OUR BABIES

Evening Post, Volume LXXIX, Issue 77, 2 April 1910, Page 15

OUR BABIES

(By Hyjjeia.) Published under the auspice* of the Society for the Promotion «t the Health of Women and' Children. "It is wiser to put up a fence it the top o( a precipioe than to maintain an ambulance at the bottom." ADDRESS OF PLUNKET NURSE AND SECRETARY. .Wellington— Plunket Nurse M'Donald, 73, Aro-street. Tel. 2425. Hon. sec., Mm. arViear, 45« Majoribankb-street, City. Tel. 2M2. Plunket Nurses lerrices free. HEALTH OF WOMEN ANI CHILDREN. The following ia a continuation of the president' i address at the second annual conference of the Society for tho Promotion of the Health of Women and Children:— OUR WORK. Speaking as a woman I feel very strongly that our views and work should be taken more eeriouely, and treated with more sympathy and lees of expressed mugivmg by tha Chief Health Officer for the Dominion. Fortunately this view has not been, taken by the leading local health authorities, and it would be difficult to over-estimate the encouragement and practical help we have received .in this direction, especially at Auckland and Christchurch. However, I cannot see why the practical health mission which Ye are carrying out by means of the committees and Plunket nurses ehdttld bo held by the Health Department, of all others, to bo unworthy to receive a penny of Government support, seeing that tho work is in it» very nature that best calculated to overcome popular ignorance and promote public health. _ With a struggle we could perhaps do without any Government help — if need be we will do without it — but it seems hardly fair that we women should be denied some shareof the assistance for our Plunket nurses which t« so freely offered— l w«8 going to say pushed — in connection with the establishment and support of dirtriot nurses. We appreciate, and are glad to acknowledge, the handsome support given by Government to the Karitane Hospital, and the meHom of »id which has been granted so far towards maintaining the Plunket nurses, but we feel that ttie continuance of such assistance is precarious. EDUCATION OF GIRLS. i feel very strongly that nearly all modern schemes of education — I am not •peaking specially of New Zealand — take far too littla account of the fact that our physical, intellectual, moral, and emotion*! natures and our practical needs in hie differ fundamentally, and must always differ, from those of men so long as we remain truly women. It should be frankly recognised in schools that the natural outlook in life of every girl is marriage, instead of making tho natural outlook throughout girlhood teem to bo the pawing of examinations with a \iew to living in an offioo ot by torching. The stress to which girls subject themselves, and are encouraged to subject themselves, at the most important epoch of their growth and development, from the point of view of womanhood ana motherhood, not only in connection with schools, but also in conneotion with music and other such eompcititions, is suicidal — race suicidal in the extreme — and altogether narrow and unpatriotic. The unnecessary stress of education and neglect of feet, normal^ recreation, and physique, is bad enough with hoys, but it is far more serious in the ca«o of girls. Tho healthy boy does not, as a rule, take school life half so seriously «s the budding girl. Give a boy too much to do, and he tends at least not to do it — that it his natural safety-valve, though it often fail* him; but the girl, more conscientious and more serious in her outlook ou lile, tends to abandon every other consideration to ♦ho carrying out of what is expwsted of her, especially if the tatk be sat by a master. CRAMMING. Wo aro told that there is no cramming now. Then let me read a few pathetic lines from a letter written only last week to my husband by a public school boy, who is quite unknown to him. This is only ono of several cases which havo been brought under his notice since the New Year. "I am sure that some foolish blunder brought mo down in_ , as I took a good position in the class. Now, I should like to work with a coach much better, for he could give mo undivided attention, and the hours would not bo so long. The following is a programme of our work here, tho extra hour of prep, having just been added.' 1 (This I take to be the natural result of tho raising of the matriculation standard decided on at the recent meeting of tho University Senate. I do not give tho programme, as I do not wish to identify tho school.) "Now, I find tho three hours' work at night too much; in fact, last year wo worked till 11 at night for six weeks before the exam. I cannot work for so long at night, and think wo get far too much work Please do not think that I shirk it, for I am in deadly earnestness about my exam. It is not my place, I know, to say anything about my masters, but 1 tee! 1 could do much bettor doing 3s I have suggested. . . Individual attention on my weak subjects is what I need, and being in earnest I am •uru 1 could do far bettor at home. . . A hard day of over 12 hours cannot keep the brain clear." Again, -let me read this extract from a recent letter about v brilliant and accomplished niece of my own, who is in the final year foi her M.A. degree at a Home university :—"B: — "B has been laid up with brain-fag. It is only two months since tho session openod, and I am sorry her stay in Franco has not fortified her for the \yinitr's work." I may aay that her stay in Trance had, for the most part, been occupied in attending lectures, and in teaching, etc. But, apart from imperfect physical development and damaged health, there is a special reason why girls should not have all attention focussed on the intellect and_ examinations — it les&ons their interest in motherhood, and often gives them a positive distaste for natural ties. I have myself noticed this very markedly in some of tho overstrained products of our system of forcing (I cannot call it education). I bolicvf- in any true nnd genuine system of higher education for women, but not in merely burdening tho mind with useless material which no ono ever thinks of retaining- when once tho examination is passed. I have noticed that our hothouse products arc inclined to show scent interest in babies nnd little children, and that little children with their quick intuition notice the absence of regard and reciprocate it.