The Bossier banner. [volume] (Bellevue, Bossier Parish, La.) 1859-1952, 1885-08-27

short, the child is given to understand,
more by covert insinuation than by di-
rect words, that any love or respect she
awards the living mother is robbery of
the dead.
Perhaps she learns this lesson at home
from some old family servant or gov
erness-a person not bad at heart, but
the victim of a suspicious nature that
magnities molehills into mountains, or
of a mawkish sentimentality that dis
Germs in the dear departed rendered
doubly dear and sacred by death-vir-
tues that would be impossible to any
inhabitant of this world, Poor moth
erless little creaturen ''Sweet, for
saken darling!" Lovely Innocent =
these words uttered in every note of
the gamut of sympathy the con-
slant refrain of the tune the child hears
early and late, and it is no wonder that
she ere long comes to regard herself as
the most forlorn and ill-treated of
human beings. Thus early schooled in
self-pity, in distrust and hatred, she is
indeed an object of commseration.
For the wisest reasons the step-mother
denies the child some wonted yet harm
full indulgence, and thereby rouses a
revolt among the whole circle of spies
and meddlers. Their manner declares
to the object of their jealous care, even
though words be wanting. that this
woman, who has thrust herself into the
own mothers place, takes malicious
delight in crossing her, and grudges her
even the most harmless pleasure.
How ic tbic VpI,por oroatI1Yo to ha1iouo
in one whom all around her distrust?
How, in her ineXperience, can she be
expected to obey that golden rule of
love even to one who despitefully uses
and persecutes her?
Now comes the Christmas and fairy
story books, with their gaily-colored
pictures, to confirm what all the world
says about step-mothers. These stories
and illustrations are of all grades, from
that of the step-mOther who clothes her
self and her own daughters in purple
and fine linen and fares sumptuously
every day, while the little step-child
occupies sort of Cinderella's place in
the household, to that GROWING atroci-
ty of step-mother. who murdered
her little step-son and set his heart,
nicely cooked and placed in a daintily
covered dish, before his own father!
Credulity is the leading trait of early
youth. To the child, printed books and
painted pictures never lie. This child
fairly groans under the weight of so
much cumulative evidence against step
mothers, and learns to doubt at an age
whose supreme happiness is unquestion-
ing faith; to hate when the most beau
tiful privilege of the human heart is to
love.
This poisoning of the very sources of
the child's love and trust must needs
react upon the step-mother. The no
blest woman is still human. The Do
naides of the old Greek myth, doomed
through all eternity to attempt to fill a
bottomless cask with water, were as
signed no more hopeless task than that
of the unloved step-mother.
The strongest sense of duty. the most
unseltsh magnanimity, are likely. in
the long run, to succumb to ingratitude,
To give out love, the heart must receive
love. The stream not replenished
from a living fountain soon runs dry
The kindest and most atfectionate nature
grows unsympathetic if it meet only in
difference, and a sighted affection
often changes into dislike and even
hatred.
The wicked step-mothers of the story
books and of the popular Imagination
have now and then found their counter
part in real life, but in only exceptional
cases. The care of children, even if
not ones own, tends to call out the
best, rather than the worst, traits of
womanly character.
Many woman, in taking upon her
self the office of step-mother, seeks to
kindle on the altar of a deserted temple
the holy flame of a new affection and
reverence. She sets for herself the high
task of re-creating domestic hearth in
the midst of loneliness and desolatjon
of being true mother to children who
have suffered that supreme earth "
atfiiction. the loss of an own mother.
She gives to this work the best years
the best energies of her life, only to find
the result estrangement, perhaps
hatred. This state of things. deplorable
as it is for her, is unutterably more so
for the step-children, who are now
1OI LulLS CHdI dCuClS lOI llIc, Wuu luttSG Ill
after years look back upon childhood
which should have been to them "a
moment of God" as to period of I'M
rest, discomfort and bitterness. Silent,
intangible influences have been at work
undermining the happiness of the home
which might have been an Eden, but
which has become desert.
Who is to blame for all this? The
common verdict of society, constituting ng
itself both judge and jury, would con-
demn the step-mother, while the father
and the step-children would be pro-
nounced innocent. In the step-mother
all family sins find convenient scape-
goat. We contend that while all these
three parties may be at fault, the
burden of guilt rests with outside peo-
pie. with those influences of which we
have spoken which come from without
the home.
Let the woman who IS not prepared
to steel her heart against the steady as
sault of outside enemies, who is not con-
tident of her power to conquer by love
and good works the foes that may arise
in that new household, remain far from
| the home where a bereaved husband be-