Advice to a Mother on the Management of Her Children

by Pye Henry Chavasse

The windows ought to be large, and should be made to freely open both top and bottom. Whenever the child is out of the nursery, the windows ought to be thrown wide open; indeed, when he is in it, if the weather be fine, the upper sash should be a little lowered. A child should be encouraged to change the room, frequently, in order that it may be freely ventilated; for good air is as necessary to his health as wholesome food, and air cannot be good if it be not frequently changed. If you wish to have a strong and healthy child, ponder over and follow this advice.

I have to enter my protest against the use of a stove in a nursery. I consider a gas stove without a chimney to be an abomination, most destructive to human life. There is nothing like the old-fashioned open fire-place with a good-sized chimney, so that it may not only carry off the smoke, but also the impure air of the room.

Be strict in not allowing your child either to touch or to play with fire; frightful accidents have occurred from mothers and nurses being on these points lax. The nursery ought to have a large fire-guard, to go all round the hearth, and which should be sufficiently high to prevent a child from climbing over. Not only must the nursery have a guard, but every room where he is allowed to go should he furnished with one on the bars.

Moreover, it will be advisable to have a guard in every room where a fire is burning, to prevent ladies from being burned. Fortunately for them, preposterous crinolines are out of fashion: when they were in fashion, death from burning was of every-day occurrence; indeed, lady-burning was then to be considered one of the institutions of our land!

A nursery is usually kept too hot; the temperature in the winter time ought not to exceed 60 degrees Fahrenheit A good thermometer should be considered an indispensable requisite to a nursery. A child in a hot, close nursery is bathed in perspiration; if he leave the room to go to one of lower temperature, the pores of his skin are suddenly closed, and either a severe cold or an inflammation of the lungs, or an attack of bronchitis, is likely to ensue. Moreover, the child is both weakened and enervated by the heat, and thus readily falls a prey to disease.

A child ought never to be permitted to sit with his back to the fire; if he be allowed, it weakens the spine, and thus his whole frame; it causes a rash of blood to the head and face, and predisposes him to catch cold.

Let a nurse make a point of opening the nursery window every time that she and her little charge leave the nursery, if her absence be only for half an hour. The mother herself ought to see that this advice is followed, pure air is so essential to the well-being of a child. Pure air and pure water, and let me add, pure milk, are for a child the grand and principal requirements of health.

Look well to the DRAINAGE of your house and neighbourhood. A child is very susceptible to the influence of bad drainage. Bad drains are fruitful sources of scarlet fever, of diphtheria, of diarrhoea, &c. "It is sad to be reminded that, whatever evils threaten the health of population, whether from pollutions of water or of air,—whether from bad drainage or overcrowding, they fall heaviest upon the most innocent victims—upon children of tender years. Their delicate frames are infinitely more sensitive than the hardened constitutions of adults, and the breath of poison, or the chill of hardships, easily blights their tender life."—The Times.

A nursery floor ought not to be washed oftener than once a week; and then the child or children should, until it be dry, be sent into another room. During the drying of the floor, the windows must, of course, be thrown wide open.

The constant wetting of a nursery is a frequent source of illness among children. The floor ought, of course, to be kept clean; but this may be done by the servant thoroughly sweeping the room out every morning before her little charge makes his appearance.