Parents who take the time and trouble to acquaint themselves with the boys in their daughter’s social circle will find themselves better able to aid the girl in her choice of friends.  The very best place for this getting acquainted is the girl’s own home, to which, therefore, young people should often be informally invited.  Nor should parents neglect occasional opportunities to observe their daughter’s friends in other environment—­at the church social or supper, at entertainments, at school, or on the street.  Fortunately the revolt against a dual standard of purity for men and women holds promise of a larger proportion of clean, controlled, trustworthy boys.

It will never be quite safe, however, to trust either our boys or our girls to resist instincts implanted by nature and restrained only by the artificial barriers of society, unless we keep their imaginations busy, and unless we implant ideals of conduct high enough to make them desire self-control for ends which seem beautiful and good to themselves.  The adolescent period is especially favorable for the formation of ideals, and a high conception of love and marriage will probably prove the truest safeguard our boys and girls can have.

The reading of the period is of special importance.  At no other time of life will altruism, self-sacrifice, high ideals of honor and of love, make so strong an appeal as now.  Adolescent reading must make the most of this fact.  Some of the great love stories of literature and biography should be read, especially one or two which involve the putting aside of desire at the call of a higher motive.  At least one story involving the world-old theme of the betrayed woman—­The Scarlet Letter, perhaps, or Adam Bede—­should be “required reading” for every adolescent girl, and should after reading be the subject of thoughtful and loving discussion by the girl and her mother in one of the confidential chats which should be frequent between them.

Girls must learn from their mothers and teachers to distrust the boy who shows any inclination to take liberties, and they must also learn that girls, consciously or more often otherwise, daily put temptation in the way of boys who desire to do right, and invite liberties from the other sort.  Restraint, in dress, in carriage, in manners, and in conversation, must be made to seem right and desirable to the girl, for her own sake and no less for the good of the other sex.  This of course means that teachers must set fine examples before the girl in their own dress and deportment.

To counteract the dangerous tendencies which have become intensified by the wholesale breaking of social customs during the war, it is necessary that parents and teachers give very careful attention to the dress of girls and to the demeanor of boys and girls of the adolescent period.  Many teachers are improperly dressed and setting the wrong example.  Many parents are dressing carelessly and sending their girls to high school improperly dressed.  The boys are tempted—­yes, are forced—­to observe the bodies of their girl classmates, in study-rooms, halls, laboratories, and on playgrounds.  These girls who are immodestly dressed are not only exposing themselves to danger and inviting familiarities, but are tempting the boys to go wrong.  Many of the tragedies in our schools can be traced to this source.