It was about this time—the first fortnight of the eighth month—that taste first became a source of pleasure to our baby. She had been given an experimental taste of several things before, but beyond the grimace of surprise (it looks like utmost disgust, but there seems no doubt that it really means surprise only) with which little babies greet new tastes, she had shown no great interest in them. Now, as nature’s supply grew scant, she was introduced more seriously to several supplementary foods, and at least once rejoiced over the taste a good deal. Still, she was apt soon to tire of them, and on the whole taste did not at any time in her first year take a large place among her interests.
As the middle of the eighth month approached, it was evident that an advance in power of movement was coming. The baby was getting up on hands and knees again; she made daily a few aimless creeping movements; and in her bath she would draw herself to her knees, and partly to her feet, holding by the edge of the tub, and somewhat supported by the water. A few days later she drew herself forward a few inches, flat on her stomach, to get something. But she still did not catch the idea of creeping, and rolling remained her great pleasure for another fortnight.
In this fortnight, which brought our baby to eight months old, the rolling grew very rapid and free. She would now roll over and over in the same direction, not to get anywhere in particular (she never learned to use rolling for that purpose), but just for fun. She varied the exercise with the most lively kicking—heels raised in air and brought down together with astonishing vigor and zest; and with twisting about and getting on hands and knees, or even on hands and feet, prattling joyously, and having a beautiful time all by herself, for as long as the authorities would leave her alone. I have no note or memory that she ever tired of it, or asked for attention or change; it was always some one else who interfered, because meal-time or nap-time or something had come.
In the last week of the month she learned to raise herself to a sitting position; and as she could now sit up or lie down at will, she tumbled about the floor with still more variety and enjoyment. In the same week she began to pull herself daily quite to her feet in the tub. It was an ordinary wooden wash-tub which was bridging the interval between her own outgrown one and the grown-up bath-tub; and she would stand, leaning her weight partly on her hands, on the edge of the tub, with her feet planted wide apart, quite on the opposite side, giving her a pretty secure base.
In this fortnight the baby’s understanding of us and feeling of nearness to us were noticeably greater. Her attachment to her favorites was striking. She would cling to us with all the strength of her little arms, sometimes pressing her lips against our faces in a primitive sort of kiss. Her desire for our attention was intense—little arms stretched out, face full of desire, while she uttered urgent cries. Now and then she was entirely unwilling to eat a meal till the person she had set her heart on at the moment had yielded to her pleading, and come to sit close beside her, for company.
She understood one or two little directions—“by-by,” and “patacake”; or, at least, associated them with the acts. She had some idea of what “No, no!” meant, and she knew perfectly that she must not keep paper or flower petals in her mouth, and after biting off a bit would put out her tongue, laughing, to have the forbidden scrap removed. And one day when I said to her, “Don’t you want to come to aunty?” without any gesture, she surprised me by leaning forward and putting out her hands to me, exactly as if I had reached my arms out for her. She could not have understood the whole question, for she hardly understood words at all at the time; but she must have made out “come,” and, putting it with “aunty,” which she had known for weeks, got at my meaning.
On the day she was eight months old, at last, the baby half sprawled, half crept, forward to get something. The early, aimless stages of locomotion were over, and she was about to start in in good earnest to learn to creep and to stand.
XI
CREEPING AND STANDING
Now, at eight months old, began a fortnight of rapid development in movements, all branching out from the position on hands and knees which the baby often took as she sprawled on the floor.
First she hit on two ways of sitting up, beginning on hands and knees. One of them, in fact, had appeared in the last days of the preceding month. She would tilt over sidewise till she was half sitting, leaning on one hand, then straighten up, raising the hand—and there you are, sitting. The other way, a few days later, was to begin as before on hands and knees, separate the knees, and lift herself over backward till she was sitting, turning the legs out at the knee. No grown person but a contortionist could do it, for our hips have not enough play in the socket to carry the movement through the last inch or two; but babies’ joints are flexible. This became our baby’s regular method, and the position it left her in—legs spread out before her, bent directly out at the knee—was her every-day one for many months. Most babies, I believe, sit monkey fashion—legs straight, with soles turned in.