The Douglas independent. [volume] (Roseburg, Or.) 187?-1885, 1884-01-05
Kiss the Cnildren Good Night.

Send the little ones to bed in a happy frame
OF mind. 1t requires some discipline and
self-denial on the part OF weary parent to
answer all the foolish questions and attend
to the many wants that multiply so fast as
the hour Of bed time draws near, but it is a
labor of love that will bring large recon-
pense. Children never forget. They will
carry with them through iifes long and
weary pilgrimage the remembrance of the
face that bent over them at night, and that
was associated in their immature minds with
heaven and God And the little tiIesome
last questions mean so mach to them. What
if we should not answer them and they never
awakened here2 Unanswered questions and
unanswered problems have followed men
and women through life with narrowing per-
sistence.
And never give thoughtless answer to
child's question. Never tell the little ones
that the thunder is the voice of Godl Think
I what an idea they must form of such God
Do not tell them petty vague stories that will
misleai them into tangled paths. Hood says
| pathetically of his own childhood:
II remember, remember
The fir trees dark and high.
I used to think their slender tops
Were close against the sky.
ssIt was a childish ignorance,
But now It's little joy
To know I'm further Off from heaven
Than when | was a boy"
No ono can so gently and kindly prepare
| the little ones for the perplexities and disap-
pointments of life, which are inevitable, as
/ the fathers and mothers to whom their edu-
cation should be a first consideration. The
moral lessons taught at the mothers knee or
IL. ~ e.,
! can the father shirk all responsibility in the
matter of home tutelage. That Is child to
be pitied who Is afraid to ask its father any
question which arises in It's young mind; who
/ dare not climb to the parental knee and
challenge the world to dislodge it, DIR. Hol
land, in his fine poem of Daniel Grey, which
is said to typify his own father, says:
ssHe had some notions that did not improve
him,
He never kissed his children, SO they say"
We feel sorry for the children of father
SO austere, but We can afford to pity one who
lost so much beauty and value out of his own
! life. Then kiss the children good night and
good morning and answer all their questions,
and you will find that in such work two are
blessed-one in giving, the other in receiving
Good sense about Chiidren.s Clothes.
There is very likely no conservatism more
difficult to deal with than that displayed by
the young boy in regard to any change in his
apparel ssIf must wear these cuffs, said
an S-year-old boy, on Sunday morning, II
am not going to church. The cuffs in ques-
tion were entirely unobjectionable in the eye
of man or woman They were probably un-
noticeable, also; but the boy discovered q
morbid dread of appearing in them, as they
were not a usual addition to his toilet He
confessed, in confidence to his mother, as
they walked along, that no dreaded the re-
marks bis Sunday school class would make
upon them. How little consideration Is shown
for the feelings of children.
How few parents realize that the child's
world, only, as John Brown, of Edinburg,
says, ssabout three feet high,n has its TRACE
dies and comedies, its fear of blighting, ad-
verse criticism. So many times, when gar
ments are cho1en, when the question is not
of expenditure, but of taste, tho children
themselves might be allowed to choose, within
certain limits, what they will have.
Who has not seen this sight; when all
the happy boys in the neighborhood are
. wearing knee pants, one small and weary
| soul appearing in pantaloons the exact coun
terpart of his fathers and reaching t. the
heels OF his Shoesl This LIE Is made q burden
|, to him, and then and there is beg otten an un.
easy consciousness of self that will require
years of thought and experience and of reso-
lutte care to overcome.
The consciousness of being well and suita-
bly, dressed, so dear to the heart of woman
8 and SO conducive to her ease is just as con
soling to child, and is no more likely to lead
, to morbid fondness for dress than is ths
! discomfort occasioned by the consciousness.
3 that there is something wrong about hi.
: clothes.
] The secret Of the Home Look
There are certain principles 70 be OBJ
} served IN room If it is to impress the Wis
: itor with sense Of comfort or beauty. Fol
] one thing there must be a variety it. It i
not necessary to buy whole set DIT fnrnitur.
alike, but there should be one prevailing
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