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CHAP. VI.]
The Use of the Perambulator.
79

these carriages, with its back to the movement. This practice, doubtless, originated in the idea that if the child faces the nurse, she is better able to see, in common parlance, "what it is up to;" but this benefit is not sufficiently great to warrant possible brain injuries resulting from its unnatural position during movement. The natural position in moving is with the face forwards, as in walking, and that the opposite position is injurious is sufficiently strongly suggested by the discomfort which it causes even to grown people. Painful or uncomfortable sensations are always a danger signal, and if, being experienced by an adult in the above circumstances, they point to some harm that is being done, how much greater must the injury be in the case of infants, whose nervous systems are so much more unstable. The child, then, should invariably be placed facing the movement; and the hood, which has its back to the movement, should be raised to protect it from the draught caused by the motion of the carriage through the air. The wind is apt to "take away the breath" of a tiny child and draughts may give colds to bigger ones. In rainy weather a second hood can be raised over the child, or an umbrella held over it; but little infants should not be taken out in the rain.

A pillow should be laid in the perambulator to make a bed for baby, with a little pillow at the top to support its head; the infant should then be laid on it as if put to bed, and a nice fur rug laid over it. Sent out in this way the risk of cold is minimized. In cold weather young infants should