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The Secret of Devotion

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Tacoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Apr 11, 1907

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 84, No. 15.

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The Secret of Devotion

By Jane Howard Latimer

I KNOW a fortunate mother who has two splendid young sons, and who enjoys the most radiantly happy motherhood.
They are manly little fellows without the least suggestion of the mollycoddle in their composition. But no matter how busy they may be about their own concerns, there is one person whose welfare never appears to be out of their minds—mother.
If they are off for the day with their chums, they will manage to find a telephone, and over the wire will flit some such message as, “All right, mother? Thought we had better call up and see.”
The younger boy has a keen eye for beauty, and may quite often be found with a beautiful flower in his hand which he has purchased with his own pocket-money, or perhaps a handful of wild flowers picked during an expedition to the woods or the “swimmin’-hole.” Any one whom he happens to meet is entirely welcome to exclaim and admire, but the flowers do not leave the young knight’s hand until he presents them to his lady mother.
Curious to know the secret of this devotion — not exceptional, perhaps, but exceptionally expressed — I questioned this fortunate woman, and she said, smilingly: “It began when the boys were very small, when I tried to show them that these little attentions were necessary to my happiness. As they grew older, I never failed to express my appreciation of the little things they did for me. If it was a tiny shell from the beach, or a smooth stone from the road, or a field flower, I was always delighted with it, and so the giving has become a habit. It means a great deal to me; and I have no doubt some woman will thank me in the future. I have always felt,” she added, “that if my boys failed in their attitude to the women who came into their lives, it must not be my fault, so I am beginning early to be a good mother-in-law.”
Would there were more such wise mothers!—Jane Howard Latimer.