habits due to faulty training, as when the nursery is light and the
baby is taken from its crib whenever it cries or wakes, or when
contrivances for producing sleep have been used. Any excitement in a
nursing mother or child before sleeping time will cause wakefulness.
Romping play just before bedtime and fears aroused by stories and pictures
are causes, and children who inherit a nervous constitution are special
sufferers from this cause. Cold feet, insufficient or too much clothing,
want of pure fresh air in the sleeping room. Tonsils or adenoids may
interfere with breathing in older children. Rousing a sleeping child from
a good sound sleep, is a frequent cause of poor sleep. If a pregnant woman
keeps herself in as good condition as possible, not only physically, but
also mentally, she will not be likely to have a nervous baby; and if a
baby is not born nervous there is no reason, at all, why it should not
sleep well, for sleep is then its most normal condition, nine-tenths of
the time. It will then depend upon the food and training it is given. The
training many babies receive is enough to make them poor sleepers.

[604 MOTHERS' REMEDIES ]

Unnecessary handling.--Babies are wakened from sleep to show to friends
who wish to see them at almost any and all hours. They are handled,
petted, and made restless. Sleep is their normal condition and they ought
to be given the opportunity nature demands. They are only to be aroused
from sleep for nurse, bathing and clothing, and immediately placed in
their crib, covered comfortably and warmly with all light shut away from
their eyes and quiet about them. They will soon wake of their own accord
for meals.

Rocking baby.--Rocking and shaking cause an increased flow of blood to the
brain, and this should be avoided, for it of itself will cause
sleeplessness. The brain during sleep is comparatively empty of blood;
warm feet and cool head tend to produce sleep. Rocking, etc., is
unnatural, and baby is made to receive and enjoy the natural. If the baby
is sick the mother may take it in her arms and sing to it and coddle it
carefully, but it is then sick. If it is trained properly from the
beginning, rocking to sleep will be unnecessary; walking with the baby is
of the same nature. See that your baby has warm feet and legs and body and
a cool head, with comfortable clothes and good careful feeding, and it
will sleep. Singing lullabies are soothing, but they do no good at first
as t