Mother, A Reminder of—See [Reminders].
Mother Caution—See [Reasoning Power in Animals].
MOTHER INSTINCT
A cow’s melancholy over the loss of her calf led to a strange incident at the home of Josiah Brown, near Mount Carmel.
Brown owned a cow with a spotted calf which was so peculiarly marked that some time ago, when it was killed for veal, the skin was made into a rug. The mother cow was downcast and bellowed continually.
Mrs. Brown went into her front parlor, and there on the floor lay the cow, placidly licking the calfskin rug. It is supposed the cow approached the house and by chance saw the calfskin through the window, then quietly pushed the doors open and walked in. One barred door had been forced open by the cow’s horns.—Boston Journal.
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MOTHER LOVE
Not long ago a woman fifty years old went to a teacher in School No. 2, and with tears in her eyes, begged permission to sit down with the little ones five to six years old, that she might learn to read and write. She explained that she had two boys in the West, and desired to learn her letters that she might be able to communicate with them. Her daughter had done this for her, but three years ago the daughter died, and now the hungry-hearted mother was willing to make any sacrifice to keep in touch with her sons. So she entered school without telling any one, even her husband. Four weeks from the day she entered she was able to read through the primer, first reader, and almost through the second. Now she can write so any one can easily read every word. She learns ten new words at home every day, and always knows her lesson perfectly. She has learned to begin and end a letter, and it will not be long before she can write a love-letter—a genuine mother love-letter—to her boys. Through the goodness of my friend, I have in my possession a yellow sheet of paper containing one of her writing exercises. Reading between the lines, there is something inexpressibly touching about it. The words are such as may be found in the copy-book of any schoolboy, but the mother, with her hard hands and tender heart, as she copied the words imagined herself writing a letter to one of her sons. After writing her address and the date, this imaginary epistle, brimming with a real love, reads: “My dear son Hugh:
Be the matter what it may,