ever enjoyed before, and this is largely due to the outdoor life which they lead. In games such as croquet, golf, and lawn-tennis, they can hold their own with boys of the same age. Even cricket is getting to be more widely played, but until some modification of the skirt is arrived at it is a game in which a woman must always be at a disadvantage. The playing of games has not unsexed our girls, nor injured their health, as was prophesied when they first adopted open-air sports and athletics once the monopoly of their brothers.
As the intellectual side of girls’ lives has become more developed, the more homely and wifely occupations of their mothers and grandmothers have lost favor, and needlework and the domestic interests of life have taken a back place. It was inevitable that such should be the case, but it is in many ways unfortunate that these occupations have fallen into desuetude. Few of the girls I speak of can cook a chop, make an omelet, darn a stocking, put on a patch, or make a buttonhole. Perhaps in time housewifery may become part of their curriculum, as it is now in our elementary education scheme. A good knowledge of housekeeping, of the management of servants, of the keeping of accounts, and of cooking goes a long way to secure domestic happiness.
I think in England we are satisfied that, with certain limitations, our system of education for the classes of which I write is laid on fairly good lines. We have certainly uprooted and changed the whole scheme of education which existed, but the new one has the merit of developing the individuality of each child, of teaching it self-reliance and courage. It does not in any way cramp or confine the bent of its inclination or study, but it brings out, we hope and believe, what is best and strongest in its character.
The system on which the early education of children is carried out varies in every country, and that in England can compare in this respect with those of France, Germany, and America. The character, temperament, and mode of life differ so absolutely that the point of view from which we regard the question must vary also. The English working-class family has never had any of the experience of the outdoor family life of the French; our cold uncertain climate has made it impossible, and the pretty pictures one sees in Paris of a family group, consisting often of grandparents, parents, and children, are unknown with us. What is true of our working-classes, is even more distantly characteristic of our higher classes. The love of family and children is not one bit less deep in England, but we are a reserved, undemonstrative race. It may be our insular arrogance which has always caused us to regard the open, demonstrative affection of foreigners to their children, as sentimental, that has made us err in the opposite direction. Every English mother knows, however, the pang with which she leaves the school at which she has deposited her beloved boy for the first time, and the effort it costs her to say good-by to him without letting her tears mingle with those that are so nearly gushing from his eyes—but it is not “good form,” in boyish parlance, to cry, and the mother has to live up to the standard of self-control of the little hero of perhaps seven or eight years of age.
The separation during these early years certainly intensifies the affection of boys for their mother, and the holidays are a bright spot in the year. There is always, I think, a shade of fear of his father in a boy’s heart, even of the most indulgent—but time dispels that, and though there may be a sort of feeling that “the governor is a little out of date” when he vetoes some of the youthful suggestions during the holidays—the feeling of friendship and equality grows as time goes on, and there are no truer or stancher friends than an English father and his son.
The effect of education and life in England has no doubt helped to diminish parental control and strengthen the independence of the young, but the love and reverence of children still remains, though they undoubtedly regard their parents from a much nearer and more familiar standpoint. It is impossible with our English system of education that it could be otherwise. Children are our equals; they criticize, discuss, and analyze us, and if we survive that ordeal—and it is a severe one—we should feel thankful that, if the awe and fear of the past has disappeared, the new order of things has not diminished their deep love and affection.
