ition of aliment." And if
we never depart from the general rule, already laid down, not to give
the infant anything but its mother's milk, we shall escape the evils
incident to variety.

SEC. 5. _How long should milk be the only food._

On this point, there is a great diversity of opinion. Perhaps the most
approved role, of universal application, is, that the first change
should be made in the child's diet, when the teeth begin to appear.

This period, it is well known, cannot be fixed to any particular age,
but varies from the fifth to the twelfth month.

Some mothers, who have borne with me patiently to this place, will
probably here object. "What child," they will ask, "would ever have any
strength, brought up so?" Not only a little pap and gruel is, in their
estimation, necessary, long before this period, but even many choice
bits of meat.

Now I am very sure, that these choice bits--whatever they may be--given
to a child before it has teeth, not only do no good, but actually do
mischief. Indeed, that which does no good in the stomach must do harm,
of course; since it is not only in the way, but acts like a foreign body
there, producing more or less of irritation.

I ought to state, in this place, that many people--mothers among the
rest--have very inadequate ideas of digestion. They appear to have no
farther notion of the digestive process than that it consists in
reducing to a pulp the substances which are swallowed; and hence,
whatever is reduced to a pulp, they regard as being digested. Whereas
nothing is better known to the anatomist and physiologist, than that
this--the formation of _chyme_ in the stomach--constitutes only a very
small part of the digestive process. The chyme must pass into the
duodenum and other portions of intestine beyond the stomach, and be
retained there for some time, before it will form perfect chyle.

This is a more important part of the work of digestion than even the
former. For, suppose the chyme to be perfect, though even this may be
mere pulp, rather than chyme, and suppose it pass quietly along into the
duodenum and other small intestines. All this process, thus far, may go
on naturally enough, and yet the chyle may not be well formed, and the
chymous mass may find its way out of the system without answering any of
the purposes of nutrition. For no matter how well the food is dissolved
in the stomach, if it do not become good and proper chyle, the blood
which is formed