Thus far the mother has developed the child's capacity of language according to Pestalozzi's method; she has taught it to speak. But now before she carries it farther, she and other members of her family must cultivate this capacity.

The speaking of the child rises by degrees to connected language. The child knows and raises itself to a determined knowledge of the meaning of all that it speaks.

By all that the mother has hitherto done for the child, it is now in a condition to know precisely the objects with which it is surrounded, to observe them singly, to separate them from each other. Its power to observe is perfectly awakened, and in full activity. The circle of its knowledge widens as its world widens; it accompanies its mother wherever her employments call her. It is continually led to know more objects of the surrounding world. The objects themselves stand forth more and more prominently.

It recognizes intelligibly what was hitherto unknown and unseparated, and still lies partly so, and will continue to be more or less so until it consciously surveys a fixed portion of the outward world, and free and independent of that world, can again create and represent it.

To raise the child to this perfectly conscious recognition of the outward world, must hence be the object of its mother's striving. The glorious kingdom of nature now opens by degrees to the child; led by its mother's hand it enters that glorious kingdom. Nature is now its world; the child creates nature from its world.

A hundred little stones, a hundred little plants, flowers, leaves, a hundred little animals, innumerable objects of nature accompany its steps; its heart beats loudly. It finds friends, it carries about and takes care of objects; but it does not know why it is happy, why it carries about and takes care of these objects, why its heart beats so loudly. Should these impressions be allowed to vanish without having been firmly retained?

According to Pestalozzi, the mother now teaches the child to perceive these objects on all sides, to recognize all their qualities, that is, with the help of all their senses; she teaches it to use its observation upon the whole aspect of them, and to give an account of them to others.

The child now holds firm points to which it can fasten its joy,— sound, motion, shape, form, smoothness, etc. It sees the connection of these qualities and a hundred others to qualities partly determinable, or merely supposable; so that the child is now first conscious of its joy.

How happy is the child now whom its mother has made conscious of all these impressions, so that he possesses a firm point by which the outward world stands in contact with him, so that he does not remain in the dark with his heart oppressed with feeling; so that he does not wander in a mist like the traveler who journeys through a pleasing country on a spring morning when nature is partly wrapped in vapor, and shows him the light that gleams through it, promising a delightful

view. As man longingly waits for the dispersion of the mist by the rays of the sun, so that the objects of nature may appear in light and clearness, so the child waits for the guidance of the loving mother who will explain to him the rapture of his heart and show him why he rejoices in anticipation.

What a calling for the mother! She teaches the child to become conscious of his joys, of the objects of his delight; she teaches it how to give an account of all it sees and feels, to express it in words and to share it with others.

The mother thus raises the child into a creature of intelligence and feeling; she teaches him the qualities of objects; she listens to every remark, every discovery, every word of her child; she rejoices when he rejoices; she receives his love and sympathy in her own breast, she reciprocates it and guides it with delight.

he

As the nature of the child receives life and significance thus, so the language which the child, the mother, the father, the family speaks, receives life and significance. Every word becomes an object, an impression, a picture; to every word the child joins a world, a cycle of impressions; goes in his remarks upon the qualities of things, from the easier to the more difficult, from the simple to the complex; he loves to seek and find it all himself; "Dear mother, let me find it myself," he says. Often have I with joy and light-heartedness heard children make this prayer with shining, sparkling eyes!

Later, the mother leads her child to classifying similar things (which it tends to do of itself) and to discriminating between different things; thus the child learns to compare what it sees.

The child besides observing, also imitates. Imitation betters and perfects his observations. The mother not only allows this imitation, she not only rejoices in it, but she aids it.

The child likes above all things to imitate the sound which it has evoked from some inanimate object perhaps, or which it seems to him to produce. It tries to imitate the sound of everything, falling, jumping, breathing, moving. All the objects of nature, animate and inanimate, seem to emit sounds; they speak audibly to him. The mother rejoices in the child's delight when in the spring it imitates the sounds of nature, and she challenges him to do it; she does it unconsciously when her impulse to do it is not disturbed. Who has not seen a poor mother playing with her child or heard her say, "What does the sheep do? What does the dog say, the ox, the bird?" The child's imitations increase; it imitates the twittering of the bird, and thus its own human tone is awakened.

If the mother sings, and accompanies the song of the birds with her human tones, he will imitate this, and thus will not only his feeling be awakened for the highest human expression, song, but his whole being is exalted, from the humming of the bees to the representation of his own feelings by simple, connected and varied human tones.

The outward world is now no longer to the child, guided by Pestalozzi's method, the chaotic, confused, misty mass, which it was earlier. 1. It is now individualized. 2. What is separated it can name. 3. It can seize it at a glance independent of other relations, and according to its relation to himself and to others. 4. It can designate what it observes and all its relations by language; it can speak and knows the meaning of the language of its parents. 5. It knows an object not only on one side but on several sides. 6. It can take an object in at a glance in many relations. 7. It can compare one object with another and recognize the peculiar qualities of each.

Ideas of Number.

The first general quality of objects is their computability. Objects are now individually separated to the child's mind, consequently following each other in time and thus appear computable.

The mother now teaches her child to recognize the computability of objects, and to separate the qualities and relations of computable objects in nature, with real objects before it, and not first by counting in an abstract manner.

By the exercises arranged by Pestalozzi the mother brings to the consciousness of the child something which hitherto was merely an obscure presentiment, scarcely a conscious feeling; she brings the conception of number, the precise knowledge of the qualities and relations of the computable, to his clear, intelligible consciousness.

