LACTATIO, Lactation, or Giving Suck. The mother's breast, if possible, should be allowed the child, at least during the first month; for thus the child is more peculiarly benefited by what it sucks, and the mother is preserved from more real inconveniences, than the falsely delicate imagine they would suffer by compliance herewith: but if by reason of an infirm constitution, or other causes, the mother cannot suckle her child, let dry nursing under the mother's eye be pursued.

When women lose their appetite by giving suck, both the children and themselves are thereby injured; wet nurses are to be preferred, who during the time they give the breast, have rather an increased appetite, and digest more quickly; the former are apt to waste away, and sometimes die consumptive. In short, those nurses with whom lactation may for a while agree, should wean the child as soon as their appetite lessens, their strength seems to fail, or a tendency to hysterical symptoms are manifest.

When the new-born child is to be brought up by the mother's breast, apply it thereto in ten or twelve hours after delivery; thus the milk is sooner and more easily supplied, and there is less hazard of a fever, than when the child is not put to it before the milk begins to flow of itself.

If the mother does not suckle her child, her breasts should be kept warm with flannels, or with a hair-skin, that a constant perspiration may be supported; thus there rarely will arise much inconvenience from the milk.

The child, notwithstanding all our care in dry nursing, sometimes pines if a breast is not allowed. In this case a wet nurse should be provided, if possible one that hath not been long delivered of a child. She should be young, of a healthy habit, and an active disposition, a mild temper, and whose breasts are well filled.