HER FINGERS WERE TAUGHT NOT TO SCRATCH 
They learned to stroke softly and gently instead. 
It was one of the first and most important 
lessons given her; and it was equally important for the young girls who looked on. 
Photograph by Mrs. Luther H. Gulick. 
a young woman could go who wanted 
really to learn mothercraft, the craft of 
the heart as well as of the head. To 
be sure Mary Read had been working 
in New York for five years trying to 
make the weight of her small school 
felt, a school where babies played a big 
part in the scheme of things and where, 
although the letter was a bit schooly, 
the spirit was lively and fresh. The 
Little Mothers’ League had been quietly 
4In New England there is a school for this purpose which is, in many ways, excellent. 
the students are never allowed to see a baby; they handle only a big doll! 
ble, we are informed, because its presence in the class would make the girls giggle. 
(Fig. 1.) 
at work getting girls and babies together 
in a sometimes very happy fashion, and 
the. .program...of .Camp-.. Fire Girls 
included a goodly round of baby-craft 
and home-craft honors. But at Morri- 
son Carnegie, at Simmons, at Bryn 
Mawr, at a score more higher schools 
for women, there were only text-books 
and gas ranges and lectures and ex- 
aminations. 
I was privileged, however, to witness 
But 
A live baby is impossi- 
It would be 
interesting to know how many graduates of women’s colleges have failed to find mates because 
their instructors had eradicated from them the ability to giggle, together with all the freshness and 
spontaneity of the feelings which giggling denotes. 
389 
