XXII.
OCTOBER.
WELL, I had my own way, and I am afraid it has been an unwise one, for though I have enjoyed the leisure afforded by everybody being out of town, and the opportunity it has given me to devote myself to the very sweetest work on earth, the care of my darling little ones, the heat and the stifling atmosphere have been trying for me and for them.My pretty Rose went last May, to bloom in a home of her own, so I thought I would not look for a nurse, but take the whole care of them myself.This would not be much of a task to a strong person, but I am not strong, and a great deal of the time just dressing them and taking them out to walk has exhausted me.Then all the mending and other sewing must be done, and with the over-exertion creeps in the fretful tone, the impatient word.Yet I never can be as impatient with little children as I should be but for the remembrance that Ishould count it only a joy to minister once more to my darling boy, cost what weariness it might.
But now new cares are at hand, and I have been searching for a person to whom I can safely trust my children when I am laid aside.Thus far I have had, in this capacity, three different Temptations in human form.
The first, a smart, tidy-looking woman, informed me at the outset that she was perfectly competent to take the whole charge of the children, and should prefer my attending to my own affairs while she attended to hers.
I replied that my affairs lay chiefly in caring for and being with my children; to which she returned that she feared I should not suit her, as she had her own views concerning the training of children.
She added, with condescension, that at all events she should expect in any case of difference (of judgment)between us, that I, being the younger and least experienced of the two, should always yield to her.
She then went on to give me her views on the subject of nursery management.
"In the first place," she said, "I never pet or fondle children.It makes them babyish and sickly.""Oh, I see you will not suit me," I cried."You need go no farther.Iconsider love the best educator for a little child.""Indeed, I think I shall suit you perfectly," she replied, nothing daunted."I have been in the business twenty years, and have always suited wherever I lived.You will be surprised to see how much sewing I shall accomplish, and how quiet I shall keep the children.""But I don't want them kept quiet," I persisted."I want them to be as merry and cheerful as crickets, and I care a great deal more to have them amused than to have the sewing done, though that is important, I confess.""Very well, ma'am, I will sit and rock them by the hour if you wish it.""But I don't wish it," I cried, exasperated at the coolness which gave her such an advantage over me."Let us say no more about it; you do not suit me, and the sooner we part the better.I must be mistress of my own house, and I want no advice in relation to my children.""I shall hardly leave you before you will regret parting with me,"she returned, in a placid, pitying, way.
I was afraid I had not been quite dignified in my interview with this person, with whom I ought to have had no discussion, and my equanimity was not restored by her shaking hands with me a patronizing way at parting, and expressing the hope that I should one day "be a green tree in the Paradise of God." Nor was it any too great a consolation to find that she had suggested to my cook that my intellect was not quite sound.
Temptation the second confessed that she knew nothing, but was willing to be taught.Yes, she might be willing, but she could not be taught.She could not see why Herbert should not have everything he chose to cry for, nor why she should not take the children to the kitchens where her friends abode, instead of keeping them out in the air.She could not understand why she must not tell Una every half hour that she was as fair as a lily, and that the little angels in heaven cried for such hair as hers.And there was no rhyme or reason, to her mind, why she could not have her friends visit in her nursery, since, as she declared, the cook would hear all her secrets if she received them in the kitchen.Her assurance that she thought me a very nice lady, and that there never were two such children as mine, failed to move my hard heart, and I was thankful when I got her out of the house.
Temptation the third appeared, for a time, the perfection of a nurse.
She kept herself and the nursery and the children in most refreshing order; she amused Una when she was more than usually unwell with a perfect fund of innocent stories; the work flew from her nimble fingers as if by magic.I boasted everywhere of my good luck, and sang her praises in Ernest's ears till he believed in her with all his heart.But one night we were out late; we had been spending the evening at Aunty's, and came in with Ernest's night-key as quietly as possible, in order not to arouse the children.I stole softly to the nursery to see if all was going on well there.Bridget, it seems, had taken the opportunity to wash her clothes in the nursery, and they hung all about the room drying, a hot fire raging for the purpose.In the midst of them, with a candle and prayer-book on a chair, Bridget knelt fast asleep, the candle within an inch of her sleeve.Her assurance when I aroused her that she was not asleep, but merely rapt in devotion, did not soften my hard heart, nor was I moved by the representation that she was a saint, and always wore black on that account.I packed her off in anything but a saintly frame, and felt that a fourth Temptation would scatter what little grace I possessed to the four winds.These changes upstairs made discord; too, below.
My cook was displeased at so much coming and going, and made the kitchen a sort of a purgatory which I dreaded to enter.At last, when her temper fairly ran away with her, and she became impertinent to the last degree, I said, coolly:
