The record-union., 1891-04-26
ON BEING AN ORPHAN.
1t is a State Not Without Its
Advantages.
Development of the Boy-How He
where,

DeVelOpmenU OF the bOy-dOW he
Makes His Way at school and Else
where.
The state of being an orphan is not
without its advantages. At first they are
not so very apparent. It seems to the
rest of us mortally hard that the poor
little mite should have no mother or
''dadda' to turn its eyes toward, in full
trust of what the one or the other shall
do to it. Even the best of substitutes for
mother must surely be a very weak
make-shift. Not one aunt in a thousand
may play the part with entire success,
and a charitable institution, though ever
SO reputable, and with ever SO long list
of benevolent gentlemen upon its COM
mittee, must as general rule take rank
below the average aunt or grandmother.
But the inevitable compensation steps
in to salve the wound. I suppose, says
writer in AU the Year Round, there is
no doubt that the boy who grows up to
manhood without ever knowing what it
is to have fathers hand interposed be-
tween himself and the consequences OF
| imprudent actions is likely to be fit to try
! fisticuffs with the world good deal
sooner than he would have been with a
| father to share, or even absorb, his earlier
responsibilities.
Again, there are fathers of kind by
which no son would benefit. The men
who regard children as a nuisance; to
whom their proper home is the most OBJ
noxiouS spot upon the earth, and who
have no notion of seeing their own Off
spring develop into men and women more
respectable than themselves-such parents
as these might just as well be dead and
out Of the way of the budding intelligence
of the children who are indebted TO them
for their introduction into the courts of
! life
1t is a stock subject for sermonizing.
| Whitechapel on Saturday night abounds
with fathers who can do little but distress
their children. The babies may not be
able to explain why they feel so relieved
when they are told they will never again
see ''dadda;" but it is a fact that ''dadda," :"
in dying, often thus unwittingly does his
first good deed since he took unto him.
self wife. While he lived he was a
stumbling block to his children, if moth
! ing worse No one is more aStonished
than are the children themselves to real
ize how faculties. hitherto undreamt of
in them, suddenly spring to light and add
! to their happiness now that he, the STUN
| bling-block, is removed.
An election day at any of the great
orphan asylums in the land affords some
strong spectacles even for the man with Il
sufficiently hard heart. The children are
! less interesting than the mothers, or those
who have hitherto acted more or less
| like mothers. To be sure, some Of them
show passion and distress. But it is of a
vague kind. They guess that something
! is about to happen in which they are to
have part; but they do not quite know
! hot MT hnr
than passionate, as rule. The children
who stamp with their feet, struggle vio-
| lently rather than consent to be separated
| from their mothers, and sob forth fearful
! infantine threats Of what they Will do,
are quite exceptions.
Some of the mothers look heart broken;
and no wonder. poor souls. They are in
their widows weeds-and perhaps the
boy or girl that holds them SO tightly by
! the hand is an only child. They act for
the child's good. not for their own relief.
1t has been set before them by their
friends and relatives; votes have been
offered; the advantages to the little one
and to the mother of free board and lodg-
ing, and education for ten years or more,
are, if anything, exaggerated; and so the
mother has been won over. 1t was not
easy, even at the outset, to consent to this
prudent, but-aS it seems to her now
more that ever-cold-blooded arrange
y.
ing come, it Is all she can do to keep from
breaking her contract, and giving her
votes to another more in earnest than
herself.
As like as not, ere the child is year
older, this young mother will be mar
ried again. 1t was part Of the plot
though she did not know it. And So lit
tie by little, it is possible that her feel
ings may chill towards the child of her
former husband. And the child, too, will
repay neglect with forgetfulness; and so
the years will roll on until, at the age OF
Is, it is sent out into the world, almost
friendless, to open the oyster.
On the other hand, it is not difficult to
distinguish the parents who are unlikely
to be of much service to the children il
these fail to be elected. They chat freely
to each other, and discuss their chances
with much less feeling than you see in 8
couple of spectators on the issue Of the
Derby.
The expression with which such g
woman awaits the result Of the poll is not
pleasing. No tears bedim her eyes, and
she is rather rough with the "pale-look-
ing thing" her son, when it transpires
that she is again outside the list. Per-
haps the best one could wish for the boy
would be his election next year. The at
mosphere of the orphan asylum is not
exactly invigorating; but it has some
good qualities that his mothers house
probably lacks.
At what age does person cease to be
an orphan? Ones grandfather is likely
TO be without father or mother; but nC
one thinks of him as an orphan, nor does
the world tender to the busy man in the
city, middle-aged and plump, the con-
ventional terms of sympathy which come
to our lips about q child who is pointed
out to us as being motherless and father
erless.
l fancy the age is somewhere on the
border of the first of the teens. At any
rate, that is the time when old ladies
cease those smooth caresses Of theirs, with
Poor little fellow ~ or "Bereaved dar-
ling ~ which hitherto were their wanted
form of consolation. They also then, il
many cases, abruptly end that much
more agreeable function of pity which
shows itself in the bestowal of welcome
tips, pleasing alike to the giver and the
receiver. Perhaps it is because they car
espy the man in the boy, and their maid
enliness takes fright. Nor do they, after
that time urge the little orphan to drink
wine and eat cake half as warmly as they
used in the days when he was about as
tall as the table.
Certainly that is the time when the
average boy has cut himself adrift from
his mothers apron strings. He no longer
feels that she is indispensable, as in The
earlier days, when the mere thought tha
some day she will die was apt to bring
soaking tears upon his pillow. Not thai
his love for her has lessened. Oh dear
rous pitch, with something of the man il
it and all the ardor of the boy. She is
being to watch over and fight for now, as
welllas to love at all tImes and be con.
!. ciliated for the sake of particular needs o
person and pocket. But the cut fingers