The Colored Girl Beautiful Part 10

Colored children have been left alone too much.

How many of them have a children's hour? How many have been given something to think about? How many spend their spare moments in reading? How many can recite poems or give quotations from the master writers?

The mothers themselves must put some time in exerting their minds in reading and thinking with a view towards mentally improving the next generation. They must observe and note what is pa.s.sing on in the great world. History is being made every day. How can the child resist the desires of the lower nature when its mother has tantrums? The colored mother must refuse to express pa.s.sion. A mother can not shame or beat her child into gentle manners when she is rough or coa.r.s.e.

How can the child be careful and controlled in speech if the mother has not the power of expressing herself in good English. Language is too powerful a weapon in reaching, compelling and swaying the feelings of others and in winning friends--to be neglected.

Children always betray home training. If they have not been trained properly as they are not adepts in dissembling and they reflect their mothers in all their thought, speech and actions.

The mother who is strict in her own conduct and who pays careful attention to the home conduct of her children will seldom be ashamed of their deportment. Good habits may not be a.s.sumed at a moment's notice.

The good breeding of parents is very truly reflected in the manners of their children.

It is sad to have the children learn the laws of politeness and good breeding outside the home, and to watch them a.s.sume that which should be innate.

It is sad to hear little children lie about their home training pretending that "My mother makes me do this or that" when they know that the mother has failed to make a strong point of this particular fault.

It is sadder still to hear colored children say, "I can't." The colored mother should put success in the child's thought and teach it to believe in himself and his race. It is the duty of every mother to preach success and one's duty to aim to excel along all lines.

How can the child be clean and love cleanliness when its mother is habitually untidy and slovenly? The colored mother beautiful would no more exhibit herself unclean than naked. She would no more walk slovenly than to dress slovenly. If a mother wears unclean clothes, has unclean thoughts or unclean manners, her children will reflect her.

How can a child hold her head up and her back straight when her mother slouches around and forgets that her body belongs to G.o.d as well as her soul.

The colored mother beautiful makes a point of teaching her child to be true and helpful to the race, and to speak up for the good points and keep silent about the weaknesses when before other races. Every race has strong and weak points.

She should take part in efforts for the advancement of the race. No one can lift the race unless he stays in it. A child should be taught not to depreciate the race any more than it would itself.

No one is so big and strong that he can exist alone. All of us are dependent to a degree. Each one will need friends. There are no friends which mean so much to us as those of our own race.

The percentage of physical deformities in colored children is lessening.

Colored mothers are learning to study children's faces and bodies in order to change and correct their physical defects. Bowed and weak legs, outstanding ears, misshapen mouths, noses and teeth are being corrected according to scientific rules. Then, too, they are training children to do things to improve their own physical defects without--of course--causing them to be over conscious.

The colored mother beautiful is the health officer of the race as well as her own posterity. It is her duty to see to it that her children have clean bodies inside and outside. She will see to it that in her neighborhood there will be more regard for health, drainage, and other sanitary conditions. She will pursue the deadly fly and cause this pest and all vermin to be eradicated.

She will study up on the kinds and amounts of food to give children that they may not be fed the coa.r.s.e, greasy food which coa.r.s.ens the instinct, or may make them gluttonous, which will abuse the stomach and cause unnatural heat that may wreck them morally. Instead, she advocates the light brain forming food to lift them above the dominant animal tendencies.

She controls the child's play which is so necessary to health and which at the present day aims for educational results.

A colored girl's estimate and idea of colored womanhood comes from her mother.

The colored mother beautiful will not give the best to strangers in preference to home folks, nor will she expect her daughter to receive politeness from other boys and men when her brothers and men in the house keep their hats on, smoke and talk in loud disrespectful tones before her.

A colored mother will teach her daughter to command respect from all boys and men and not to capitulate in any way. To do this she will teach her daughter that she must conquer or control her lower nature and not permit privileges with her body or her given name. Her conduct at home and on the street must also command this. Her daughter will no more use the Lord's name in exclamation than any other profanity. She must be taught not to hang out or talk outside of the windows.

She must be taught that she is never to stand and talk to men on the street, also that she must not continue a conversation with a man or boy who shows he has no respect for her. She will demand a respectful att.i.tude if she is a good girl or else she should excuse herself from further conversation and a.s.sociation.

The daughter of the colored woman beautiful will be taught to expect boys and men to tip their hats in meeting and parting, and she will not encourage them to sit in her presence if she stands unless they are her elders, superiors, or invalids. If necessary she will exaggerate the importance of these seemingly small courtesies to impress them upon other younger and less thoughtful girls.

Such a daughter will be taught to count for something besides clothes and looks. She will pa.s.s an intemperate or immoral man as she would something polluted, for both are irresponsible and she may suffer from even a moment's contact.

