red 76--was
too immature to draw upon my sympathies; since I freely acknowledge such
specimens are utterly devoid of interest for me until their bones are of
sufficient consistency to enable them to sit upright and look about as a
British baby should. This particular infant had not an idea above
culinary considerations. He was a very Alderman in embryo, if there are
such things as coloured Aldermen. Then there were twins--that
inscrutable visitation of Providence--three brace of gemini. Triplets,
in mercy to our paternal feelings, Mr. Giovannelli spared us.

There was one noteworthy point about this particular exhibition. The
mothers, at all events, got a good four days' feed whilst their
infantile furniture was "on view." I heard, sotto voce, encomiums on the
dinner of the day confidingly exchanged between gushing young matrons,
and I myself witnessed the disappearance of a decidedly comfortable tea,
to say nothing of sundry pints of porter discussed sub rosa and free of
expense to such as stood in need of sustenance; and indeed a good many
seemed to stand in need of it. Small wonder, when the mammas were so
forcibly reminded by the highly-developed British baby that, in Byron's
own words, "our life is twofold."

It is certainly passing, not from the sublime to the ridiculous, but
vice versa, yet it is noting another testimony to the growing importance
of the British baby, if one mentions the growth of creches, or
day-nurseries for working-men's children in the metropolis. Already an
institution in Paris, they have been recently introduced into England,
and must surely prove a boon to the wives of our working men. What in
the world does become of the infants of poor women who are forced to
work all day for their maintenance? Is it not a miracle if something
almost worse than "farming"--death from negligence, fire, or bad
nursing--does not occur to them? The good ladies who have founded, and
themselves work, these creches are surely meeting a confessed necessity.
I paid a visit one day to 4, Bulstrode Street, where one of these useful
institutions was in full work. I found forty little toddlers, some
playing about a comfortable day-nursery, others sleeping in tiny cribs
ranged in a double line along a spacious, well-aired sleeping-room;
some, too young for this, rocked in cosy cradles; but all clean, safe,
and happy. What needs it to say whether the good ladies who tended them
wore the habit of St. Vincent de Paul, the