OUR SPORTING PURISTS.
Urchin. "Come an' play cricket, Alf."
Alf. "Wot! In the football season?"
THE REVOLT OF YOUTH.
We publish a few selected letters from the mass of correspondence which has reached us in connection with the controversy initiated by "A Bewildered Parent" in The Morning Post:
A Leguminous Laudation.
Sir,—I confess I cannot share the anxiety of the "Bewildered Parent" who complains of the child of two and a half years who addressed her learned parent as "Old bean." As a convinced Montessorian I recognise in the appellation a gratifying evidence of that self-expression which cannot begin too young. Moreover there is nothing derogatory in the phrase; on the contrary I am assured on the best authority that it is a term of endearment rather than reproach. But, above all, as a Vegetarian I welcome the choice of the term as an indication of the growth of the revolt against carnivorous brutality. If the child in question had called her parent a "saucy kipper" or "a silly old sausage" there would have been reasonable ground for resentment. But comparison with a bean involves no obloquy, but rather panegyric. The bean is one of the noblest of vegetables and is exceptionally rich in calories, protein, casein, carbo-hydrates, thymol, hexamyl, piperazine, salicylic dioxide, and permanganate of popocatapetl. This a learned parent, if his learning was real, ought to have recognised at once, instead of foolishly exploiting a fancied grievance.
Yours farinaceously,
Josiah Vedgeley.