Domestic medicine : or, a treatise on the prevention and cure of diseases, by regimen and simple medicines: With an appendix, containing a dispensatory for the use of private practitioners / by William Buchan.

  • Buchan William, 1729-1805.
Date:
1820
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Domestic medicine : or, a treatise on the prevention and cure of diseases, by regimen and simple medicines: With an appendix, containing a dispensatory for the use of private practitioners / by William Buchan. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh. The original may be consulted at the Royal College of Physicians of Edinburgh.

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    OF CHILDREN. every organ, carry them abroad in the open air, wash their bo- dies daily in cold water, &c. By this management their chil- dren become so strong and hardy, that by the time our puny infants get out of the nurse’s arms, theirs are able to shift for themselves *. Among brute animals, no art is necessary to procure a fine shape. Though many of them are extremely delicate when they come into the world, yet we never find them grow crooked for want of swaddling bands. Is Nature less generous to the hu- man kind? No: but we take the business out of Nature’s hands. Not only the analogy of other animals, but the very feelings of infants tell us, they ought to be kept easy and free from pres- sure. They cannot indeed tell their complaints, but they caa shew signs of pain ; and this they never tail to do, by crying when hurt by their clothes. No sooner are they freed from their bracings, than they seem pleased and happy: yet, strange infatuation ! the moment they hold their peace, they are again committed to their chains. If we consider the body of an infant as a bundle of soft pipes, replenished with fluids in continual motion, the danger of pres- sure will appear in the strongest light. Nature, in order to make way for the growth of the children, has formed their bo- dies soft and flexible; and, lest they should receive any injury from pressure in the womb, has surrounded the foetus every- where with fluids. This shews the care which Nature takes to prevent all unequal pressure on the bodies of infants, and to de- fend them against every thing that might in the least cramp or confine their motions. Even the bones of an infant are so soft and cartilaginous, that they readily yield to the slightest pressure, and easily as- sume a bad shape, which can never after be remedied. Hence it is, that so many people appear with high shoulders, crooked spines, and flat breasts, wdio were as well proportioned at their births as others, but had the misfortune to be squeezed out of shape by the application of stays and bandages. Pressure, by obstructing the circulation, likewise prevents the equal distribution of nourishment to the different parts of the body, by which means the growth becomes unequal. One part grow's too large, while another remains too small ; and thus in time the whole frame becomes disproportioned and misshapen. To this we must add, when a child is cramped in its clothes it naturally shrinks from the part that is hurt; and bv putting its body into unnatural postures, it becomes deformed by habit. * A friend of mine, who was several years on the coast of Africa, tells me, that the natives neither put any clothes upon their children, nor apply to their bodies bandages of any kind, but lav them on a pallet, and suffer them to tumble about at pleasure ; yet they are all straight, and seldom have any disease.