“YES, I suppose I shall be obliged to teach my little girl to sew, some time; but I am very thankful that I have some years yet before I need take up this cross. I supply her with bits of cloth, needles, thread, and scissors, and let her amuse herself with an attempt at sewing; but how I dread the time when I must begin in earnest, and try to teach her the proper way! I sometimes hope that by letting her botch and play sewing, by and by, as she sees me making even seams, and taking small stitches, she will, by imitation and observation, gradually learn, without much effort on my part. Do you not think that she may?” Never. No doubt some children learn with much less effort than others; but by letting your little girl “play sewing,”--_botching_ as you term it,--you only connive at her acquiring a careless habit which she will not easily exchange for straight seams and tiny stitches. “Would you advise me to keep thread and needles and cloth from her, and endeavor to interest her in some other play, till such time as I am compelled to teach her how to use them properly?” No; why should you debar her from such innocent amusements? Why not begin at once to teach her how to do a thing right, even when in play? “Teach that baby! What can she learn at her age?” Can she not thread her needle? “Certainly; quite expertly.” And can she not push her needle in and out of the cloth? “O yes; for a baby, she shows quite a genius for this quiet kind of womanly accomplishment.” Then you see she can learn something, notwithstanding her youth. How much more maturity or skill, think you, will it require for her to learn, by a few well-directed efforts on your part, how to put the needle in at proper distances, taking up only just so many threads for a stitch? “Why, she is only a baby; but little past three years. Teach her! How preposterous! You must be--”