WOMEN’S NOTES

Manawatu Standard, Volume XLIV, Issue 1179, 29 November 1924, Page 7

WOMEN’S NOTES

At Karori this week Mr and Mrs 11. Oook celebrated their golden wedding and at the same time honoured Mr Cook’s 80th birthday.

Miss Margaret Pitt-Morrison, Perth, has boert registered as art architect, and thus secures the distinction of being tho first qualified woman architect in the State of West Australia.

It was reported at the meeting of the Wellington Hospital Board this week that the following nurses sat for hospital final examination last month and all passed : A. P. Malcolm, M. E. 1.. Houghton. K. Berry, N. MacMillan, IC. M. Thomson, J. Fitzgerald, J. Dalziel, V. L. Griffon, V. M. Weaver, T. H. Sheridan, JO. S. McLeod, IC. Sievers, J. Robertson, and I. M. Field.

At the parish church of Wymington. in Bedfordshire, England, where restoration work is now going on, a mural picture has been discovered upon which many women are depicted wearing bobbed hair. The church was built in 1300, and the vicar believes that the picture is as old as the church. So bobbed hair is no new fashion, but is merely a revival of an old one. And probably these women of 500 years ago were merely copying the women of hundreds of years before. OUR BABIES. (By llygeia.) Published under tho auspices of the Royal New Zealand Society for tho Health of Women and Children. “It is wiser to put up a fence at the top of a precipice than to maintain an ambulance at the bottom.” FLUNICET METHODS. In recent articles, as the outcome of a letter from a grandmother, we have been discussing the pros and cons of waking a young; baby at 9 or 10 p.m. for its last feeding. We have known a good many cases in Englnnd, Australia and New Zealand in which, without any theory or special interest on the part of the mother, the baby hits never been fed between 6 p.m. end b a.iii. —the feeding being confined in some eases to only four feedings in the £4 hours. These babies have gone ahead at the normal rate; and, seeing that calves, which are suckled or bucket-fed only three times in the 24 hours, put on weight and condition just as quickly as those fed more frequently, the question naturally suggests itself whether there are any serious grounds for feeding the ordinary baby more often than, say, four times a day and wiving no feeding during darkness. It may bo mentioned that on tlie dairy farm it is a lucky calf that gets more than two feedings a day—morning ur.d evening. PEASANTS OF CORSICA. Pointing in the same direction, the French Consul and his wife, in a leading account of primitive life among the peasants earning their living among the mountainous tracts in Corsica. Breast-feeding being taken for granted, and the mothers having to be away all day at their work, the baby would be suckled only morning and evening and at bedtime. Yet we were assured that these children were characteristically strong, vigorous, and contented. What would these Corsican women think of our mid-Victorian mothers who drifted into feeding their babies 10 times in the 24 hours, and imagined that by doing so they were merely following the immutable laws of God and Nature?

Of course, it is very difficult for mothers to get rd of preconceived notions and prejudices which have no foundation in fact. One of the commonest fallacies one meets with among nurses and mothers is the notion that they can form a sound judgment as to whether a baby is getting enough food or not by observing certain signs or symptoms which they think infallibly indicate hunger or satiation of the natural appetite. They will say, for instance, that if a baby appears ravenous and vigorously sucks his lingers ne must be hungry arid needs more fool, and that if he drops off to sleep lontentoliy at halftime ho has probably taken enough. Yet the reverse may be the truth in both cases. The baby who is Habitually ovt rlec'i often has an abnormal craving for food (not true appetite), just as lakes place in the case of adults who suiter from chronic indigestion. On the other hand, the sleepy, too-easily-contented baby is not infrequently one who has drifted into the lazy habit of living on the fat stored tm in the cupboards of his body, who won t exert himself unless stimulated, to keep awake and take in the necessary supplies. How many of our mothers of 25 years ago realised —indeed, how nu.uy realise to-day—-the truths of such a paragnph as the following taken from the treatise of Dr Birk, a leading German authority on feeding throughout infancy:—“lri more than twothirds of the cases in which the physician iu consulted by the mother for the pi rpose of finding out whether her infant is receiving enough food, tiie concern of tho mother proves groundless The laitv quickly conclude that the infant- does not get enough to eat if it is restless or sucks its fists. Neither symptoms indicates underfeeding, an occurrence much more rare . than is commonly supposed. Further on he says concerrrng the baby who habitaully tends to take too little food: ‘The child falling asleep, one easily concludes that is satisfied, and it is taken away from the breast. In reality it is

