The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1884-05-17
THE BABIES.
Written for the indianapolis Journal.
L l. 1. -.

Il can find no rhyme to lady but baby"
Much Ado About Nothing
Now the babies, as everybody knows, have
been, and will forever be. the most valued pro
duct of any habitable part Of our planet All
the blessed people who go through the world
looking for the good, the beautiful and the true,
must find greater delight in the sweet face and
fair form of babyhood than in all the many
monuments of art that CLEAN along the track of
the centuries
How amusing and wonderful it is to study
their characteristics note the different types and
try to classify them.
There is a specimen near me I will call the
tropical, brownish baby-not Brownie-with
browner eyes and hair, and cheeks
of so rich red as to sug
gest the golden orange rather than the rosy
apple. He is a natural ac robat, his performances
ever varying, new, original and entirely indie
scribable He creeps to the middle of the
pet gives an indifferent glance at the always in
terested spectators, stretches out turns over
winds his arms around his own neck and has
been known to feel the dimple in his chin with
the end Of his big toe; next he imagines himself
on the equator, puts his little feet together and
elevates them over his head as parasol pats
his breast with delight and chatters in the jargon
of the barbarian parrot or outlandish cockatoo
But he is a darling, and no one complains of lone
illness in the home Of which he is the light and
the glory.
In contrast to this we have near by the appre-
hensive baby shadowy little form, with violet
eyes and sensitive mouth She seems to think
within herself, and is afraid of everything from
a shoestring to dried leaf She screams at the
sight of dog, and shudders at the touch of
pussys soft fur; but, cGnging close to mothers
bosom or sheltered close in fathers loving arms
such look of security comes over the gentle
face that you feel the holy angels must be drawing
near, while none the less you offer up silent
prayer that she may ever thus be shielded from
the ills of life.
And somewhere in the relationship of every
family the investigating baby is pushing about
she is certain to be beauty, most often with
golden hair and blue eyes, She opens cupboards,
rummages in Closets lifts up basket lids, takes
eorks out of bottles and tumbles down steps
in all directions. She knows the taste
of mustard and stove backing, of soft
soap, brickdust and a poison two. She has
baptized the hymn book in the wash bowl, set
her own two shoes sailing across the milk bucket
and Gagged the little kitten in her fathers best
boot and is happy
Strangely enough. her cousin is the solemn baby,
who seems Indifferent to all sublunary things
till you try him with goodies. for he has sweet
tooth. You address him kindly, and he hears
you not; you hatter, and he heeds you not.
he soliloquises in thought ITO be, or not to be,
but in the midst of this he will grab a banana,
or clutch a stick Of candy, and will be- when they
have utterly vanished, just shade more melan-
choy
But our baby of the most pronounced Ameri-
can type learns to walk and talk early, and goes
ahead, He helps himself beautifully
to- fsge ms share nort OF and fSo nr heF
of happiness. He is usually the only boy in
family of girls is not only proud but pharisai-
cal occupying the best seat IN the carriage,
while his too much neglected sister stands in the
gateway sobbng silently; he fairly swells him
self up with self-righteOusness and says: Me
don't cry" This boy is sure to be told, and
most ready to believe, he will be a man before
his mother.
But there is another baby yet, representing
too, the largest class that is just rapture to
behold; he has radiant eyes and hair that looks
as though eternal moonshine had settled upon
it. His waking is like the rising of the morning
star, and when he sleeps-always looking little
too much like his own image carved upon his
own tomb-you long to follow where the dream
barque bears him on toward some blessed Island
of Beattudes. His breath is as
"The breath of a thousand sweet flowers
All gathered and mingled in one,
His tears are dews of pearl, his laughter the
pealng joyousness of fairy bells, his FIRST words
are all
Harmonious sounds
On golden hinges turning"
The babes the blessed babies! They were not
in Paradise, but they will be in heaven. for so
the Word of Truth has promised We care little
for the mighty Cheops of old in his awful tomb,
but memory guarded history may never spare
the baby Moses in the little ark among the bull
rushes, rocking lightly on the waters of the sto-
ried Nile.
Transcendent masters of heroic song may
bring before visions OF purple pageants and
gilded glory, thrones. and crowns, and scept-
ers of vanished empires, but forever unmatched,
and haloed with a light divine, will be the an
gel-heralded and angelguarded one toward
whom the mother love of all the world has
gushed, of whom the little ones are told at
Christmas time, the story of stories, the story
always new the beautiful, the true story of the
babe in the mahger the babe of Bethlehem.
LOUISE v BOYD.
DUBLIN, Ind, May 1884.