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DISEASES OF CHILDREN.

while nothing is more common among the rich and affluent. The inha -bitanfs of every country are prolific in proporlion to their poverty; andit would be an easy matter to adduce many instances of women, whyby being reduced to live entirely upon a milk and vegetable diet, l^econceived and brought forth children; though they never had an\,before. Would the rich use the same sort of food and exercise as thebetter sort of peasants, they would seldom have cause to envy their poorvassals and dependants the blessing of a numerous and healthy offspring,while they pine in sorrow for the want of even a single heir to their ex-tensive domains.

Affluence begets indolence, which not only vitiates the humours, butinduces a general relaxation of the solids; a state highly unfavourableto procreation. To remove this, we would recommend the followingcourse; First, sufficient exercise in the open air; secondly, a diet consisting chiefly of milk and vegetables; thirdly, the use of astringentmedicines, as steel, alum, dragon's blood, elixir of vitriol, the Spa orTunbridge waters, Peruvian bark, &c.; and lastly, above all, the coldbath.

Barrenness is often the consequence of grief, sudden fear, anxiety, orany of the passions which tend to obstruct the menstrual flux. Whenbarrenness is suspected to proceed from affections of the mind, the per-son ought to be kept as easy and cheeiful as possible; all disagreeableobjects are to be avoided, and every method taken to amuse and enter-tain the fancy.

Dr. Cheyne avers, that want of children is oftener the fault of themale than of the female, and strongly recommends a milk and vegetablediet to the former as well as the latter; adding, that his friend Dr.Taylor, whom he calls the Milk-doctor of Croydon, had brought sundry-opulent families in his neighbourhood, who had continued some yearsafter marriage without progeny, to have several fine children, by keepingboth parents, for a considerable time, to a milk and vegetable diet.

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GHAP. XLIX.

DISEASES OF CHILDREN

MISERABLE indeed is the lot of man in the state of infancy ! Hecomes into the world more helpless than any other animal, and standsmuch longer in need of the protection and care of his parents; bu',alas! this care is not always bestowed upon him; and when it is,often sutlers as much from improper management as he would havdone from neglect. Hence the officious care of parents, nurses, anamidwives, become one of the most fruitful sources of the disorders oinfants.

Of the officious and ill-judged care of midwives we shall adduce onlyone instance, viz. the common practice of torturing infants by squeezing