fuller of artists, who have no native gift for their calling, into which they were driven in early childhood, either through the conventional ideas of other people, or because those about them were deceived by an appearance of zeal, which would have led them to take to any other art they saw practised.  One hears a drum and fancies he is a general; another sees a building and wants to be an architect.  Every one is drawn towards the trade he sees before him if he thinks it is held in honour.

I once knew a footman who watched his master drawing and painting and took it into his head to become a designer and artist.  He seized a pencil which he only abandoned for a paint-brush, to which he stuck for the rest of his days.  Without teaching or rules of art he began to draw everything he saw.  Three whole years were devoted to these daubs, from which nothing but his duties could stir him, nor was he discouraged by the small progress resulting from his very mediocre talents.  I have seen him spend the whole of a broiling summer in a little ante-room towards the south, a room where one was suffocated merely passing through it; there he was, seated or rather nailed all day to his chair, before a globe, drawing it again and again and yet again, with invincible obstinacy till he had reproduced the rounded surface to his own satisfaction.  At last with his master’s help and under the guidance of an artist he got so far as to abandon his livery and live by his brush.  Perseverance does instead of talent up to a certain point; he got so far, but no further.  This honest lad’s perseverance and ambition are praiseworthy; he will always be respected for his industry and steadfastness of purpose, but his paintings will always be third-rate.  Who would not have been deceived by his zeal and taken it for real talent!  There is all the difference in the world between a liking and an aptitude.  To make sure of real genius or real taste in a child calls for more accurate observations than is generally suspected, for the child displays his wishes not his capacity, and we judge by the former instead of considering the latter.  I wish some trustworthy person would give us a treatise on the art of child-study.  This art is well worth studying, but neither parents nor teachers have mastered its elements.

Perhaps we are laying too much stress on the choice of a trade; as it is a manual occupation, Emile’s choice is no great matter, and his apprenticeship is more than half accomplished already, through the exercises which have hitherto occupied him.  What would you have him do?  He is ready for anything.  He can handle the spade and hoe, he can use the lathe, hammer, plane, or file; he is already familiar with these tools which are common to many trades.  He only needs to acquire sufficient skill in the use of any one of them to rival the speed, the familiarity, and the diligence of good workmen, and he will have a great advantage over them in suppleness of body and