Читать книгу A Montessori Mother онлайн

32 страница из 51

But I had not been all the morning in that children’s home, perfect, though not made with a mother’s hands, without having my mother’s jealousy sharply aroused. A number of things had been stirring up protests in my mind. I was alarmed at the sight of all these babies, happy, wisely occupied, perfectly good, and learning unconsciously the best sort of lessons, and yet in an atmosphere differing so entirely from all my preconceived ideas of a home. All this might be all very well for Italian mothers so poor that they were obliged to leave their children in order to go out and help earn the family living; or for English mothers, who expect as a matter of course that their little children shall spend most of their time with nurse-maids and governesses. But I could not spare my children, I told myself. I asked nothing better than to have them with me every moment they were awake. What was to be done about this ominously excellent institution which seemed to treat the children more wisely than I, for all my efforts? I felt an uneasy, apprehensive hostility towards these methods, contrasting so entirely with mine, for mine were, I assured myself hotly, based on the most absolute, supreme mother’s love for the child.