If Nature has prepared milk for the young animal, it is quite obvious that milk is its natural diet, during the period in which it is provided. The fact that shows clearly and convincingly the splendid food value of milk is that during the period of most rapid growth, in the lives of mammals, milk is the sole food. So efficient is it as a food that a baby ordinarily will double its weight in 180 days with no other article of food. A calf or colt doubles its weight in sixty days and a pig in ten to fifteen days on milk alone. It is equally apparent that the milk of the species of which any young animal belongs is the one best adapted to it.

Certain it is that nature did not intend the baby to chew food until its teeth are sufficiently developed to perform this function. Since they reach this stage of development at from twenty to twenty-four months after birth, there seems to be no earlier need for "solid" foods. If earlier need of such foods exist why does nature not supply the needed chewing equipment at an earlier period?

The natural indications are for an exclusive milk diet for at least the first two years. We add fruit juices, not because there is any need for them in nature's scheme of things, but because in our unnatural life, we do not supply them with milk of proper quality. Soft fruits may be used before the teeth are fully developed, but only after they are sufficiently developed to enable the child to mash these up well.

No other food except milk and fruit juices should be given the child for the first two years of its life. At about eighteen months of age soft fruits may, however, be added to the diet. These should form all or part of one meal a day. If four feedings have been indulged in up to this time one of these should now be stopped. No starchy foods or cereals should be given under two years. Artificial sweets--candies, cakes, pies, sugar, etc.,--should never be fed to children. It goes without saying that all food fed to infants and children should be fresh and pure. But we do well to remember that the most wholesome food soon become poisonous if taken in excess.

Investigations made in Boston a few years ago, showed that a breast-fed baby has six times the chance of living through the first year as a bottle-fed baby. Elsewhere I have shown the great percentage of infant deaths from gastro-intestinal disorders. Less than ten percent of the cases of death from "diarrheal causes" occur in breast-fed babies, while ninety percent of all infantile deaths are in the bottle-fed babies.

Breast-fed babies have a better start in life. This can be given them by no other means. As a class they are more vigorous and healthy and are more resistant to disease than bottle-fed babies. They develop into better and stronger children.

Statistics show that only two breast-fed babies contract the so-called contagious diseases where five bottle-fed babies do so, and that where such diseases are contracted the chances for recovery are greatly increased in the breast-fed baby as compared to the chances of the bottle-fed ones. Adenoids and enlarged tonsils are also more common among bottle-fed than among breast-fed babies.

American and English mothers are fast losing the capacity to nurse their babies. Investigations have shown that only 12 per cent of American babies are entirely breast-fed, while 28 per cent are absolutely bottle-fed and the residue from both breast and bottle, but many of these insufficiently from the breast. These young citizens get a bad start in life and the results show up very plainly when the call for men comes, as in the recent war. Hardly more than fifty per cent of the young men of this nation were found physically fit. In New Zealand, where breast feeding is the rule, the infant death rate is only half of that in America. This is significant and should lead mothers to a more wholesome mode of living to enable them to suckle their own children.

Nursing Baby

Nurse your child as long as you can. So long as it is thriving well on your milk this should form its food. If it does not thrive well on this alone, give it an orange juice and grape juice feeding each day, in addition to your own milk. Indeed I believe that with the poor milk supply of modern women, these juices should be fed even if the child does seem to thrive well. See directions in this chapter.

Supplement your own milk with cow's milk or goat's milk, if you must, but do not do so, unless this becomes necessary. Let your child nurse as long as possible, even though it gets only a small amount of its food from you. Up to five years, if you can supply it milk, do so.

Dr. Tilden says: "I am compelled to compromise with most mothers, and permit four feeds a day, and then the majority will sneak in an extra feed at night, which, of course, the baby has to pay for with occasional sick spells."

