[There is a pause.]
Babies are merry enough things, if you like.
Yes, and spoilt too.
And troublesome as well. I cannot abide them. As soon as ever they are born they begin to cry out, and to beg for what they want, just as though everything ought to be ready to their hand at once. Even before they can see out of their eyes they have learnt that there are such things in the world as a breast and milk, and straightway they ask for them. Then they need to be put to bed, and to be rocked to sleep, and to have their little red backs patted. For my part, I like them best when they are dying.
Then they grow less clamorous—they just stretch themselves out, and require rocking to sleep no more.
But they are such playful little dears! How I love to wash them just after they are born!
And I to wash them just after they are dead!
No quarrelling, no quarrelling! Each to her own taste. One loves to wash them after they, are born, and another to wash them after they are dead. That is all about it.
But what right have babies to think that they may cry for what they want? It does not seem to me the proper thing.
They think nothing at all about it. 'Tis their stomach which does the asking.