Further, a thick soup may be substituted as soon as the child's stomach has become used to vegetables, such as pea, potato, or lentil soup, or a milk soup, or rice soup. In all these cases the soup must not be made of a rich stock. As regards the milk pudding used now and again as a change on the soup or broth, rice is the most suitable thing to make it of, and it should contain egg. It would be only an ordinary milk pudding, such as would be made for an ordinary nursery meal, that is, enough pudding would be made with one egg for three persons. The infant would only get a small portion of this with a cup of milk.
On any day the infant had soup, a share of any milk pudding, made for other children, might be kept for the infant, as a change on its 5-o'clock bread-and-milk meal.
Pudding made with egg proving suitable, at about eighteen months a lightly-boiled egg may be given for dinner, with bread and butter and milk.
At about the same age, also, a well-boiled, mealy potato mashed with a little butter, or gravy from meat, with a little added salt, makes an excellent change for dinner, with a cup of milk, other meals remaining as stated.
The earliest date at which fish or meat should be given to children is about two years. At this age it should be given only very occasion ally, say once a week, and it should be lightly cooked and finely chopped up. Lightly-steamed wince may be tried to begin with, only a small spoonful, mixed up with well-mashed potato. Fish or chicken may be used in the same way. But by this time the child should have been taught to chew properly. This important lesson may be begun by substituting bread and butter, with milk, for the morning or afternoon meal; and if the child is taught thoroughly to masticate bread and butter, it will be pre pared for a meat meal.
At two years of age the early-morning drink will have become unnecessary, and four regular meals a day will be sufficient as follows:— 8 to 9 a.m.: Porridge and milk; or bread and butter and milk, hot or cold according to the season.
12 noon : Soup or broth and bread ; or milk pudding made with egg, eaten with milk, and bread and butter or a biscuit; or potato with a little fish, chicken, or meat ; or an egg, bread and butter, and milk.
4 p.m.: Milk, bread and butter; or milk pud ding and milk.
8 p.m.: Rusk and milk; or milk and a biscuit.
At the afternoon meal the bread may be spread with jelly, honey, or syrup.
Some regard should be paid in dieting to the relation of the meals to one another. If the breakfast consists chiefly of porridge and milk, or bread and milk, the dinner should contain a good proportion, of animal food in the shape of egg, fish, or butcher-meat of some kind. For it must not be forgotten that at this age the child cannot obtain sufficient flesh - forming material from bread, and still less from rice, sago, corn-flour, or such substances. It cannot even drink sufficient milk to supply this want. The result will be that, if animal food is not supplied, the child will be soft, with soft bones and flabby muscles, wanting in sustained energy. The necessary animal part of the diet should therefore be made up at dinner, and if, owing to the nature of this meal, on some occasion it is in deficient quantity, it may be made up at tea by a part of an egg or a whole egg. Animal food should be given preferably
at mid-day. The meat should be boiled or roasted. Salted meats, pork, veal, and lamb are to be avoided. A small quantity of vege table may also be allowed when the child has passed two years of age, potato as already mentioned being given earlier than that age, if not new and if mealy and well mashed ; but after two years, turnip, and cauliflower, well boiled, may be permitted in small quantity, cabbage or green vegetables also, but they must be finely chopped and thoroughly cooked. Soft green peas may be allowed. Some cooked fruits —stewed apple or prunes— will usually be relished given with well-boiled rice, but un cooked fruits are injurious, except the orange when in season, the child being taught to reject the skin and seeds. Pastry and nuts are to be avoided.
The diet recommended will strike many people as generous, and liable to lead, to over feeding. It will not do so if the child receives its meals at regular times, and does not get additional food at odd moments. If a child has its regular meals it will take at each what satisfies it and no more, provided an undue variety of dishes be not produced to stimulate its appetite. But if in addition to its own meals it is permitted partly to share its parents', then overfeeding or digestive troubles will likely arise. As great an evil is the giving of sweet biscuits, pieces of bread and jelly, and so forth, between meals.
Parents should from the first entirely set their face against " pieces" between meals. They prevent a healthy appetite at the proper meal-time, and derange the digestion besides. As a rule, also, sweetmeats are given very indiscriminately. An occasional sweetmeat is not hurtful, if only one be given occasionally. Those made entirely of pure sugar, or a gum pastille, or a small piece of chocolate may be given, but only occasionally. Any containing almonds, nuts, &c., should be avoided. Simi larly, cakes with raisins, currants, &c., should not be given. Plain sponge-cakes or plain bis cuits alone are admissible, but ought to be used at meal times as an addition to the meal, and not between meals.
Finally, children should be taught to take their food slowly and to chew it thoroughly.
The only beverages for children are milk and water. The practice of giving small quan tities of wine, malt liquors, or stimulants of any sort for little ailments is hurtful in the extreme; still more is the habit of giving these things as a matter of course a most pernicious one. Stimulants should be given to children only on the direct order of the medical attend ant, and then only in the small doses he orders, which should be carefully measured. As re gards tea, many parents like their children beside them at table, for one meal at least, when they reach two or three years of age, and tea is often the meal. The child may have its cup of warm milk and water sweetened, and if it be barely coloured with tea no harm is done, but it ought not to be more than barely coloured. Thin cocoa, made mainly with milk, is, however, quite digestible for children, and also nourishing.