The Wet Nurse

The wet nurse, though now almost obsolete, has saved the lives of many children and deserves to be restored to her former position from which the cow has dislodged her. That the best food for an infant is that of its own mother is undoubted by those who are in a position to know. Next to this, is the milk of a healthy properly fed wet nurse. Indeed, where the mother's milk is defective, that of another woman will be best for the child.

Formerly, wet nurses were more plentiful than now, because there was more demand for them. Unnatural feeding had not then supplanted the natural method. Many babies can be saved if supplied with the milk of a wet nurse, who will be almost certain to die without it. Others that will eventually "pull through," in spite of artificial feeding, will be saved much illness and suffering and the parents will be spared much anxiety if a good wet-nurse is employed.

The qualifications for a wet-nurse are health and cleanliness. It makes no difference what her race, color or religion, or social status is. She imparts none of these to the child through her milk. In the South are many adults who were nursed at the breasts of "old negro mammies," and though we often hear the old mammies say "that boy sure must have some negro in him," it is not so. We do not become cows by drinking cow's milk.

The Wasserman test is unreliable clap-trap and syphilis is a frightful night-mare. Don't worry over this in choosing a wet nurse. See that she has good health and is cleanly. See that she is properly fed.

It does not hurt a child to be given milk from several women any more than it does to be given milk from several goats or cows. Breast milk, put on ice, will keep as well or better than cow's milk. It is also cleaner and more wholesome. Where a wet-nurse cannot be had, milk taken from more than one woman may be fed the child.

Hospitals, maternity homes, physicians and nurses can usually supply one with a wet nurse. In some of our larger cities, Boston for example, there is a directory for wet-nurses. One can usually be found if we seek diligently enough. An ad in the paper will often produce results.

Beginning Feeding

Real hunger seldom appears for two or three days after birth as is evidenced by the fact that the baby will be satisfied by a water diet. During this period nature does not provide real milk, but a secretion called colostrum, which probably serves several needs of the child and does not behave merely as a laxative, as it is usually supposed to do.

We hear of a so-called "inanition fever" that is supposed to develop in rare cases during this period, when it becomes necessary to feed the baby artificially. This is a medical fallacy and need not be considered here.

Some ignorant and ill-advised nurses and mothers, thinking it necessary to feed the baby during this period, when nature has not supplied food, give it cow's milk or sugar in water, or other "food." This is a needless and pernicious practice. The baby need not be put to the breast during the first twenty-four hours after birth.

Night Feeding

Feeding the baby at night prevents both mother and child from sleeping and teaches the child irregularity in sleep. Night feeding saps the mother in supplying the abnormal quantity of milk and in depriving her of sleep. When the mother's sleep is disturbed in this way, she is weakened and normal secretions are interfered with, resulting in an impairment of her milk. The impairment of the milk reacts unfavorably upon the child. Feeding at night is not only not necessary, it overfeeds and sickens the child.

Dr. Dewey says: "The last thing you should do before entering your beds at night is to nurse your child, and that should be the last nursing until the next morning." With the advice not to nurse the child during the night we fully agree, but the advice to nurse the child the last thing before retiring must be qualified. Women retire at different times of the night. Dr. Dewey adds: "As for night nursing it is entirely a matter of habit and a very bad one. There is absolutely no physiological need for food and a night of rest is no less important for the tender life than for the mother. If the habit has been formed it should always be broken and it will require only a short time in most cases."

Hunger Vs. Regularity

Regularity in feeding quickly establishes the stuffing habit. It teaches the infant to eat at certain times as a mere matter of habit, and not because there is a real demand for food. It prevents the development and regulation of natural desire which, alone is a reliable guide to frequency in feeding.

If the child does not relish or desire food it is folly to force or persuade it to eat anyway. Never compel a child to eat. If the child is uncomfortable wait until comfort returns before feeding. Children fed in this way will grow up strong and healthy and miss the so-called children's diseases. Overfeeding and wrong food combinations are responsible for most of the diseases peculiar to children. A little intelligent attention to proper feeding will avoid all of these.