maid is usually in attendance to open the door, direct the guests to
the drawing-room, bring hot tea or hot water when needed, remove soiled
cups and perhaps pass the food. In the latter service the hostess may
have the aid of her friends, who usually appreciate the honor of being
asked to “pour” or to help act as hostesses in introducing new-comers,
looking after the comfort of strangers and making sure that no one is
neglected in the distribution of refreshments.
Thus far reference has been made to hospitality exercised in the home
where a maid is kept. Far more numerous are those establishments in
which no regular service is employed. Even in these one’s friends may
be entertained as delightfully, if not as formally, as in the houses
supplied with hired domestics.
The regulation dinner is practically out of the question, and it is
wiser not to attempt it. But merry informal suppers, luncheons, and
breakfasts can be compassed and often these are greater successes
than those parties given under the supervision of a staff of trained
servants. The main point to be guarded against is the attempt at
anything which cannot be put through well. As soon as struggle is
made to do the impossible the effort becomes not only a burden to
the host and hostess, but a sort of nightmare to the guests. Better
have a roast-oyster party in the kitchen, where selected members of
the company do the cooking over the gas-stove, while others take upon
themselves the responsibility of serving the eaters, and the whole
affair is a jolly picnic, than to endeavor to manage a stately function
with insufficient aid and appurtenances.
The same sort of informality may mark the afternoon-tea party in
the home where no maid is kept. All the making ready can be done in
advance, the sandwiches cut and piled, the cakes arranged, the china
and tea equipage set out, so that nothing is needed but to start the
kettle to boiling and make the tea when it is needed. A friend will
preside at the tea-table, other friends will look after other details
and leave the hostess free to welcome and entertain her guests. Such a
party as this is one of the pleasantest, least costly, and generally
satisfactory ways of gathering one’s friends about one for a social
hour or two.
The hostess of small means and no maid should concentrate upon some
such line of entertaining as this and stick to it. She should aspire
to become known for her merry afternoon teas, her pleasant Sunday-night
suppers, her gay and informal after-theater spreads, where the
chafing-dish is the principal feature and where her guests are so well
amused that they think far less of the simple food put before them than
they do of the good-fellowship they have enjoyed. Formal entertaining
may have to be foregone, but the substitutes she offers are more
genuinely satisfactory both to the guests who share them and to the
host and hostess who have to pay for them!
X
THE CHILD IN THE HOUSE
With the introduction of a baby into an establishment the whole general
management of the place is changed.
That is to say, it is changed for a while. A serious mistake is made
when even so important an event as the arrival of a new member of the
family is permitted to cause a permanent alteration in the conduct
of the home. The most devoted of husbands and fathers will yield his
position as first-and-foremost for a while to the latest advent; will
take it for granted that his wife shall be absorbed in the needs of the
baby, shall have no conversation but that which deals with its joys and
woes, its accidents and accomplishments; but eventually any man worth
a row of pins will recollect that after all he was a human being, a
husband, and a householder before he was a parent, and will claim a few
of the rights coming to him in those capacities.
The prospective mother who grasps this truth and puts it into practical
service after the baby comes is much more likely to make a success of
her wifehood and matronhood than the one who is all mother and nothing
else. If the child is well and is properly trained there is no reason
why it should not be a satisfactory member of society and a joy to the
household and to all about it instead of a nuisance to every one except
its most devoted parent.
A great deal more of the comfort of the child and its future good
habits is settled within the first month of its life than is suspected
by those who have had little to do with the care of babies. If it
is started with regular habits of eating and sleeping, is from the
beginning accustomed to lie in its cradle or crib instead of being held
in the arms constantly and lifted and rocked at its first whimper, it
takes such treatment for granted and forms no habit of making demands
for that which is difficult for the attendant always to supply and does
no good to the child to receive.
With a delicate or sickly babe the same strict rules cannot be enforced
as with a healthy infant, and yet even a puny child is better off
if kept to a steady regimen than if fed, taken up, and put down at
uncertain intervals, and allowed to accumulate a crop of irregular
fashions of eating and sleeping. Sometimes the struggle to implant a
sense of law and order is a difficult undertaking when the ill health
of the child or the carelessness of the first nurse has brought it into
bad ways, but persistence in the effort is worth while for the sake of
the comfort success is bound to bring later to all concerned.
