EFFECTS OF INTOXICATING AGENTS ON NURSES AND CHILDREN.
Women, especially in a low station, who act as nurses, are strongly
addicted to the practice of drinking porter and ales, for the purpose of
augmenting their milk. This very common custom cannot be sufficiently
deprecated. It is often pernicious to both parties, and may lay the
foundation of a multitude of diseases in the infant. The milk, which
ought to be bland and unirritating, acquires certain heating qualities,
and becomes deteriorated to a degree of which those unaccustomed to
investigate such matters have little conception. The child nursed by a
drunkard is hardly ever healthy. It is, in a particular manner, subject
to derangements of the digestive organs, and convulsive affections. With
regard to the latter, Dr. North[50] remarks, that he has seen them almost
instantly removed by the child being transferred to a temperate woman. I
have observed the same thing, not only in convulsive cases, but in many
others. Nor are liquors the only agents whose properties are communicable
to the nursling. It is the same with regard to opium, tobacco, and other
narcotics. Purgatives transmit their powers in a similar manner, so much
so, that nothing is more common than for the child suckled by a woman
who has taken physic, to be affected with bowel complaint. No woman is
qualified to be a nurse, unless strictly sober; and though stout children
are sometimes reared by persons who indulge to a considerable extent in
liquor, there can be no doubt that they are thereby exposed to risk, and
that they would have had a much better chance of doing well, if the same
quantity of milk had been furnished by natural means. If a woman cannot
afford the necessary supply without these indulgences, she should give
over the infant to some one who can, and drop nursing altogether. The
only cases in which a moderate portion of malt liquor is justifiable,
are when the milk is deficient, and the nurse averse or unable to put
another in her place. Here, of two evils, we choose the least, and rather
give the infant milk of an inferior quality, than endanger its health, by
weaning it prematurely, or stinting it of its accustomed nourishment.
Connected with this subject is the practice of administering stimulating
liquors to children. This habit is so common in some parts of Scotland,
that infants of a few days old are often forced to swallow raw whisky.
In like manner, great injury is often inflicted upon children by the
frequent administration of laudanum, paregoric, Godfrey’s Cordial, and
other preparations of opium. The child in a short time becomes pallid,
emaciated, and fretful, and is subject to convulsive attacks, and every
variety of disorder in the stomach and bowels. Vomiting, diarrhœa, and
other affections of the digestive system ensue, and atrophy, followed by
death, is too often the consequence.
An experiment made by Dr. Hunter upon two of his children, illustrates
in a striking manner the pernicious effects of even a small portion
of intoxicating liquors, in persons of that tender age. To one of the
children he gave, every day after dinner, a full glass of Sherry: the
child was five years of age, and unaccustomed to the use of wine. To
the other child, of nearly the same age, and equally unused to wine, he
gave an orange. In the course of a week, a very marked difference was
perceptible in the pulse, urine, and evacuations from the bowels of the
two children. The pulse of the first child was raised, the urine high
coloured, and the evacuations destitute of their usual quantity of bile.
In the other child, no change whatever was produced. He then reversed the
experiment, giving to the first the orange, and to the second the wine,
and the results corresponded: the child who had the orange continued
well, and the system of the other got straightway into disorder, as in
the first experiment. Parents should therefore be careful not to allow
their youthful offspring stimulating liquors of any kind, except in cases
of disease, and then only under the guidance of a medical attendant. The
earlier persons are initiated in the use of liquor, the more completely
does it gain dominion over them, and the more difficult is the passion
for it to be eradicated. Children naturally dislike liquors—a pretty
convincing proof that in early life they are totally uncalled for, and
that they only become agreeable by habit. It is, in general, long before
the palate is reconciled to malt liquors; and most young persons prefer
the sweet home-made wines of their own country, to the richer varieties
imported from abroad. This shows that the love of such stimulants is in
a great measure acquired, and also points out the necessity of guarding
youth as much as possible from the acquisition of so unnatural a taste.