My private opinion, which, of course, I do not divulge to Mrs. D., is that her husband is a Yahoo, and ought to be banished to Gulliver’s famous island, in order that he might consort with his fellows.
Even good, right-minded, affectionate Papas—like your stronger half and mine, dear reader!—do not overwhelm his very littleness with demonstrations of esteem.
“Say good-by to Baby!” you plead, as his paternal progenitor enters the nursery to take leave of you until dinner-time.
If he does not smoke, and is very amiable, he stoops and touches the little forehead with his lips—a very different salute from that bestowed upon yourself. If he has lighted a cigar, he replies: “I won’t kiss him. The tobacco might sicken him. Good-by, monkey!” tapping the velvet cheek with one finger.
Baby blinks and throws his fat arms about in a blind, senseless fashion, which you think very cunning.
“Did you ever see a child grow and improve as he does!” you ask, delightedly.
“Oh, very!” is the good-natured, but not very pertinent response. “The fact is, wifie, I am not much of a judge of the article in its present state. Wait until he reaches the interesting age, and you will have no cause to complain of my lukewarm praise.”
Bridget, also, “is very fond of children, when they get to be knowing and wise, and full of pretty tricks, but she finds the care of a young baby very confining,” and but for the tip-top wages she gets, would probably look out for another place.
No, fond mother—and proud as fond! your blessed baby is, during the first months of helpless, dumb infancy, “interesting” to nobody except yourself. But there are weighty reasons besides the indifference of others that should make him, now, the object of your especial care, and this period one of continual watchfulness and affectionate solicitude. Intrust to no nurse, however experienced, the task of bathing and feeding, dressing and undressing, the tender little body. It will never need your gentle handling, your quick eye, more than at present. A pin misplaced, a sudden wrench of a joint; the twist of the upholding hand, bringing the head or a limb into contact with table or chair, may lay the foundation of years of pain and disease, if not of incurable deformity.
We hear much talk about good and bad babies; how Mrs. Such-an-one always has model children, that give her no trouble at all; but sleep and eat at regular seasons, and never cry when awake, unless they are in pain, while Mrs. So-and-so’s existence is a woeful burden with her restless, fretful progeny, who turn day into night, and night into day, and sometimes decline having any night at all in the course of the twenty-four hours; who are continually crying to be fed at all manner of inconvenient times; who are, in short, as wrong-headed and peevish brats as one can find in a day’s ride. Yet, Mrs. So-and-so says that they are healthy and hearty, and suffer no pain. “It is just her luck to have cross children. All hers are born crabbed.”