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are compelled to work for a living, especially upon those whose
occupation is domestic work as servants, or who are engaged in
employments of other kinds which impose upon them the necessity
of boarding out their babies entirely, or during the day when they
themselves are at work. The wages earned are insufficient in many
cases to enable them to make payments to foster-mothers, and
others undertaking the care of the babies, commensurate with the
work done for, and the food required by, such infants. Inasmuch
as this work is not undertaken on account of disinterested benevolence,
or charity, but for profit, it follows that the payments should
be in excess of the expenses incurred in providing milk and other
foods so as to leave a balance as a recompense for the trouble and
labour involved. If this balance be insufficient to satisfy the fostermother
there will be ever present the temptation to enlarge the
balance by diminishing the amount spent on milk and other foods,
and, if the temptation be not resisted, the child may have to suffer
through inadequacy of food supplies, possibly through actual
starvation. It is to meet such cases as these that supplementary
payments to foster-mothers have been proposed ; also, in this same
connection, that some means might be found for the avoidance of
so early a separation of mother and child as most commonly has
to be endured.
" It seems to me that there are several courses which might be
adopted, either conjointly, or separately.
" 1. A list might be made giving the names and addresses
of all women known to be in the habit of receiving such
children, and classifying them so as to distinguish those who
take in babies during the day only and those who take them
in entirely as boarders. The Health Visitors might assist in
making out the lists, and in subsequently visiting and reporting
upon the ' foster-mothers,' their homes and surroundings,
their methods of feeding babies, sufficiency of food of a proper
land, general cleanliness, personal and domestic, and general