Methods exemplified.

One of the simplest and easiest modes by which a mother can avail herself of the vivid imagination of the child in amusing and entertaining him, is by holding conversations with representations of persons, or even of animals, in the pictures which she shows him.  Thus, in the case, for example, of a picture which she is showing to her child sitting in her lap—­the picture containing, we will suppose, a representation of a little girl with books under her arm—­she may say,

“My little girl, where are you going?—­I am going” (speaking now in a somewhat altered voice, to represent the voice of the little girl) “to school.—­Ah! you are going to school.  You don’t look quite old enough to go to school.  Who sits next to you at school?—­George Williams.—­George Williams?  Is he a good boy?—­Yes, he’s a very good boy.—­I am glad you have a good boy, and one that is kind to you, to sit by you.  That must be very pleasant.”  And so on, as long as the child is interested in listening.

Or, “What is your name, my little girl?—­My name is Lucy.—­That’s a pretty name!  And where do you live?—­I live in that house under the trees.—­Ah!  I see the house.  And where is your room in that house?—­My room is the one where you see the window open.—­I see it.  What have you got in your room?—­I have a bed, and a table by the window; and I keep my doll there.  I have got a cradle for my doll, and a little trunk to keep her clothes in.  And I have got—­” The mother may go on in this way, and describe a great number and variety of objects in the room, such as are calculated to interest and please the little listener.

It is the pleasurable exercise of some dawning faculty or faculties acting through embryo organs of the brain, by which the mind can picture to itself, more or less vividly, unreal scenes, which is the source of the enjoyment in such cases as this.

A child may be still more interested, perhaps, by imaginary conversations of this kind with pictures of animals, and by varying the form of them in such a way as to call a new set of mental faculties into play; as, for example,

“Here is a picture of a squirrel.  I’ll ask him where he lives.  ’Bunny! bunny! stop a minute; I want to speak to you.  I want you to tell me where you live.—­I live in my hole.—­Where is your hole?—­It is under that big log that you see back in the woods.’  Yes” (speaking now to the child), “I see the log.  Do you see it?  Touch it with your finger.  Yes, that must be it.  But I don’t see any hole.  ‘Bunny’ (assuming now the tone of speaking again to the squirrel), ’I don’t see your hole.—­No, I did not mean that any body should see it.  I made it in a hidden place in the ground, so as to have it out of sight.—­I wish I could see it, and I wish more that I could look down into it and see what is there.  What is there in your hole, bunny?—­My nest is there, and my little bunnies.—­How many little bunnies have you got?’”—­And so on, to any extent that you desire.