“The household must weep for forty days on the birth of a girl.”
Arabic Proverb.
“Is it all forgot? All schooldays’ friendship,
Childhood’s innocence?”
Shakespeare.
“Where children are not, heaven is not.”
A. Swinburne.
The children of Mosul have on the whole a very good time. From their earliest days they are allowed to do pretty much as they like, and only when the process of spoiling is completed, and the child has become a terror to all, do the parents realise that it is far easier to spoil a child than to “unspoil” him, once the deed is done. This method, or rather lack of method, of bringing up the children, is a great cause of trouble and sorrow in after years both to the parents and to the children themselves, but yet they never seem to profit by their experiences, for they still continue to say that it is a great “aib” or shame to deny a child anything he may want. Although this spoiling process is carried on with both boys and girls in the earlier years of their lives, it is brought to perfection in their treatment of the boys.
I remember a pretty little child called Jamila (beautiful); she was so fair and pretty that she was known by many as “the English child.” When she was about three years old she became very ill, and the mother brought her to my husband, who prescribed for her, but said that the chief part of the treatment lay in the diet. On no account was solid food to be given for at least three or four days. The mother looked in despair when she heard this, as she said, “Jamila will cry if she cannot have her meat and bread and pillau!” A day or two later I was calling at the house, and saw that Jamila was looking very ill, and asked the mother what the child had been eating. “Oh,” she said, “poor little child, I had to give her meat and bread, for she tore her hair and clothes in her anger, on my refusing to give them to her, and so, how could I deny them to her?” And sure enough, while I was there, Jamila began to cry for bread, and on her mother refusing, threw herself on the ground in a paroxysm of anger, beating her head and face with her clenched fist, till she was quite blue and black in the face. The mother ran at once and brought bread and meat, and gave to the child, who immediately recovered her equanimity of mind and temper.
Then again, I have seen a room full of people all in despair over a child of perhaps two or three years old, who refuses to drink his medicine ordered by the doctor. The father begins the performance by solemnly taking the glass containing the medicine up to the child, and saying to him, “Oh, my beloved, will you take this medicine?” “No,” says the child, and pushes it away. The father looks round on the audience for signs of wonder and astonishment at the marvellous doings of the child. Then perhaps the uncle has a try, and meets with like success; then the mother, the aunts, and a few friends all beseech the child to take the medicine, saying, “For my sake, for the sake of your father, your mother, &c., take this,” but, of course, all are unsuccessful, and they all shake their heads and say, “I told you so, he will not take it,” and it being a “khatiya” (sin) to force a child to do anything against his will, the child, of course, gains the victory in this as in everything else. If you suggest pouring the medicine down the child’s throat by force, the parents and friends will put you down as being a monster of cruelty.