Page:Australian enquiry book of household and general information.djvu/153

 while waiting to go out, while talking to visitors, all these moments should be filled up. Teach the boys to draw, paint, model, make furniture for their sister's dolls, netting, or mecramèmacramé [sic] work (the latter is excellent work for boys). There are lots of things the boys can do to occupy themselves during the evenings while mother, or one of their number, reads aloud. Let sleeping rooms be well ventilated and thoroughly aired, never sleep in an impure room. Do not go to bed directly after studying hard, or if you do, take some light book, a novel, a magazine story, and read for a few minutes before trying to sleep, as the brain is apt to dwell upon the work last done unless distracted from it before sleep. A few turns up and down the verandah before going to bed is beneficial after studying hard. If after all sleeplessness ensues then try a wet bandage. Dip an ordinary rough towel in water, wring slightly and fasten it round the body over the region of the heart, and at once, over the towel wrap a flannel or flannel bandage so as to quite cover the towel. The effect in most cases is perfectly magical. I have been advocating these cold bandages to mothers at intervals for several years, both personally and in my newspaper writings. I have found them such a benefit, a God-send I may say, when I have had a restless fractious child that I would have all mothers to know of them, and I am sure that after one trial no mother will be without them at hand. I have used them successfully at all ages and seasons of childhood, from infants teething to lads over wearied with study, and have always found them work like a charm. Some people keep a length of linen or thick twill sheeting for the under bandage, but I consider the towel best as it is always handy, is the exact length required to go round easily, and is not so cold as the plain material. For the outside two yards of good flannelette folded to the right width makes as good a wrap as a better flannel. Doctors usually advise oiled silk for the outside bandage, but the flannelette answers the purpose just as well. Often merely putting a cold bandage round the left wrist will induce sleep. In using it with an infant, the whole towel is too large, so a piece should be torn from an old one and instead of dipping it in cold water (which would be too great a shock to a baby) wring it out of warm or tepid water, put it on as quickly as possible and the flannel over it before it gets cold. It is advisable to put the infant into a flannel night dress, or else wrap it in a warm shawl, and no matter how restless or feverish the baby is (provided it is not really in ill health or suffering from any pronounced fever) it will very soon become soothed and drop off to sleep. Try it upon yourself some night when restless and irritable and you will be astonished at its effect, and the delightfully soothing sensation that gradually overcomes you.