constantly kept within doors. Sponging the whole body also with cold water with bay-salt in it every morning, should be insisted upon, if possible: it preserves cleanliness, and greatly invigorates the health. United with this, the nurse should rise early, and also be regularly employed during the day in some little portion of duty in the family, an attendance upon the wants of the child not being alone sufficient.

An amiable disposition and good temper are very desirable. A violent fit of passion may exert so peculiar an influence in changing the natural properties of the milk, that a child has been known to be attacked with a fit of convulsions after being suckled by a nurse while labouring under the effects of a fit of anger. The depressing passions frequently drive the milk away altogether. It is hence of no small moment, that a wet-nurse be of a quiet and even temper, and not disposed to mental disturbance.

3. ARTIFICIAL, FEEDING, OR BRINGING UP BY HAND.

Extreme delicacy of constitution, diseased condition of the frame, defective secretion of milk, and other causes, may forbid the mother suckling her child; and unless she can perform this office with safety to herself, and benefit to her infant, she ought not to attempt it. In this case a young and healthy wet-nurse is the best substitute; but even this resource is not always attainable. Under these circumstances, the child must be brought up on an artificial diet "by hand,"—as it is popularly called.

To accomplish this with success requires the most careful attention on the part of the parent, and at all times is attended with risk to the life of the child; for although some children, thus reared, live and have sound health, these are exceptions to the general rule, artificial feeding being in most instances unsuccessful.

THE KIND OF ARTIFICIAL FOOD BEFORE THE SIXTH MONTH.

It should be as like the breast-milk as possible. This is obtained by a mixture of cow's milk, water, and sugar, in the following proportions:—

Fresh cow's milk, two thirds;
Boiling water, or thin barley water, one third;
Loaf sugar, a sufficient quantity to sweeten.

This is the best diet that can be used for the first six months, after which some farinaceous food may be combined.

In early infancy, mothers are too much in the habit of giving thick gruel, panada, biscuit-powder, and such matters, thinking that a diet of a lighter kind will not nourish. This is a mistake; for these preparations are much too solid; they overload the stomach, and cause indigestion, flatulence, and griping. These create a necessity for purgative medicines and carminatives, which again weaken digestion, and, by unnatural irritation, perpetuate the evils which render them necessary. Thus many infants are kept in a continual round of repletion, indigestion, and purging, with the administration of cordials and narcotics, who, if their diet were in quantity and quality suited to their digestive powers, would need no aid from physic or physicians.

In preparing this diet, it is highly important to obtain pure milk, not previously skimmed, or mixed with water; and in warm weather just taken from the cow. It should not be mixed with the water or sugar until wanted, and not more made than will be taken by the child at the time, for it must be prepared fresh at every meal. It is best not to heat the milk over the fire, but let the water be in a boiling state when mixed with it, and thus given to the infant tepid or lukewarm.

As the infant advances in age, the proportion of milk may be gradually increased; this is necessary after the second month, when three parts of milk to one of water may be allowed. But there must be no change in the kind of diet if the health of the child is good, and its appearance perceptibly improving. Nothing is more absurd than the notion, that in early life children require a variety of food; only one kind of food is prepared by nature, and it is impossible to transgress this law without marked injury.

If cow's milk disagree with an infant—and this is sometimes unfortunately the case, even from its birth ass's milk,—diluted with one third its quantity of water, may be given as a substitute. I am now attending a lady in her fourth confinement, who is unable, from defect in her nipples, to suckle her children. The first child had a healthy wet-nurse, and has grown a fine healthy lad. The second, a girl, was unfortunate in her nurse, she being of a strumous and unhealthy constitution, although to a casual observer bearing the appearance of health. The child lived only three months, and the nurse died of a rapid consumption shortly after. This discouraged the mother from adopting wet-nurse suckling for the third child (a great error); and an artificial diet of cow's milk was resorted to. The third day from commencing this plan, flatulence, griping, purging, and vomiting came on, one symptom quickly following the other; the child wasted, and on the sixth day had several convulsive fits. The diet was immediately changed for ass's milk, and in less than twelve hours the sickness and purging ceased; the flatulence was relieved; the motions, from being green, watery, and passed with great violence and pain, became of a healthy consistence and colour, and the screaming ceased. The symptoms did not return, the child thrived, very soon consuming regularly one quart of the ass's milk daily, and is now a fine healthy girl two years old. A fortnight since the parent was confined with a fourth child. Cow's milk was given to it for two or three days (from the difficulty of obtaining that of the ass), the same train of symptoms, precisely, came on with which the third child had been affected, which again gave way upon following up the same plan of diet—the substitution of the ass's milk for that of the cow. The evident conclusion from this is, that the breast-milk of a healthy woman is incomparably the most suitable diet for the infant; but that, if she be not of a healthy constitution, it may be destructive to the child; and that where this cannot be obtained, and cow's milk is found to disagree, ass's milk may sometimes be resorted to with the happiest results.[FN#8]

[FN#8] An infant will generally consume a quart, or a little more, of ass's milk in the four and twenty hours; and as this quantity is nearly as much as the animal will give, it is best to purchase an ass for the express purpose. The foal must be separated from the mother, and the forage of the latter carefully attended to, or the milk will disagree with the child.

Sometimes the mother's breast, and every description of milk, is rejected by the child; in which case recourse must be had to veal or weak mutton broth, or beef tea, clear and free from fat, mixed with a very small quantity of farinaceous food, carefully passed through a sieve before it is poured into the sucking-bottle.

THE MODE OF ADMINISTERING IT.—There are two ways—by the spoon, and by the nursing-bottle. The first ought never to be employed at this period, inasmuch as the power of digestion in infants is very weak, and their food is designed by nature to be taken very slowly into the stomach, being procured from the breast by the act of sucking, in which act a great quantity of saliva is secreted, and being poured into the mouth, mixes with the milk, and is swallowed with it. This process of nature, then, should be emulated as far as possible; and food (for this purpose) should be imbibed by suction from a nursing-bottle: it is thus obtained slowly, and the suction employed secures the mixture of a due quantity of saliva, which has a highly