ild, but
also those who have had several children--are too apt to try to quiet
a restless child by placing it near a bright flame; much evil to the
future use of those eyes is the outgrowth of such a pernicious habit.
Light throws into action certain cells of that wonderful structure of
the eye, the retina, and an over stimulus perverts the action of those
cells. The result is that by this over-stimulation the seeds of future
trouble are sown. Let the adult gaze upon the arc of an electric light
or into the sun, and for many moments, nay hours, that individual has
dancing before his vision scintillations and phosphenes. His direct
vision becomes blurred, and as in the case of a certain individual I
have in mind, there may be a permanent loss of sight. Parents should
take the first precaution in the child's life, and not expose it to a
light too bright or glaring. When in the open air let the child's eyes
be protected from the direct rays of the sun. While it is impossible
to give all children the advantage of green fields and outdoor
ramblings, yet nature never intended that civilization should debar
the innocent child from such surroundings.

An anecdote is related of a French ophthalmic surgeon, that a
distinguished patient applied to him for relief from a visual defect;
the surgeon advised him to go into the country and look out upon the
green fields. The green color with its soothing effect soon brought
about a restoration of vision. What I wish to illustrate by this
anecdote is that children should be allowed the green fields as their
best friend in early life. It tones up the system and rests the eye.
After outdoor exercise and plenty of it, we should turn our attention
to the home surroundings of our little ones. The overheated rooms of
the average American home I am sure have more to do with the growing
tendency of weak eyes than we feel like admitting. Look at these frail
hot-house plants, and can any one believe that such bodies nourished
in almost pestilential atmosphere can nourish such delicate organs of
vision, and keep them ready for the enormous amount of work each
little eye performs daily? The brain developing so rapidly wills with
an increasing rapidity the eye to do increasing duties; note the
result--a tendency to impoverished circulation first, and the eye with
its power to give the brain a new picture in an infinitesimal short
space of time means lightning-like circulation--the eye must give way