CHAPTER XIII
ETIQUETTE FOR CHILDREN
One may be taught self-restraint and unselfish consideration for others at so early an age that such virtues become habitual, and minor maxims are to a large extent unnecessary. Of course, the child will still have to be shown the various ways in which he can show consideration, but he will quite frequently do of himself those acts which make for the comfort and well-being of others.
Habits of deference to elders spring from more complex motives, and the training in them may have to be more persistent and rigorous. Boys should be taught to take off their caps to their elders, both in the family and in the circle of friends, when they meet them on the street. They should rise when ladies enter the room, and remain standing until all are seated.
An important part in a child's bringing up is to teach him to put away his own garments and to clear up after his play or work. If this is instilled early into the child, there will never be any need of the pain of counteracting slovenliness, and also never any of that disagreeable haughtiness toward servants, which is fostered by nothing so much as by the inch-by-inch waiting upon a child.
The child who has been made a companion of, and not repressed or driven away by the older people of the family, has a sort of instinctive respect for them, which, though it may overstep itself in some daring familiarity occasionally, is the basis of a strong authority over him. The child who has been spied on, and whose idea of all adults is that they are a sort of modified policemen, will show respect only under compulsion, and will fail in all those fine courtesies which the thoroughly well-bred child grows to delight in.
Self-control and self-repression are equal virtues to be cultivated in the child. To permit the child to be indifferent and inattentive when one is trying to amuse or entertain, to be impatient to get at the end of a story or a game, to keep yawning; or making other expressions of weariness when being reproved or reprimanded, cultivates in the child a mental laziness which is as bad as its opposite,—parrot-like facility for chattering and asking questions, which gives a child no chance to think, and makes him develop into a man of only surface intelligence and thoughtless flippancy. Even a child can appreciate, if rightly taught, the motive back of a kind action, and can respect that even if the action does not interest him.
On the other hand, it is a serious matter to allow a child to be constantly bored with lectures on his conduct, or even with efforts to amuse him. He should be let alone, thrown upon his own resources, and not permitted to be taxed beyond adult endurance by well-meaning but futile efforts on his behalf.
Children should never be allowed to interrupt. For that reason parents, and those who have the care of children, should remember not to monopolize the conversation when there are children present, nor talk on and on for a long time, as no person, least of all a child, can follow such continuous talk without weariness.