INFANCY IN THE CITY. 687 



mother's own infant, which should be seen if possible. And it must 

 be remembered that even here another imposition may be practiced — 

 a neighbor's baby can be borrowed for the occasion. The flattering 

 testimonials of fidelity and satisfactory conduct in previous positions 

 are often from employers who have departed for Europe or some 

 other quarter of the globe, and are therefore inaccessible. When suc- 

 cess has rewarded the search for a wet-nurse, there is no guarantee that 

 her milk will remain satisfactory for any length of time. If she has 

 the true maternal instinct, she mourns for her own child, and it is not 

 long before, deprived of its proper nourishment, it sickens and, more 

 often than not, dies, and the grief of the mother dries up her milk. 



The question of artificial feeding becomes, then, one of paramount 

 importance, since the largest proportion of city infants must subsist 

 in this way. In summer it is indeed a difficult task to raise an in- 

 fant in the city. New York physicians know very well that a large 

 proportion of artificially fed infants who enter the summer months 

 die before the return of cool weather, unless saved by removal to the 

 country. 



One of the most benevolent institutions which has been devised is 

 the Floating Hospital of the St. John's Guild of New York, which 

 daily in summer takes its freight of pallid, almost dying, infants, suf- 

 fering from faulty nutrition, out into the fresh ocean-breezes for the 

 day. 



Cow's milk coming from a long distance is unfitted for infant feed- 

 ing ; but, if it can be obtained fresh, it is the best substitute for moth- 

 er's milk. It must be diluted the first six weeks one half, the next six 

 weeks one third, and after three months a fourth, and at five or six 

 months it can be given pure. The feeding-bottle should be perfectly 

 sweet and clean. It has been found both in private practice and hos- 

 pital experimentation that milk which has been prepared with the ex- 

 tract of pancreas can be used more successfully than any other. In- 

 fants' foods abound in the market, whose inventors claim all sorts of 

 merits for them. For a while one food will prove advantageous, 

 when, having obtained a reputation and come into extensive use, less 

 care is taken in its preparation, and through the suffering of many in- 

 fants it is proved unworthy of longer confidence. Goat's milk is good 

 for city infants, because it can be obtained fresh, and the animals can 

 be kept by poor people at little expense. 



Many an infant suffers from irregularity of feeding and overfeed- 

 ing. There is in the popular mind but one interpretation of a baby's 

 crying, " It is hungry," and immediately it is given more food to eat, 

 when already its tiny stomach is distended and irritated. Infants' 

 meals should be regulated by the clock.* This prescription, unaided 



* An infant under three weeks should be fed every two hours, or twelve times in the 

 twenty-four, receiving one to one and a half ounce of cow's milk each time, if artificially 

 fed. At three months the child should be fed every three hours, or eight times in the 



