Charities for Children in San Francisco [pp. 78-101]

Chiarities for Children in San Francisco.
be spoken of here. This function seems
to me, after a somewhat careful reading
of what kindergartners themselves say
on the subject, to'be twofold. In the
first place, between the ages of two and
six the child of squalor or vice has for
four hours a day the experience of cleanliness, innocent' amusements, gentle
manners, decent speech, and pleasure in
occupation. He must know forever after
that such things exist. He experiences
them before sentiments of antagonism
toward the more fortunate and their
ways have taken root in his mind, and
before any real love for vicious pleasures
can have gotten hold upon him. He
must have some dim conception that
something of all this is attainable by
himself, and if there are any seeds of aspiration and courage in him, they get an
impulse toward growth, and a hint of
possible direction for growth that may
be very potent. Moreover, the training
undoubtedly makes easier the.learning
of a handicraft later, if the child should
have opportunity.
On the other hand, the influence of
the street stands'steadily against that of
the kindergarten, and has the majority of
the child's day, even during the few kin dergarten years. In reading the reports
one is forced to think that the evil is
flowing into the little lives by a strong
and continuous current, and being drawn
out by very small driblets; that the Devil
(having the advantage, to begin with,
of their inheritance of vitiated desires,)
must be building faster than the kinder gartens can pull down. It seems a wo.
fully bad economy to leave these children
in their evil surroundings, and try to do
much with them there; and there have
not been wanting, in other parts of the
world, suggestions to the effect that the
children should be once for all taken
away. Here are sample quotations from
the teachers' reports. One child is
very erratic in his attendance at the kindergarten,
as his father and mother are both confirmed drunk ards, and take turns, as G expresses it, in being
"took up." When they are both in the lock-up the
saloon-keepers take care of him, and so satisfy their
consciences.
One little three-year-old positively refuses to go
home to lunch, and will not go home at night unless
absolutely driven home; but I can scarcely blame
her. The place she lives in is not worthy the name,
of home. It is nothing but a saloon of the worst
stamp.
Dear Mrs. Cooper, what am I to do about M,
the little boy, you know, whose mother has "gone up
for six months," as he told me? His clothes are just
dropping off him. The children don't like to stand
beside him, because he is not clean....Mmother has returned; she thanked us for our kind
attention to her boy while she was away... Poor
little M- told us this morning that his mother
had gone off again. When we asked where, he said,
" 0, with two policemen, you know, to the same
place; and my papa says she will be gone a long
tinme."
Yet, of course, there are many things
that stand in the way of any such sweeping interference as one might be tempted
to wish in removing children once for all
from bad surroundings. Not to raise at
all the question of how far the inherent
right of parents to keep their children
may conflict with the right of children
to be decently kept, it seems well enough
shown that a general sense among the
degraded, that children will be taken off
their hands if they neglect them enough,
will lead to boundless increase of ne glect. And there is no more significant
point in Mrs. Cooper's reports, than the
statement that the value placed on the
children by the kindergartens seems to
arouse in the parents the new idea that
they are of some value. It is safe to say
only this much: that the kindergartens
and the Society for Prevention of Cru elty to Children, the aid societies and
asylums, ought to be in the closest co operation, so that in those extreme cases
where society does already think it best
to remove a child from its surroundings,
this might be promptly and thoroughly
done. It would probably be necessary
always that the kindergartner should be
kept out of the fight in the courts, and
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[Jan.