clogged with evaporated perspiration. In the case of infants I recommend a tepid bath with soap twice daily, and for older children a tepid or nearly cold bath every morning, and a hot bath at night once a week, or oftener if possible, but always at bedtime. Cold baths ought always to be taken in the morning, and hot baths at night. In giving cold baths to children, great care must be taken that the child does not remain in the water too long, or reaction will not follow the shock; the child shivers, the limbs are cold and numb, and as a necessary result congestion of the brain or internal organs results. The circulation of the blood is ever varying in force at different times in different situations: we may take as an example of this the feeling of cold experienced when the blood is driven from the surface by the shock of cold air or water; after which, if the shock be not too severe, or too much animal heat be removed from the body, the blood rushes back like a wave, as it were, to the surface, and a most delightful glow is the result, whilst during the process the nerves concerned in carrying out these phenomena receive a healthy stimulus. It may be accepted as a rule that two minutes is quite long enough for a child to remain in cold water. And in winter, when the water is much colder than in summer, if the chill is not taken off by the addition of a little warm

water, a plunge in and out is all that ought to be permitted where this cannot be carried out, a sponging bath can always be obtained; and I wish particularly to impress upon mothers the necessity of cold or tepid bathing, if they wish to see their children well nourished by their food. After drying, a rough towel should be briskly rubbed all over the body, and particularly down the back, and the child will be ready to enjoy his breakfast as soon as he comes from the bath.

EXERCISE AND REST.

If the weather be fine, children ought to take daily exercise out of doors; those children are invariably most healthy, and digest their food best, who live almost entirely in the open air. Care must be taken to prevent too violent exercise, especially under a hot sun, children being especially liable to attacks of congestion of the brain, often very serious in their results. For this reason the head should always be protected, if a straw hat be worn, by a "puggaree" or sun bonnet, or the old-fashioned cabbage leaf in the crown of the hat or bonnet. The precise amount of exercise taken must be regulated by parents according to the physique of the child: three or four hours daily ought certainly to be spent out of doors, until the child is of an age to go to school, when so much time can

scarcely be spared for that purpose. It will be found that children who have not been forced at home, make more progress at school than those infant prodigies who have been at once the delight of their mistaken parents and the horror of every one else. All precocious children turn out feeble men and women, and the greatest minds have been found in those who as children have been considered backward for their age. In determining the amount of physical and mental work to be done, the regularity of nature ought to be sedulously copied, and regular intervals of rest between the periods of activity observed. The old adage, “ All work and no play makes Jack a dull boy," is true, inasmuch as he becomes puny in mind, stunted in body, and priggish in disposition; but if I were to supply a converse to the proposition, I might say, "All play and no work makes Jack a young Turk," because he lacks discipline and self-control, of all qualities the most difficult to obtain, and in which a child must be trained from earliest infancy; and so, in considering the question of education, as indeed in all others, "the happy medium" is that which we must strive to preserve. Change of air should be obtained as often as possible during the year, and sea air should be preferred, especially in the case of pallid children. The sea air, laden with its beautiful salts in minute subdivision, infuses new

life into the poor little weakling; the dull eye begins to brighten, the pale cheek becomes tinted with colour, the appetite improves, the dragging step becomes elastic, and all these changes are produced by sea air. I may be said to be enthusiastic, but "we speak that which we do know," and I have experienced fully all that I have described.

THE EDUCATION OF CHILDREN.

This is a subject on which every parent holds different opinions, and it would be useless for me to do more than to point out the evil effects upon the stomach of too close or prolonged application, and, indeed, a similar effect is produced upon the whole system. It must always be borne in mind. that the brain, through the medium of the sympathetic nervous system, exercises a most marked and important influence over the stomach, both as regards the desire for food and the capability of digesting it.

In the appendix will be found some simple forms of medicine suited for children.

THE STOMACH IN YOUTH.

THE next period to be considered is that of Youth, which may conveniently be fixed at from twelve years to twenty-five years of age; that is the entire period during which puberty commences and is completed, and the body attains its fullest development. I do not mean to say that no changes go on in the body after twenty-five years of age, but that it cannot be said to arrive at maturity prior to that period, at any rate in this country.

This is a period during which the first early impressions which are assumed to have been made by the mother in childhood are to be developed in that course of moral training so important to the physical as well as spiritual health of the individual. I will not wander into a disquisition on the moral requirements of the present day, further than to observe that the absence of a careful moral training has a far greater influence over the causation of disease, both of the stomach specially, and the body generally, than many people imagine; and it must be remembered that the freedom of thought and action which parents at the present day generally insist upon for themselves must not be accorded by them to their children, because they