little, would you advise composing medicine to be given to him_?

Certainly not. The practice of giving composing medicine to a young
child cannot he too strongly reprobated. If he does not sleep enough,
the mother ought to ascertain if the bowels be in a proper state,
whether they be sufficiently opened, that the motions be of a good
colour--namely, a bright yellow, inclining to orange colour--and free
from slime or from bad smell. An occasional dose of rhubarb and
magnesia is frequently the best composing medicine he can take.

86. _We often hear of coroner's inquests upon infants who have been
found dead in bed--accidentally overlaid what is usually the cause_?

Suffocation, produced either by ignorance, or by carelessness. From
_ignorance_ in mothers, in their not knowing the common laws of life,
and the vital importance of free and unrestricted respiration, not
only when babies are up and about, but when they are in bed and
asleep. From _carelessness_, in their allowing young and thoughtless
servants to have the charge of infants at night, more especially as
young girls are usually heavy sleepers, and are thus too much
overpowered with sleep to attend to their necessary duties.

A foolish mother sometimes goes to sleep while allowing her child to
continue sucking. The unconscious babe, after a tune, looses the
nipple, and buries his head in the bed-clothes. She awakes in the
morning, finding, to her horror, a corpse by her side, with his nose
flattened, and a frothy fluid, tinged with, blood, exuding from his
lips. A mother ought, therefore, never to go to sleep until her child
have finished sucking.