FOR THE CHILDREN.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 2544, 3 July 1909, Page 1 (Supplement)

FOR THE CHILDREN.

! ««>- l|lg|| IN A DOLLY’S HOSPITAL. 1 There are many distressing scenes 1 i "a doll’s hospital. Dismembormei without enaesthesia is an hourly crt currence. It is a rule in these if stitutions not to permit the relatives c the patients to visit them during th critical periods of their treatment Such visits would do the patients ii good, and the effects upon sympathy ing callers might be serious. Operators in other departments <S surgical work think they have don something to tueir credit when the; have successfully accomplished a bit q skin grafting but what would the; give if they could do a leg and arm an* head grafting? Not many years ago a doctor opera ted on a rough who had been *ho; through the intestines. The surgeoi patched up half a dozen holes, and 11 a few weeks the patient was back a* nis old haunts, drunk and disorder!* and looking tor more trouble. The cas* attracted almost world-wide interest; yet for years laparotomy had been on* of the commonest of operations in th* dolls’ hospitals. The house surgeon of one of thesf institutions was in the midst of ai operation when a reporter called anc was invited to the operating-room. & phonograph on a stand m a corner wa; grinding out an air that had an old time familiar sound. <; Do you X'ocognisc- the air?” th< operator asked. “It happens to bo verj appropriate to the occasion. It is ‘Fit Saddest When I Sing/ but because ©i an imperfect record it says ‘l’m Sawdust When I Sing.’ ” Thereupon he proceeded to empty th« sawdust out of the vocal organs of a singing doll. Hie leak was quicky discovered, a few stitches put in, the sawdust was replaced, and the wound closed, and once more the doll sang without the sawdusty effect. “Our practice,” the doctor said, “is entirely surgical; we use no medicines; 'Nor do we use any liniments or band- ! ages. Healing is my first intention, i “The most common accidents? Well, they are nasal. When uol's fall they are apt to fall on their noses. There would seem to be an even chance that 1 they would fall on the backs of thenheads. but for the same reason that a slice of bread and butter usually! falls buttered side down, dolls commonly fall with the nose side of their; heads to the position of greatest peril. “Nose-grafting,” the surgeon went on, “is about the most delicate of our' l practice. When a doll is admitted to the hospital with her nose missing,we can usually tell by the other features what the shape of the lost nose/ was. This is important, for the youn; relatives of do.ls want them to com out of the hospital with the expression they had before the accident —the ex. pression they have learned to love bj\ iig care for them. _ ' “But once in a while we make mistakes in nose grafting. I remember. the distress of little Miriam, in the avenue, when she came to remove her doll from the hospital. The 'loll had been left here for treatment by a servant girl, and after surveying the face of the doll and that of the girl who brought it, I provided the doll with aj neat turn-up nose and you could not see where the splice had been made.; But the doll with her turn-up noeo was disowned when called for, and If had to remodel the nose entirely--... C J “Some dolls get the habit of re-; fusing to shut their eyes when they are laid down to sleep, and others are unable to open them when taken up to bo dressed. These eases of optical mality are usually quickly responsive to intelligent treatment. A child at the phonograph had been changing the record, and the machine broke out with “Saw My Leg Off.”/! “That reminds me,” said the sur-! geon, “of an operation I promised to do this afternoon.”

Thereupon he proceeded deftly to clip a damaged limb from the torso of a ■wax doll. As he was selecting from a basket of legs one that would fit when grafted, he remarked: “In operations of this sort we always follow the rule laid down by President Lincoln as to the proper length of a person’s legs—they should be just long enough to reach the ground.” The treatment of dolls in the hospitals for them is fairly profitable. Very close is the attachment of children for their dolls, and parents will pay more than the original cost of the doll to have it restored to the condition it- was in when it gained its place as a cherished member ef the family.

A DWARF IN THE PIE. j There are some children who think j it funny to laugh at a dwarf, forget- | ting that dwarfs have feelings to hurt ! just the same as other people. To laugh at a dwarf is not only cruel, but | it is also very silly, for dwarfs are f really wonderful people, and they have afforded lots of fun to boys and girls! who read fairy tales. 1 Most children will remember Rumpel- § stiltkin, the dwarf in Hie fairy tale; | and readers of the Arthurian cycle of.' tales may have wondered at the con- | siderab’e supply of dwarfs constantly f at hand. Every maiden seemed to possess a dwarf chaperon. "Why is this? The medieval dwarf, brownie, pixie, or elf is generally believed to have been, a survival from ancient times, when a < small, dark race of aborigines inhabited the countries of Western Europe.;! Thus the folk-talc has an 'actual basis of fact. The dwarf is of very ancient lineage and most remarkable attachments. In* former times dwarfs were always in-;* eluded in the retinues of kings. A dwarf 19 inches in height was presented to Henrietta, of France in a pie--, Bebe, the celebrated dwarf of King » Stanislus, of Poland, was 24 inches i liigh. The smallest of dwarf’s recorded ; in history was Miss Hilany Agyba, of j Sinia. She reached tile height of 15 indies. Herodotus, who first told a _ dis-| believing world of the long Polar night, | also referred to the annual migration | of cranes to Africa, wbero they en-:J gaged in fights with pigmies. It was-1 not until the visit of Stanley to the | great equatorial forests of the Congo, _ however, 'that the existence of tho . : j dwarf race was proved. These dwarfs';*! have since been brought to England | and placed on exhibition. Their ayeE-A age height is from 3ft Gin to a little! above 4ft. .. f The Alikas, of British East Africa, are a dwarf race. They usualv live s| under tho protection of the negroes, ,| who fear their thievish propensities and|J the poisonous arrows that they employ .! in warfare. In South Africa are the | Bushmen, dwarf hunters of the great' J desert. In the Andaman Islands, tho coast of India dwells the Mincop- L| ios, a dwarf race in a; verv low state -1 of civilisation, living _ in huts called “cliongs,” which consist of a roof on,, four stakes. Clothes are unknown to . them. Dwarf races also exist in the { Peninsula of Ma’acca, and in xh - ,