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10 THE HOUSEHOLD A DEPARTMENT OF EXPRESSION FOR THOSE WHO FEEL AND THINK, CONDUCTED BY ADDIE L. LINDSEY. The Gentle Sister That We Lost ARTHUR M. GOODENOUGH. The gentle sister that we lost! How clear in memory’s crystal frame Her likeness shows; how reverently We breathe the dear, familiar name! The merry heart—the wholesome life— The sunshine and the song of birds, All these were hers and skillfully She linked her pleasant thoughts in words. Here was the soul of simple faith— Not hers to question but to trust, And rarely has a human soul Shown brighter through its human dust. Fain would I trace her praises here Webster tells us that a gossip is a person who “runs about telling and hearing news.” But Webster was a chivalrous gen tleman, and times have changed since his day. His definition of a gossip has become weak and lacking in descriptive force. But common consent is more up to date —more accurate and just in its verdict—and by common consent the professional gossip has been des ignated as a thing in human shape with more mouth than brains. The small town gossip can do more harm in one hour than a whole com munity of people can overcome in a lifetime of effort. The gossip is the buzzard of socie ty, the bane of humanity and the advance agent of the devil. The gossip has but one creed, and that is the crucifixion of innocence and the perpetuation of infamy. The tongue of the gossip is so forked it would bring the blush of shame to the face of that other rep tile of the split tongue species—the snake. The gossip lives but to revel in the slime of insinuations and innuen does and calumnies. Scandal is the bread of life to the gossip, and the greatest desire and most intense longing of the profes sional is for “more gossip.” The stock in trade of the gossip is like the rainbow—it has no end. It just keeps on going and enlarging and crucifying until it blights every thing it encounters. It is like the breath of hell upon the fair cheek of an angel. The gossip’s tongue begins to wag in the morning, wags all day keeps on wagging into the night and like cascarets wags while you sleep. The gossip construes the idle pass time of the innocent maiden into the intrigues of a subtle and poisoned brain. If a man looks twice at a woman the gossip rips his character to WHAT IS GOSSIP? For many people to admire; But I may not my wish attain And vainly I the task aspire! What boots the meager verse of men ? The Angels saw her virtue, too; And prized her smiles, and told her worth More fittingly than we can do. And even death (I like to think) When he approached her cottage porch Assumed his least repellant guise— The youth with the inverted torch. Ah, time to us shall bring the rain, The wind, the canker and the frost, But nothing of it all shall stain The gentle sister that we lost! shreds and nails his hide to the wall of obloquy. The gossip meddles in the private affairs of everybody within reach of the vitriolic tongue, peers behind the curtains of every home, and erects skeletons in closets where none exist. The tongue of the gossip is the most poisonous and deadly instru ment of torture in existence, for it has no regard for truth, or for hu man suffering. The poisonous reptile strikes and inflicts a mercifully quick death. But the gossip maims and lacer ates and crucifies until the human soul is seared with its burden of agony. When God created the heavens and earth He inflicted humanity with the presence of snakes and other slimy and oozy and pestiferous and odori ferous objects of loathing. And He also inflicted us with the gossip—for what reason only He in His superior wisdom can tell. Is there a hereafter for the gos sip? And if so WHERE IS IT? Heaven won’t have them, and hell don’t want them . Are they to pass down through the ages of eternity as a people without a final place of abode? Or are they, like the reptile, a thing without a soul? The question is to deep for the human mind to solve. . But perhaps the gossip can tell. ANTI-GOSSIP. PUTTING OFF. The other day I came across an article which was printed in the old New York Ledger way back in 1868. It read as follows: “No good work that can be commenced at once should ever be postponed. Men sometimes compromise with their consciences by promising to abandon some pet vice at a future day. We have no faith in post dated promises of reform. Persons who make them may think they are earnest, but they deceive themselves. Why not resolve THE GOLDEN AGE and execute simultaneously?. If a habit is evil and dangerous, give it no quarter. Slay it on the spot. Re spited vices are rarely conquered.” And the above is as true today as it was when it was written almost fifty years ago. “Procrastination,” says Edward Young, “is the thief of time.” You can not catch a train if you arrive at the station after it has gone. And so it is with our lives. We can not reclaim an opportunity which we have let slip by. “Never put off till tomorrow what you can do today.” FRANK OWEN. SECOND LETTER ON HINDRAN CES TO EDUCATION. Dear Household Sisters: In thinking