This daughter must be taught not to marry for support or for money. That is selfish and cowardly. Love should be the basis of marriage because after the honeymoon is past there are responsibilities, troubles, sorrows and self-sacrifice which need the stimulation of the "Love light."

The daughter of the colored woman beautiful will aim to marry a man mentally and physically fit to be the father of her children. An immoral, vile-tongued, untruthful or diseased father is a curse to his race. It is her duty and aim to improve racial stock.

This daughter will study the ethics of the period of engagement and will not abuse or destroy the mysterious charm which belongs alone to the early period of wife-hood.

A girl should be taught the duties of married life; to fulfil the beautiful aim of motherhood should be her ambition and her daily prayer.

Boys, also, get their estimate of colored womanhood from their mothers.

A whipping, striking, scolding, threatening, "shut-up" mother presents him a wrong view point of real motherhood.

The colored mother beautiful will teach her son to respect colored womanhood and to show this respect in every word and action. He is not supposed to know the "wheat from the tare." To any woman in all the small courtesies of life he will reflect his mother's home training. He will be taught to look up to, and to show special respect and reverence for the great women and men of the race.

Even in the way he puts on or takes off his hat he reflects his mother.

If a colored boy is expected to tip his hat to any woman, he should tip it to the women of his mother's race.

If it is expected that he should stand erect before any woman, he should before the women of his mother's race. Off will go his hat, if even asked a question. His voice, his eyes, his backbone, his heels, all reflect his mother and her training. In spite of protest he will never sit if a woman is standing unless he is ill or a cripple. Especially does he exhibit the mother training he has received from his manner in his actions to colored women.

If he is expected to speak respectfully to any woman he should to the women of his mother's race.

If he works faithfully for any woman who employs him he should work faithfully for a woman of his mother's race.

When he marries he should select a woman of his mother's race--a Colored Woman. His mother will teach him that a good wife is about the best thing in the world.

He will be taught to support and trust his wife as he did his mother and never doubt her until he has positive proof that she is unworthy.

He will never publicly put another woman before his wife if he lives with her. As long as a wife bears his name and stays under his roof she is ent.i.tled to the respect that her t.i.tle is supposed to carry. He would never go about complaining of his wife for that is small and cowardly.

He will tip his hat as gallantly to his wife as to another woman and kiss her with uncovered head to show his respect to the woman he has chosen to bear his name.

The son of the colored mother beautiful will not smoke in the presence of his wife or friends unless he is sure it is un.o.bjectionable and he should regard this as a privilege rather than a masculine right. He will be taught to wear his coat at table and regard it also as a privilege if he appears otherwise. He will be taught that it is unmanly to tattle and gossip.

He will be taught that it is vulgar and low to quarrel especially in the home. No man will strike a woman no matter what the provocation might be any more than it would have been right for his father to strike his mother. A man who is unable to control himself in anger is a weak man and is hardly fit to be a husband, much less father. Belonging to a race full of impulse and emotion he must be taught to control his emotions as he would his appet.i.te. Culture and manliness are really restraint.

He will be taught to remember the vital s.e.x difference in strength and physique and will not permit a woman to lift or reach unnecessarily--not even to help with his coat. He will not preach a double standard of morality for the men and women unless he practices what he preaches and has always been pure.

Early in the boy's life the colored mother beautiful will teach him to keep as pure in thought and deed as girls are expected to be. He will be given a right idea of the sacred s.e.x organs and will be taught their health--value and the price of their abuse. Self mastery will be the watchword in thought, even in sleep and recreation.

The colored mother beautiful will teach her son not to lie and steal or to use intoxicants and profane language. She will teach him to keep both his inward and outward body clean. She shall insist that he keep his lips "in" while his chest will be out. The son will be taught the value of a good name and that fondness for work is one of the best recommendations in the world. He will be taught not to scorn or neglect his ch.o.r.es and to help his mother in the housework, not only because it is his duty but because it will prepare him for the duties of married life when he may be able to help his wife or instruct her if it should be necessary.

The colored mother beautiful will teach her son to be a little man and not to receive "penny tips" like a beggar. He should be taught to do neighborly favors without pay, after first asking his mother for permission. If he must have money let him work for wages that he may be his own business boss. He should never be permitted to ask any one but his parents for pennies and he should be encouraged not to expect or accept them.

A boy should be expected to walk with a graceful carriage and present an attractive personal appearance in the way of clothes, teeth, hair and nails as well as a girl.

Early in life he should be taught to invest in a savings bank, to get the saving habit.

The habit of reading good books should be made a part of his daily work as a preparation for the idle hour when he would otherwise seek excitement and harmful a.s.sociation.

A boy should be taught the duties of married life and what to expect from a good wife.