ui LA 



WE ATM KM. 



that OK eblkl has bad enough. On no account should children be fed 

 gain immediately after Yomiting, practice that is often extremely 

 Injurious. 



A child increases In tat and strength, it requires other food in 

 addition to milk, and at lst ceases to require supplies from its mother. 

 Although this is a perfectly natural process, it is often, from want of 

 skill, or rather want of knowledge of natural laws, a source of painful 

 disease to the mother, and sometimes eren loss of life to the child. 

 As a general rule, it may be steted that a child should never be 

 suddenly weaned, and that the more gradual the separation between 

 mother and child thn better will it be for both. The time for weaning 

 must depend in some measure both on the development and health of 

 the rhilH and the state and health of the mother. With regard to the 

 chil>l, one of the first indications that weaning may be commenced is 

 the appearance of teeth. This is indicative of preparation for other 

 kind of food, and generally occurs in healthy children about the sixth 

 or .-eventh month ; and it is at this period that a gradual abstraction 

 of the breast may commence. If this be done, it is seldom that a 

 child will require suckling beyond the first year ; although, where no 

 111 consequences result to the mother, there is no objection to the child 

 continuing at the breast till it is eighteen months or two years old. 

 Where children are backward in the development of their teeth, and 

 present other signs of want of strength and delicacy of constitution, it 

 is frequently advisable that they should remain a lengthened period at 

 the breast. It is always necessary to take into inn the health 



of the mother during suckling, as children m.iy puller much more 

 severely from .in imperfectly secreted or diseased state of the milk than 

 they would from immediate weaning, and under these circumstances 

 of course the least evil is to be preferred. 



In ordi r that the weaning should be gradual, the child should be 

 induced at the fifth or sixth month to take some light food once or 

 twice a day, and its supply from the breast should be proportionately 

 diminished. If such a plan is pursued, the quantity of food adminis- 

 tered by hand being increased whilst the supply from the nurse is 

 decreased, it will be generally found that little difficulty will lie 

 experienced in entirely weaning the child at ten or twelve months old. 

 After a child has been weaned its food ought principally to consist of 

 liquid or semifluid substances. Asses' and cows' milk alone, or boiled 

 with bread, thickened with barley or baked flour, may be given for the 

 first few months. To these may be added, for the sake of variety, rice, 

 tapioca, sago, and arrow-root, which may be made up with milk or 

 water, or both ; and when water nlone is used, sugar should be added. 

 Where children cannot take milk, light broths should be administered. 

 As solid food for the first year after weaning, there is nothing better than 

 bread and butter : but in all cases in the diet of children a due regard 

 should be had to the relation between azotised and non-azotieed 

 aliments. If the former are given in too great quantity, congestion 

 and inflammation are frequently the result ; whilst if the latter prevail 

 in the diet, the child gets fat and loses strength, and becomes subject 

 to diseases of debility. Neither the one kind nor the other should be 

 withheld, and it is only by their judicious combination that the fatal 

 effects of improper diet can be avoided. 



(Oardien, Hiciionnain da Seieneet Mtdicala ; Combe, On the 

 of Infancy ; Maunsell and Evanson, OB the IKteax* of 



WEAR. [WnR.1 



\ltl\(!. [VKERIHO.] 



WKATII KH in a term used to denote the state of the earth and of 

 the atmosphere with respect to heat or coldness, dryness or humidity, 

 wind, rain, Ac. 



In some countries the variations of the atmospherical phenomena 

 occur in an order which is nearly constant ; and in those regions, pre- 

 dictions concerning the weather for several days, and even for months 

 to come, may be made with almost a certainty that they will be 

 Terined by the event. On the opposite sides of the chain of the 

 Ghauts, which extends along the western peninsula of India nearly 

 fn-m north to smith, the phenomena during each half of the year are 

 constant ly and exactly reversed : thus, along the Malabar coast there is 

 a clear sky from September to the following April, and on the coast of 

 Coromandel the fair season continues from April to September; while 

 dunng each following six month*, in the two regions, it rains almost 

 incessantly. Alternations of fair weather and rain also take place 

 regularly in the interior of Africa ; and, according to Humboldt, it 

 rains constantly during five or six months in c\ rom the coast 



of Guiana to the Andes. But in insular situations generally, and in 

 Europe sod North America particularly, the winds, varying in direction 

 and intensity according to no constant known law applicable to the 

 purpose, mingle together at intervals of time apparently irregular, the 

 masses of air which abound with vapour raised from the ocean, and 

 thu cause clouds to cover the horizon, and showers of rain, hail, or 

 snow to descend. The wind which is most prevalent at any one place, 

 generally when It begins to blow affords an indication of the kind of 

 weather which mav be expected ; but, frequently, no circumstance 

 occurs by which a change from a clear to a cloudy sky, or the contrary, 

 can be predicted even a few hours before its occurrence. 



