IN THE NURSERY.
It is a somewhat remarkable fact that the younger the servant employed,
the greater and more precious is the first charge usually placed in
her hands. I mean, of course, the baby, with occasionally two or three
other small children in addition.
To nurse the one and keep the other out of mischief is generally deemed
the fitting occupation for the little maid, herself a mere child when
she first goes out to service. The young hands that are too unsteady to
be trusted with such fragile articles as glass and crockery, lest these
should suffer damage, too unskilled in household matters to be esteemed
of much value in the cleaning and scrubbing department, are deemed
quite competent to hold the baby and act as caretaker to the whole
juvenile brood.
Often the busy, notable mother of a family will say, when speaking of
a child-servant, ‘I cannot let her help in the house-work. She would
only make more labour than she would save; would dirty more than she
would clean; break more things by clumsiness and carelessness than her
wages would pay for. I can get through much more quickly by myself,
and nothing will need doing over again. But she _can_ nurse the baby
and look after the children, which will set my hands free to do the
house-work.’
So the house-mother bustles from place to place and does the work
herself. In the meanwhile, the inexperienced hands which must on no
account be trusted with the crockery, the chairs, and the tables, have
the sole charge of what should be to every mother the most precious of
helpless treasures--her infant.
In the comparatively poor districts of large towns, chiefly inhabited
by working people and small shopkeepers, it is no uncommon thing for
a little maid, barely in her teens, to go out nursing by the day--and
generally a very long day. She comes home to sleep, the small place
where a business is carried on being often filled to overflowing by the
shopkeeper’s actual belongings. It is probably fortunate for the small
servant that she does go home to sleep, or her day’s work might come to
an end even later still, or last all night, should the baby sleep with
her.
Numbers of little maidens make their start as domestic servants in
this way, and rise by gradual steps to what is considered a position
of greater trust and responsibility. I have been in a tiny shop when
a dot of a girl, pinafored and with a cotton hood or woollen kerchief
on her head, has entered. Dropping a little bob of a courtesy, she has
announced that she is seeking her first place by the question, ‘Please,
ma’am, do you want a girl to help to nurse the baby?’
It is often the case that these little maids, the eldest of large
families, have served a seven years’ apprenticeship at home nursing
before they are twice that number of years old. They are frequently far
more handy with babies than much older people, and the very small folks
always like a girl-nurse, who is not too old to romp and play, and who
enjoys the games as heartily as do her little charges. These mites love
to see a merry face, to hear a good ringing laugh, and to listen to the
nonsense rhymes and nursery jingles which come pattering from the still
childish lips of their young guardian.
I do not know a greater affliction in a nursery than a nurse, no matter
how good and conscientious she may be, who goes through her duties in
a grave, stolid, unsympathetic way; washing and dressing the children,
tidying and stitching in a mechanical, plodding fashion, and doing
her duty faithfully, according to her light, but forgetting, in her
dealings with children, that she was once as young as they are.
The nurse who worrits over a soiled pinafore or rumpled hair, who
is for ever straightening up, and putting the toys and litter which
children delight in and ought to have around them on high shelves
and in out-of-the-way places, may have a tidy nursery, but she will
certainly have a brood of unhappy youngsters around her.
There are nurses who are old in years, but young in heart, bright,
cheerful, and abounding in love for children, and who come second only
to the good mother in the affection of the small people. And there are
others who are by no means old counting by years, but who left their
youthful spirits behind them, if they ever had any, when they began to
run alone.
I once heard a lady speaking of two girls, of only eighteen and twenty,
who had the care of her three children. ‘They are both good girls,’
she said; ‘truthful, conscientious, well-behaved. I have no fear that
the children will ever learn anything wrong from them. But they are so
stolid and dull that they seem to take all the brightness out of the
lives of the little ones. One sits like a lump at her stitching; the
other, like a second lump of human material, keeps the children out of
mischief, and takes care that the nursery is in a painful state of
order, and that smeared faces and soiled pinafores are things unknown.
‘Let a child leave a toy for a moment, it is seized and put carefully
away. These nurses never can be made to understand that, what would
appear untidy and disorderly in a drawing-room, is the proper and
necessary state of things in an apartment dedicated to the use of
little ones. If children are to be happy they must be occupied, and to
find them employment a variety in books, toys, and pictures must be
within their reach.
‘A childish mind does not fix itself upon any one thing for a length
of time. But though Jack may have become weary of the pursuit of
architecture, and may demolish with one stroke the castle he has spent
half an hour in building, he does not want the materials packed away,
in case he should determine on erecting a church somewhat later in the
day. He likes to have his bricks within reach, even while he is looking
at pictures, and to be able to turn from his book to his wheelbarrow
without asking nurse’s leave. Then the children want some one to laugh
with them, to sing, to lead their games and teach them new ones; and
when they go out they do not want to be led solemnly along as if they
were attending a funeral.
‘I am sorry to part with two thoroughly good girls,’ added the
speaker, ‘but I cannot bear to see the children growing up such little
sobersides, so unnaturally grave and old before their time.’
‘What shall you do then?’ asked the friend to whom the lady was
speaking.
‘Oh, I have engaged a cheery, middle-aged widow to do the sewing and
superintend generally. She is to have a little girl of fourteen under
her as her messenger and the children’s playfellow. I fell in love
with the little maid when out district-visiting, through seeing the
delightful way in which she managed to keep her own small brothers and
sisters amused and happy, with next to nothing in the way of materials.
