A QUEER SWEDISH CUSTOM.

Lake Wakatip Mail, Issue 2280, 29 September 1899, Page 5

A QUEER SWEDISH CUSTOM.

The people of Sweden, mainly on account of their isolated position from the rest of Europe, still retain many of their peculiarities in dress and habits, particularly among the peasantry, and perhaps more so in the country of Dalecnrlia, on t he shores of Lake Sdjan, than in any other part of the con ntry.

When you 20 into a Swedish house your attention is instantly drawn to the great double bed in the corner of the room, for it is not a bedstead that you can move from place to place, but a solid fixture, forming a part of the framework of the house, with posts at the corners and a wooden shelf 011 top. From the shelf hang down snow white toweling*, embroidered with brigiitcoloured yarn, making a very artistic and pretty eikrt against the natural woodwork of the bed and walls. From the shelf also hangs a short, stoub strap or cord, terminating in a stirrupshaped handle that is used to take hold of when rising in the morning to hoist yourself up into a sitting position. After you hava feasted your eyes on this aesthetic piece of bedroom furniture you notice something like a small meal «ack surmounted by a chubby little head, with blue eyes and flaxen hair, stuck down in an upright position between the bedding and the side of the bed. You call the mother's attention to it as she sits by her hand loom, or spinning wheel, and she savs, " Oh, yes, that is the baby, and it is about time 1 wound it up.' In your astonishment you venture to ask if it is customary to wind up babies in Sweden as we wind up clocks to keep them in regular order for a week's time, when she will answer you with a smile. " Oh, no, not just the same, for we wind our babies oftener, generally three or more times a day. and if you have time I will show vou how we do it."

She then proceeds to take the baby from the bed and commences to unwind it —that is, to unfasten one end of a long linen band, about six or eight inches wide, and gradually to release it, either by turning the baby over and over or by passing the bund around the baby as it is being gradually unwound.

When fully released, it is given the freedom of its legs, arm?, and body for a short time, and after being washed and fed she proceeds to wind it up again with a fresh linen band.

Commencing at the feet the mother winds it tightly in a spiral manner upwards to the armpits, and sometimes the arm! are also laid close to the body, and the linen band passed around the arms and body, and round and round toward the feet again, and so on. until the little one is made nearly as stiff as a board, and put away either on the bed or between ic and the bedding in an upright [josition, as when we first discovered it

The process is continued until the child is from ten to twelve months old, and it is the universal custom in Sweden among all classes of the people from tho lowest to tho highest. Why do the Swedish women keep up to this very day this peculiar method of winding up their infants ? Ask them, and they will tell you that it is done for the purpose of making the children grow up tall and straight-limbed, and to prevent them from being hunchbacked or bowlegged, as well as to prevent their feet from turning inward, and, as a matter of fact, there seem to be fewer deformed people in Sweden th in in some other countries where this practice of winding the babies is not in use.

Whether or not the results are always aa anticipated is uncertain, but for all that you can never prevail upon a Swedish mother to give up her daily practice of winding up the baby.