r
description; but, on considering how very rare it must be to find any
mother capable of abandoning her newly-born infant to the breast of a
woman who has already suckled another child one year, any surprise that
might be felt at the circumstance will, I am sure, immediately cease. It
must also be noticed that only among the lowest grades of society do we
find women so long after delivery performing the office of wet-nurse at
all, and those who entrust their infants to the latter are often so
peculiarly situated as to feel no interest whatever in the preservation
of their offspring: indeed I cannot but suspect that, among such,
criminal motives frequently lead to the adoption of the unnatural and
baneful practice in question.

I do not recollect to have seen a case of Meningitis from suckling
except when this process had been _protracted_, either as respects the
child or the nurse; though I by no means doubt the possibility of its
occurrence under other circumstances: but I have met with numerous
instances of other diseases produced by the palpable deterioration of
the mother's or nurse's milk at various periods after delivery; in by
far the greater number, however, of such cases, lactation had been
continued for an unusual length of time.

Vomiting, griping, and diarrh[oe]a, are so common among infants, and
arise in general from causes apparently so evident, that, unless severe
or of long duration, they rarely form the subject of minute inquiry.
Hence these complaints are, perhaps, not so often attributed to
deteriorated milk as they ought to be, although the fact of their
occasionally originating from a morbid condition of this fluid, (and
therefore from protracted lactation as one cause of the latter effect,)
is too well established to be questioned. Dr. Underwood observes, 'has
not every Physician of experience seen infants frequently thrown into
tormina immediately after coming from the _breast of an unhealthy
mother, or one who has but little milk_?'[N] and Mr. Burns states, that
if the usual periodical appearance should return, 'the milk is liable to
disagree with the child, and produce vomiting or purging;' while Dr.
Hamilton expressly mentions that diarrh[oe]a is 'not unfrequently
_occasioned by the depraved quality of the nurse's milk_.'

The two former authors merely testify to the fact of diseases being
produced by the milk, while the latter more explicitly mentions the
cause from which they proceed.