The Columbian. [volume] (Bloomsburg, Pa.) 1866-1910, 1890-07-18
Putting Children to Bed.

The mother who puts the timid child
to bed, aud takes away the light, and
goes down stairs, and leaves him to
his conjuring, careless and Indifferent
and disbelievmg, or bent on overcom-
ing the mischief forcibly, is destroy
ing something that one would think of
small worth to her-not only his ner-
vous fibre, but his love of herself; and
the day will come when fate will have
its revenge on her in his own indiffer-
ence TO her and she will recognize IT,,
even if he behave in all outward re-
spects like dutiful son. 1t is her
part to examine the matter, to reason
with the child, to comfort him, to see
how far it is possible with him to sub
due the fear If she cannot stay with
him herself, she can at least leave the
door open SO that he may hear the
cheerful downstairs voices, the hum
of life, not 10 be shut into his tomb, as
the unformulated thought of his
desperate little mind makes it; she can
leave a lamp on the hearth, ar d so let
there be some light to dispel his fau-
cles and keep back the dark and un.
shaped visions. She may regard it as
trihlng, but to him it is tremendous;
and if she is wise either in mother love
or human kindness che will not let the
imaginative and sensitive child suffer
more than it must, remembering that
that temperament, il it has more to en-
" through life than any others, has
also much, much more TO suffer.
When a few nights have failed to
bring calm to the little being out of
experience, and the last goirg to ted
alone is as bad as the first, and all
threats have only made matters worse,
and all reasoning has produced no
good result; when he has tried to con.
quer, and the effor has left him trem-
bling as violently as if he had an ague
then 1t is something not to be over
come by hard or rough or peremptory
IN -s-ures, and the mother should sec to
it that this child has some active physi-
cal exercise just before g"ing TO bed
will make his little body glad of rest,
and she would best lie down beside
him, or find some work that she can do
upstairs till he falls asleep, in order to
afford him the comfort of companion.
ship and the sense of embracing love,
and soothe his irritable nerves to re-
pose instead of rousing them TO action.
Tlese nerves would never have been
irritable if she had not insisted on her
own way too long in the beginning, if
she had given them no chance to get
on fire, and then to go on exciting
themselves. If she had put the child
to bed alone from the very outset of
his career, so that it was the natural
order of things to him, and he had the
habit established ofquiet sleep and ab
senee of fear from the frsr, in ninety
nine cases out of a hundred there
would never have been any trouble OF
the sort. But if through any idiosyn-
Grassy of the child, or any remissness
of her own, the fear has come upon
him, she will never iL all the years re-
maining have greater love outpored
upon her than that child will give who
sees her lowering over his pillow,
moving about his room, or feels her
pressure on the bed beside him till the
drowsy warmth steals over aud wraps
senses and Imagination aud all to-
gether, and lets her off again to the
duties that are less imperative than
care of that child's nerves, to the
pleasures that are less pleasant than the
love he gives in return.-Harper's 8
Bazdr.