Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1886-09-24
Aiu,c Fo13s 1,n.ong the z.,..s.


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Little Folks xins0Mg the Zsslsss.
Africa has a warm climate, so warm
that the little babies do not need any
clothes. But it is too cold sometimes
for the little tender babe to be without
blanket. There is occasionally
white frost down in the deep valleys in
the winter, but it never comes up the
hills to the houses on the coast. Away
back, sixty miles from the coast, there
is little ice. and beyond that on the
mountains there is some snow. My
children had never seen snow when
they came to America. One morning,
as they came down from their sleeping
rooms, they saw, for the first time, the
ground all white They were very
much excited and rushed out to pick
up the snow to see what it was like.
But they threw it down quickly, for
they said it burnt their fingers; they
did not know that snow would burn.
The Zulu mother buys cotton blan-
ket, that costs her a good deal of
money as cents), to wrap up the babe
| on these cool mornings. She has no
bed or crib to put the little one in, SO
| she lays it on a mat on the ground, and
there it sleeps sweetly. The mother
has not much work to do in her hut.
She has no clothes to make, or wash, OF
mend. She does not even wash her
blanket often. for she says it will wear
| it out to wash it, and I think it would
| wear holes in it if she should wash it
clean. She has only one dish of food
to cook at meal She sets that out in
the middle of the floor, and the men
gather around it, sitting on the ground,
and cat with wooden spoons until they
are satisfied. Then tine women and
children come and eat what they want,
and if there is any left the dogs lap it
out of the dish. SO the woman has
only one dish and few spoons to wash,
and only one room in her hut to sweep
out and no furniture to dust.
But she does not expect to live in
idleness, since her husband has paid
ten head of cattle for her She takes
great pride in having nice garden
as much so as your mothers in having a
nice house. When the mother goes
out into the garden to work, she ties
the babe on her back with the blanket
l have spoken OF, and marches out with
q great hoe on her shoulder, dish Of
sour milk on her head to feed the babe
with, and her hands full of ears of corn.
Arriving she scatters the corn broad
cast and commences her digging. swing
ing back and forth with her little one
on her back, thus rocking her babe to
sleep. She then lays it on the soft
grass in the shade of tree, and al
though there are so many snakes all
about there, we have never heard of
their biting the little ones. There is
one very large snake there-large
enough to swallow a babe. I have
caught them as large as stove-pipe,
aud sixteen feet long But they do not
swallow the children.
When the little one wakes up il cries
just as white children do, and the
mother throws down her hoe and runs
to it Just as fast as any of your mothers
run for you when they hear you crying.
She loves her child just as much as
white mothers do theirs. It is hungry,
and the mother feeds it with that sour
milk she has brought on her head.
They never drink sweet milk-neither
the children nor the grown people-and
it is more convenient to have it sour,
for their dishes are always sour.
The mother has nice way of feed
ing her little one without cup or
spoon. She puts her hand just under
the babes mouth and makes q tunnel.
and pouring in the milk it runs right
down the child's throat. When the lit
tie fellow is big enough to run all about
the hut, and he sees his father has some
food ready to eat Git may be thick milk
with boiled corn ground), he comes and
holds out his two hands put together
and says, "Gi pc bahia ukudhla kwako
okum unandi" (give me, papa, some
food of yours which is nice) The father
fill his hands heaping full, and he laps
it all out without spilling a drop on the
ground.
The children are contented with plain
food, and have but one kind of food at q
meal They never complain of hard
bed, though they sleep on mat on the
ground, often without even q little
blanket to cover them. If YOU should
go into their hut you woull find "the
little darkeys in bed with nothing over
them" They are just as happy as the
goats they sleep with at night, OF as the
monkeys that come down from the tons
of the trees to steal the corn as soon as
it is ripe. They are as cheerful as the
balloons that come out from among the
rocks to scratch up the corn the mother
plants, if she does not remain in the