Listen, son; I am saying this to you, as you lie asleep, with one little hand tucked under your cheek and the curls of your hair dangle from your forehead. I have sneaked into your room alone. Just a few minutes ago, as I sat reading my paper in the library, a hot wave of remorse swept over me. I could not resist it. I came to your bedside.

These are the things I was thinking, son:

I had been cross to you. I scolded you as you were dressing for school because you gave your face just a dab with a towel. I took you to task for not cleaning your shoes. I called out angrily when I found you had thrown some of your things on the floor.

At breakfast I found fault too. You spilled things. You gulped down your food. You put your elbows on the table. You spread butter too thick on your bread. ...................And as you started off to play and I started off to work, you turned and waved a little hand and called, "Good-bye, Daddy!" and I frowned, and said in reply, "Hold them shoulders back!!"

Then it began all over again in the late afternoon.

As I came up the road I spied you, down in the dirt playing baseball. You were wearing holes in your pants. I humiliated you before your friends by making you march ahead of me back to the house. Pants were expensive......And if you had to buy them you would be more careful!

Do you remember, later, when I was reading in the library, how you came in, softly, timidly, with a sort of hurt look in your eyes? When I glanced up over my paper, impatient at the interruption, you hesitated at the door.

You said nothing, but ran across, in one great plunge, and threw your arms around my neck and kissed me............. again and again, and your small arms tightened with affection that God had set blooming in your heart and which even neglect could not withstand..........And then you were gone, pattering up the stairs.

Well, son, it was shortly afterwards that my paper slipped from my hands and a terrible, sickening fear came over me.

What had habit been doing to me? The habit of complaining, of finding fault, of reprimanding---all of these were my rewards to you for being a boy. It was not that I did not love you; it was that I expected so much of youth. I was measuring you by the yardstick of my own years.

And there was so much that was good, and fine, and true in your character. You did not deserve my treatment of you, son. The little heart of you was as big as the dawn itself over the wide hills. All this was shown by your spontaneous impulse to rush in and kiss me goodnight.

Nothing else matters tonight, son.

I know you would not understand these things if I told them to you during your waking hours, so I must say what I need to while you sleep:

I have come to your bedside in the darkness, and I have knelt here, choking with emotion, and so ashamed!....my little son... I kneel before you in sorrow and tears.... and if it were not for waking you, I would snatch you up and hug you as tight as I possibly could.

I am afraid I have visualized you as a man. Yet as I see you now, son..... crumpled and weary in your little bed, I see that you are still a baby. Just yesterday you were in your mother's arms, your head on her shoulder. I have asked too much.

I have prayed God to strengthen me in my new resolve.

Tomorrow I will be a real daddy. I will chum with you, and suffer when you suffer and laugh when you laugh. I will bite my tongue when impatient words come. I will keep saying......... "He is just a little boy.... a little boy"

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