“Come, Charlie. I want you to drive a few nails in the shed for me,” said Nettie to her brother the other day. Charlie was splitting wood at the time, and her father, overhearing the request of his daughter, said:— “Why not drive them yourself?” “Because I can’t,” she replied. “Because you can’t? Why, McCarty says there’s no such word in the book. Come here, and I’ll show you how to drive nails.” With hammer in one hand and nails in the other he went into the shed, drove a few into the door, and then gave the remainder to Nettie. She found it an easy thing to drive the nails, and felt quite proud of her achievement in the mechanical art. She having completed the work, her father said:— “Now, my girl, that lesson makes you independent. Some of these days I’ll teach you how to drive a horse, sharpen a knife, and whittle, too, without cutting your fingers. Don’t let the doors creak on their hinges for want of an oiled feather; or the little children’s shoes, or your own shoes, get hard in the winter time for the want of a little grease. “And as for you, my boys,” said the father, turning to Charlie and his little seven-year-old brother, “you ought to learn how to make a bed, sweep a room, or sew on a button. A little cooking will not hurt you. Many a beefsteak and fish have I cooked in my day, and my mother told me when I was a boy that I could beat any boy making a pot of coffee. There is no telling what your lot may be, or where you will be cast sometime during life. The most helpless people I have met with were those who could only do one kind of work. All you boys and girls should learn some one thing very well, and make that your dependence for a living; add to it as much skill as you can; for it costs nothing to carry knowledge, and it enables you to pave your way to independence.”—Anon.