the first part of life. Hoffman says, that the human species are infants until they begin to talk, and children till the age of puberty. Anatomy discovers to us, that during infancy there is much imperfection in the human frame; its parts, for instance, are disproportioned, and its organs incapable of those functions which in future life they are designed to perform. The head is larger in proportion to the bulk of the body than that of an adult. The liver and pancreas are much larger in proportion than in advanced life; and their secretions are also more in quantity. The bile is very inert; the heart is stronger and larger than in future life; and the quantity of blood sent through the heart of an infant, in a given time, is also more in proportion than in adults. Though these circumstances have their usefulness, yet the imperfection attending them subjects this age to many injuries and dangers from which a more perfect state is exempt. Dr Percival observes, in his Essays, that of all the children who are born alive, two-thirds do not live to be two years old.

Infants have a larger proportion of brain than adults, and hence are most subject to nervous disorders; whilst the diagnostics of disease are in many respects obscure or uncertain, particularly those taken from the pulse, which, from the irritability of the tender bodies of infants, is suddenly affected by a variety of accidents too numerous, and seemingly too trivial, to gain our attention. From this cause, however, no very great embarrassment arises to the practitioner; for the disorders in this state are generally acute, less complicated than those in adults, and more easily discovered than is generally apprehended.

Infants, amongst the Jews, Greeks, and Romans, were swaddled as soon as they were born, in a manner similar to that practised by the moderns. The Jews circumcised and named their infant children on the eighth day from the birth. On the birth of a son, the Grecians crowned their doors with olives, on that of a daughter with wool. The infant was washed in warm water, and anointed with oil, and by the Spartans with wine; it was then dressed, and laid in a basket, or on a shield if the father was a warrior, particularly amongst the Spartans. At five days old they ran with it round the fire, and the mother's relations sent presents. The Greeks named their children on the tenth day, the Romans on the ninth; and this was attended with sacrifices and other demonstrations of joy.