The periodical changes of the moon's phases often coinciding with 

 changes in the phenomena of the atmosphere, it was very natural that 

 the Utter should, by many persons, be thought to have some depet 



on the former [II MX, col. 929] ; an opinion apparently strengthened by 

 the known fact that the tides of the ocean and atmosphere are produced 

 by the attractions which the moon and sun exercise on the 

 water and air. It is certain, however, that the influences of the moon 

 In changing the state of the atmosphere are of short duration, and take 

 | place gradually according to constant Uws : they are consequently 

 j quite incompetent to the production of those sudden and irregular 

 I changes to which the atmosphere is subject There are not, however, 

 wanting men who have formed tables in which the pmKiblu state of 

 the weatherisst.it ui-.li tin- hour of the day or night 



: at which the new and full moons take place; and that which * 

 possess most the confidence of persons to whom an : 

 ' or fair weather is of importance, is one which I >r. > mm. 1 rl.r , 

 I f eased to have formed from along series of observations. It is sufficient 

 here to mention that in this table rain is predicted when the new or 

 full moon takes place between noon and 2 r M., or between 4 and A.M. ; 

 and fair weather is announced when cither takes place between 4 and 

 , 6p.il., or between 10p.ii. and 2A.M. An opinion has prevailed that 

 I seasons of a like character return in like order after each revolt r 



the moon's nodes ; that is, at the end of every 1 8 or 19 years, at which 

 ) times the earth and moon are nearly in like situations with r 

 the nodes ; but though seasons distinguished by more or less than the 

 usual quantities of rain have been observed to return at certain in- 

 ! tervals, there appears to be no ground i li that 



astronomical period. The existence of a " Cycle of > . ars in 



the Seasons of Britain," has been maintained by Mr. Luke Howard, in 

 his work having that title; but the validity of the evidence a<; 

 has been subsequently denied by the Kev. L. Jenyns, in a volume on 

 Meteorology. 



The only indications of rain or fair weather upon which any reliance 

 may be placed are those which have been noticed by the 1 

 Humphrey Davy, in his 'Salmonia:' mid as his 

 founded on physical conditions, a brief statement of them may with 

 propriety be introduced in this place. 



One of the speakers in the Dialogue inquiring why the clouds in the 

 west being red, with a tinge of purple, should portend fair weather, is 

 answered that the air, when dry, refracts more of the red and heat- 

 making rays than when moist; and as dry air is n ' trans- 

 parent, those rays are reflected in the horizon. It is added that a 

 coppery or yellow sunset foretells rain ; but that, as an indimi 

 approaching wet weather, nothing is more certain than a halo 

 the moon, since it is produced by precipitated water : the larger the 

 circle is, the nearer are the clouds ; consequently the more ready to 

 descend in rain. 



In explaining why a rainbow in the morning betokens rain, and one 

 in the evening fair weather, it is stated that the bow can only be seen 

 when the clouds depositing the rain are opposite to the sun ; thus in the 

 morning the bow is in the west, and in the evening in the east : and as 

 the rains in this country are usually brought by westerly wind.*, a liw 

 in the west indicates that the rain is coming towards the spectator ; 

 whereas a bow in the east indicates that the rain is passing away from 

 him. 



The indications of fine weather from swallows flying high is ex- 

 plained by stating that the insects on which these birds feed delight to 

 fly in a warm stratum of air ; but worm air, being lighter than that 

 which is moist, occupies a higher part of the atmosphere, and, 

 fore the birds then find their prey in the upper regions. On tho 

 contrary, when the warm air is near the surface of the earth, the insects 

 and birds are there also ; and then, as the cold air from above de- 

 into it,a deposition of water takes place. The opinion th.it sea-birds 

 come to land in order to avoid an approaching storm is stated to be 

 erroneous; and the cause assigned is that, as the fish upon whi'-h the 

 birds prey go deep into the water during storms, the birds come to 

 land merely on account of the greater certainty of finding food there 

 than out at sea. 



It may be observed here, that tho kind of cloud which is designated 

 cirrostratus [CLODDs],in which, when the particles of water composing 

 it are in a state of approximate coalescence into drops, the Iwlo is 

 formed, is almost always followed by a depression of temperature in 

 the atmosphere, and by wind or rain. For indications of the we .itlier, 

 which are afforded by the oscillations of a mercurial column, see 

 BAROUETBR ; and for those which precede cyclones, or revolving 

 storms, see that subject in the artirli V. 



Tho observations of Principal Forbes (stated in the article V .< 

 i have shown that the red colour of the clouds is ref' 

 t<> a ill .,}. -lit cause from that to which it is ascribed by Davy, in the 

 cit.itions above. But the red evening and grey morning have been 

 regarded as the surest and most consistent signs of fine weather. They 

 would naturally be observed from the earliest period", and accordingly 

 they appear to be tho most ancient of prognostics, having been ret 

 in the verses of the Greek poet Aratus, who was contemporary with 

 Kin-lid ; in tho New Testament (Matt xvl. 2, 3) ; and in one of our 

 most familiar ] roverlw. The purple tinge alluded to, according to 

 Principal Forbes, probably arises from a mixture of the reflected blue 

 of the pure sky, which is always present when purple is seen, with the 

 yellow-orange of the opalescent vapour. 



" The modified hues of the sky, and of the sun and moon near tho 

 horizon, have, for so many ages and in so many countries, been re; 







