Leonard Keene Hirshberg (H.L. Mencken)

Delineator/December, 1908

A HUMAN infant, during the first few months of its life, is an extremely delicate organism, and so it should be handled with care, which means that it should be handled as seldom as possible. The young mother who, in the excess of her pride and love, cuddles her baby to her breast and showers kisses upon it by the half-hour makes a pretty picture, it must be admitted, but it cannot be maintained that the little one is benefited by her caresses. Quite to the contrary, her every kiss helps to make it nervous and irritable and prepares the way for the seeds of disease. A baby that is fondled too much is a baby that cries too much, and is ill too much.

Despite the evidences of intelligence apparent to loving eyes after the first week, an infant’s mind is a happy blank, and it gets no joy out of the affections. To it, its mother appears merely as a source of food, and later on, when its brain begins to function, this primitive association of a craving and the means of satisfaction is probably the first definite idea that formulates in its mind. When it is hungry, it wants its mother to feed it, and before long, instead of merely crying for food, it cries for her.

When it is not hungry, its chief need and desire is for sleep. A healthy baby, during its first month, should sleep at least eighteen hours a day. And this sleeping should be done, not in a rocking, nerve-racking cradle, but in a solid, comfortable crib. The cradle belongs to the age of spinning-wheels and flails, of soothing syrups and necromancy.

It is not until the fourth day after the baby’s birth that its mother’s milk is truly nourishing, but such as it is, it exactly meets the needs of the child. It is, in fact, a sort of laxative serum, which stimulates the entire digestive tract and prepares the stomach for the reception of food. On the first day the baby should be nursed only once, but it should be given a drink of boiled water every three hours or so. On the second day it should be nursed three times — morning, afternoon and night — with the same allowance of water. On the third day the routine of the second day should be repeated. At the end of the third day it will be found that the child has lost a quarter or half a pound. This need cause no alarm, for it is perfectly natural, and a steady gain will immediately begin.

On the fourth day both baby and mother are ready for regular feedings at shorter intervals. From this time onward, until toward the end of its second month, the child should be nursed every two hours, with a slightly longer wait after its daily bath, and an interval of seven hours in the night. In all, it should have about nine feedings during the twenty-four hours, as follows: 6, 8 and 10 A. M. and 1, 3, 5, 7, 9 and 11 P. M. Between eleven o’clock in the evening and six in the morning it should not be fed at all. The fact that most babies demand food during this time merely shows that most babies have bad habits. Let the child cry in vain for three nights running and it will never cry again. But during the day, even if it happens to be sound asleep, it is well to waken it in order to keep to this schedule faithfully.

The bath should be given just before the ten o’clock feeding in the morning. The water should be at the temperature of the body — about 99 degrees — and soap should be used very sparingly. After the child has been gently washed, sponge it with a soft cloth dipped in cold water and give it a brief rub-down with alcohol. This will bring the blood to the surface, stimulate the circulation and prevent colds. It is well to let the baby sleep three or four hours after its bath. Then, if it has not already awakened and demanded food, it should be aroused and the regular schedule of feeding resumed.

The length of time that the child should be kept at the breast at each feeding depends so much upon the volume of the milk and its own idiosyncrasies that it is impossible to lay down an invariable rule. The mother should be guided by the fact that a newly born infant’s stomach has a capacity of but one ounce, or eight teaspoonfuls. Some babies are able to ingest this amount of milk in a few minutes, while others require much longer. But it is rarely safe to keep a child at the breast for more than from ten to fifteen minutes.

An infant’s stomach is not a fully developed organ, and, as every one knows, it can digest only milk, or something closely approximating milk in composition. As a matter of fact, it probably plays but a minor role even in the digestion of milk, for it stands almost perpendicular and is really little more than an extension of the bowels. The food which enters it passes into the bowels very quickly, and there the more important part of the process of digestion takes place. But, all the same, a baby should be given no more food than its stomach can hold.

A baby, like an adult, needs water as regularly as it needs food. The milk that it gets, though a liquid, does not satisfy its thirst. It should be given water at least three times a day, and this water should be nearly, if not quite, free of organisms. The water that comes from the average city main or country spring is alive with microscopic plants and animals, even when it seems clear and sparkling. These minute organisms, as a rule, are harmless to adults, but in the delicate stomach of the baby they are apt to cause disturbances, and so they must be eliminated. The best way to get rid of them is to allow the water to boil twenty minutes. After that, let it cool and store it in clean, well-corked bottles which have been previously immersed in boiling water for five minutes. Glass stoppers are better than corks.

Boiled water is tasteless and insipid because of the absence of air-bubbles, but the baby seldom notices it. It is best drunk out of a thoroughly clean nursing-bottle. Offer water to the infant every four hours, and let it drink as much as it wants. The supply for each day should be boiled in the morning. Under no circumstances should water be kept more than a day.