INFANCY. 
rs 
the -formation of the nipples. Behold the 
economy of the infant himself; see him in- 
stinctively taught to search for the breast, and 
to suck the breast; to draw his nourishment 
from a new source, yet still from your body, 
and from your fluids. Did you see this con- 
nection lufliciently, you would neither give 
him over to the suckling of another woman, 
nor would you feed him with any other sub- 
stance than your own milk.” Dr. Iierdman 
on Infancy. 
Dr. Buchan gives it as his opinion, that not 
one in a hundred of those children survives 
who are abandoned by their mothers, and 
committed to the charge of foster-parents in 
the earliest stages of life ; and although we 
may deem this statement in some measure 
exaggerated, the reflection of its approach 
to truth ought to be a sufficient incitement 
for the appointed and professed guardians of 
the health and we 1-being of society to enter 
a severe and unbiassed protest against the 
custom to which we now refer. 
For the first two or three months the nutri- 
ment of the infant ought to be received en- 
tirely from the breast of its mother. During 
the whole of this time its wants ‘are almost 
confined to nourishment and sleep. It is, 
however, to be confessed that there are some, 
although bu.t comparatively few, instances of 
inability on the part of the parent to furnish 
milk in due quantity or suitable quality to the 
requisitions of her offspring. “ To the puny 
progeny of a puny consumptively-disposed' 
mother I would forbid (says Dr. Bedddes) 
the mother's breast.” Now, although we 
are inclined to suppose that the author just 
quoted has admitted too much in favour of 
what is termed rearing by hand (for capa- 
city of bearing is commonly connected with 
a capacity of nursing children), yet, where 
circumstances necessarily deprive the child 
of its regular and more salutary nutriment, 
it becomes a question of moment, What is to 
be substituted in its place? Not by any 
means what the generality of hired attendants 
direct. As soon as an infant by its cries de- 
notes hunger, the nurse has, for the most 
part, instant recourse to a mixture of bread 
and water (pap), which is perhaps spiced, or 
qualified with a little brandy. To attempt the 
union of oil and water would be scarcely less 
incongruous : it is not hazarding any thing to 
assert, that the major part of infantile ail- 
ments are to be attributed to the heterogene- 
ous compounds that are early given to chil- 
dren ; and the spicy or spirituous ingredients 
which are added, in order to force an artifi- 
cial digestion. The necessity of the latter 
bears decided evidence against the propriety 
of the former. In no period of life, during 
health, ought food to be of such a quality as 
to require the assistance of condiments or 
spirits ; which last are especially injurious to 
the assimilating organs of a new-born infant. 
About half a tea-cupful of cow’s milk, 
gently warmed, is the only food that ought 
to be given to a child at its birth, after which 
it will frequently sleep for ten hours ; a sym- 
ptom which, although. often alarming to the 
obtrusive ignorance of nurses, is to be re- 
garded as a demonstration of the proper na- 
ture of the food that has been given, and an 
indication of future health. 
To this plan it is sometimes necessary to 
have recourse, even when it is the intention 
of the mother to suckle her child, as women 
who have had many children frequently have 
no proper secretion of milk until after the 
second or third day from delivery. 
Before quitting this part of the subject it 
is proper to observe, that the custom of im- 
mediately pouring down 'purgatives, as if to 
prove to the little stranger that it has arrived 
in a world of physic and or evils, is, although 
very generally adopted, highly injudicious. 
The bowels do not, in general, require to be 
thus artificially cleansed. 
With respect to the quantity and times of j 
administering food, mothers and nurses are 
accustomed to err. Nothing can be more - 
improper than to suckle or teed an infant two ! 
or three times in the course ot an hour. A ; 
child judiciously regulated does not demahd 
nourishment, even during the first months, J 
more than once in three or tour hours; as it j 
advances it requires feeding even less fre- ! 
quently, and less sleep during the day. 
It has already been stated that, with the | 
exceptions pointed out, the mother’s breast j 
ought, at least during the first two or three j 
months, to be live sole repository and entire 
source of infantile nutriment. If the child is. 
brought up by hand, cow’s milk gently 
wanned is all the food that will be necessary 
for the first four or five months. After these 
times milk may be alternated, not by moist 
bread, biscuit, cakes, sugar, panadas, and 
gruel, but by ground rice or Hour well baked; 
the gravy of- boiled meat, which last will 
generally" be taken with avidity ; small quan- 
tities of beef-tea, or veal-jelly, and other sub- 
stances of the like nature; still avoiding, un- 
less during the actual existence of disease, 
and under professional direction, every article 
in the long list of fermented, fermenting, 
spicy, and spirituous materials; the with- 
holding of which, however it may offend and 
alarm the nurse, will be of incalculable bene- 
fit to the child. 
