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Worth Womans While
Danger to Children From Negro
Nurse Maids.
The babies and children of the South are brought
up largely by negroes. This is a statement we should
not, like to be confronted with away from home.
Neglect is a charge none of us like to meet, and for
a mother to have to own that for .the first five or six
years of its life her child was in the care of its
negro nurse, with whom it was on far more famil
iar terms than with herself, is a thing she would
rather not do; she would rather evade it, and pre
tend with herself that it is not true. It is a custom
we have been so long given to we do not realize
the extent of it until it is presented to us from
without, yet when we come to think, no fact, no
feature of our national life, is more patent.
There are exceptional cases, of course, but as a
rule no mother who can afford the expense of a
nurse maid will be without one for the first several
years of her child’s life; if she is in restricted cir
cumstances she will have the servant only through
the day, but if well-to-do, nurse is virtually bought
and owned for the time being, sleeps in baby’s room,
and has the complete care and nearness that Na
ture gave to the mother. It must be owned that the
devotion of some of these servants shines pre-em
inently in their favor as it is compared with the in
difference of the parents; but not all are good, and
their ways are not ways of wisdom nor their teach
ings such as would be chosen for the infant mind.
But perhaps the one thing most objectionable in
a negro nurse girl is her habit of kissing the baby—
full upon its little mouth, its breath, its very life,
covered with hers. Possibly you are too occupied
to notice it much in the case of your own child and
nurse, but observe when you are out upon the thor
oughfare where the maids congregate with their
charges, not only your servant, but her friends will
kiss and caress your delicate baby girl in away that
would horrify the great tuberculosis doctors, or any
sane mother, as for that matter.
We used to have great dread of consumption; now
we hear little of that, but much of tuberculosis.
Consumption was thought to be a fatal and incura
ble disease confined to the lungs; tuberculosis (which
is the same thing) may develop in any part of the
body, and, taken in time, may be cured. The au
thorities on this widespread malady claim that one
out of every seven persons, dies of tuberculosis—
the estimate does not include the eases treated and
cured. Late investigations show that the ravages
of the disease among negroes are such that with
the present rapidity and increase it is only a ques
tion of time when the race must disappear.
Contagion being from the mouth it is plain what
the danger to the young child is, held even while
sleeping, in the nurse’s arms, and breathing her
breath—many mothers even use the negro wet
nurses.
The other day a convention of medical men in
Brooklyn discussed the question, “How can the
physician and layman accomplish most in the fight
against tuberculosis?” And Dr. S. A. Knopf pro
posed a system to be taught children by their
teachers, one rule of which says, “Don’t kiss any
body directly on the lips, and don’t let anybody
kiss you on the lips.” A most excellent direction,
but beginning rather late. A great deal is left for
the teachers to do—the doctor’s plan does not ask
the co-operation of the parent, but appeals to the
teacher, the faithful friend and guardian of child
hood, without whose guiding hand its pathway
would be far less smooth and rosy. There is no
denying the teacher is to a certain extent a very
savior after her jurisdiction begins, but there are
the six or seven years before she comes into the
child’s life, and even when the little one goes out
from home the teaching he has had from his mother
should be ever paramount in the little mind, over
The Golden Age for May 17, 1906.
By FLORENCE 'TUCKER
any that the whole wide experience of life can offer.
Children in the arms can be taught by the mother
not to submit to being kissed. Fancy yourself be
ing pounced upon perhaps twenty times a day and
kissed by friend or stranger, and think what this
indiscriminate attack must mean to delicate sensi
bilities ( and even babies have sensibilities), to say
nothing of just so many contacts with as many
different diseased organisms. And suppose you had
to be kissed by your own nurse, and not only that,
but by her friends?
Dr. Knopf is on the right track. The children
should be taught not to submit to being kissed; and
before they are old enough to understand they should
be protected by their mothers from the menace of
deadly disease in the breath and lips of the negro
nurse maids.
If Not Memory, Its Effects.
The gift of memory is more coveted, perhaps, than
any other. It is a gift; the faculty may be culti
vated, but as with other talents Heaven has endow
ed some where to others it gave but a meager por
tion. The average mortal becomes greatly discour
aged when his own forgetfulness, as he is apt to re
gard it, is impressed upon him by contrast with one
of the favored ones. He feels almost helpless be
fore this superior mentality, and even wonders, per
haps, if Nature has done all her duty by him, if
all is his that should by right be. But the mother
possessing diversity of gifts often makes up for the
absence of one in the bestowal of another—the
thing is that we just have the good sense to recog
nize it, and to utilize it, and to utilize what is ours.
A sound, wholesome philosophy stands us in as good
stead oftentimes as a shining gift.
