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medicine from the sixpenny doctor." When death occurs, they
assert that their children died "of no particular disease," or from
"fretting inwardly."
They rejoice when their children get an infectious disease, and
are removed to hospital to get good food, a good cleaning
up and good nursing. "It is the making of the children."
When children get colds or bronchitis, the mothers abstain from
washing them until they are convalescent.
Nearly every skin eruption of the baby is attributed by the poor
to teething or to a "spring breaking out," or is called a "gum
rash," and considered thereby to need no further explanation. The
usual treatment is to rub it with "nine oils," camphorated oil, or
other liniment, according to the taste and fancy of the mother.
Many—far too many—of the babies were clothed in cotton. The
mothers usually knew this was wrong, but were unable to buy
woollen clothes, because they could not afford them, or because
the fathers were out of work.
One mother objected to knitted woollen vests because they were
too "area ted."
Illustrative Cases.
1. The family occupied two rooms, and consisted of the
parents and twins, 6 weeks old. The mother had insufficient
clothes for the twins. One was sent into a home, and the clothes
in which it was wrapped were brought back for the other. They
consisted of a cotton shirt, a stiff cotton binder, a flannelette coat
and a piece of carpet used as a shawl.
2. The family occupied three rooms. The baby was two
months old. There were five children, all alive. The baby had a
slight cold, and the mother was attempting to clear the nostrils
by means of a camel-hair brush dipped in camphorated oil. She
thought that as the oil was a good liniment for the chest, it must
be a good application for the nose.