The Dickinson press., 1888-06-09
WOMAN AND HOME.
A SACRED PRIVILEGE THAT is TOO
OFTEN NEGLECTED.

Jennic's Dainty Appctitc-Talking to In.
valids The Jadcd Wife - Kitchen
Aprons-Nomps-A sulky Rcllc-The
Tenchcr-Chcap Living-Notcs.
An acquaintance of mine who had removed
from Newport. r.. L., to Cambridge, Mass,
was asked what was the social difference. He
said that he could perceive none except that
there Were fewer handsome equipugcs, and
that Young mothers wheeled their own baby
wagons. This las; point of observation quite
restored the balance, for what gorgeouSncss
of livery can compare with the proud faces
of such parents. and what occupants of n
phaeton OF Il baroucle-landau can have such
felicity as beams in the face Of that rosy
little creature. TO whom every individual
atom oi the Great universe is an ineXllaustible
novelty: My friends remark was, | fear, n
just one: | ran recall but two young mothers
among my Immediate circle of acquaintance
in Newport who halituallv took out their
own babies fora airing. while in Cambridge
| can not think of one who does not. except
one who mentioned this To me as the greatest
privatiom of Il long illness, and the one loss
that she never could replace. | can remcm-
Der one who did it in New York, and when
her father, n clergyman. was congratulated
on the good SENSE of his slaughter, he replied,
SIN our family we believe in the natural
affections"
1t would, of course, he very unfair to deny
an ample supply of natural affections to
those who halitually send out their young
children with Il nurse: there are many pre-
occupations, many Inconvenience. that may
be in the way. The thing of which one may
iISt1v ppD1I,1oip is thn tradition ,,..,rilinr
among the well to do circles of many cities,
east and west, north and south, that the
mother is never to take out her child. This
seems to me n wrong both to parent and
child, as much Il wrong rs the habit still
lingering in France of sending Il young child
to dwcll with a nurse. the mother only visit
ing her occasionally: or the habit formerly
prevailing i'll the English upper classes,
which forbade n mother sucking her own
child-a habit so fixed that when Georgiana,
Duchess of Devonshire, broke through it,
the poet Coleridge wrote her IL Resembling
ode, as if She had done some great deed:
lady. nursed in pomp and pleasure.
Who taught You that heroic measure:
In the present case the heroic young
mother who wheels her own baby wagon
gains the felicity of the fresh mir. to begin
with: She shares the happy little cooings and
pointlngs of her young charge: she is ASSOC
ciatel with its first contact with the world
outside: she will never forget these sweet and
simple associations. and she will always be a
part Of them to her child. She has, beyond
this, the in.stimahlc satisfaction of knowing
that her child is cared for: that it is not
wheeled against the broad sunlight till its
eyes water, or pushed backward till its
brain whiris: that it is not left TO cry I'M
needed while the nurse gossips with her fifth
cousin. or taken fultively into some base
men, kitchen rocking with tobacco or onions.
aud not unsupported of diphtheria.
read the other day in a woman's essay,
which had many good points in it. two as
~sertions which seemed to me Very wide of
the mark. The first WAS that there is now
hardly such Il thing in America as a fresh,
simple, mSpoilcd child: to which statement
/ should oppose tho objection that there are
ut least a dozen Of these rare beings in the
one Short street where ! happen to dwell.
The second point was that we should find a
remedy for this alleged evil in Introducing
the English system of keeping children as
much us possible in nurseries, and having
them as LITTLE as possible in contact with the
family life. Had this statement been turned
just the other way it would have seemed
more reasonable, for surely it is where there
are most nurses and mlrserics-in America
at least-tllat one finds the artificial and self
conscious children, while the simplest and
most genuine are i'll those households where
servants are few or none. This whole philos-
ophy seems to me far less sensible than that
of a little boy of my acquaintance, who once
made Il protest against the whole race of
nurses in these plain terms: "Manma, l do
wish I op,1lj La fnl.n, oI.o of 1,r r,r,,l,l.
that lives III the front part of the house"
This criticism involves no injustice to
those kindly and child loving races who sup
ply nine-tentls of our nurses-the Celts, the
negroes-and one sometimes finds among
them individuals of n quality so superior
that they are wholesome and innocent conf
panions for any child, and even Ignorance
forms 10 bar to Il life long and genuine
friendship. But what risks are run to tenn
per, to health, even to morals, i'll the effort
to find this paragon! How many poor little
things horrible, frightful terrors and
nightmare supcrstitions and manifold last
ing injury to being intrusted almost ul-
watched to persons to whom no one would
intrust the training of u pet animal. One
may see households where Il man servant
who should kick Il ~favorite dog, or even
speak angl.ily to II high bred horse, would be
dismissed instantly, and yet where delicate
and sensitive children may be scolded and
twitclied about and even chastised by nurses
OF no higher training and principle.
l know IL family whose sweet faced nurse
was the admiration md envy of all who
came to the house; it was nevertheless moi
intended for an instant that the power OF
furnishing should be placed in her hands; no,
was it discovered until weeks after she haC
left the family that She had been i'll the habi
of taking her little charge privately into the
pantry and putting mustard on her tongu,
by way OF punishment for such sins as cal
be committed at 3 Years old. The inhlmani
ties of parents, OH which u brilliant Amcri
can woman once wrote an essay. may be bat
enough. but il has always seemed to me thai
the worst ~inhumanity, in the long run, wa.
to leave a child to the unmatched control Of
a hired attendant. l say "unwatched," but
after all, how can any watching he NOR,
than superticial!-T. w. Higginson in Har
per's Bazaar.