in the first days. Variot says that out of 32 children of both sexes,
aged from six to nine months, all but six showed the presence of milk
in the breasts. Gibb mentions copious milk-secretion in an infant, and
Sworder and Menard have seen young babes with abundant milk-secretion.

Precocious Lactation.--Bochut says that he saw a child whose breasts
were large and completely developed, offering a striking contrast to
the slight development of the thorax. They were as large as a stout
man's fist, pear-shaped, with a rosy areola, in the center of which was
a nipple. These precocious breasts increased in size at the beginning
of the menstrual epoch (which was also present) and remained enlarged
while the menses lasted. The vulva was covered with thick hair and the
external genitalia were well developed. The child was reticent, and
with a doll was inclined to play the role of mother.

Baudelocque mentions a girl of eight who suckled her brother with her
extraordinarily developed breasts. In 1783 this child milked her
breasts in the presence of the Royal Academy at Paris. Belloc spoke of
a similar case. There is another of a young negress who was able to
nourish an infant; and among the older writers we read accounts of
young virgins who induced lactation by applying infants to their
breasts. Bartholinus, Benedictus, Hippocrates, Lentilius, Salmuth, and
Schenck mention lactation in virgins.

De la Coide describes a case in which lactation was present, though
menstruation had always been deficient. Dix, at the Derby Infirmary,
has observed two females in whom there was continued lactation,
although they had never been pregnant. The first was a chaste female of
twenty-five, who for two years had abundant and spontaneous discharge
of milk that wetted the linen; and the other was in a prostitute of
twenty, who had never been pregnant, but who had, nevertheless, for
several months an abundant secretion of healthy milk. Zoologists know
that a nonpregnant bitch may secrete milk in abundance. Delafond and de
Sinnety have cited instances.

Lactation in the aged has been frequently noticed. Amatus Lusitanus and
Schenck have observed lactation in old women; in recent years Dunglison
has collected some instances. Semple relates the history of an elderly
woman who took charge of an infant the mother of which had died of
puerperal infection. As a means of soothing the child she allowed it to
take the nipple, and, strange to say, in th