Page:In the dozy hours, and other papers.djvu/209

Two vastly different types of infant precocity have been recently given to the world by Mrs. Deland and Mrs. Hodgson Burnett, the only point of resemblance between their respective authors being the conviction which they share in common that children are problems which cannot be too minutely studied, and that we cannot devote too much time or attention to their scrutiny. Mrs. Deland, with less humor and a firmer touch, draws for us in "The Story of a Child," a sensitive, highly strung, morbid and imaginative little girl, who seems born to give the lie to Schopenhauer's comfortable verdict, that "the keenest sorrows and the keenest joys are not for women to feel." Ellen Dale suffers as only a self-centred nature can. She thinks about her self so much that her poor little head is turned with fancied shortcomings and imaginary wrongs. Most children have these sombre moods now and again. They don't overcome them; they forget them, which is a better and healthier thing to do. But Ellen's humors are analyzed with a good deal of seriousness and sympathy. When she is not "agonized" over her tiny faults, she is "tasting sin with