OUR BABIES

Dominion, Volume 10, Issue 3113, 18 June 1917, Page 3

OUR BABIES

fB? HYGin.l Published under the auspices, of tho Kocicty for the Health of Women ami OMldrcn. "It. is wiser to put tip a, fence at tnn top of a precipice than to miilulnin an ambulance ut the bottom." THE WAR AND BABIKS. One can scarcely pick up a paper at. Iho present time from .any part of tliii world which doe.-, not concern itself with problems of motherhood aud babyhood from the. national point or view. Nothing is more curious in Hue direr(ion than the way in winch men of Ihe highest standing. In all walks of life, arc coming forward to champion tho child and demand that it Khali hiive its full rmhts. No little person in the nursery Is so email or unimportant nowadays as to bo deemed unworthy of serious consideration on tlie part of male mankind. Our lords and masters no longer say,to us women, ne they did in Herbertßpcucor'B day. Oh, T leave all those thintrs to tho women — with the implication in tone and manner that lo show interest, in the healthy renrIng or little children was :i matter not consistent with mo-scutlnc dipuity. What, is bringing man to realise that, bahies—even other \ people's babies—arn rwilly Interesting and worthy of serious attention? It is the war that has forced the baby to the front, the child being tho father of the man, and strong men and women beinff needed if onr nation is to hold its own. How much safer would tho British Empire stand to-day if tie nation had paid heert 50 years ago to Herbert Bpencer's pnssionnte plea for tlie right of the child to be well'reared. Conld anything be more amazingly significant or prophetic than the following passage:— Physical Fitness. To be n, nation of "good animals" is tho first condition to national prosperity. Not only is it that, the event, of a war often turns on the strength nnd hardiness of soldiers, but it Is that the contests of commerce, arc in part determined by the bodily endurance of producers. Thus fur we havefound no reason to fear trials oF stro_n?th with other races in cither of these fields. But. there are pood wanting signs that our powers will presently bo taxed to tho uttermost. And this was written half a, century before George V became King! I hnve purposely quoted tho conclusion beforo tho preamble. Now let me give some extracts from what led up to Spencer's plea. Why Not the Cult of the Human Being. Equally at tho Bciuire's table after tho withdrawal of the ladies, at tho market and i.it the fillago alehouse, the topio which excites the most geueral iutcroßt is the management of auimaln. . . . Take the adult males throughout the kingdom, and a great majority will bo found u> show some interest in the breeding, rearing, or training of animals of one kind or other. But during after-dinner conversations, or at other times of like intercourse, who hears anything said about the rearing of children? ... On croascinmination nearly every "man, would disclose the latent opinion that the regimen of tho nursery was no concern of his. "Oh, I leavo- all these things to the women!" The fact seems strange that, while the raising of fli'st-ratc bullocks is an occupation on which educated men willingly bestow much time and thought, the bringing up of fine liuman beings is an occupation tacitly voted unworthy of their attention. . . . Meanwhile tho fathers read books and periodicals, attend agricultural meetings, try experiments, and engage in discussions, all with the view to discovering how to fatten prize pigs I Had Gulliver narrated of the Laputans that tho men Wed with each other in loarning how best to rear their own offspring, he would bavo paralleled any of the other absurdities ho ascribes to them.

What Knowledge is o£ Most. Worlh. But it is under the above heading in an curlier chapter that Spencer's irony is most, scathing:

If by Bomc strange cbance not a vestige of us descended to the remote future save a pile of our school books or some examination papers, we may imagine how puzzled an antiquary of the period would be on finding in them no sign that tho learners were ever likely to be parents. '"This must have been the curriculum for their celibates," we may fancy him concluding. "I percei/o here an elaborate preparation for many things, especially for reading the books of extinct nations and of co-existing nations, but I find no reference whatovor to tho bringing up oJ children. They could not have been eo absurd as to omit all training for this gravest of responsibilities. Evidently, then, this was tho school course of one of their monastic orders.

Seriously, is it not an astonishing fact that though on the treatment of oHepring depend their lives or deaths.

. . . yet not one word of instruction on the treatment of offspring is ever given to those who will by-and-by bo parents? Is it not. monstrous that the' fate of a new generation should be left to tho chances of unreasoning custom, impulse, fancy, joined with the suggestions of ignorant nurses and tho prejudiced counsel of grandmothers?

Massacre of the Innocents. \ To tens of thousands that arc killed odd hundreds of thousands that survive with f(;eble constitutions, and millions that crow up with constitutions not so strong as they should be, and you will have some idea of the curse inflicted on their oHfinring by parcDta ienora-nt of the laws of lite.