OUR BABIES.

Oamaru Mail, Volume XLIV, Issue 14008, 12 March 1920, Page 6

OUR BABIES.

By Hygeia. . - Published under the auspices of the Royal New Zealand Society ( for the Health of Women and Children. "It is wiser to put up a fence at the top of a precipice than to maintain an amonlance at the bottom." DIGESTIBILITY OF FOOD. (Continued from last week.) • F«rst ol all we shall, recapitulate what was said last week. Excessive so-called '"digestibility" ot food, whether achieved by partial predigestion or not,, is the reverse of beneficial in the caise ol healthy normal people. To make this point clear I have drawn up the following table:— Foods popularly Foods popularly regarded as di- regarded as regeatible.*' latively "indigestible," if compared with the foods placed opposite. Peptonised " Breand and milk, peptonised Cheese" say milk gruel; cheese.— eaten with :i crust of wholemeal bread, or with plain oat cake or biscuit. Milk, milk puddings, custards, etc. (Clear soups, beef tea, calf's foot jelly, etc., might be placed under the same category, but they contain so small a proportion of nutrient material that they should be regarded as appetising or raildy stimulating drinks or relishes, rather than as supplying appreciable food. Thus the nutritive, building. or sustaining powers of the Tood * stuffs contained in - :i whole bucketful of beef tea or good clear soup are not equivalent lo those of single quart of milk.) White bread. "Wholemeal bread. Well boiled roll- Plain oat. cake: fii oats or oatmeal.nuts or almonds. Delicate while oroper (hapukai fish; or schnapper. Sweetbread.:" Ordinary roast tripe: breast of mutton, or roast chicken; or very beef, not specially tender mutton. tender. Baked apple, Raw apple, stewed i' rui ts, other raw fruits, cooked vegetables, salads. * In order to understand the meaning and full significance of the above table, read at this stage the section ''Farreaching Effects of Masticatory Exercise" in the Society's book "Feeding and Care of Baby," pages 14G to 148. The foods in the second column are fiot really indigestible, but for the most part they need, thorough mastica-

tion. Provided this is carried out they I are. in a sense, really more digestible 1 as a whole than the foods in the first column, because the latter do not ensure enough work, especially on the mouth, jaws, teeth, and salivary glands: and most of thenkdo not leave enough unabsorbable. debris to ensure proper action of the bowels—the common result of these two defects being constipation, fermentation of the contents of stomach and bowels, flatulence, and. in a word, "indigestion." It is not suggested for a moment that a nursing mother, however strong, .should confine herself to the class of foods given in the right-hand column, but that she should take a considerable proportion of food needing thorough chewing and insalivation. A reasonable choice from both columns would form a sronu diet. The most questionable articles mentioned in the second column are cheese and salads. A little plain, - good ciieddar cheese (not strong or very rich cheese, such as Stilton) is regarded as beneficial to the nursing mother, especially if she has been iii the habit of taking cheese, and it has been found . to agree. Of course it should be avoided if any tendency to ■disagree has been noticed. Cheese does not ayree with some persons owing to special idiosnycracies on their p:jrt. It should be well masticated with crust or brown bread. Tender salad, taken with

little if any "dressing," is generally beneficial, if used in moderation, and thoroughly masticated. Here again previous habits and experience form helpful guides. VEGETABLE MARROW.'

Where does marrow come in, and how is it that our corres|>ondent has found this vegetable indigestible? . If marrow is eaten in the very young, green state —in the stage at which we rut cucumbers, the stage before the seed* have properly formed and while the flesh is free from fibre if used then, marrow is quite easily digested. True, the direct nutritive value is -almost nil (only about a tenth that of au equal bulk of potato), but such foods are valuable on other grounds. To those wlii) like them, young marrows afford the stimulus of enioyment common - to all pleasant and platable changes of food. Further, they tend to prevent over-eating, and supply a certain

amount of soft, unabsorbable residue for the bowel to work on. Finally, they are a source of wholesome salts similar to those present in the growing tissues of' all green young vegetables. It is not probable that the marrow which disagreed with our correspondent was oaten at the early stage. I assume it had l>een allowed to ripen to the yellow. more or less mealy condition, in

which there is liable to lie a good deal of firmer, more fibrous tissue, and the wliole vegetable has l>eeome "stronger'' in taste and coarser in texture. Tn this condition there would be much more chance of disagreement. This might arise from the simple need for mere thorough mastication, or it might 1m- due to the deve]opment of chemical substances, not trying to most people, but liable to specially affect certain individuals. The first'difficulty would nrobablv be overcome by more thorough mastication. and the second would also tend

to be minimised by paying strict attention to- all-round liygiene( mastication, fresh air. exercise, etc.). hilt there are cases where people cannot take wiili impunity certain articles of diet which are quite innocuous as renards the great majority of human beings. Common examples are tomatoes, rhubarb, stone fruits. strawberries, potatoes, hr.ney. cane sugar, shellfish, game. etc. The practical question whether our corresnondent should cive up eating Vegetable marrow or try to habituate herself (and indirectly her babv as u'ell) to its use. is one which could only be satisfactorilv determined by takiry into consideration all the facts noted above.

If. in spite, of all precautions, fullgrown marrow, eaten in moderation, still tends to disagree, it would be wise to cease taking it. esoeciallv while nursing, because the babv might have a similar idiosyncrasy to the mother. Tn this particular case, some substance derived from the marrow, finding its way through the mother's milk into the Mikml and tissues of her child, might up>et both in the same way. . On the other hand, where fruit and vegetables are scarce, it is a pitv to srive no one which is relished and .wlArh. mnv b«. disagreeiiia simply because it needs more m-istiration -fa form of exereise which would rreatlv benefit the mother in other directions as well), or because the vegetable needs gathering -at an earlier stage, or nerhnps requires cooking differently. Many people bake marrow under meat, and thus saturate it with tat instead of boiling it. Finally, there is a very potent reason for a particular food disagreeing, which may obtain in our correspondent's cas" —namely, "worry" and what is called

"auto-suggestion." Tf a person form a conclusion that anything is_ going fo disacrce. and thinks or woros over the point, the probability is that digestion will l>e unset- whenever the narticular viand which, gives rise to this anxious expectancy is taken. Many cases'supposed to illustrate the saying "One man's food is another man's noison" are reallv dne to this factor. Moral— DON'T WORRY: