REMEDIAL THEOEIES AND EXPEEIMENTS 237 



at best for the baby's natural food. She is given 

 simply worded literature pointing out the great ad- 

 vantages of breast-feeding and the dangers of all 

 other kinds of food for infants, and physicians and 

 nurses urge the same truths upon her. This is the 

 normal, everyday practice of nearly every infants' 

 milk depot I have ever known of, and it seems not 

 unlikely that the depots are producing a result the 

 very opposite of that feared by many critics. 



That the influence of society should be exerted to 

 encourage breast-feeding is true, of course. Possibly 

 we shall yet be able to develop our school system in 

 this country along lines making for physical effi- 

 ciency as advocated by Dr. GuUck," and, in the last 

 years of school life, do what we can to educate our 

 girls so that they may not enter upon wifehood and 

 motherhood so utterly unequipped as they now do. I 

 have no doubt that a great deal could be done to 

 educate mothers upon this and many other matters 

 of vital importance — that much could, and there- 

 fore should, be done. But what are we to do with 

 the women, rich and poor, who decline to nurse their 

 babies, and with the babies themselves? Shall we, 

 like that ruler of Finland who, in 1755, issued a royal 

 edict prescribing a fine of ten dollars to be imposed 

 upon mothers who through neglecting to suckle their 

 babies for at least half a year lost them,*' make a 

 mother's refusal "to nurse her baby a criminal offence? 



