LITTLE AND MUCH by Alice Hamilton Rich

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Oct 22, 1894

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 20, No. 50.

LITTLE AND MUCH.

By Alice Hamilton Rich

BY ALICE HAMILTON RICH.

ONE morning I was taking a few moments' leisure in that haven of rest familiarly called in the household "grandma's room," when I heard the rush of eager feet up the stairway, and the usual call, on return from school, "Where's mamma?"

Opening the door, my little six-year-old came in, and I saw by her flushed face something unusual had occurred.

She said, "Mamma, please come in the other room."

I followed her into my own room, which I try to make as much an "inn of rest" to the children as mother's is to me, when the child burst into a tempest of tears; no other word than tempest expresses the violence of her sobs.

I tried in all usual ways to comfort her, and enable her to control herself enough to tell me the cause of her grief, but in vain. She sat in her little chair, "refusing to be comforted."

She had entered the public schools but a few months before, at her own urgent request, being lonely without her elder brother and sister. She was considerably younger than the others had been when they entered, and there had been some doubt in the minds of her parents as to the advisability of her doing so, so young. Having already taken the kindergarten course in a private kindergarten, and the lowest primary being largely a continuation of kindergarten methods, her father and I consented to have her make the experiment. Interested friends had suggested private schools, saying the child would meet all sorts of children, and be under unfortunate influences, in fact, using all those arguments usually made by those who are not in sympathy with the public schools.

Being myself a devoted adherent to our system of public schools, my own experience as a teacher having proved to my satisfaction that not all the children of parents who provide private schools for their children are more likely to influence for good other children than those usually found in these schools, I had favored the public schools. That the arguments used against public schools had not been without effect, will be shown by the fact that I was thoroughly frightened when, after much coaxing, my little girl said, "It is too bad to tell you."

There rose in my mind, as it is said to do in drowning persons, all the stories I had heard of the evil working of public schools, as well as my own obstinacy in regard to the matter, and I really felt faint at the thought that some terrible experience had come to my baby through my mistake.

Tenderly explaining to the child that there never could be anything too bad to tell mother, at last she lifted her eyes to mine, as if to read my very thoughts, and said, "Mamma, I have broken something at Hinch's."

My own relief at the words can only be understood by a mother to whom the payment of money, however she might be called upon to deny herself to obtain money for the purpose, is not to be compared for a moment to either premature knowledge of evil or actual wrong done by a child in consequence of evil companions. It was difficult to keep the relief from being too apparent. To the child this was a matter of great moment, and as such I felt I must regard it.

To understand the matter, I will say that "Hinch's" was a little store where were kept school supplies, and, to the regret of parents and teachers, everything ingenuity could devise to take the pennies of the children,—wonderful whistles, penny draws, candy canes, and chocolate creams in forms of mice and cigars. My little girl had gone to Hinch's with some other children, and had broken something. I supposed, from what she told me, it was the large glass in the show case, and I presumed it would cost considerable to repair the damage; but this could be estimated on a money basis, while the loss I feared would have been incomparable.

As I comforted the little one, telling her mamma could make it right, she took heart so she could answer questions.

"Did Mr. Hinch scold you?"

"No," said the child.

"Did he send word to have it paid for?"

Again she said, "No; but, mamma, will you go right off and see him?"

Giving her the desired promise, the now happy child went with me to dinner; and as soon as possible afterward I took her to school, while I went to the store to ascertain the extent of the injury to the show case.

Upon inquiring, Mr. Hinch showed me the break, which was a single small pane of glass, of little value. He said, "Was it your little girl?"

It seems the child was leaning against some little boxes of nuts, which were shown through glass, and pressed her knee against them, breaking the glass; and Mr. Hinch said he called to her as she ran out, fearing she had cut her knee, and the broken glass would harm her.

Again worried at the new thought of physical harm, I went to the school yard; and the child came running to me, saying, "Is it all right, mamma?" and, upon assurance that it was, I examined the poor little bruised knee—serious in my mind, but of no consequence in comparison with what the child thought was "too bad to tell." So true it is that, no less with a child than man or woman, physical pain is not to be compared with mental or spiritual suffering! When I wanted her to come home and have the knee bound up, she only laughed, as if too happy to be able to express herself: "This doesn't hurt much. I am so glad I told you."

Mothers, does this seem a long story—a "much ado about nothing"? It was a good lesson to me, and it gave an opportunity to show my child that there could be nothing "too bad to tell mamma."

The child had not been forbidden going to Hinch's, and thought no harm of going with a friend; but it was a long time before she was willing to go again, even on an errand, and she learned to be more careful while in a store; but of greater value was the lesson learned to come at once to mamma and tell the exact truth. It seems she had been advised to say nothing about it, and mamma would not know.

Some time afterward she came to me with these words: "Mamma, I heard something to-day which is too bad to tell anyone but mamma!" And the child was correct in her, estimate of the "too bad to tell." While regretting that to so young a child should come a knowledge of evil, I was thankful that she brought it to me.

As parents we need to take great care not to show ourselves so shocked by the evil that our children will not bring everything they see and hear that is wrong to us. I have known this mistake to be made. A boy comes to his father or mother and tells of an oath, or an impure expression, used by another; and the parent, shocked by the words, quoted though they be, says, "Never let me hear such words from your lips again;" and very likely he never will. But the boy will hear, not only the same, but even worse; and, forbidden to talk of them to his parents, he is in great danger of learning like language himself. And whose is the greater blame—the boy's or his parents?

We need also to remember, as in the case of the broken glass, that a matter in itself may be of great importance to the child, while much less serious to us, and thus take care to make neither too little nor too much of those things which concern our children.—S. S. Times.