Toddler

“ They stayed not long.—The blameless Infant grew;
The Child whom Ellen and her Mother loved
They soon were proud of: tended it and nursed,
A soothing comforter, although forlorn;
Like a poor singing-bird from distant lands;
Or a choice shrub, which he, who passes by
With vacant mind, not seldom may observe
Fair-flowering in a thinly-peopled house,
Whose window, somewhat sadly, it adorns.
—Through four months' space the Infant drew its food
From the maternal breast; then scruples rose;
Thoughts, which the rich are free from, came and crossed
The sweet affection. ”

“ Every mother and real nurse knows that when the baby begins to be uneasy and gives a cry of dissatisfaction,—to come near with a smile, to make one's presence felt by a caressing tone, or to take the infant in their arms, will comfort it, bringing back the joyful sense of life—a word which signifies active relation;—and, in its highest sense, spiritual relation. ”

“ The mother who carefully observes and analyzes all the acts of the child of two and a half or three years of age will discover that the baby has a great desire to be busy, continually, and in imitation of his mother’s busy-ness about the home. He handles with the greatest eagerness and interest his shoes, his father’s neckties, his mother’s brush and comb, the family silver, the kitchen utensils, the door latches and knobs, the window [152] fastenings. He is more interested in the tools of grown-up housekeeping than he is in his toys. ”

“ When a fresh infant was published in a house, the critics would call in a body to pass their judgment upon it, and the young mother would bring it down for them to sample.
"Did you ever see a child anything like that in this world before?" she would say, holding it out to them. "Isn't it a wonderful baby? You never saw a child with legs like that, I know. Nurse says he's the most extraordinary baby she ever attended. ”

“ What an unnatural thing it is to confine a child several hours a day to his lessons; why, you might as well put a colt in harness, and make him work for his living! A child is made for play; his roguish little eye, his lithe figure, his antics, and his drollery, all point out that he is cut out for play—that it is as necessary to his existence as the food he eats, and as the air he breathes! ”

“ The little child from three to six is interested in sun, moon, and stars, in day and darkness, in rain, snow, wind, in flowers and trees, as well as in animals and birds. Natural, spontaneous questions regarding the biological origin and development of life are asked between three and eight, and this is the period especially recommended for teaching the child of the mother’s part in his prenatal care, and the value of the father’s share, and thereby fostering his wholesome attitude of gratitude, and his respect for all motherhood and fatherhood. ”

“ My dear little woman, the child is not going to die every time it sneezes, the house is not bound to get burned down and the nurse run away with a soldier every time you go outside the front door; nor the cat sure to come and sit on the precious child’s chest the moment you leave the bedside. You worry yourself a good deal too much about that solitary chick, and you worry everybody else too. Try and think of your other duties, and your pretty face will not be always puckered into wrinkles, and there will be cheerfulness in the parlor as well as in the nursery. Think of your big baby a little. ”

“ It is astonishing how little trouble is caused by the infant when it is trained in correct physical habits from the beginning, compared with the babe that is treated in a spasmodic fashion—everything overdone sometimes and nothing at all done at other times. In the former case the little one is quiet and peaceful and sleeps, as it should, most of the time, especially at night; in the latter case the child is fretful and cross and requires the father to trudge it about at night much to his discomfort and loss of temper. ”

“ Often a child objects to stop all day in its little cot, but move it to its mother's or nurse's big bed; and with a large tray of toys before it, and a little of the tact which love teaches, the day will pass in unclouded content and cheerfulness. ”

“ Here the child may learn that consideration for others which will help him to be kind, quiet, unselfish, and polite. Here, also, he may take a small part in the care of the big human family in preparing food, laying the table, learning household cleanliness and household order. The child instinct to fetch and carry, which shows itself very early in the life of the baby, may be turned into channels of usefulness if the child is taught to happily wait on himself and others. ”

“ GENERAL TREATMENT OF INFANTS. Children are given to parents only for a lifetime; it may be long, or it may be very short; but to array them in fine linens, with bare neck and arms, as has been and is now to a great extent the custom in many refined communities, for public exhibition, is, it seems to me, a questionable act of parental affection. Yet many do so, and boast, when otherwise advised, of their ability to toughen. Mother, your child may be only one of a hundred to survive such experiments ”

“ These people “believe that an infant is the child, not of its parents, but of the spirits, and in this belief they go through the following formalities. As soon as an infant is born it is bathed and dressed, laid upon a rice-sieve, and placed—by the grandmother if present, if not, by the next near female relative—at the head of the stairs or of the ladder leading to the house. ”

“ Now if we may take an illustration from the workings of an infant's mind, it is pretty clearly made out that as baby sits propped among his pillows and turns his eyes hither and thither in following his mother's movements to and fro in the room, she seems in coming toward him to enlarge and in going away to diminish in size, like Alice in Wonderland. ”

“ We shall see hundreds of small children, not more than five or six years of age, carrying, fast asleep on their shoulders, the baby of the household, its tiny smooth brown head swinging hither and thither with every movement of its small nurse, who walks, runs, sits, or jumps, flies kites, plays hop-scotch, and fishes for frogs in the gutter, totally oblivious of that infantile charge, whether sleeping or waking. If no young sister or brother be available, the husband, the uncle, the father, or grandfather hitches on his back the baby, preternaturally good and contented. ”

“ This growing sense is very clear to one who watches an infant in its second half year. Sometimes its mother gives it a biscuit, but sometimes she does not. Sometimes the father smiles and tosses the child; sometimes he does not. Even the indulgence of the grandmother has its times and seasons. The child looks for signs of these varying moods and methods of treatment ”

