Vernon Parish Democrat. (Leesville, La.) 1917-193?, 1919-11-22
TIE cHILDRENS BIRTHRIGEIT
By Henry Turner Bailey, Director
Cleveland School Of Art.


know the JOY of playing in healthful
mud, Of padding in clean water, Of
hearing roosters call up the sun. and
birds sing praises to God for the new
day.
They should have the vision of pure
skies enriched at dawn and sunset
with unspeakable glory; of dew
drenched mornings flashing with price
less gems; of grain fields and wood
lands yielding to the feet of the wind;
of the vast night sky all throbbing and
painting with stars.
They should feel the JOY of seed time
and harvest, Of dazzling summer
moons, and of creaking glittering win
ter nights. They should live with flow
ers and butterflies. with the wild things
that have made possible the world of
fable.
They should experience the thrill of
going barefoot, Of being out in the
rain, without umbrellas and rubber
coats and buckled overshoes; of rid
ing white birch. Of sliding down pine
boughs, of climbing Lodges and tall
trees, of diving head first into trans
parent pool
They ought to know the smell Of
wet earth, of new mowh hay; of the
blossoming wild grape and eglantine;
Of an apple orchard in May and Of a
pine forest in July; of the crushed
leavs of wax myrtle. sweet fern, mint
and fir; of the breath of cattle and of
fog blown inland from the sea.
They shoulE hear the answer the
trees make to the rain, and to the
wind; the sound Of ripping and fall
ing water; the muffled roar of the sea
in a storm, and its Iisping and laugh
ing and clapping of hands in a stiff
breeze. They should now the sound of
the bees in a plum tree in May of frogs
in bog in April, Of grasshoppers a.
long the roadsides in June, of crickets
out in the dark in September. They
should hear a leafless ash hum, pine
tree sigh. old trees groan in the forest,
and the floating ice in brook making
its Incompatible music beneath the
frozen crystal roof of some flooded
glade.
They should have chance to chase
butterflies. to catch fish, to ride on a
load Of hay, to camp out, to cook over
an open fire, to tramp thnouh new
country, and to sleep under the open
sly. They should have the fun of driv-
ing horse, padding canoe, and
sailing a boat, and of discovering that
Nature will honor the humblest seed
they plant.
Things that children can do in cities
are not to be compared with such
country activities. Out of the country
and its experiences has come and all
ways will come the most stimulating
and healhful art of the wOrld. One
cannot appreciate and enjoy to the
full nature-books, novels, histories,
poems, picturs, or even musical COM
positions, who has not had in his
youth the blessed contact with the
world of nature.
/ do not forget what cities have
done for us, and always must do; but
one can get all the best city has to
WELD bv visiting it, whereas one cannot
reap all the harvests of the country
Except by living there in childhood.
}And | feel somehow that such life
lin the country is the birthright of
tevery child. There is truth in Cowper's S
statement that God made the country
land man made the town.
| believe that every child of God
has right to see the country-the
}house his Heavenly Father made for
Ihim-unobstructed by brick walls, un-
spoiled by filth and undimmed by
smoke. And one of these days, some
how, all children born into the world
will be given a chance to enjoy to the
full their inspiring patrimony.
I Living in the country in childhood
}''the voice of the Lord God, walking
lin the garden in the cool Of the day"
lis more likely to be heard; and being
Sheard by all, that Voice will be ans
Swered more universally, and with
warmer love.
(HeIp to reach all the parents of the
country by cutting this out and passing
Iit on to a friend.