STUDIES OF CHILDHOOD. in 



flaw in the indictment. Any exaggeration into which, a feeling of 

 indignation happens to betray the accuser is instantly pounced 

 upon. If, for example, a child is scolded for pulling kitty^s ears 

 and making her cry, it is enough for the little stickler for accu- 

 racy to be able to say : " I wasn't pulling kitty's ears, I was only 

 pulling one of her ears." This ability to deny the charge in its 

 initial form gives the child a great advantage, and robs the accu- 

 sation in its amended form of much of its sting. Whence, by the 

 way, one may infer that wisdom in managing children shows it- 

 self in nothing more than in a scrupulous exactness in the use of 

 words. 



While there are these isolated attacks on various points of the 

 daily discipline, we see now and again a bolder line of action in 

 the shape of a general protest against its severity. Children have 

 been known to urge that the punishments inflicted on them are 

 ineffectual ; and although their opinion on such a matter is hardly 

 disinterested, it is sometimes pertinent enough. An American boy, 

 aged five years and ten months, began to cry because he was for- 

 bidden to go into the yard to play, and was threatened by his 

 mother with a whipping. Whereupon he observed, " Well now, 

 mamma, that will only make me cry more." 



These childish protests are, as we know, wont to be met by the 

 commonplaces about the affection which prompts the correction. 

 But the child finds it hard to swallow these subtleties. For him 

 love is caressing him and doing everything for his present en- 

 joyment; and here is the mother who says she loves him, and 

 often acts as if she did, transforming herself into an ogre to tor- 

 ment him and make him miserable. He may accept her assurance 

 that she scolds and chastises him because she is a good mother ; 

 only he is apt to wish that she were a shade less good. A boy of 

 four had one morning to remain in bed till ten o'clock as a punish- 

 ment for misbehavior. He proceeded to address his mother on this 

 wise : " If I had any little children I'd be a worse mother than you 

 I'd be quite a bad mother. I'd let my children get up directly 

 I had done my breakfast, at any rate." 



If, on the other hand, the mother puts forward her own com- 

 fort as the ground of the restraint, she may be met by this kind of 

 thing : " I wish you'd be a little more self-sacrificing and let me 

 make a noise." 



Enough has been said to illustrate the ways in which the nat- 

 ural child kicks against the imposition of restraints on his free 

 activity. He begins by showing himself an open foe to authority. 

 For a long time after, while making a certain show of submission, 

 he harbors in his breast something of the rebel's spirit. He does 

 his best to avoid the most galling parts of the daily discipline, and 

 displays an admirable ingenuity in devising excuses for apparent 