The time of weaning must be regulated 
entirely by circumstances. '1 he process 
should not be abrupt, but gradual. It is very 
seldom advisable to refuse the breast entirely 
before the ninth or tenth month. 
We have particularly insisted on the ne- 
cessity of excluding those substances from 
the diet of infants which are disposed to fer- 
ment, or turn sour. A general acquaintance 
with the laws which regulate the existence 
and decomposition of such substances may 
be acquired with less labour than would be re- 
quisite to retain in the memory, without the 
aid of some connecting principle, all the in- 
dividual articles which are prescribed or ad- 
mitted as part of the diet in childhood and 
youth; and in consequence of such pleasing 
and easy acquisition, we should find know- 
ledge and humanity joining issue in the joy- 
ous task of averting the artificial evils which 
ignorance and error have made to attach to 
the extremely susceptible, though not natu- 
rally unhealthy, state of the primary periods 
of existence. Whence does the perversity 
of nurses respecting the treatment ot chil- 
dren arise? Solely from ignorance. Were 
they convinced that the plans which are 
adopted prove ultimately "subversive of their 
intended object, they would readily consent 
to abandon them. “ Obedience will always 
be more cheerful and steady after a reasona- 
ble explanation.” “ I have heard a variety 
of mothers (says Dr. Bedcfoes) complain that 
sugar, biscuit, and cakes, disagreed in tire 
most evident manner ; and yet that it was 
impossible, by any injunctions, to prevent the 
one from being made a part of the food, and 
tlie other (sugar) from being given to stop the 
hiccups, or produce a sensation that should 
suspend crying for a moment. Now it is 
well known that perpetually recurring com- 
plaints in the stomach and bowels arise from 
mere sourness ; and the parties, by whose 
mistaken kindness, or by whose delicacy of 
ear they are occasioned, are perfectly inform- 
ed so far. it remains only to carry their 
knowledge a step further. Respecting the 
juice of the sugar-cane, it is a very striking 
particular, that the poorest sort will scarcely 
keep a quarter of. an hour in the receiver 
without turning sour. This can only be told. 
The acescent nature of bread, of sugar, and 
of the various compositions into which bread 
and sugar enter, may be shtuii . For this 
purpose it is only necessary that a solution of 
sugar and water should be made into vinegar. 
In like manner bread and sweet cake should 
he placed in a heat nearly equal to that of 
the human body, and the servant be put to 
taste the infusion when it becomes acid. By 
an address suited to tiie object in view, there- 
will surely be small difficulty in giving these 
simple experiments all the effect that can be 
desired. 
“ I shall very contentedly allow the child- 
less wit to laugh at me for the whimsical idea.- 
of tutoring nurse-maids in chemistry. I have 
a balm at hand for any wouifi the shafts of ri- 
dicule may inflict. Considerate parents will 
avail themselves’ of so practicable an expedi- 
ent, and many little sufferers will escape the 
consequences of an improper regimen. And 
these are probably (the author might have 
said certainly ) far more serious, even in re- 
spect to the future than the present. For it 
clearly results from a contemplation of the 
manner in which human feelings and ideas 
gain th* ir connection, that frequent discom- 
posure of the stomach in the morning of life 
may be instrumental in overcasting its meri- 
dian and its close with a cloud of misery, such 
as neither skill nor fortune can disperse.” 
Beddoes’ Hygeia. For further information 
on the subject of diet, consult the article 
Materia Medica, section Dietetics. 
Sect. II. — Of temperature, including re- 
marks on the clothing, and likewise on the 
washing or bathing, of infants. 
The remarkable success with which the 
subject of animal temperature has been re- 
cently investigated, and the application of 
facts, deduced from a developement of its 
laws, to the living system, both in its healthy 
and disordered state, constitute perhaps the 
most material improvements in modern phy- 
siology and medical practice. 
Respecting the generation and adjustment 
of animal heat, it is not the business of this 
article toenquire (see Physiology, and Me- 
dicine).; our present' plan extends no fur- 
ther than the statement of a few practical 
rules on the subject of heat and cold, abso- 
lutely necessary to be attended to by all who.- 
undertake the guardianship of infancy and 
childhood: "for the management of tempera- 
ture is of high importance in the treatment of 
the infant. It runs through, and is connected, 
with, every part of his general treatment. It 
