The Ely miner. [volume] (Ely, Minn.) 1895-1986, 1940-10-10

foster mother may in some cases
have to deal with temperament, with
lack of training, with perhaps a
total ignorance of politeness and
manners, with inconsistencies and
strangeness and unhappiness.
ALI these children won't come from
the better homes. We have many
of those fortunate babies already;
the ones who could come over with
a good nurse in charge, and are
rapturously absorbed by rich grand
mothers and friends. Most of the
children who are coming will be-
have much as our own American
children would if they were suddenly
transplanted from New York or Bos-
ton or any other American city and
suddenly transported to England.
Ernest Thompson-Seton once gave
in one of his books the jungle's rule:
"if it's strange, it's hostile" and
children still retain many of the in
stincts of the jungle.
In handling these guests we must
use infinite patience and tact, and
an entirely unreasonable amount of
kindness. They mustn't be disci-
plined, or subjected to rules, even
as much as our own children are.
No woman who wants to shelter one
should undertake it unless she is
willing to regard the experiment
with the utmost seriousness, and ex-
poets no surety of personal pleasure
or fr0x,o - I'll, ~,
Keep Arrivals Together.
My own hope is that America,
rather than scattering the small
English arrivals, will keep many of
them together in something as like
great boarding-schoo as possible;
will find good-hearted Englishwomen
who will understand them, and act
as nurses, cooks, guardians, teach
ers for them. That would seem to
me a far truer hospitality than the
seemingly-kindlier one of giving
them to individual foster-mothers in
scattered homes.
There must be in our various cit
les many empty buildings that could
easily be fitted with cots and lock-
ers and refectory tables, and
equipped very simply to meet the
needs of small children. There are
certainly, in all our communities,
experienced mothers, doctors, diet
specialists to keep an eye on the
visitors, and be sure that they have
plenty of outside pleasures and ex-
curSionS.
Handle With Mass Efficiency.
We should make this an under
taking entirely separate from the
ordinary line of our charities and
synipathieS, and handle it with mass
efficiency, and with the proper pub
Lefty to prevent the difficulties that
will be inevitable if the Smiths and
the Bakers and the Johnsons all are
permitted to stretch out welcoming
hands to small Londoners who, with
in three weeks will have every
member of the household in a state
of complete bewilderment and dis
comfort.
These little war-scared folk are
sacred responsibility; we want
them always to remember their
American visit as a time of happi-
ness and affection; we want them to
go back as so many separate am
bassadors of friendship between one
great country and another.
Any woman willing to try this ex-
pertinent in advance need only 60
to the nearest bureau of the Asso-
ciated Charities and ask for one CT
our own American underprivileged
children. She will gladly be given
some small pale girl or boy who
needs a few weeks of country air.
She may be shocked, surprised. puz-
zled, tired, disillusioned by the end
of the first three days, but at least
she will be able somewhat to gauge
her fitness to handle, for the long
duration of the war, a child from
foreign country with an even
stranger background.