The Palatka daily news. (Palatka, Fla.) 1884-1888, 1886-10-23
WOMAN AND HOME.
THE GIRL BABY AND HER FIRST
HOUR AT SCHOOL.

Physical Health of W0men- Utilizing
Stale Bread-Short Visits the Best-Dis-
case Breeders House Flies - Earache
and Legache-Notes and Paragraphs.
Tomorrow my baby will be my baby no
longer; she is going to school. Her world is
about to widen, her life is about to broaden,
but l. shall lose my babyI
What short six years they have been!
They brought her and put her on the pillow
beside me; put my finger near her hand and
she grasised it. Heaven came closer to me
than had ever dared hope it might. The
first day that sat up nurse gave her to me
and l held her IN my arms. My own little
baby / wanted no past, no future; / was
supremacy happy in the present.
When she lay i'm her crib and followed me
with her eyes, that was bliss When she cooed
to me, When she stretched out her little hands
to mel When she laughed / came near
herr All. God is very good to mothers, and I
wondered why such joy should come to me.
Perhaps there was pang of sorrow as she
left off her long clothes. Yet the cunning
little feet, the creeping figure, the aimless
steps, the final walking, these made the
change a time of fulness for the mother, and
the baby still all my own
She has grown in everything except in get
ting along without me. Mamma has been
the pivot around which her life has revolved.
She has come to me with her pains, her dis
appointments, her failures and her joys. In
my she has whispered the wonderful
thoughts that childhood lives upon. No
question could reach so high or pierce such
depths hut that mamma could answer it. No
danger coald threaten her that mammals
arms not safe refuge from. No pain
so severe but that mamma could relieve it.
How many hours in these six years have
we two been together, All, me, we shall be
but one from this on, but we have been but
one thus far. Not any less real to her than
am, are the hundred heroes of stories that I
have evolved for her; they seem very real
indeed, to me. If have entertained her she
has no less been my ~Scheherezadc," and has
related tales fully impossible the Ara
bian Nights. OF late she has wandered fur
thcr away, but never so far but that she
could quickly home if her fear was
aroused. She has brought with her thoughts
gathered from other children, but they are
brought to ic tried in the crucible Of man,
mas judgment and wisdom. When she "keeps
housc' often take tea with her, and she can
not take more pleasure in tho 'sInake believe"
than 1 do.
But now she is going to SCHOOL, shall
lose my baby; / have lost her She will
leave tho door with kisses on her lips and nv
words in her ear, but she will come home full
of school, Of companions and teachers. She
will pass into II world where am not; where
l can only follow at a distance; and she will
never again bc wholly mine. Oh, good
teacher! she is but one of fifty in your room,
and, perhaps, i'll your eyes. one Of tho least
interesting But, oh, she is my one eve
lamb, and heaven shines on ME out Of her
EYES. must share my kingdom with you.
Your praise viii count with her greater than
mine; Your frown will be more fearful than
all my laundering. She was but a baby an
hour ago, hut she is one no longer. l shall
pick uI most of the playthings and put them
away. Tomorrow night she will look on
them with great scorn, she win be baby no
longer, and she will have put away her baby
things.
So sit here plying myself while / press
her to my heart. She is full of the happiest
anticiIsitions, but l whisper to my aching
heart am about to lose my baby.-William
II. Mahcr, in The Toledo Journal.