Juniata sentinel and Republican. [volume] (Mifflintown, Juniata County, Pa.) 1873-1955, 1889-09-04

hand as much as its right one 1t was
Charles Reade who once said men we're
rirlthanded by habit, education, and
p..rhaps bv 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 more
than the other. Indeed, every mother
will tell YOU how she fought against
Willie or Johnny or Jennie being left
handed. not that to have a left handed
son or daughter is positive disgrace,
but all mechanIcalappliance and every
thing intended for the use of humanity
Is by common consent made right hand
ed.
NEARER THE BEING.
Take a child when II is first able 10
sit alone and Is neither right nor left
handed. Offer 1t an object and the
chances are ten to one II viii reach for
il with the left hand Every one has
noticed this. How it worriesthe moth
er. and how she struggles for months,
or until the child has got into the habit
of using the right hand, to prevent 1t
from being left handed The left hand
Is the more sensitive of the two; 1t Is
nearer the child, II Is nearer its being,
its life and action Offer to shake hands
with IL and II extends the left.
Not that hand" SAYS the mother,
give the gentleman the other hand"
And after being directed two or three
times 1t extends the other. and the
mother apologies by saying she does
not understand why 1t wants to give its
left hand; that she Is sure that none of
her people or her husbands are left
handed Poor, deluded motheri And
then when the little thing Is put up to
the table 1t insists upon taking its fork
in its left hand to eat. Every child
does it, with hardly an exception, as
every mother can testify.
Ii Is not natural to use either hand;
that Is TO say, both hands are certainly
made to use, but until they have been
trained both seem useless appendages.
The child VIII ram its fists into lis
mouth, its eyes, or into anything that
Is within reach. 1t does not know what
its little hands are for, and IT has not
the least idea what To do with them.
They are SO many white elephants to
it.
Go into a factory and watch the oper-
ators. How deftly they use their fin
gers. how accurate every movement.
The variation of an eighth of AN inch in
"A movement might cost them the price
of "A week : work, so accurate must they
Ice, and vet they continue, their fingers
flying swiftly dny after day without an
error. They are not using the right
hand alone. The left Is doing its part.
Perhaps at this machine, or at that
table, the Office the left hand performs
Is more important than that of the right
but II Is trained as the right Is trained,
in the performance of the ordinary
affairs OF life, and II Is true to its mas
ter.
The factory operator was as awkward
at his work the first day he began at IT
as the child Is in its efforts to handle
material things, with the single excep-
tIon that the operator knew what iIs
hands were for, and they had been
trained to respond To his viii in the or
binary movements. But how long did
1t take him to become perfect? One
year-two years. So can Won train the
left hand III the same length of time to
perform any act accurately which can
be done with the right. 1t Is well
known that persons who lose the use of
the right hand entirely learn to write
more beautifully with the left than they
ever did with the right This Is ac-
counted for, stated at the beginning
of this article, by the fact that the left
nature than the right, and, therefore,
more accurate IN precision.
Every person has certain things which
they do with their left hand, and which,
from never having done the same things
with the right, they would be as awk-
ward about, were they to attempt il, as
they are about doing things with their
left hand which they have trained their
right to perform.
Nearly every one holds n garment in
the left hand to put II on. Why Well,
they learned to do 1t that way because
their mothers never taught them differ
emily. And IN putting on a garment
this way-puttlnS the right arm IN first
the left hand performs all the work.
Ii holds the garment, draws ton TO the
right arm, and then, while the right
arm crooks and the hand comes up and
catches the lapel of the coat, the .'awk-
ward eft hand goes round behind you,
catches the coat, straightens II out, as
II were, and proceeds to search for the
place to insert itself, and, having found
1t, goes in and actually puts the coat
on. The left hand has done 1t all
And now, which hand do You button
with? Nine people out of ten use the
left, and those who use the left cannot
button with the right to save them.
They never learned that way. In
guarding against the use of the left
hand that was one thing the mother
forgot.
The man smoking uses his left hand
to hold his cigar or cigarette. He will
tell YOU the reason he does not use his
right Is because he has got in the habit
of using his left. The fingers of the
-
yellow with nicotine. He uses the left
hand; it's simply habit. The right hand
Is busy with pen and pencil, and the
hand Is trained to perform this duty,
and when 1t has once been trained 1t
always performs the task, whether the
right hand Is engaged at something else
or not
THE PUGuIsT's BEST.
Pugilists use their left hand to pro-
tect themselves from the blows of the
adversary, and probably the hardest
blows ever struck in prize ring are
the s-heft handed" ones. ''Landed one
with his left" Is almost as much of
chestnut in the report of fight as
''dul thud" is in a hanging report.
Delsart, famed for teaching the court
children how to walk, move or sit down,
and whose methods of stage fainting,
falling, walking, etc, are studied by all
emotional actresses, says the left arm
and foot are stronger than the right.
1t is an undeniable fact that left
handed persons, or rather those who
have trained the left hand instead of
the right from infancy, are much bet
ter performers on the piano than right
handed persons. One of the greatest
difficulties to be overcome by the piano
players in the rendition of classical mu-
sic is the accurate execution of the bass