The periods of feeding are determined by the doctor, to begin with, and
the space between them is gradually widened as the child grows older.
The system which should be the guide of the housekeeper in her home has
as large a field of usefulness applied to children as anywhere else.
The baby should be washed and dressed at a regular hour; the time for
its meals and its outing should be invariable; the hour for undressing
it, washing it, and making it ready for bed should never vary except in
cases of rare exigency. If it is a healthy child it will fall naturally
into the habit of taking a morning nap after the bath and the meal, of
waking at a certain time, and then of lying comfortably in the bed or
on a couch or in its carriage with no wails to be lifted and walked
with. Modern medical science has declared that the less handling a
little baby receives the better for it, and that for some months its
growth should be in most respects as much like that of a vegetable as
possible.
As the child gets older and begins to use its limbs it will be good for
it to be exercised rather more, but nature is a pretty safe guide to
follow in this respect. The baby who is well and normal is not slow to
show its growth and progress, and it is far wiser for the parent to be
led by these than to attempt to hurry development either of body or of
mind. The child will assert itself soon enough, and so decidedly as to
leave no room for doubt as to its proclivities.
Possibly it may sound a trifle absurd to say that from the first the
child should have the habit of obedience implanted, yet this is no
absurdity, but a serious and important fact. At an astonishingly early
age the infant endeavors to pit its small will against that of its
seniors, and the initial step in revolt is promptly followed by others
unless the attempt is checked at once.
Neither time nor place is sufficient here to go into the reasons why
the training of a child in obedience, even at the cost of suffering
and punishment, is not the exercise over the weak of the tyranny of
the strong, but the display of superior wisdom for the benefit of the
inexperienced. It is enough to remind those who think that a child
should be allowed to grow up naturally, unrestrained by rule and
severity, when severity is required to enforce discipline, that all
through life the human being must conform to constituted authority
as exemplified in the laws of health, of the state, of teachers and
employers, of morality, of religion. In view of this the sooner the
child learns to defer to those in whose charge it is the better for it
later on, the less cruel the lessons life holds in store for it.
Apart from this there can be no doubt that the well-trained child is
actually happier than the one with no law but its own whim. Also it is
much pleasanter company than the self-willed, undisciplined infant who
follows its own sweet will regardless of the comfort or preference of
others.
The same kind of regimen established for a child in babyhood should
be pursued when it grows older and begins to share more actively in
the life of the household. The mistaken custom of permitting a child
to keep the same hours, eat the same diet, and follow practically the
same life as its elders cannot be sufficiently condemned. The habit of
going to bed early after a light meal, of having the heaviest repast
in the middle of the day, of partaking of such food as is particularly
suited to the needs of a growing child, of being debarred rich and
indigestible articles of diet, of having postponed until more advanced
years exciting amusements and pursuits instead of being hurried into
them while hardly out of infancy, should all be enforced. A child is
not a miniature man or woman, but an immature human being who must
develop naturally, as plants grow, and is wronged by being forced
into premature bloom or fruition, mentally or emotionally as much as
physically.
The child’s food should be carefully considered by the mother and she
should not regard the time wasted she bestows in studying food values
and devising the best sort of diet for the nursery. Not until the first
teeth begin to come should starchy food of any sort be given, and then
with caution. Until the saliva flows freely to help digest starch,
bread in any form, crackers, etc., should be withheld. As the child
reaches the stage where solid food is allowed this should continue to
be simple in character. A child does not have the longing for variety
common to more sophisticated palates.
For the breakfast of the child of two or more years of age a cereal,
well cooked, with plenty of milk, should be given. Sugar should not
accompany it. When sweet is desirable, as it often is, it should be
taken in some other way than as an adjunct to a regular article of
diet. With the cereal and milk the child seldom needs anything more,
but if the consumption of the porridge is not sufficient, a soft-boiled
egg or a poached egg may be supplied, with a little toast. Milk should
be the drink.
In the middle of the morning a supplementary meal may be taken, and
this may consist of a piece of bread and butter and a glass of milk.
Whole-wheat bread is better than that made from the bolted flour. When
there is a tendency to constipation Graham bread is good.
At noon the substantial provision of the day is to be served and a
cup of soup may begin the dinner, followed by a very small piece of
steak or chop cut up fine, or by an egg, if one has not been taken at
breakfast, a baked potato, well mashed, with butter or cream and salt
upon it. Rice is also excellent when served with plenty of good butter.