over the things that will help instead of hinder the education of children, I make a strong plea for music and pictures in the home. Many children are developed through a love for music. Many are fond of pictures and can be stimulated to questions through them. We need to find the trend of the little minds— to know which way the thoughts in cline before we can help the develop ment. I do not like suggestion as a child soon gets to depend on it, and it is death to originality. The best part of education is not •between the coVers of books and can be best begun by surrounding chil dren with things to draw out their originality by asking questions—or better still, by waiting for questions to be asked and then answering them with careful attention to using words that the little ones can understand. When I find out what a child wants to know—what he takes most inter est in, then I can get the trend of his faculties and his preferences; it is best to try to guide the general trend of a child’s preferences and his own line of thinking, than to try to make him think along certain lines of your own chosing. In the first case you develop natural faculties and tendencies, and in the second place you begin to make an artificial mentality that will soon react. I like to let a child have his wishes as far as possible—for instance if I had two boys—one liking to stay out doors and ride horses and dig in the ground and climb trees and wade mudholes and chase rabbits. I would certainly encourage him in all out door sports and teach him botanical things and natural history, etc.; and if the other boy seemed inclined to stay indoors and read and look at pictures and strum on the piano or listen to a musical instrument of any kind and did not care for out-door things I would fix him a room with pictures and books and art materials and allow him to follow his natural bent along as wisely directed lines, as possible, only urging necessary rec reation and exercise. The girl who writes neatly and cor rectly, having what is called a pret ty penmanship, but misspelling half the words and never getting her arithmetic, can be depended on to make beautiful embroidery and do neat sewing, always following pat terns and being able to do nothing original; the girl who writes scraw ly, spells correctly covering many, many tablets with her examples, but gets it correctly before she stops, can be definitely located as one who is original and becomes disgusted with following, wanting to do things her own way. I like originality, but there are very fine characters who will always have to follow. In the play grounds there are us ually leaders who just develop and can’t be suppressed and so have to be considered in the scheme of things as leaders, and when there are two of this type in a crowd friction re sults, and the director of the play ground must take care of these vary ing personalities as best she can in order not to discourage the leading: capacity of a really fine child. Books could be written along this line and many have been written but teachers and parents seem not to be inclined to adopt any method other than the old way or making all chil dren in the family or school follow the same rules no matter how un wise or unsuited to the nature or temperament of the child. Parent—Teacher Association. This plan has caused the loss of many fine personalities—just repress ed and suppressed and discouraged and restrained and warped into in sipid weaklings, because of a lack of knowledge on the part of parents and teachers. This should not go on, and we can correct it by forming Par ent-Teacher Associations in all com munities and allowing the persons who deal with the children to discuss the needs of the little ones from a scientific and broad point of view. Many times the teacher has a knowledge of the personalities of (.Continued from page 11.) FINDS A PELLAGRA All Skin Eruptions Gone? Doctors Now Convinced Mrs. Vaughn Is Entirely Well. Mrs. G. H. Vaughn, Millville, Ark., writes:—“There is nothing I ever could do but what I can do it now. There is no sign of skin eruption. One of our local doctors told me that my cure was one of the greatest thing* that ever happened—not only for me, but for the whole community, to let them know that there is a cure for Pellagra.” “All the doctors that waited on m» are convinced that your remedy is a real cure.” There’s the true word from a cured patient. If you have Pellagra or know of anyone who suffers from Pellagra it is your duty to consult the resourceful Baughn, who has fought and conquer ed the dreadful malady right in the heart of the Pellagra belt in Alabama. The symptoms—hands red like sun burn, skin peeling off; sore mouth, the lips, throat and tongue a flaming red with much mucous and choking; indi gestion and nausea; either diarrhoea or constipation. There is hope. Get Baughn’e Big Free Book on Pellagra, and learn about the remedy for Pellagra that has at last been found. Address American Compounding Company, Box 587-W, Jasper, Ala., remembering money is refunded in any case where the remedy' fails to cure. April 22, 1915