The care of the baby : a manual for mothers and nurses, containing practical directions for the management of infancy and childhood in health and in disease / by J. P. Crozer Griffith.

  • Griffith, J. P. Crozer (John Price Crozer), 1856-1941.
Date:
1903
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: The care of the baby : a manual for mothers and nurses, containing practical directions for the management of infancy and childhood in health and in disease / by J. P. Crozer Griffith. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University Libraries/Information Services, through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the the Augustus C. Long Health Sciences Library at Columbia University and Columbia University.

    170/462 (page 166)
    alone long after others are taking a diet somewhat like the list given for the age of eighteen months to two years. In such a case it is folly to alter the diet hastily. The weight and the general condition of the baby are far better guides than the number of months old which it hap- pens to be or the number of teeth cut. It is always very important, as previously pointed out, to make no changes during the hot weather when it is possible to avoid doing so. On the least disturbance of the digestion, too, the diet should be cut down to milk for a day or two. From the age of about two and a half years onward the child may sit at the table in its high chair with the fam- ily, or at a small table close to the mother if this is found desirable. If it never receives articles of diet not suited to it, it will soon learn not to ask for them. At the age of three years the child may have its diet considerably increased in variety, since it has now acquired powers of digestion much more like those of the adult. Some of the green vegetables are of advantage. It is very impor- tant at this age to prevent a child from helping itself to all sorts of edible articles both at the table and, especially, between meals. If it is really hungry, there is no objec- tion to its having some simple thing between meals, not sufficient in amount to lessen the appetite at the regular meal-time. It is impossible to give any series of distinct diet lists for the age of three years and onward, inasmuch as the child now eats selections from the food provided for the family in general. Care must be taken that it receives no indigestible, highly seasoned, or made-over dishes, and that it masticates slowly and thoroughly. The chief meal (dinner) ought always to be in the middle of the day, and the supper always light, as of bread and milk or cereals and milk, in order that sleep may be sound. Milk should still constitute a very large part of