Now, a Newbery writer might have dealt with the first two of these items; but he never could have countenanced such portents of revolution as “Garden Mischief” and “Hyde Park Romps”.
The letters which Mrs. Argus receives from children show nothing like the decorum of the Goodwill Correspondence.
Here is one from a typical Bad Boy (which however, Mrs. Argus contrasts with another, “couched in terms of becoming timidity”, from a girl):
“To Mrs. Argus,
“A friend of Mamma’s says that you are very clever at finding out the faults of children, pray tell me mine, for if you are as cunning as she says you are, I need not mention them to you. I am certain I know you; don’t you walk in the Park sometimes? I am sure you do, though, and you have a very long nose; my sister Charlotte and I hope you will answer this directly, for we are in a great hurry to be satisfied about you.
“Your’s
Charles Osborn.”
Mrs. Argus gives sound and pleasantly pointed advice in her replies, though she loses more than one laugh to modern readers in her care for propriety.
“Will you be so good” she writes in one postscript “as to tell your brother that the word Thump which occurred in his letter appears to me an expression unworthy of a well-educated child.”
Yet she surprises a pugnacious grandson with the novel argument that so few things are worth fighting about; and shows a genuine sympathy with boyish pranks.