Savannah courier. (Savannah, Tenn.) 1885-1979, 1889-07-25
USE BOTH HANDS.
They Were Certainly Intended for
a Like Service.
People Are Right Handed Chiefly From
Education-The Left Hand May DO
Made Equally Expert and
Useful.

Until OF late years the most of the
world has believed that it was Sc
rious error to allow child to use its
left hand as much as its right one. 1t
was Charles Reade who once said men
were right-handed by habit, e1uca-
ton and perhaps by inheritance. 1t
is no more natural to be right handed
than left-handed, except that having
two hands we get in the habit of using
one of them more than the other. In
deed, every mother will tell you how
she fought against Willie or Johnny
or Jennie being left-handed, not that
to have left-handed son or daughter
is a positive disgrace, but all mechan-
ical appliances and every thing in
tended for the use of humanity is by
common consent made right-handed
Take child when it is first able to
sit alone and it is neither right nor
left-handed. Offer it an object and
the chances are ten to one it will reach
for it with the left hand. Every one
has noticed this. How it worries the
mother, and how she struggles for
months, or until the child has got into
the habit of using the right hand, TO
prevent it from being left-handed.
The left hand is the more sensitive Of
the two; it is nearer the child, it is
nearer its being, its life and action.
Offer to shake hands with it and it ex.
tends the left.
''Not that hand" says the mother;
''give the gentleman the other hand. v
And after being directed two or three
times it extends the other, and the
mother apologies by saying she does
not understand why it wants to give its
left hand; that she is sure none of her
people or her husbands are left
handed. Poor, deluded mother! And
then when the little thing is put up tc
the table it insists upon taking its
fork in its left hand to eat. Every
child does it, with hardly an excep
tion, as every mother can testify.
1t is not natural to use either hand
that is to say, both hands are certain
ly made to use, but until they have
been trained both seem useless ap
pendages The child will ram its fists
into its mouth, its eyes, or into any
thing that is within reach. 1t does
not know what its little hands are for
and it has not the least idea what tC
do with them. They are so many white
elephants to it.
Go into factory and watch the
operators. How deity they use theil
fingers; how accurate every move
ment. The variation of an eighth o.
an inch in movement might cos
them the price of weeks work, Sc
accurate must they be, and yet they
continue, their fingers flying swiftly
day after day without an error. They
are not using the right hand alone
The left is doing its part. Perhaps a
this machine, or at that table, the
office the left hand performs is more
important than that of the right, su
it is trained, as the right is trained, IL
the performance of the ordinary at
fairs of life and it is true to its master
The factory operator was as awk
ward at his work the first day he be
gan at it as the child is in its efforts tt
handle material things, with the sin
gle exception that the operator knew
what his hands were for, and they haC
been trained to respond to his will in
the ordinary movements. But how
long did it take him to become per
feet? One year-two years. so car
YOU train the left hand in the same
length of time to perform any &C
accurately which can be done witt
the right 1t is well known that per
sons who lose the use of the righ
hand entirely learn to write NOR
beautifully with the left than they eve
did with the right. This is accounted
for. as stated at the beginning OF thu
article, by the fact that the left hand o.
arm is moro sensitive in its natur
than the right, and, therefore, NOR
accurate in precision.
Every person has certain thing
which they DO with their left hand, ans
which, from never having done tn
same things with the right, they woul'
he rs awkward about were they to at
tempt it. as they are about doing thing
with their left hand which they hsY
trained their right to perform.