OUR BABIES

Dominion, Volume 9, Issue 2652, 24 December 1915, Page 10

OUR BABIES

fBT HTGEU.I Published under the auspiccs o£ tl Royal New Zealand Health Society for tl Health of Women and Ohildren. "It is wiser to put up a fence at tlio to of ft precipice than to maintain an ambi lance at the bottom." Sleep tor Babies. "Anxious Mother" writes asking _m to give advice as to tho sleep requirt nients of babies. I must say I fc< somewhat ot a loss where to bogii the subject being so broad and fai reaching. In the first place, it should ho un derstood that therfj is a clear distinc tion between tho new-born babe an the adult in regard to the time need ed for the perfect rest and reoupern tion which only sleep can give. Th young baby should sleep 21 out of tli 24 hours; whereas an old adage assign to adults, "Six for a man, seven for woman, and eight for a fool." Why Babies Need So Much Sleep. Tho raunger the'baby the higher th' pressure at which, the vital macliiner; is run. A 101b. bab.V, needs to consum more than a,third of the nutriment rc quired by an average man in tho prim of life weighing 1601b.—that is_ to say •the baby, in proportion to ; its weight am size, has to digest and turn into blood bone, muscle, etc., or use up for heat ing 'purposes five' times as much fool as a. vigorous- adult. By .the time th< adult has reached '90 the vital pro cesses have so slowed down that l»i: total intake of food needs to ho ni mere than that of a year-old baby. What is true of. the relative 'feeding requirements of babies and adults i equally true of their breathing require pionts. We take air into our lungs ii order to burn our food, and thus kee] our vital machinery at work, and alst to keep ourselves warm; hence it i: that, as' Florence. Nightingale, wiseli said, a' baby has even greater need o: pure air thnn'an adult; and hence i 13 also that doctors have gradually comi to the conclusion, on scientific grounds that a baby'should have.as much room space as an adult. Working and Resting. The miracle of the body # is that ii I can koep iqn all through _ life working and resting at the same time. It usee to' be said that once tho heart hac started it was never allowed to stoi aiul rest asa long as life lasted; but new wb know that the heart rests betweer every beat—actually rests longer thar it works. And so it is with all th< organs. If they don't tak'o'long spell; from time to time, they must take frequent short spells, and this they do ir hitherto quite unsuspected ways, as in the oa6e of the heart. The Harder They Work the More the Need for Plenty of Sound Sleep. 'Seeing that tho baby's organs wort much more actively than those of anj adult, and that its tiny cells are always hard at it, not only in the way of burning and making the wheels go round, but also in_ tho way of giving birth tc countless' tiny baby .cells, and buildinp up brick by brick. Seeing that the baby's body is such a hive of industry, it follows naturally that theremust be plenty, of undisturbed sleep if justice is to be' done to the young baby. If all is tc> go well not only with tho baby's b'ody, but also with the developing mind and spirit, the mother must sacrifice anything rather than the sacred needs of her child. "For are not your bodies tho temples of the Holy Ghost?" "The Pictures" No Place for Babies. If women only understood the wrong thoy wero doing in taking babies (or, indeed, any young children) to picture palaces, there would, surely! be few oi them cruel enough to indulge themselves thus, at the expense or the helpless little things entrusted to their care and protection. The taking of infants to picture shows is one of the greatest wrongs of our modern civilisation; and if .'no other way can |be found of preventing vice of this kind, the Legislature should step in and make, it illegal to admit not only "infants in arms," but auy very young children.^ The same principle applies to all unnecessary travelling. and gadding about with batiies—to all breaking in on their appointed times. for sleep. Even with children up to five or six years of age, the "morning sleep" is precious, and every effort should be_ made to. safeguard this time from invasion. Of course, this will sound very exacting and old-fashioned'to a good, many ' self-indulgent, modern women ;• but -the true mothers, upon whom the future greatness of tho race depends, may be relied on not to fail the children in their hour of greatest need. How often one hears a woman say nowadays, "Oh. I'm not going to give , up everything for the baby!" Of course, there is no need "to give up everything"; but the spirit of being willing and, indeed, glad to giveup a for the sake of tho" child /HoiTsnp the very root of all true and / noWe /motherhood. ~ I Mr/. Earlo, who at 60 wrote her first „ book/ and became through her ""pouiri from a Surrey Garden," ,the intimate friend of tens of thousands of her/ fellow-women, says in her chapter, on "Daughters":— , In the days long ago, when my children were children, and, as is apt to be tho case when onetis sur- ( . rounded with a small, growing-up family, half tlio population of the world seemed to me to bo children, my thoughts were so centred on the subject that nothing else seemed to me of any great importance. Who can question that this .breathes the genuine l spirit that makes for national greatness —tho spirit whioh of all things is most needed by our women now in our hour . of . greatest stress, peril, and sacrifice of life? Tho following brief, but practical, noto is taken- from the society's book, "Feeding and Caro.of Baby":— SLEEP AND REST..I. kaby needs abundance of sleep. A newly-born baby normally sleeps ninetenths of its time!. At six months it should sleep two-thirds of the time. If it is sleepless, it is uncomfortable, duo most probably to its being dyspeptic, irregularly or too often fed, overfed or hungry, wet and cold, or oppressed by excess of bedclot'hing and over-heating ; or the nursery may be insufficiently ven. tilated; or baby may be suffering from thirst or irritation of 'the skin. "Children should be put to bed regularly at a reasonable hour. "It is well to continue the morning sleep or rest until the child is five or six years old, especially during the sumnier, when children wake early. This can' easily be accomplished if there is a little firmness on the mother's part. A short sleep or rest restores a child wonderfully, and the result is that there is no crossness or , fatigue at tho end of'the day." J" !'»■■ I"" Mr. Allen Doono announces in Sydney that ha is to sail for America an January '20. Something must have ujpset his plans, as lie is booked to play round here next. year. Ladies, when passing Herb Pr.ico's Store, Willis Street, s.eo the special window displays of Christmas gifts for gentlemen.—Advt. Britain's biggest bell is not Big !Bcn, but. Great Paul, which hangs iir St. Paul's Cathedral. It weighs neacly 17 tons, and is rung, by the comtoined oll'orts of four men. s. 6dA