The mother teaches the child that one stone and again one stone are two stones, etc.

Farther, she teaches him to know the value of numbers by the opposite process, for example, ten nuts less one nut are nine nuts.

Already this little exercise has brought conversation to life between mother and child, when, for example, in the first case, she says to the child, "Lay down two flowers and one flower; how many flowers have you? how many times one flower have you? how many times two flowers have you?" etc.

Or, in the second case, for the solving of numbers, she says to the child, "Put away one of your six beans; now how many have you? how many times one bean have you still?"

The mother goes a step farther; she now lets him add two, three and four; for example: "One stone and two stones are three stones." The child learns by observation that 5 are 5 times 1, are 4 and 1, and 3 and 2.

Or, 1 and 3 are 4, 4 and 3 are 7, 7 and 3 are 10 objects.

The mother then goes backwards over the same ground. For example: if you take 2 from 15, 13 remain.

Questions enliven and elevate conversation between the mother and

child.

The mother may work in the field or in the house; the child sits near

and plays with stones or flowers. The mother asks: "When you put 2 flowers to 1, how many have you?"

All this is play to the child; it handles its favorite objects; it moves them about, and sees a purpose in doing it, for in all its plays the child gives itself a problem. The child is with its mother, so it is happy, and its mind and feelings are awakened.

When the child knows how to count in these different ways, and knows the qualities of numbers thus represented, it will soon find that the pea leaf has 2 times 2 little leaves, and the rose leaf 2 times 3 little leaves. A hint to the mother, and she carries her child still another step in the knowledge of computation. The child has several single objects around it. "Place your little blocks," the mother says, "80 that 2 will lie in every heap. Have you done it? Count how many times 2 you have." The child will count: "I have 2 times 2, 3 times 2, or I have 1 time 2;" or it will say perhaps a little later, "I have 1 two heap; 2 two heaps," etc.

The mother goes farther and says: "Place your things so that 3 or 4 or 5 will lie together, and tell me how many times 3 or 4 or 5, etc., you have." [She selects one of these numbers, of course. We omit many similar exercises in numbers now familiar to kindergartners.]

FORM.

So Pestalozzi would have the mother teach the child form in its play. "Here is a lath-it is straight; here is a branch-it is crooked." The child remarks the laths on the fence, the prongs on the rake; they are at equal distances from each other. His mother tells him they are parallel. The ribs on the leaf of the large plantain unite in a point; they are radiating. The child goes into the woods with its mother; it sees the fir trees and the pines, it is pleased with the variety; and it knows how to describe it. The needles of the fir tree are parallel, those of the pine unite in a point.

The child observes the relations of the branches to the stem. Its mother has taught it to observe angles. The branches and the stems form angles, but these joinings of branch and stem make in one tree quite a different impression upon the child from those in another tree. How delighted it now is to recognize this variety, so that it has a firm point to which it can fasten its impressions. It is the greater or less inclination of the branch to the stem. So in the surroundings in nature, which is its world it recognizes, led by its mother, it sees 3 or 4, or many cornered forms. The intersection of the hemlock twig forms a regular pentagonal (or five corners). The mother leads the child to a regular comparison of this form and to seek its variety.

The child will soon pluck leaves and find other objects in view of their forms, and with childish critical senses will separate them from the objects to which they belong. He will go farther than I venture to describe.

"See, mother, what round leaves I have found," and the child shows

the mother many such leaves, of larger and smaller sizes, which he has picked. "See how little this one is, and how big this one is!" he thus leads himself to the contemplation of size. A hint, a word from the mother, and the child has received a new item of culture.

He selects three leaves, lays them upon each other, and says: "That is the largest leaf, that is smaller, but that is the smallest."

"Mother, look at this long stalk. The stalk of the flax is only half as long," he will perhaps say, if he has learned the meaning of the word half. Or, after the mother has laid the flax upon the corn stalk, he will say, "this is 2 times as long," or perhaps as long again as that one, or he breaks a pear leaf in the middle, lengthwise, and finds both halves equally long; perhaps he cannot describe what he finds and his mother tells him that these two parts of a whole are called halves, and thus widens the circle of his knowledge again.

Pestalozzi wishes to make known intelligibly in small things the attributes of form as well as the recognition of the foundation of its qualities.

The child will lead on the attentive mother and father still farther. The child will soon come to the consideration of large equal objects in comparison with large unequal objects; he will find that a part is smaller than the whole, the whole is larger than a part.

Objects of nature as well as of art will lead the child to this comparison.

Everything in his circle, in his world, will thus become means of information, material for development.

If the child is in its earliest years where the mother is, and rightly guided, it costs but a suggestion from her and it can busy itself many hours.

It accumulates objects, arranges and investigates them; it is quiet and happy.

One will scarcely realize that the child is occupied, and yet the powers of its soul and mind are coming forward and developing themselves by practice.

In this way all the capacities and powers of the child are now developed according to Pestalozzi's method; his senses cultivated, his inner and outer being exalted to true life; he errs no more unconsciously as one enveloped in mist; the way is open for every kind of knowledge, every shade of feeling. Sympathy, that beautiful attribute of man, is possible to him in its whole scope; his language is formed.

With deepest love he hangs upon the glance of his mother, his father -the parents to whom he owes all this joy.

All which has thus far been done by the mother was the object of the Book for Mothers, and suggested by it; at least this is what Pestalozzi wished for as belonging to the calling of the mother.

Pestalozzi wishes that the child shall live in this manner seven happy, delightful years.