STUDIES OF CHILDHOOD. 107 



is excessively unpleasant. It is as yet not resistance to law as 

 such, but rather to one specific interference of another's will. 



At the same time we may detect in some of this early resist- 

 ance to authority something of the true rebel nature that is to 

 say, the love of lawlessness, and, what is worse perhaps, the obsti- 

 nate recklessness of the lawbreaker. The very behavior of a 

 child when another will crosses and blocks the line of his activity 

 is suggestive of this. The yelling and other disorderly proceed- 

 ings, do not they speak of the temper of the rioter, of the rowdy ? 

 And then, the fierce persistence in disobedience under rebuke, and 

 the wild, wicked determination to face everything rather than 

 obey, are not these marks of an almost Satanic fierceness of re- 

 volt ? The thoroughly naughty child sticks at nothing. Thus a 

 little offender of four, when he was reminded by his sister, two 

 years older, that he would be shut out from heaven, retorted 

 impiously, " I don't care," adding, " Uncle won't go ; I'll stay with 

 him."* 



The fierce and noisy utterance of the disobedient and law- 

 resisting temper is eminently impressive. Yet it is not the only 

 utterance. If we observe children who may be said to show, on 

 the whole, an outward submission to authority we shall discover 

 signs of secret dissatisfaction and antagonism. The conflict with 

 rule has not wholly ceased ; it has simply changed its manner of 

 proceeding, physical assault and riotous shouts of defiance being 

 now exchanged for dialectic attack. 



A curious chapter in the psychology of the child which still 

 has to be written is the account of the various devices by which 

 the astute little novice called upon to wear the yoke of authority 

 seeks to smooth its chafing asperities. These devices may, per- 

 haps, be summed up under the head of " trying it on." 



One of the simplest and most obvious of these contrivances is 

 the extempore invention of an excuse for not instantly obeying a 

 particular command. A child soon finds out that to say "I 

 won't," when he is bidden to do something, is indiscreet as well 

 as vulgar. He wants to have his own way without resorting to 

 a gross breach of good manners, so he replies insinuatingly, " I's 

 very sorry, but I's so busy," or in some such conciliatory words. 

 This field of invention offers a fine opportunity for the imagina- 

 tive child. A small boy of three years and nine months received 

 from his nurse the familiar order, " Come here ! " He at once 

 replied, " I can't, nurse ; I's looking for a flea," and he pretended 

 to be much engrossed in the momentous business of hunting for 

 this quarry in the blanket of his cot. The little trickster is such 



* My correspondent, discreetly perhaps, does not explain why the uncle was selected as 

 fellow-outcast. 



