The Toledo chronicle. [volume] (Toledo, Tama County, Iowa) 1873-1924, 1875-10-21
ChildhoOd's Miseries.

WRITING of children brought up and
educated in large families q contributor to
the Saturday ReoieU says: 1t is a pity one
of the Commissioner of Education could
not unseen spend a few mornings in some
of the school-rooms in which little girls
wash their states with their tears, yet
never thoroughly master the simple rules
of arithmetic; where they labor over
"Mangnall's Questions" but know moth.
ing of history and where, hating music,
they are yet compelled to practice many
weary hours every day. The room is
probably the smallest in the house. If in
a town it is perhaps in a dingy back room
looking out Oh the leads. As 1t contains
a piano, a bookcase, a large table, a re-
clining board and at least half a dozen
chairs, there is not much cubic space left
for air to breathe. On a hot summer day
it would be a hard-hearted person who did
not commiserate the victims of what
might be supposed to be the height of
barbarism, but is in reality the result of a
high state of civilization. A child may
be heard attempting by the aid of memory
alone, no map being allowed in this lesson,
to describe the courses CT the Don, the
Dnieper, the Dniester and the Danube, in
which attempt she is ~signally unsuccess-
ful, and only manages to puzzle herself
hopelessly and for life on the subject. The
geography is put aside to be relearnt, and
she goes on with her task in "Mangnall's
Questions" Out of that mine of infor-
nation her governess has crammcd her
with a little u~ndigested information. The
child has succeeded with much pains in
retaining a few facts, such rs that the
two Distinguishing traits in Cromwell's
character were hypocrisy and ambition,n
that "stops were first introduced in the
reign OF Elizabeth" and that tho Univer-
sity of Cambridge was commenced by
Sigbert, King of the East Angles, III G30.
She also learns that it is a most remarka-
bic fact that John Gaunt never came to the
throne. Her sister Is meantime gazing
dejectedly at al exercise in syntaX, and
vainly trying to discover the mistake in
such a sentence as " We have the power
of retaining, altering and compromising
those images which we have once re-
ceived into all the varieties Of picture and
vision" Poor child! What with heat
and the Incidence of mind which has
been allowed to grow upon her, she has
no power of retaining anything except a
vision Of how delightful the garden must
be looking, particularly the honey-suckle
seat under the beech-trce- She tries an
other sentence, and here she is quite will
ing to allow that there must BE something
wrong in such an assertion rs that "our
tutors are benetactors who We owe ODE
dience TO and who we ought to love-" 1t
would be trying TO assent to the PROPOSE
ton under the circumstances, 50 she feels
quite ready TO correct it in sense, if not in
grammar, Another sister is involved in Il
painful struggle with a sum which she
could easily do if she had the faintest idea
what all these figures meant. 1t is not
much help to the pupils that all through
Iesson.tim a jangling noise, called prac-
ticing the piano, should go on, nor does
it help the teacher to keep her head clear.
Go%vernesses, as a rule, are subject to
toothache, and do not like open windows;
consequently, before half the morning
lessons are over the pupils feel exhausted,
stupid and cross, and thcirteacher has not
improbably become unreasonable and un-
discriminating. She praises the girl who
repeats her lesson With parrot.l like pre-.
cision and thus saves her trouble. She
scolds the slower but perhaps more pains.
taking child, who has no faculty for learn
ing by rote what her understanding has
not completely mastered. The poor little
wretch is accused of idleness and obstina-
cy, and kept in to learn texts of Scripture
during her play-hours. Complaints are
made to her parents, who think it their
duty to support the goyerness. The child
becomes bewlldered by the accusations
made against her and cannot explain mat
tiers TO her own or nyone else's s~atisfac-
ton. When she goes to bed she cries her.
self to sleep over her unlcmncd lessons,
her lost play-hours, and feels weighed
down with the sense of remorse which
blame, just or unjust, always brings to a
child. She awakes, unreireShed, TO begin
over again the same weary round, which
is only lightened by the hope that a day
will come when Joyce's Scientific Dia-
logues" may be replaced by the last three
volume novel and the dancinglessons
practiced in the county ballroom. In
stead of wishing to continue her studies
when she leaves the schOOI-rOOm she is
sick to death of them, and, if she marries,
is only too glad to find an excuse to dis
continue her practicing or put aside her
paintbrush, Poets sing about happy child
hood, but we are not sure that civilization
has not robbed it of much of its joy.