will not take him into her lap and caress him. Again, it is the teacher's duty to guard against making a mere parrot of his pupil, when he is teaching him by book. If a boy has to get all he reads by heart, his faculty of memory may be strengthened, it is true; but if his intelligence is not promoted, and he gets no practical knowledge, then his education is all a sham. Whether the pupil be old or young, the matter should be explained to him in such a way that his mind may grasp what he is learning. By a good system of education, and judicious tact in teaching, an intelligent comprehension of a subject may be effected such as no amount of mere chiding will bring about.

Matilall had learned nothing of morality or good conduct in his Vaidyabati home, and now his residence in Bow Bazar proved a curse rather than a blessing. Becharam Babu had two nephews, whose names were Haladhar and Gadadhar. These boys had never known what it was to have a father; and though they occasionally went to school out of fear of their mother and uncle, it was more of a sham than anything else. They mostly wandered at their pleasure, unchecked, about the streets, the river gháts, the terraced roofs of houses and the open common; and they utterly refused to listen to anybody who tried to restrain them. When their mother remonstrated, they would just retort: "If you do this we will both of us run away;" so they were left to do pretty much as they pleased. They found Matilall one of their own sort, and within a very short time a close intimacy sprang up between them; they became quite inseparable; would sit together, eat together, and sleep together; would put their hands on each other's shoulders, and go about both