The American Missionary — Volume 36, No. 1, January, 1882Various
Religion
The American Missionary — Volume 36, No. 1, January, 1882
Various
Congregational churches -- Missions -- Periodicals; Home missions -- Periodicals
Much of their future usefulness depends on the industrial training
which is becoming more and more a feature of our schools. The
difficulty of uniting this branch of instruction with the regular
school duties was long ago recognized by so eminent a teacher
as Mary Lyon; and what was hard in New England is even harder
in Georgia and Alabama. But the need is greater, too; and on
missionary ground the question cannot be, “Is it difficult?” but
only “Is it best?” and, since there could be but one answer,
all over the South, this work in many forms is being carried on
to-day. Due attention is paid both to theory and practice. Lectures
on cooking, for instance, are followed by conversations on the
subject, where questions can be freely asked and difficulties
explained, after which the pupils are required to test their
knowledge by making bread, cooking meals and the like. This
practice is repeated day by day, and the examinations are as rigid
as in any other department. Sewing is as carefully taught, a part
of each day being devoted to it. Darning and patching become an
art, until some specimens of their skill in this line could be
ranked almost as ornamental needlework. Not only sewing, but the
cutting of garments, is taught; and this affords good opportunity
for those wise counsels on economy, simplicity and kindred subjects
which these girls need so much.
Housekeeping in its minutest details receives careful attention,
and here, as everywhere else, precept follows precept and theory is
supplemented by practice.
Another and no less important branch is that of nursing the sick.
The ignorance of the very simplest remedies and of hygienic laws on
the part of many of the colored people is appalling. The treatment
of a cold, or a slight accident, is as much beyond their knowledge
as the most complicated disease would be, while a sudden emergency,
as a case of poisoning, would paralyze them with fear. Medicine
to them is simply medicine, and one kind as good as another. “I
didn’t have no sugar,” said the mother of a sick baby to the
missionary who was attending to its needs, “and so I put a spoonful
of the medicine that didn’t want sweetening into a spoonful of the
medicine that did want sweetening and it seemed to do him good.”
That this ignorance was not unusual may be inferred from the
estimate that in the city where this mother lives the death rate
among the negroes is three times that of the whites.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
Reviews
Reviews
No reviews yet
Be the first to share your thoughts on this work.
Join the Discussion
Join the discussion
Sign in to leave a comment or review.
Sign InorCreate an account