70 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [bull. 34 



The nursing" of the infant presents one characteristic feature, 

 found among all the ti-ihes visited: It is generally prolonged much 

 beyond the period customary among the whites. Nursing is begun 

 from witliin a few hours to several days after confinement, according 

 to the flow of milk, and, unless a new pregnancy intervenes, the 

 infant is not wholly weaned until 2, 3, or even 4 or more years old. 

 The reasons usually assigned for this custom are that "it is good for 

 the infant," "it makes the cliild strong and healthy," "it w^ants it," 

 and "does not want to give up." There are rare instances in which 

 a mother nurses the newly arrived infant as well as the last preceding 

 child. The infant does not live exclusively, however, on the mother's 

 milk, except during the first three to eight months; after this stage, 

 which differs in duration with the various tribes and with circum- 

 stances, it receives in addition more or less of the food forming the 

 diet of the mother. 



The Indian woman, particularly in the uncivilized tribes, has gen- 

 erally breasts of Init moderate size, which produce a fair but not an 

 unusual quantity of milk. A few instances were learned of in every 

 tribe in which the secretion was insufficient, but such cases are rarer 

 than among the whites of the larger cities. When the child can not 

 be nursed by the motlier recourse is had to goat's or cow's milk, it 

 may be fed on what the people consider light diet, or another woman 

 may nurse it. When a new pregnancy supervenes nursing is usually 

 stopped, although, as mentioned above, there are exceptions to this 

 custom. After they get teeth and run about some children wean 

 spontaneously; in other cases the woman must absent herself for 

 a time or apply some substance to her nipples, the bad taste of 

 wliich does away with the child's desire to nurse. In some of the 

 tribes included in the writer's researches the beginning of nursing is 

 purposely somewhat delayed on account of peculiar notions of the 

 people. 



Details. — For the first five or six months the Apache baby gets 

 only mother's milk; later on it receives a little food of any kind 

 eaten by the mother. The nursing is continued until after the child 

 walks, unless there is a new pregnancy; but even the latter does not 

 always cause an interruption. The ordinary method of weaning a 

 child is to put a little red pepper on the nipples. If the mother has 

 milk very soon after confinement, she begins to nurse the baby when 

 it commences to cry; in some cases, however, she delays "until the 

 baby's mouth gets all clean." If milk does not appear promptly, 

 the child gets nothing for about a day, and it is then fed on milk or 

 something else that is not "strong." The results of special inquiry 

 as to the appearance in different women of milk sufficient for nursing 



1 Bee also notes on pp. (id et seq. 



