ABSTRACT
Men must work and women must weep, says the song; it might be added that children must play. Even the ill-used, half-starved child of the London slums can find surcease from the horrors of its lot in a world of make-believe. The ruling principle is invariably that a boy or girl shall choose one of the opposite sex, kiss, and then leave the other to pursue a similar policy of selection. At the game of “Higher and Higher,” which begins and ends in jumping over a rope, they display an amazing agility, whisking their bodies into the air by a revolving action and clearing almost their own height. And all the while, in many cases, they have to play another part of little mother to younger brothers and sisters. Whilst the boys are being Red Indians and pirates, and yearning to run amuck through the Ten Commandments with a cardboard sword, the girls are learning how to be mothers.