As in the case of the Irish washerwoman. The
priest, making her a visit on Monday morning, she
told him she had enjoyed the sermon of Sunday.
“Ah?” said his reverence much pleased. “Tell
me about it—what do you recollect that impressed
you most? Now, let us hear.”
“Well,” replied Bridget, “I can’t say as I rick
erlect onything at all. No, I can’t say as I do.”
“The text, then—of course you remember that?”
“Nayther the text. There’s ne’er a part of the
sermon as I can tell the words of.”
“What!” cried the irate priest, “you tell me
that it was a fine sermon, that it did you good, and
yet you cannot so much as give the text! How is
that?”
“Yer riverance,” said the imperturbable Bridg
et, “it is like this: The water and soap that goes
into these clo’es, none of em stays in, but ye sees
fer yerself how clane and white they leaves the
clo’es. The sermon nor the text would stick in my
head, but my heart is the whiter for havin’ heerd
em.—l am claner jist as the clo’es is clane.”
And so, when we reflect, may we all comfort our
selves. Nothing is lost; no impression ever made—
no sentence read or word spoken—but has left its
little dent in the mind, found its own little place
of lodgment in the heart, and had its own influence
ever after. We cannot quote long poems, perhaps,
or recall readily passages that come to us only hazily
and so seem no good at all, but if the reading has
been good, if associations have been what they
ought, like the water and soap, they have made us
whiter and cleaner, and without even keeping them
with us, we yet have the best that we could want
of them; their effect upon us.
Amid those whom many would give up as beyond
reach and unworthy of effort, I have found generosi
ty, unselfishness, patience and cheerfulness that
would often teach people in happier circumstances
a striking lesson.
—-Maud Ballinger Booth.
Respect For Elders.
Two young women were walking on the crowded
thoroughfare of a large city when an elderly lady
in passing spoke pleasantly.
“Who was that?” asked one of the other.
“Oh, I don’t know, some funny old woman in
St. Paul’s Church.,” her companion replied indif
ferently.
“Well, you didn’t trouble to be nice,” responded
the first, “she is old, and if she is funny, too, there
will be plenty of people will not be nice to her, you
might have smiled.”
What a pity young people cannot always remem
ber “their manners,” as the old-time servants
were accustomed to designate the courtesy which
society dictates and kindness should prompt. A
respectful salutation accompanied by a smile is as
little as could be expected in recognition of the
attention of an elder, yet so indifferently are young
people the aged will often times go round them to
escape open rudeness.
A gentle little lady no longer young was wending
her way homeward the other evening accompanied
by a sweet young girl whose beautiful demeanor
toward older people would perhaps bring upon her
the epithet of old-fashioned, when they were met
by four boys and girls walking solidly abreast and
as though they possessed the right of way; not one
inch of pavement did these young people give, and
the gentle little lady walked outside, she was
forced to, as they proceeded on their uncompromis
ing way as regardless of her as though she did not
exist. “Some people have a good deal to learn
yet,” she remarked quietly, it did not occur to her
to assert herself, she preferred getting off the
pavement to being pushed off by youthful arro
gance—as in fact, she was.
It really is painful to see how regardless the
world is of maturity, the fullness of experience
which has learned all of life that each one in turn
must make his by actual passing through, theripe age
to which all alike look forward. Self-respect, even,
is lost sight of in the want of respect for seniors.
A careless, light-brained woman answered the tele
phone; the call was for one who chanced to be out
and was not reported to her. The matter was one
of importance, and out of the failure to communi
cate by ’phone arose complications confusing and
disappointing before all was done. When the absent
one, on returning and learning of the neglect, in
quired into the cause, the excuse was: “Oh, I knew
it was just the old professor!”
The old professor! And because he was old she
did not regard him or his message. She did not
even comprehend that since that day she first put a
telephone in her house no person, man or woman,
of higher, loftier character, of wider culture, or
broader kindliness, had ever held speech with her,
asking so simple a favor. Because his years were
many she failed to discern their fullness; she could
not see that he was the more a man for them; she
slighted him, caused disconcertment where it need
not have been, and brought on herself the contumely
of those who knew of her action.
Carelessness, indifference toward age is one of
the most deplorable signs of our times—it betoken
a rottenness at the core, the heart of us; reverence
has its exercise only in certain places and to certain
extent, and veneration scarce anywhere at all. What
are we coming to, when our elders are treated not
even with common consideration?
He who walks through life with an even temper
and a gentle patience—patient with herself, patient
with others, patient with difficulties and crosses—
he has an everyday greatness beyond that which is
won in battle or chanted in cathedrals.
—Orville Dewey.