The Toledo chronicle. [volume] (Toledo, Tama County, Iowa) 1873-1924, 1875-05-06
Nagging.

THIS term, according to one of our
leading literary authorities, means mot
scolding, reproof or outright punish
ment, but being always at child"-fnd-
ing continual fault with him about little
things. Though the gentleman to whom
we are indebted for this definition ad-
dresses his admonition with respect to
"nagging" to teachers it occurs to US
that parents might, without injury, take
the matter to heart.
1t is not always easy for US to distin-
guish between what is essential and what
is an accident of development in our
children. For the former we must have
long, patient and judicious training,
reaching from infancy to maturity, slow
wedding out elements that are noxious
and as slowly incorporating those that
are wanting, just as we graft pears upon
quince-roots or apples on the thorn-tree.
For the accidental qualities we have
only to wait their outgrowth. Yet these
qualities, mainly, and not the essential
ones, provoke "nagging," of which moth
ers far more than fathers are apt to be
guilty.
At one time in the life of boy, and
this applies to girls as well, he delights
to get into the ink. Look out then for
stains on the carpet, scribblings in your
choicest books and blotches on handker-
chiefs, aprons, dresses and table-covers
they are as certain to come as March
winds, and almost as trying; but they
go of themselves, and nagging" neither
hastens nor delays their departure.
Dancing a chair about On one leg while
sitting is another stage that nervous
children have to go through, and it lasts
till they grow into easy self-conidence.
Though excruciating to the susceptible
looker-on, patience is the only true
remedy. Mild expostulation and pleasant
ridicule may hasten the progress of the
disorder to happy termination, but it
will cure itself in time.
Slamming doors and leaving them open
mark another regular stage in the growth
of every boy. Life is too short in the
juvenile estimation to shut them quietly,
perhaps to shut them at all; and about
this time, all along before and after, he
has too much on hand to stop to wipe his
shoes when he comes in from the muddy
street. What matters little mud? As
he sits by the stove, warming his feet
and leaving traces of their presence,
what more natural than that he should
whistle or sing comic song or psalm
tune comically! He doesn't mean any.
thing wrong by it. The boy nature, ex-
uberant, etfervescent, overlooking, must
work itself off in some manner or dan
gerous consequences will ensue, the very
worst of which would be Immature re-
sulting from suppression. "Nagging"
does no good at all; it only makes mat
tiers worse.
Coeval with muddy feet and slamming
doors are images IN pencil on the house,
finger-marks on the windows, especially
of frosty morning when they are SO
tempting as tablets, trials of the new
jack-knife on the dining table or the pill
lars of the front porch, marginal read
ings on spoilers and arithmetics in HE
roglyphics that not even Champollion
could have deciphered; the boys name
in uniformed chirography scrawled in
chalk or pencil everywhere-on the coal
bin, the barn-door, the parlor window
sill, the walls of his sleeping room all
these testify to the presence of the boy
in the house. Can he help it. Are such
things to be allowed? By no means;
they are to be borne with, kindly re-
buked, perhaps, and the activity that en-.
genders them turned into a channel large
enough and attractive enough to absorb
it all. A damp cloth will remove the
chalk and finger marks; erasive soap
will take off the plumbago, tartaric acid
obliterate the ink-spot; but what can
eradicate from the childs character the
effects of perpetual "nagging ?"
The time comes fast enough when
there will be no little careless hand to
make "muss" on the clean tablecloth,
no tiny fingers to scatter things round,
no clatter of childish feet on the stair.
way. Fresh paper may cover all the
marks on the hard-fnish, paint may con.
ceal the ambitious handwriting on the
and those traces of boyish
pranks that still remain the mothers
eye and heart may cherish as sacred to
the memory Of the dead or the absent,
as something she would not willingly be
In genial, wholesome, tolerant, low
ing atmosphere, the boy and girl will go
through the various stages of growth
from childhood to adult life, dropping
whatever is in its nature juvenile, little
by little as naturally as the bean-vine
1rops its seminal leaves; but the for
and loving patience of the wise
father and judicious mother who under
provocations refrained from |
nagging," will not be forgotten.-N |
2. Tribune.
BosT0N complains of stagnation in her