Children's Ways

aciousness, by the friendly impulse they disclose to get mentally near us, to enter into the full fruition of human intercourse. The difficulties, too, which we manage to lay

downright earnest when he trie

ths which precedes true speech. For the same reason I shall have to pass by the interesting beginnings of sign-making, and shall only just touch the first stages

, all mothers know. When, for example, a child expects you to translate his sound "koppa" into "Tommy," or "pots" into "hippopotamus," it will be acknowledged that he is making heavy demands. Yet though he causes

mer of

o do when trying to use verbal sounds with their right meanings. Here, too, we shall find that huge difficulties beset his p

touched on above (p. 3); and many other examples might be given. Thus when one child first saw a star and wanted to name it he called it, as if by a poetic metaphor, an "eye". In like manner the name "pin" was extended by another child to a crumb just picked up, a fly, and a caterpillar, and seemed to me

chologist calls association. This is illustrated by the case of Darwin's grandchild, who after learning to use the common children's name for duck, "quack," proceeded to call a sheet of water "quack"

tion to express what may be called the inverted relation. For example, like the unschooled yokel they will sometimes make the word "learn" do duty for "teach" also. In one case "spend" was mad

of familiar ones. One child, for example, possessing the word steam-ship and wanting the name sailing-ship, cleverly hit upon the composite form "wind-ship". One little girl, when only a year and nine months old, showed quite a passion for classing objec

r little boy dubbed a teacher the "lessoner". Two children invented the quaint substantive "thinks" for "thoughts," and another child used the form "digs" for holes dug in the ground. Other droll inventions occur, as when one small person asked to

rson or thing from another of the same kind. Thus a German professor tells us that his grand-niece introduced her

. They are sometimes misled by false analogies into the formation of such c

tence-b

wishes by single vocables, such as "mamma," "milk," "puss," "up," and so forth. Each of these words serves in the first baby language for a variety of sentences. Thus "Puss!" means sometimes "Pu

s of the simplest, two words being placed one after the other, in what is called appo

this rude fashion without any aid from those valuable auxiliaries, prepositions, and the like. For example, one boy when in his t

baby 'pecs," meaning in our language, "Baby pulls (or will pull) out the spectacles". Sometimes the order reminds us still mo

express his approval of something, say a dog, to use the form, "This a nice bow-wow, not nasty bow-bow". Similarly a little girl

wont to violate the rules of grammar when using verbs, as in saying "eated" for "ate," "scram" for "screamed,"

y "you" his own person, which is, of course, called "you" by others when addressing him. The forms "I," "me" and "my" are apt to be hopelessly mixed up, as in saying "me go" and "my go" for "I go," "me book" for "my book," and so forth. One l

g told by his sick mother that he had not said something she wished him to say, answered, "I said it, but you didn't hear, you are poorly, and so blind in the ear". Quite pretty metaphors are sometimes hit upon, as when a little boy of two seeing his father putting a piece of wood on the fire said, "Flame going to eat it". A boy of twenty-seven months ingeniously said,

rpreter

e which deserves especial notice, viz., the puzzling ou

of the good Samaritan to mean that a gentleman came and poured some paraffin (i.e., oil) over the poor man. By a child's mind what we call accidentals often get taken to be the real meaning. A boy and a girl, twins, had been dressed

n were "half price" at a certain show, wanted his mother to get a baby now that they were cheap. Many another child besides Jean Ingelow has been saddened at being told by her father or other grown-up who was dancing her on his knee that he must put her down as he "had a bone in his leg

rwards proceeded to call his father "fat" when he saw him taking his bath. "Fat" had by a natural misconception taken on the meaning of "naked". It was a simple movement of childish thought when a little school-girl answered the qu

evenson's last story naturally enough said in speaking of his father, the "hanging judge," "It were better for that man if a milestone were bound about his neck". Similarly they will invert the relat

came and sh

im nasty p

doctor come and shook my head?" It was so much more natural to suppose that when t

h she had been suffering for some time. He thereupon exclaimed, "I don't think it's new ralgia, I call it old ralgia". Was this playful punning or a half-serious attempt to correct a misstatement? A child called his doll "Shakespeare" because its spear-like legs could be sh

and the comical errors he will now and again fall into in exercising his corrective function, are well known to parents. Sometimes he shows himself the most absurd of pedants. "Shall I read to you out of this book, baby?" asked a mother of her boy, about two and a half years old. "No," replied the infant, "not out of dot book, but somepy inside of it." The same little