I am quite reckoning on litter and laughter in my nursery, in place of
unvarying tidiness and dulness.’
Do not imagine that this lady would have tolerated any lack of real
cleanliness in the persons or surroundings of her children. She
estimated at their full value the neatness and particularity of her
maids; but she felt that, while the young bodies were admirably cared
for, the nursery atmosphere was cheerless and depressing. It was
deficient in human sunshine and sympathy.
Instead of being merry and childlike, her youngsters were becoming
staid, prim little men and women; their very games were made a serious
business; the care of their toys was a matter of grave responsibility.
The children could hardly have had more upright and careful attendants;
but the mother saw that spotless pinafores, constant supervision, and a
tidy nursery were not in themselves sufficient for happiness.
I have given this little sketch from life because I want to impress
upon my girl readers who think of offering themselves to fill the
situation of nurse, that something more is required to make a good one
than a mere knowledge of nursery work.
If I were engaging a nurse for young children, I should not only
inquire about the experience she had gained in caring for their bodies,
her cleanliness, truthfulness, honesty, and general trustworthiness.
I might be satisfied on these points, and the applicant might also be
one of the best seamstresses that ever took needle in hand, and yet I
should want something of more importance than all these.
I should need to be convinced that she was not taking a place as nurse
merely as a means of breadwinning, but because she honestly loved the
helpless little ones, and was sufficiently young-hearted to feel for
and with them in matters that are trifles to grown-up people, but great
things to children.
I should want to study her face a little, to find that it was bright
and happy-looking, and that her voice had a cheery ring in it. To be
convinced that, when the laughing, crowing baby looked up in its glee,
it would see a responsive smile on its nurse’s countenance, and that
her presence would be likely to make the nursery not merely a cleanly
but a happy place for the children.
So I say to my readers, never take a place as nurse unless you can
carry with you a heart large enough to hold all your little charges,
and warm enough to pay back with interest the love they are so ready
to give to those who sympathise with and are kind to them. You will
need patience to bear with them, and firmness to check what is wrong;
you will need constant watchfulness and prayerful self-examination in
order that, by God’s grace, you may be enabled to subdue in yourselves
whatever might set a bad example or produce a bad impression on the
children intrusted to your care.
Next to the mother, probably no human being has so great an influence
over the little ones for good or evil as the nurse. Take care that
yours shall be for good. There is no lesson more quickly learned by
a child than that of trying to hide a fault by telling an untruth.
Perhaps curiosity has led to meddling, meddling to an accident and a
breakage. To cover this and escape punishment, the child deliberately
plans concealment, and tells its first lie.
The same teacher--fear of consequences--often finds an apt pupil in
the nurse as well as in her young charges, and she tells, or it may be
only acts, a falsehood in their presence. Who can estimate the mischief
done, or the fruit produced from the seed of that evil example? Young
eyes are quick to see,--young minds to receive impressions. Not so
quick to lose the effect, or get rid of the consequences, of a single
lesson in deceit.
Dear young nurses, let me plead with you for the sake of the immortal
souls of these precious little ones; be true in word and deed. Strive
to lead them gently and lovingly; set them a good example. Ask strength
from God to overcome the temptations to anger and falsehood. Be
careful, too, that no profane or impure expression ever passes from
your lips, to defile the ears and corrupt the minds of the children
committed to your care. Let not those young eyes witness any action
that you would be afraid or ashamed for a grown-up person to see.
Nay, let your thoughts soar still higher, and remember the Eye that
never slumbers nor sleeps, the Ear which hears equally the prayer and
the wrong or idle words of which we often think so lightly.
Should any accident happen to an infant either through inadvertence
or want of care on your part, be brave and true. Go at once to the
mother, and, even at the risk of losing your situation, or of a
severe reprimand, tell about the fall or the blow which the child has
received, and ask that means may be used to prevent any permanent harm
resulting from it. I have known two cases of life-long deformity and
lameness, both of which might have been prevented had the nurses told
of comparatively trifling accidents when they occurred, but which were
rendered serious for want of immediate attention.
The little creatures had wailed and cried,--their only mode of
telling that they were in pain. The tears were put down to teething,
crossness--anything but the real cause. Had the truth been told and a
doctor sent for, the experienced professional touch and eye would have
discovered the injuries, the joints would have been replaced, and two
fine girls saved from lasting disfigurement.
Better, far better endure displeasure or even the loss of a place,
than carry the life-long memory that, through your want of courage
and candour, a young creature’s existence has been blighted, or its
activity and usefulness impaired. Ay, and what is of still more
importance, better be the humblest drudge at the roughest of household
work, than undertake the charge of children without a deep sense of the
solemn responsibilities belonging to the nurse’s office.
If you cannot carry into the nursery loving hearts, patience,
self-control, cheerfulness, courage, truth, pure speech, propriety of
manners, and tender sympathy, work elsewhere in the household. Remember
that it is not only the bodies of the little ones for which you have to
care, but that you will have to answer for the influence you may exert
on their minds and souls. Are they not the lambs whom Jesus loved and
blessed? Do they not belong to that flock for which the Good Shepherd
laid down His life on Calvary?