EXPORE INFANTIUM.

Press, Volume LXVII, Issue 20280, 4 July 1931, Page 13

EXPORE INFANTIUM.

[By "Stct" in the "Week-end Ecviewv'J I will not affect to be, comprehensively anijl full-time, a lover of children. In regard to some children all the while, and in regard to a good many at whiles, I echo Charles Lamb's cry, 'Good King Herod!" (I hope it was ILamb/s, but at any rate it was human, and certainly it has been mine.) Not being a social reformer, being on the contrary a reasonably considerate man anxious that His Brightness and His Darkness should be spared the boredom of finding all souls entering gal vation or damnation by, in each instance, tho one road, I do not much want to regulate anything. But children, there J. make an. exception. * * They should, J. think, bo subjected to these, among other, regulations: (a) they should not be begotten; (b) they should be born threo years old; (c) between the ages of nine and nineteen they should bo hidden away, not in an educational establishment lest they write novels of school-life; (d) they should never be brought to table with their elders, but should bo abundantly supplied with jam in the nursery independently of their conduct; (o) in contradiction of that riionstrous maxim about their being seen and not heard, they should be obscene and heard; (f) in special instances, they should bo adored, with intervals for spanking; (g) in special instances, they should be massacred; (h) they should, unless unbegotlen or massacred, always be educated on the Marryat system. * *• Were this an educated nation instead of only one that spends enormous sums on education, all would know the great system of the good Captain Marryat, who did more than write those more than merely hearty novels of naVal life, lie was not a doctrinaire: he did not, like Mary Shelley's father, enunciate great theories of education and then, with reference to his own family, say loftily that he "had not leisure to reduce his theories to practice." Marryat was practical. And this was his practice.

Once a week, in true quarter-duck style, he paraded his children and their governess. Ho then presented substantial rewardß to the children who were reported to have behaved well, substantial consolation prizes to the children who had to bo reprimanded for behaving ill, a substantial bribe to the protesting governess. Ho reduced his theories to practice, and bo could .1, Perhaps not all my theories, but some. Placed in charge of a kindergarten, 1 should probably simplify my problem by the swift application of regulations (d) or jam, (f) or adoration, and (g), or massacre. But, to be plain, I think I should do best in charge of a kindergarten that emptied generations ago, and the jam and adoration sections of which survive only in literature. For you can shut up a book. * * And so I am conic to the lato Lord Birkenhead's anthology of letters, the two most delightful items in which are letters by children. May be that "The 500 Best English Letters" (Cassell, 8s Od) does not quito' live up to its title; five pages for Charles Lamb and three for Edward FitzGerald are surely inadequate in a volume of over 900 pages, for are not they the most continuously delightful correspondents we have had? Also, is it fair to include letters which are letters only in form, "Letters to the Editor," letters like Andrew Lang's to an imaginary young man who proposed setting up as a journalist? But on the whole Lord Birkenhead's choice was judicious and independent; and, for capital morit, ha included those two masterpieces by children, Marjorie Fleming's and Nannie Fox's. * * When 1 see anything of Marjorie Fleming's, X 'am entitled to talk of "second impressions": for very many years I have known and valued pretty well all that is to be known about the eight years' life ■ of that enchanting little creature, worthy to be as she was the darling of Sir Walter Scott. But Nannie Fox is to mo utterly novel: My Dear Mama,—l am very sorry for touching that stinking little cat. I'll try to-morrow and Tuesday if 1 can do as happy and well without touching Dawny. I had once before my birthday a little holiness in my heart and for two days I was trying to keep it* in and I exceed a little in it but alas one day Satan tempted me and one day I kept it out of my heart and then I did not care what I did and I ware very bold. One day the week after that I tried without touching Dawny and I thought myself every bit as much "happy but. I was tempted tempted tempted another day: but I hope to-m&rrow morning I may be good Mama and that there will bo one day that I may pleaso Mama. Thus Nannie Foir, at tho a.ge of seven. * * As for Marjorie Fleming, that wonderful child'of five began tho letter selected for this anthology in what Keats would have called "stationing" words: "My dear Isa, I now sit down on my botom to answer all your kind and beloved letters," and concluded with the great protest: "This horrid fat Simpleton says that my Aunt is beautiful which is entirely impossible for that is not her nature." "Where children should be, if allowed to be at all, I have already proclaimed.A general rule, with exceptions. Would you very much "nind if I invited Marjorie to sit down on her "botom" on that chair and Nannio to bring in her "stinking little cat?" Heaven knows, I do not want to upset whatever order obtains at these Barmecidal feasts; and I will not provide imaginary dessert, in war against wine, for the children or the adults. But, Nannie, new to me, and Marjorie, loved of old, they shall be bidden to the table. * - A little milk for the cat. partly because it was so prettily called Dawny but chiefly because Nannie touched it; a cushion for Marjorie; and though am not beautiful, which is entirely impossible for that is not my nature, fo» me the friendship of these two children, pledged in whatever liquid may be at once beloved by tho very young and potable by a man, somewhat fastidious in this matter, who is only a few weeks off fifty. To Marjorie, to Nannie, to Dawny, and even to the fat; Simpleton (I do not but do not much mind your meaning, myseli).

The Prague daily "Lidore Noring" has announced the result of a straw vote to determine the books of 1930 which have given the most pleasure to Czechoslovak readers. As always, French books are in the lead. The most popular books on the list were Georges Duhamel's much abused "Scenes de ta Vie Future," the memoirs of Clemenceau, Andr6 Maurois' "Disraeli," and Louig Bertrand's "La Vie do Rt. Augustine."