Spirit of the age. [volume] (Woodstock, Vt.) 1845-1913, 1881-04-20
THE USE OF THE BABY.

|
The baby has SO long been regard
cd merely as "a well spring Of pleas
ure IN the house. that IL Is difficult tt
conceive Of mu, IN any other relation
But that is not the highest or trues,
function, Not only does no mlserably
fail in many eases as a ''well-sprins,
bu, by confning him to that we miss
his real use. lie is properly an OBJ
jcct Of scientific observation, and the
study Of him can be made to conduce
to the harmony OF philosophy and 10
add to onr general knowledge. In the
present agitation, which ia shaking the
universities of Oxford and Cambridge
for the endowmen, of re search, the
baby should not be overlooked. There
should be proiessorships established
for the research OF the baby. Probably
| it would be too expensive to billet the
professors about in different houses
where they were babies to be studied,
and the better way would be to collect
the Inf,nts into sort OF a conserva-
tory, where the professor could study
their Developments as easy as he con'd
note the growth of planiS,
OF course we make this suggestion
10 view o. the lamentabIc inadeqnacy
Of "a Biographical Sketch OF an In
fant' by Charles Darwin, which is
lust published. The observations re-
corded were made on an infant belong
ing to him some ,hirty-seven years
ago. The are very interesting, but
of little scientific value, be cause COLI
fined to one specimen; and the variety
of infants are so great that it Is not
safe to seneralize on them except from
q vast amount of statistics about vast
multitude of babies. Mr.. Darwin him.
self admits this in noting the fact that
his boy was an adept at throwing
books and sticks at any one who OF
Tended him when he was two years
and three months old, whereas there
was no trace of any such
aptitude in his infant daughters-from
which insufficient observation he infers
an inherited tendency in boys to throw
things. Mr.. Drawn would of course
admit thai wider research is needed
before he can tkaw any such conclu-
sion. There NAV have been grand
mother somewhere back who threw
things, and the girls of another family
NAV he as destructive as his male in
FAINT. Another unsatisfactory thing
abont Mr.. Darwin's sketch is that it
| is on observations made thirty seven
years ago, and everybody knows that
infants have changed "a much as any
thing else in all these years. They
are born advanced and "cultured." 1t
is common now for baby when he is
lO6 days old to whistle "Champagne
Charley" and on the ll5th day to
call his daddy "Governor, And a
female infant only 81 days old has
been known 70 wink at her nurae.
Observations on infants in order to be
Of any serviceto science must be fresh
and up to date.
For instance. Mr.. Darwin tried an
experiment On his baby when it was
seven days old, which he would not
dare to repeat on All infant of our
time. He touched the naked sole OF
the foot with !; bit ot paper. The
baby tbinkingit wasa mosquito and
having no knowledge as yet Of his
dastardly and scientific papa, drew
away hls foot and curled up his toes
as if he were tickled. A modern in
iant, thus !smpered with. it is need
less to say would have kicked his
father in the fnce. This reflex move.
ment of the baby be jersing away
of the t;ckled ioot--on the seventh
day (which ought TO have been q day
of rest) was only the climax of a series