hungry. Further developments ensue. The mother notices, after a time, that the baby is not growing well, and she now attempts to nurse it more frequently; no longer every four hours, perhaps, but every two. This always ends in failure, for now the infant, in addition, loses its appetite, and no longer nurses vigorously. With long continuance of inanition, the infant loses its agility; it is tired and drowsy; the skin becomes shrivelled and easily broken. It is a notable fact that the infant with chronic starvation is never restless. It is always quiet and seems content. Upon questioning the mother, one learns that it usually lies at tho breast a long time. In overy case the cause of the inanition must be determined. In practice one proceeds as follows the hour of feeding the infant is weighed; then it is allowed to nurse freely. Afterwards it is weighed again; tho difference gives tho amount of breastmilk taken. From this it is easy to make at least an estimate of (lie quantity of food taken in the 24 hours.” COMMENT. This single 1 lest weighing is much better than more guessing, which is, of course, quite wrong and unjustifiable. The only right tiling to do is to weigh such a baby before and after nursing for at least 24 hours so as to ascertain precisely how much is being drawn oft from the mother, so as to bo able to determine exactly how much tho baby needs in addition in the form of properly modified cow’s milk —in other words, some suitable form of humanised milk. What has been said above leaves out of account tho fact that what tho mother or nurse often assumes to be a sign or some quantitative or qualitative error in regal'd to baby's food or feeding is often nothing of the kind but is due simply to thirst or some other cause of craving, irritation, or discomfort. MISS COOK’S WEDDING. AN ALL-AUSTRALIAN PARTY. LONDON, Nov. 20. St, Clement Danes Was decorated witli chrysanthemums and autumn leaves, Australian fruit, and gum leaves, and the Anglo-Dominion flags for the wedding of Sir Joseph Cook’s daughter, Miss Winnie Cook, to Captain Robert Cook. There were two bridesmaids. Miss Constance Cook, and Miss Kirby. There were four trainbearers—two small girls, and two small boys. The bride wore a long straight gown of white satin, finished with a pearl girdle. The train of silver luce and ermine had a foundation of pale pink georgette. The tulle headdress was completed with a coronet of orange blossoms und madonnalike veil. . .

The bridesmaids were frockpd in pale pink taffetas, and wore Dutch caps. They carried posies of roses and forget-me-nots. The reception was held at Australia House, where Lady Cook received the guests. She wore a smart blue frock, and furs, and black hat. Her bouquet was of pink roses. Those present included Sir Littleton Groom, Mr W. R. Campion. Sir Newton Moore, Sir Archibald and Lady Weigall, Sir Hugh and Lady Denison, the Agents-General for the States, and Mrs W. A. Holman. Later Captain and Mrs R. S. Cook left for Morite Carlo, where tlie honeymoon will be spent. LET SUN DO IT. GOOD NEWS FOR- THE PLUMP. NEW YORK, Nov. 12. Mary Garden, the grand opera star, has returned from France 171 b lighter than when she departed from the United States. She now weighs eight stono. “My friends will bo surprised when they see mo at ‘Thais,’ ” she declared. “I have the waist of a wasp. I did it at Monte Carlo. 1 went out in a motor-boat two miles off the shore, stretched myself on the deck in a battling suit and let the sun do its worst.” BRITAIN’S HOUSING PROBLEM. LONDON, Nov. 28. Mr Neville Chamberlain, addressing a meeting of Conservative women in London, said tlie Government did not intend to repeal the Wheatley Housing Act, but preferred to let the Act hang itself with its own rope. The problem might be solved speedily by having houses produced in enormous numbers out of new materials in factories free from interruption by the weather. Sample houses would be built throughout the country so that the women could judge of the results. It was mentioned that a scheme for the erection of steel houses was recently advocated by Lord Weir.—-A. and N.Z. cable.