“ He begins with the newborn infant, and demands that, if possible, it shall not be taken from its mother. He sets his face strongly against the custom of committing the child during the tenderest and most impressible period of its whole life to the care and companionship of an ignorant nursemaid, or of servants who have not the mother’s instinct, or the knowledge that can tell them how to behave in its presence. ”

“ If the mother would have this child love and not hate the baby, if she would have peace and not tempest reign in the little heart, she will be very watchful. She will have her eye on the little creature, and call it to help her to take care of the baby. She will keep it at her knee, and show it, with many a tender kiss between, how to make baby smile, how to warm baby's feet; will let it taste whether baby's food be nice, and then peep into the cradle, to see whether baby be asleep. ”

“ He looks up so earnestly, with such a solemn look in his eyes sometimes, that you would fancy he had all the cares of the world to think about, instead of only what his dinner will be, and when it will come, like other babies of two years old. Baby can talk nicely; he says his prayers night and morning, and before nurse feeds him with his beef-tea, he will fold his hands, and say his grace after her, as well as he can in his baby lisp. ”

“ For, what has a baby to be miserable about in a land where it is scarcely ever slapped, where its clothing, always loose, is yet warm in winter, where it basks freely in air and sunshine? It lives in a house, that from its thick grass mats, its absence of furniture, and therefore of commands "not to touch," is the very beau-ideal of an infant's playground. ”

“ If waiting for play till baby has had its meal, how it stands at its mother's knee, making folds in her gown,—see-sawing its body perhaps, and fetching deep sighs, to throw off its impatience, but speaking no word—making no complaint till baby has had its dues. And when its turn is come, baby being laid down, what a spring into the lap, what a clasp of the neck is there! ”

“ Toddle, toddle, waddle, waddle,
On her little pinky toes.
Stumble, stumble, pitch and tumble,
That's the way the baby goes.
Prattle, prattle, rattle, rattle,
Little shouts and little shrieks,
Tears, with laughter coming after,
That's the way the baby speaks.
Playing, toying, still enjoying
Every sweet that Nature gives.
Smiling, weeping, waking, sleeping,
That's the way the baby lives. ”

“ Intercourse with other children and with the older members of the child's family will also furnish constant material for the thoughtful mother. The baby bumps its head, and the mother soothes it with gentle, loving words. It is more than likely that the three-or four-year-old will express his sympathy also. ”

“ An infant understands to a certain extent, and as I believe at a very early-period, the meaning or feelings of those who tend him, by the expression of their features. There can hardly be a doubt about this with respect to smiling; and it seemed to me that the infant whose biography I have here given understood a compassionate expression at a little over five months old. When 6 months and 11 days old he certainly showed sympathy with his nurse on her pretending to cry. ”

“ The children try with all their might to be quiet; and even the little two-year-old one struggles not to cry for company when baby cries, and learns a lesson in self-restraint. They look with respect on the maid or the nurse when they find that she has been up in the night, tending mother and baby, and that she looks as cheerful in the morning as if she had had good rest. ”

“ Infants are the poetry of the world; the fresh flowers of our hearts and homes; little conjurers, with the magic of their natural ways, working by their spells what delights and enriches all ranks and {58} equalizes the different classes of society. Every infant comes into the world, like a delegated prophet, the harbinger and herald of good tidings, whose office it is to make young again hearts well-nigh wearied with the cares of years. ”

“ Invariably the child will smile indulgently at us, as at a likeable but irresponsible person, and change the position of the infant not one whit. She is really the mother, she feels, with a mother's knowledge of what the baby needs; we are only nice library teachers. Their pride in the baby and their love for it sometimes even exceeds that of the mother who is forced to be so much away from the little ones. ”

“ We propose to dwell, hereafter, somewhat minutely upon the all-important subject of infant training, and in a way to show the care and attention which both parents should bestow upon each child, so as to provide proper food, clothing, and the means of self-culture and amusement, and absolute control over it at the earliest possible period—the earlier the better, so as to secure "a sound mind in a sound body." ”

“ I have seen children apparently not more than two years old sent for wood; and even at this age they are so thoroughly trained in the observances of etiquette that babies just able to walk never toddle into or out of this house without formal salutations to each person within it, the mother alone excepted. They don’t wear any clothing till they are seven or eight years old, and are then dressed like their elders. ”

“ When he sees me hold my hand to my head, he says, 'Mama tired—head bad—Baby play self.'"
"July 9.—Baby can now find his way all over the house, goes up and down stairs alone and about the lawn and garden quite independently, and enjoys the liberty of going in and out of the windows: runs after butterflies or to catch his own shadow: picks up flowers or leaves, and is the picture of enjoyment and happiness. ”

“ There are no standards of behavior or conduct for young infants. Our experimental work, which even at the end of two years is just beginning, has taught us that the study of infant activity from birth onward will enable us to tell with some accuracy what a normal child at three months of age can and should do and what additional complexities in behavior should appear as the months go by. ”

“ Don’t I know that every mother of a first child is infallible, and knows more about children than all the old doctors in creation? But, supposing you had asked me, I should have said—Get him each day to occupy himself a little longer with one plaything than he did the day before. ”

“ Both baby and mother have a hard time of it for the first few weeks of its life. The baby is passed from hand to hand, fussed over, and talked to so much by the visitors that come in, that it must think this world a trying place. ”

“ The infant is carried by the mother almost continuously during the waking hours of its first year of life; it is generally suspended in a sling made of wood or of basket-work, resembling in shape the baby's swing familiar in our nurseries ”