Page:Popular Science Monthly Volume 36.djvu/229

Rh the adult, but that it has also a much larger surface in proportion to the mass of its body, and will consequently be far more susceptible to cold. Cold feet cause a great amount of indigestion, and exposure of the large blood-vessels of the thigh during childhood frequently sows the seeds of kidney diseases, to develop in afterlife.

Insufficient clothing and much exposure to cold have the effect of making a child appear torpid, benumbed bodily and mentally, and it stands to reason that if its small powers are entirely consumed in merely keeping alive and fairly warm, no vital energy will be left for anything else, and a child has more to do than the adult: it has not only to repair waste, but it has to grow and make new tissue. But it must not be thought that I am a friend to coddling on the contrary, I believe that, once let a child be clothed from head to foot in wool, it may go out in almost any weather; and I am sure that most nurseries would be healthier by being kept cooler. I know that I shall have the cottage children held up to me as examples of the hardening system; I shall be told to observe their rosy cheeks, their sturdy limbs. As a matter of fact, I don't much believe in them. Our hospitals are full of cottage children—poor little creatures, mostly suffering from exposure and bad feeding! The reason that the strongest live is that they live in the open air, and it is a common thing to hear a poor woman say in response to your inquiry as to her children: "I've got five, ma'am; I've buried four." The largest mortality occurs in children under one year old; and in Russia, I believe, chiefly owing to the intense cold in winter, the death-rate among children is something appalling. In England infant mortality is greatest in hot summer and autumn—from diarrhœa—largely owing to badness of milk kept in dirty vessels.

In concluding this part of my paper, I may remark that a mother should remember the old proverb that prevention is better than cure, and that, by daily careful supervision of her child, she may save him from much that the unfortunate child of a careless mother has to endure, and may also console herself, when unavoidable illness comes, that she has done all that lies in her power to provide her child with health and strength to resist disease.

As soon as a child is old enough to develop a will of its own, the first thing it does is to try and get its own way, and one of the earliest lessons it has to learn is that it can only have its own way when it is compatible with the comfort and rights of others; and even a mere baby will soon find out how far it may encroach on the kindness or weakness of those around it.

As we are none of us born models of virtuous behavior, some