CARE OF THE FRAME.
We have seen something of the influence of the infant upon others: now
let us see what others can do for it.
Here is a little creature containing within itself the germs of all
those powers which have before been described; but with all these powers
in so feeble a state that months and years of nourishing and cherishing
under the influences of Nature are necessary to give it the use of its
own powers. What its parents can do for it, and all that they can do for
it, is to take care that it has the full advantage of the influences of
Nature. This is their task. They cannot get beyond it, and they ought
not to fall short of it.
Nature requires and provides that the tender frame should be nourished
with food, air, warmth and light, sleep and exercise. All these being
given to it, the soft bones will grow hard, the weak muscles will grow
firm; the eye will become strong to see, and the ear to hear, and the
different portions of the brain to feel, and apprehend, and think; and
to form purposes, and to cause action, till the helpless infant becomes
a self-acting child, and is on the way to become a rational man. What
the parents have to do is to take care that the babe has the best of
food, air, warmth, and light, sleep and exercise.
First, of food. About this there is no possible doubt. The mother's milk
is the best of food. What the mother has to look to is that her milk is
of the best. She must preserve her own health by wholesome diet, air,
and exercise, and by keeping a gentle and cheerful temper. Many a babe
has had convulsions after being suckled by a nurse who had had a great
fright, or had been in a great passion: and a mother who has an
irritable or anxious temper, who flushes or trembles with anger, or has
her heart in her throat from fear of this or that, will not find her
child thrive upon her milk, but will have much to suffer from its
illness or its fretfulness. She must try, however busy she may be, to
give it its food pretty regularly, that its stomach may not be
overloaded nor long empty or craving. An infant does not refuse food
when it has had enough, as grown people can do. It will stop crying and
suck, when its crying is from some other cause than hunger: and it will
afterwards cry all the more if an overloaded stomach is added to the
other evil, whatever it may be. Of the contrary mischief--leaving a babe
too long hungry--there is no need to say anything. And when the weaning
time comes, it is plain that the food should be at first as like as
possible to that which is given up; thin, smooth, moderately warm,
fresh, and sweet, and given as leisurely as the mother's milk is drawn.
It is well known that milk contains, more curiously than any other
article of food, whatever is necessary for nourishing all the parts of
the human body. It contains that which goes to form and strengthen the
bones, and that which goes to make and enrich the blood--thereby causing
the soft bones of the babe to grow stiff and strong, and its heart to
beat healthily, and its lungs to play vigorously, and its muscles to
thicken and become firm. While all this is going on well, and the child
shows no need of other food, there is nothing but mischief to be looked
for from giving it a variety for which it is not prepared. Milk, flour
and water are its natural food while it has no teeth to eat meat with,
and vegetables turn sour on its stomach. As for giving it a bit or sip
of what grown persons are eating and drinking--that is a practice too
ignorant to need to be mentioned here.
Next comes air. Here, as usual, we have to consult Nature. There is an
ingredient in the air which is as necessary to support human breathing
as to feed the flame of a candle. Where there is too little of it, the
flame of a candle burns dim; and where it is not freely supplied to a
human frame, it languishes, and pines and sickens. A constant supply of
pure air there must therefore be. If the house is close, if the room is
too long shut up, with people in it who are using up that ingredient of
the air, they will all, and especially the babe, languish and pine and
sicken. Every morning, therefore, and during the day, there must be
plenty of fresh air let in to replace that which has been spoiled by
breathing; and in fine weather, the babe should be carried into the open
air every day. But Nature also points out that we must avoid extremes in
giving the child air, as well as food. We see sometimes how a babe grows
black in the face if carried with its face to the wind, or whisked down
stairs in a draught. Its lungs are small and tender, like the rest of
it, and can bear even fresh air only when moderately given. By a little
care in turning its face away from the wind, or lightly covering its
head, a child may be saved from being half strangled by a breeze out of
doors; while care will, of course, be taken within doors to keep it out
of the direct draught from door or window.
As for light--we do not yet know so much as we ought about the relation
between light and the human frame. I believe some curious secrets remain
to be discovered about that. But we do know this much--that people who
live in dark places, prisoners in dungeons, and very poor people in
cellars, and savages in caves who do not go abroad much, are not only
less healthy than others, but have peculiar diseases which are
distinctly traceable to deficiency of light. My own conviction is that
we grown people can hardly have too much light in our houses; and that
we are, somehow or other, alive almost in proportion to the sunshine we
live in. But we must observe, at the same time, the difference which
Nature makes between the infant and adults. The infant's eyes are weak,
and its brain tender; so that, while there is plenty of light about its
body, we must take care that there is not too much directly before its
eyes. If held opposite a strong sunshine, it will squint if it does not
cry, or by some means show that the light is too much for its tender
brain.
