CHAPTER XX.
CHILDREN AS BURDEN-BEARERS.
Those of us who are mothers would do well to read carefully and ponder deeply St.Paul's assertion that when he was a child he spoke as a child, and felt as a child, and thought as a child; and that when he was a man, and not until then, he put away childish things.
Can the same be said of the child of to-day?
In this "bit of talk," I want to enter my protest against thrusting upon children the care-taking thought that should not be theirs for years to come.

When the responsibility that is inseparable from every life bears heavily upon us, we sigh for the carefree days of childhood, but we do not hesitate to inflict upon our babies the complaints and moans which teach them, all too soon, that life is a hard school for us.

A child must either grieve with us or become so inured to our plaints that he pays no attention to them.

In the latter case he may be hard-hearted but he is certainly happier than if he were exquisitely sensitive.
"What a pretty suit of clothes you have!" said I to a four-year-old boy.
The momentary expression of pride gave way to one of anxiety.
"Yes; but mamma says when these wear out she does not know how papa will ever buy me any more clothes.

I am a great expense! Oh!" with a long-drawn sigh of wretchedness, "isn't it _awful_ to be poor ?" The poverty-stricken father was at this time managing to dress himself, wife and baby on an income of four thousand dollars per annum.