With respect to Drink, physicians are decidedly against giving it to children in large quantities, and at irregular periods, whether it consists of the mother's milk, or any other equally mild liquid.
2037. Improper
It is improper and pernicious to keep infants continually at the breast; and it would be less hurtful, nay, even judicious, to let them cry for a few nights, rather than to fill them incessantly with milk, which readily turns sour on the stomach, weakens the digestive organs, and ultimately generates scrofulous affections.
2038. Liquids
In the latter part of the First Year, pure water, milk-and-water, or toast-and-water may occasionally be given. On no account should a young child be permitted to taste beer or wine, unless specially ordered by a medical man. Those parents who accustom their children to drink water only, bestow on them a fortune, the value and importance of which will be sensibly felt through life.
2039. Drinking with Meals
Many Children acquire a Habit of Drinking during their meals; it would be more conducive to digestion if they were accustomed to drink only after having made a meal. This salutary rule is too often neglected, though it is certain that inundations of the stomach, during the mastication and maceration of the food, not only vitiate digestion, but they may be attended with other bad consequences; as cold drink, when brought in contact with the teeth previously heated, may easily occasion cracks or chinks in these useful bones, and pave the way for their carious dissolution.