As to warmth--everybody knows that a babe cannot have that constant
warmth which is kept up in older persons by constant activity. Its
little feet require frequent warm handling; and its lips often look blue
when everybody else in the room is warm enough. By gentle chafing and
warming it must be kept comfortable during the day, without being shut
up in a hot room, or scorched before the fire. As for the night--its
warmth should be secured by sufficient clothing, in a little bed of its
own, as early as possible, rather than by lying with its mother, which
is far too common a practice. It may be necessary, in extremely cold
weather, to take the child into bed for warmth; but even then, the
mother should not sleep till she has put it back, warm and well covered,
into its own bed. I need say nothing of the horror we feel when, every
now and then, we hear of a miserable mother whose child has been
overlaid. That accident happens oftener than many people know of. But,
besides that danger, the practice is a bad one. The child breathes air
already breathed; it soaks in the perspiration of its mother. If its
state is healthful, its natural sleep will keep it warm, supposing its
bedding to be sufficient; while it is likely to be too hot, and not to
breathe healthfully, if laid close by another person. In all seasons,
its clothing should be loose enough to allow of a free play of its
limbs, and of all the movements within its body--the beating of the
heart, the heaving of the lungs, and the rolling of the bowels, to go on
quite naturally. By careful management, an infant may be kept in a state
of natural warmth, night and day, through winter and summer; as every
sensible mother knows.
The little frame must be exercised. Every human function depends on
exercise for its growth and perfection. A person who lives almost in the
dark has little use of his eyes when he comes into the light; an arm
hung in a sling becomes weak, and at last useless; a talent for
arithmetic or music becomes feebler continually from disuse. To make the
most therefore of the frame of a human being, it must be exercised--some
of its powers from the beginning, and all in their natural order. We
must take care, however, to observe what this natural order is, or,
judging by our present selves, we may attempt too much. We must
remember that the infant has to begin from the beginning, and that its
primary organs--the heart, lungs, and brain--have to become accustomed
to moderate exercise before anything further should be attempted. At
first, it is quite enough for the infant to be taken up and laid down,
washed and dressed, and carried about a little on the arm. When the
proper time comes, it will kick and crow, and reach and handle, and look
and listen. Its very crying, if only what is natural to express its
wants, is a good exercise of those parts intended to be used afterwards
in speaking and making childish noises. Poor Laura Bridgman, the
American girl, who early lost both eyes and the inner parts of the ears,
and cannot hear, see, smell, or taste, and whose mind is yet developed
by means of the sense of touch, said a thing (said it by finger
language) which appears to me very touching and very instructive. Not
being able to speak, she was formerly apt to use the organs of speech in
making odd noises, disagreeable to people about her. When told of this,
and encouraged to try to be silent, she asked--"Why, then, has God given
me so much voice?" Her guardians took the hint, and gave her a place to
play in for some time every day, where she can make as much noise as she
likes--hearing none of it herself, but enjoying the exercise to her
organs of sound. What Laura does now, an infant does by squalling, and
children do by shouting and vociferating at their play. Their parents,
it must be remembered, are talking for many hours while they are asleep.
Other exercises follow in their natural course--the rolling and tumbling
about on a thickly wadded quilt on the floor (saving the busy mother's
time, while teaching the child the use of its limbs)--feeling its feet
on the lap, and learning to step, scrambling up and down by the leg of
the table, pulling and throwing things about, imitating sounds, till
speech is attained--these are the exercises which nature directs, and
under which the powers grow till the mother can see in her plaything the
sailor who may one day rock at the mast-head, or the stout labourer who
may trench the soil, or the gardener who will name a thousand plants at
a glance, or the teacher who will bring out and train a hundred human
intellects. What she has to look to is that the powers of her child are
all remembered and considered, and exercised only in due degree and
natural order.
After exercise comes sleep. If all else go well, this will too. If the
child digest well, be warm, sufficiently fatigued and not too much--in
short, if it be comfortable in body, it will sleep at proper times. One
of the earliest pieces of education--of training--is to induce a babe to
sleep regularly, and without the coaxing which consumes so much of the
mother's time, and encourages so much waywardness on the part of the
child. If a healthy child be early accustomed to a bed of its own, and
if it is laid down at a sleepy moment, while the room is quiet, it will
soon get into a habit of sleeping when laid down regularly, in warmth
and stillness, after being well washed and satisfied with food. The
process is natural; and it would happen easily enough if our ways did
not interfere with Nature. By a little care, a child may be attended to
in the night without fully awakening it. By watching for its stirring,
veiling the light, being silent and quick, the little creature may be on
its pillow again without having quite waked up--to its own and its
mother's great advantage.
Cleanliness is the removal of all that is unwholesome. Nature has made
health dependent upon this, in the case of human beings of every age:
and the more eminently, the younger they are. One great condition of an
infant's welfare is the removal of all discharges whatever, by careful
cleansing of the delicate skin in every crease and corner, every day;
and of all clothing as soon as soiled. The perpetual washing of an
infant's bibs, &c., is a great trouble to a busy mother; but less than
to have the child ill from the smell of a sour pinafore, or from wet
underclothes, or from a cap that holds the perspiration of a week's
nights and days. It is a thing which must be done--the keeping all pure
and sweet about the body of the little creature that cannot help itself;
and its look of welfare amply repays the trouble all the while.
Such are the offices to be rendered to the new-born infant. They consist
in allowing Nature scope for her higher offices. By their faithful
discharge, the human being is prepared to become in due season all that
he is made capable of being--which may prove to be something higher than
we are at present aware of.