Page:Samantha on Children's Rights.djvu/178

 "Because she did sunthin' that interfered with your comfort when she hadn't the least idee of its bein' wrong you pounced at her and hurt her, and want her whipped. And the other day, Josiah Allen, when she did do a little sunthin' we had told her not to, because she did it in such a cunnin' way, you laughed, and wuz mad because I spoke of punishin' her for it."

"Well, I spoze you want me to say that I think it is right for her to burn up the world, but you won't git me to." But his axent wuz gittin' smoother, it wuz about as smooth as a gimlet hole now.

Sez I, "I believe in punishin' children when they persist in wrongdoin'. But I always believe in findin' out whether they have done wrong or not, and then in the next place try to punish 'em, not for revenge and to satisfy our own feelin's, but to do them good, break 'em of wrongdoin'. And if you can talk them out of it it seems so much more noble and dignified than it duz to pound 'em. It duz somehow look so disagreeable to see a great strong man or woman weighin' two hundred or so standin' over a little mite of a thing that can't help itself anyway, whippin' it."

"Solomon sez," sez Josiah,"spare the rod and spile the child."

"Well," sez I, "if I wuz in Solomon's place" And then thinkses I the least said the soonest mended, and I thought I wouldn't say anything agin Solomon and his havin' so many wives, and actin', and shet my lips up tight.

"Solomon what?" sez Josiah.

"Nothin'," sez I.

And again he sez, "What? Solomon what?"

And again I sez, "Nothin', Solomon nothin'." And