296 MEDICAL SECTION 



feeding, and the care of infants. They had heard in one 

 of the papers of the importance of the midwife. Where 

 he came from they had not this great problem of the pro- 

 fessional midwife to such an extent as they had in England. 

 But the only way he saw of improving the midwife was 

 to improve her out of account altogether. They did not 

 accept a death certificate unless it were countersigned by 

 a qualified physician, and he held that the poorest woman 

 in the State ought to be able to demand from the State 

 the services of the qualified woman or the qualified man 

 when she was bringing her child into this world. The 

 sooner that came about the better. The point he wished 

 to speak particularly about was the elementary education 

 in schools, but as so much time had been taken up he 

 would only say one thing. If they had to improve the 

 education of the physician let them see that this instruction 

 filtered in the best possible way through schools for 

 mothers, through classes for nurse-girls who had to look 

 after the children of the middle classes (for they had the 

 poorest results often among their better-class patients), and 

 particularly let them see that no girls, especially of the 

 working and artisan classes, who were to be the mothers 

 of the nation, left school without having had, during their 

 last year of school life, the opportunity of learning how to 

 attend to the duties of motherhood. 



Dr. TRUBY KING (New Zealand) said he had listened 

 with the greatest possible interest to the admirable address 

 of Dr. Hedger, and the remarks which followed from Dr. 

 Saleeby. It seemed to him that this was one of the funda- 

 mental questions about which there ought to be no possi- 

 bility ot doubt. They knew that so far as the race was 

 concerned the health of women was of infinite importance, 

 and after all the essential question, as Dr. Saleeby had said, 

 was that of nutrition. They could concede that there were 

 two fundamental considerations when they were dealing 

 with all living beings, namely, nutrition and reproduction. 

 As Schiller said, " Love and hunger rule the world "; and 

 these were the problems of nutrition and reproduction. But 

 from the scientific point of view there was only one function 

 that of nutrition because after all the function of re- 

 production was only the co-ordinate expression of the func- 

 tion of nutrition. If there was proper nutrition the re- 

 productive function was primarily provided for. If any- 

 thing was calculated to limit the reproductive capacity of 

 a woman it would be at the time when she was growing 

 most, as she was at the period of puberty, and if she be 

 subjected to excessive strain in directions which did not 



