OUR BABIES.

Waipa Post, Volume IV, Issue 152, 8 October 1912, Page 3

OUR BABIES.

By Hygeia. (Continued.) Published under the auspices of the 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 ambulance at the bottom.” WHY CAILDREN’S TEETH DECAY. In last week’s article I said : The jjlood supply to any part of the body is dependent mainly On the amount of work done in the particular area or organ and in its neighbourhood. Hence it is that when we work with our hands and stimulate the palms the circulation and food supply sent to nourish the cells is increased, and a thick horny layer is formed—a protective covering analogous to the enamel of teeth. Applying these considerations to the building of mouth, tongue, jaws, teeth, nose, and throat of a baby, we realise how it is that the Maori was so perfect in ail these respects, and that we on the contrary are so degenerate. FEEDING EXERCISE. Normal suckling involves at least two hours of active exercise a day. In the case of the Maoris, this was usually continued for about 18 months, whereas our women rarely nurse for more than hah the time, often for only a few months. There is no valid reason why bottle-fcccl-ing should not be so conducted as to afford ample exercise; but unfortunately the idea of exercise in connection with feeding rarely enters the mother’s head. MISTAKEN ADVICE. The following incident shows how completely oblivious the average woman is as to the need for baby to work hard at meal times. Some time ago a short pamphlet, intended to give simple, sound advice to mothers, carefully prepared by a committee of earnest women, was submitted to me for review, and the compilers were much surprised when I pointed out that their advice as to the artificial feeding of young babies was quite erroneous. In order to avoid the risks of germs and uncleanliness in connection with indiarubber teats, they thought to solve the difficulty by advocating that, however young the baby, it should be straightway fed by means of a spoon if the breast supply gave out.

BOTTLE-FEEDING—RIGHT AND WRONG. Of course there is bottle-feeding and bottle-feeding. The baby who imbibes his milk passively through a large hole in an indiarubber teat is no better qff as regards exercise .than a spoon-fed baby, and tends to be worse off as regards cleanliness.

One scarcely knows how to express one’s contempt for the woman who says impatiently, as one so often hears the modern mother say, “ Oh, I can’t spend /my time holding the bottle.” There is notaso-called “lower animal” that refuses to spare her offspring time to take its food, yet we often find the human mother declining to “waste her time” over her baby’s meal, though she would have had to do so, but for the fact that she lias failed to tit herself for natural motherhood. The greatest curse of babyhood ismaternal laziness and carelessness, super-added to failure on the part of the mother to iff herself to feed her offspring, in the natural way. By care and attention any woffign can do much to compensate the child for her qwq but the woman who says shj>‘* won't take the trouble ” to do so is,m<sre than unnatural; such conduct since it involves the add'tioU'bfuntold suffering and often death itf-The primary injustice done in Wiffg failed j;o supply the best food—."tfamely, mothers milk. The following extract from the Society’s book, “ What Baby Needs’” describes the best method of boUle-feeding,’