The Elk County advocate. [volume] (Ridgway, Pa.) 1868-1883, 1868-12-18
BAHY's RIGHTS.
A BABr's STORY BY A BABY.

i have bread and milk out OF a bowl
Bridget ties my bib under my chin and
feeds me very fast-she don't understand
that l ought to have time to swallow
When / shut my lips and sputter, she
says, "There now take your supper
good, like darlin !" / cant swallow a
whole bowl at time: and l cry. and
she gives me a shake. After that have
the stomach ache.
Lying awake with it, one night, be
gan TO think that I hadn't my rights
and | want 'em. How to get 'em don't
know l cry all l can-but that's no use.
1 kick, too-but what good comes of
il? They only give me drops to make
me sleep; then feel hot, and sick, and
stupid all next day. One of my rights is
not to have drops; but there now, how
am I not to have 'em? There it comes
again .....-.
| know baby, who lives down street,
who has one of his rights. It's kind
of breakfast | never had-a nice, cosy,
comfortable breakfast, that isn't cho&ed
down you by a spoon and Bridget. You
put your check against it, and play with
it, and talk to it, and have little more,
and coo over it, and feel warm and hap
py-all the while being softly rocked and
sung to, not by Bridget
The most comfortable thing | ever had
was an India rubber bottle. What are
mothers made for, if baby isn't to have
Que? Who invented nursing bottles p
| hate him, whoever he was.
l have mother, you know-a lady,
who says she is comes in sometimes and
tells other ladies that she's mot content
ed with Bridget - Neither am !, for
that matter; but you see my mother is
not thinking of my rights, but of hers.
She wants to vote . and even WaHtthg to
do it takes a great deal of time She
writes, too for the newspapers. When
| want to find out whether she really is
my mother, and, begin to talk to her,
she says, Bridget, you must really take
that darling child away-hc disturbs me
dreadfully -
Bridget is big and coarse, her great
strings too tight and .jogs me too hard.
My own mother is soft and fair, and
her skin is like silk, and like to touch
her. I'm lady's baby, aud one of my
rights is that lady should handle and
dandie me. Nc one sees it, Pm put off
on Bridget.
Mamma don't like to sit at table with
Bridget, but she lets her feed me Per-
haps have aristocratic notions, too; who
cares for them?
One day, Bridget had big pewter
breastpin, with yellow stone in it on
her collar, and it kept scratching my head;
nobody knew it. One day, she took me
out in my wagon and upset me; no one
knew that either.
She takes me out to her cOuS Sins shanty,
where little Pat has the measles, or the
small pox, and if don't catch EN- both,
it's because There's sweet little
cherub tina. sits up alott,' to keep watch
for poor, motherless babies
Sometimes she leaves me alone in the
room with a CRATE fire. always want
to put my fingers in it, and they always
burn. Once mamma found it out, aud
then had different Bridget They
are all alike; they come from the INTEL
gence office, and are rough and coarse
and smell of smoke, and take care of me
for money and not for love. This new
one is sleepy, and mods over and drops
me sometimes One got tipsy and lay
on me. Some day one will tumble down
stairs with her big feet and slip shod
shoes, and break my neck, / dare say.
A father, too. / have a right to a
father. Nine is Wall street man; he
goes out early and comes home to dinner,
| should think he might be very nice to
know, but m not acquainted with him /;
he has nice black whiskers and he laughs
and says, " halo, old fellow" when we
meet, and try to tell him about Bridget /;
and my feelings overpower me, and l
cry, and he says, Take the little rascal
away, Biddy."
One dreadful thirg LIDO have it's a
family doctor; he says l am very fine
child and does dreadful things to me-
Once he lanced my gums, and once he
vaccnated me. After that had sore
arm, and Bridgets blue mcrino hurt it
In summer there used to be some com,
fort in going out in my perambulator,
and seeing that, after all, | was not worse
off than other babies, all given over to
Bridgets, whom | met ; but now it's
winter, and l have to stay in my nursery,
in flannel shawl, and do nothing but
think and I've decided that l must
have my rights A whole mother ought
to belong to every baby; and Bridget is
an imposition. A lady baby ought to
lie sometimes in lady's arms, and be
talked to by a lady. When l am able to
speak | shall say what Bridget says and
with her accent, and then | shall be scold-
cd, as if it were my fault. That's the
way with my brother Tom;
Here 1 lie now, while Bridget talks to
the milkman in the area. I'm hungry,
and damp, and wretched. l IN tired of
being in the cradle, and | shall hurt my
| self if | roll out | want the bi0