for another reason take
care to put all dangerous things effectually out of the child's reach,
instead of saying perpetually, "Take care, don't touch that!--don't do
that!--let that alone!" The child, who scarcely understands the words,
and not at all the reason of these prohibitions, is frightened by the
tone and countenance with which they are uttered and accompanied; and
he either becomes indolent or cunning; either he desists from
exertion, or seizes the moment to divert himself with forbidden
objects, when the watchful eye that guards them is withdrawn. It is in
vain to encompass the restless prisoner with a fortification of
chairs, and to throw him an old almanack to tear to pieces, or an old
pincushion to explore; the enterprising adventurer soon makes his
escape from this barricado, leaves his goods behind him, and presently
is again in what the nurse calls mischief.

Mischief is with nurses frequently only another name for any species
of activity which they find troublesome; the love which children are
supposed to have for pulling things out of their places, is in reality
the desire of seeing things in motion, or of putting things into
different situations. They will like to put the furniture in a room in
its proper place, and to arrange every thing in what we call order, if
we can make these equally permanent sources of active amusement; but
when things are once in their places, the child has nothing more to
do, and the more quickly each chair arrives at its destined situation,
the sooner comes the dreaded state of idleness and quiet.

A nursery, or a room in which young children are to live, should
never have any furniture in it which they can spoil; as few things as
possible should be left within their reach which they are not to
touch, and at the same time they should be provided with the means of
amusing themselves, not with painted or gilt toys, but with pieces of
wood of various shapes and sizes, which they may build up and pull
down, and put in a variety of different forms and positions; balls,
pulleys, wheels, strings, and strong little carts, proportioned to
their age, and to the things which they want to carry in them, should
be their playthings.

Prints will be entertaining to children at a very early age; it would
be endless to enumerate the uses that may be made of them; they teach
accuracy of sight, they engage the attention, and employ the
imagination. In 1777 we saw L----, a child of two ye