Advice to a Mother on the Management of Her Children

by Pye Henry Chavasse

The food ought to be of the consistence of good cream, and should be made fresh and fresh. It ought to be given milk warm. Attention must be paid to the cleanliness of the vessel, and care should be taken that the milk be that of ONE cow, [Footnote: I consider it to be of immense importance to the infant, that the milk be had from ONE cow. A writer in the Medical Times and Gazette speaking on this subject, makes the following sensible remarks—"I do not know if a practice common among French ladies when they do not nurse, has obtained the attention among ourselves which it seems to me to deserve. When the infant is to be fed with cow milk that from various cows is submitted to examination by the medical man and if possible, tried on some child, and when the milk of any cow has been chosen, no other milk is ever suffered to enter the child's lips for a French lady would as soon offer to her infant's mouth the breasts of half a dozen wet-nurses in the day, as mix together the milk of various cows, which must differ, even as the animals themselves, in its constituent qualities. Great attention is also paid to the pasture, or other food of the cow thus appropriated.">[ and that it be new and of good quality, for if not it will turn acid and sour, and disorder the stomach, and will thus cause either flatulence or looseness of the bowels, or perhaps convulsions. The only way to be sure of having it from one cow, is (if you have not a cow of your own), to have the milk from a respectable cow keeper, and to have it brought to your house in a can of your own (the London milk cans being the best for the purpose). The better plan is to have two cans, and to have the milk fresh and fresh every night and morning. The cans, after each time of using, ought to be scalded out, and, once a week the can should be filled with cold water, and the water should be allowed to remain in it until the can be again required.

Very little sugar should be used in the food, as much sugar weakens the digestion. A small pinch of table-salt ought to be added to whatever food is given, as "the best savour is salt." Salt is most wholesome—it strengthens and assists digestion, prevents the formation of worms, and, in small quantities, may with advantage be given (if artificial food be used) to the youngest baby.

35. Where it is found to be absolutely necessary to give an infant artificial food WHILST SUCKLING, how often ought he to be fed?

Not oftener than twice during the twenty four hours, and then only in small quantities at a time, as the stomach requires rest, and at the same time, can manage to digest a little food better than it can a great deal. Let me again urge upon you the importance, if it be at all practicable, of keeping the child entirely to the breast for the first five or six months of his existence. Remember there is no real substitute for a mother's milk, there is no food so well adapted to his stomach, there is no diet equal to it in developing muscle, in making bone, or in producing that beautiful plump rounded contour of the limbs, there is nothing like a mother's milk alone in making a child contented and happy, in laying the foundation of a healthy constitution, in preparing the body for a long life, in giving him tone to resist disease, or in causing him to cut his teeth easily and well, in short, the mothers milk is the greatest temporal blessing an infant can possess.

As a general rule, therefore, when the child and the mother are tolerably strong, he is better without artificial food until he have attained the age of three or four months, then, it will usually be necessary to feed him with The Milk-water-and-sugar-of milk Food (see p 19) twice a day, so as gradually to prepare him to be weaned (if possible) at the end of nine months. The food mentioned in the foregoing Conversation will, when he is six or seven months old, be the best for him.

36. When the mother is not able to suckle her infant herself, what ought to be done?

It must first be ascertained, beyond all doubt, that a mother is not able to suckle her own child Many delicate ladies do suckle their infants with advantage, not only to their offspring, but to themselves. "I will maintain," says Steele, "that the mother grows stronger by it, and will have her health better than she would have otherwise She will find it the greatest cure, and preservative for the vapours [nervousness] and future miscarriages, much beyond any other remedy whatsoever Her children will be like giants, whereas otherwise they are but living shadows, and like unripe fruit, and certainly if a woman is strong enough to bring forth a child, she is beyond all doubt strong enough to nurse it afterwards."

Many mothers are never so well as when they are nursing, besides, suckling prevents a lady from becoming pregnant so frequently as she otherwise would. This, if she be delicate, is an important consideration, and more especially if she be subject to miscarry. The effects of miscarriage are far more weakening than those of suckling.

A hireling, let her be ever so well inclined, can never have the affection and unceasing assiduity of a mother, and, therefore, cannot perform the duties of suckling with equal advantage to the baby.

The number of children who die under five years of age is enormous—many of them from the want of the mother's milk. There is a regular "parental baby-slaughter"—"a massacre of the innocents"— constantly going on in England, in consequence of infants being thus deprived of their proper nutriment and just dues! The mortality from this cause is frightful, chiefly occurring among rich people who are either too grand, or, from luxury, too delicate to perform such duties; poor married women, as a rule, nurse their own children, and, in consequence reap their reward.