A plain sweet, like stewed fruit, a milk pudding, one of rice, of
arrowroot, tapioca, or a custard, will answer. Milk may again be drunk
unless the child has eaten a meat soup or broth and meat besides.
Generally the little one who has taken so substantial a meal as this
at noon will need nothing more until supper-time, when bread and milk,
crackers and milk, or something of the sort may be provided; or bread
and a good plain jam or stewed fruit, like prunes or apple-sauce, with
a glass of milk. After this comes the child’s bed-time, and it should
be put to sleep in a quiet room, alone, with the door open if symptoms
of nervousness declare themselves, but without a nurse or other
attendant. This may sound hard-hearted, but the child who is accustomed
to such solitude from infancy will not feel it an infliction, and the
saving of inconvenience to the parents in the habit of going to sleep
unattended is incalculable.
The good manners of the child should receive early consideration.
The habit of courtesy implanted in infancy gives a finish of manner
in later life that no surface polish can impart. It is as easy for a
little boy and girl to be taught to rise when elders come into the
room, to take their turn at the table, to handle a knife, fork, and
spoon properly, to eat in a decent fashion, to say, “Thank you,” “If
you please,” and the like, and to show the thoughtfulness for the
feelings and comfort of others which is the foundation of all good
breeding, as it is to let the youngsters grow up as they will and
hammer superficial manners into them when they are older. The good old
rule that “children should be seen and not heard” is sadly in need of a
revival in many homes, and parents cannot wonder at the unpopularity of
their offspring when they reflect upon the disagreeable qualities these
often possess.
All this does not mean that children should constantly be snubbed and
repressed until individuality and initiative are crushed out of them.
In most children these characteristics are strong and triumphant. But a
certain measure of deference to elders should be inculcated--a respect
which will prevent a child from interrupting the conversation of his
seniors, a regard for the conventions which, after all, have more to do
with peace and amity in the family than many of us are willing to admit.
As the child grows older and begins school and kindergarten, other
children will be associated with him, and from them he will learn many
things it would never occur to his parents to teach him. Sometimes it
seems as though the least that children acquire at school is their
regular lessons. These become almost a side issue. The influence of the
strange boy or girl often carries more weight with a child than all
the precepts of father, mother, and teacher. Part of this effect is
transitory, but much of it sticks through life; and while the children
are little more than babies it becomes incumbent upon the parents--by
which is usually meant the mother--to strengthen the bond between
herself and her child so that she may the more effectually offset the
outside forces that sway him.
The sooner the mother recognizes that this is her lifelong “job” and a
most important one, the better for all concerned. The mere animal care
of the child any competent nurse could bestow, and sometimes it seems
as if the charge of a specialist who understood the ins and outs of
dietetics and was able to study the child’s constitution impersonally
might perhaps be better than the attention received from the average
parent. With regard to the question of instruction in book learning
there is little doubt that a well-qualified teacher is far more capable
than the most devoted father or mother. All such duties as these can be
delegated to those who are trained and paid for the work.
When it comes to the companionship, however, it is another matter.
Here is something only the mother can give. It is “up to her” to
study the ins and outs of her child’s nature; to know where and how
to bring pressure in order to counterbalance another influence; to
make herself so one with him that he turns to her instinctively, with
complete confidence in her ability to meet his need; to be so close
in his intimacy that she grasps his thoughts almost before they are
formulated; to persuade him unconsciously to rely upon her judgment,
her companionship, her understanding to an extent that will hold him in
temptation and move him to range himself on the side of right against
wrong.
Of course it is not always easy. The mother does not resign her own
individuality by the mere fact of motherhood; she does not lay aside
her special interests when she takes up those of her child. Yet if she
lets him suspect that anything comes ahead of his well-being in her
heart she makes a fatal mistake; she starts the rift between them which
may widen into a chasm not to be bridged by all her agony and tears.
It may sometimes be hard to yield up one’s own will and preference in
this way, and yet the mother gets her pay as she goes along, and her
labor brings its reward in a fashion unequaled in any other vocation in
the universe. Nothing in the whole world pays so well as being a mother!
THE END
Transcriber's Notes:
Italics are shown thus: _sloping_.
Variations in spelling and hyphenation are retained.
Perceived typographical errors have been changed.