a circular form,
scarcely larger than a small pin's head; but after having existed for a
day or two, some of the spots become three or four times as large, while
at the same time they in general lose something of their circular form.
By degrees the small white crusts fall off of their own accord, leaving
the surface where they were seated redder than before; a colour which
gradually subsides, as with the infant's improved health the mouth
returns to its natural condition. If the improvement is tardy the white
specks may be reproduced and again detached several times before the
mouth resumes its healthy aspect. In the worst cases the specks
coalesce, and coat the mouth as though lined with a membrane which is
usually of a yellowish-white tint instead of having the dead white
colour of the separate spots. Even here, however, though the surface is
very red, it scarcely bleeds if the deposit is removed from it gently
and with care.

The popular notion that when the deposit of thrush appears not only in
the mouth, but also at the edge of the bowel, it has passed through the
child is altogether erroneous. The lining membrane of the bowel indeed
is red, inflamed, and presents those conditions to which I have already
referred when speaking of the atrophy of hand-fed children, but the
actual deposit of thrush can take place only where there exists an
appropriate structure for its formation, and that is to be found, not in
the bowels, but only at the inlets and outlets of the digestive canal.
The actual deposit at the outlet of the bowel is indeed exceptional,
though the edges are often red and sore from the irritation produced by
the acrid motions, and this irritation sometimes extends to the skin
over the lower part of the baby's person, which becomes rough, and
covered with a blush of redness.

Thrush in the child is of far less serious import than in the grown
person. In the latter it indicates the existence of some very serious,
almost hopeless disease, and hence it is that we meet with it in the
last stages of dysentery, cancer, and consumption. In the child a slight
attack of thrush may occur from causes which are by no means serious,
and may disappear under the use of simple means, such as I have already
described when speaking of the troubles of digestion in early infancy.

While in any case it must rest with the doctor to regulate as he best
knows how the constitutional treatment of the condition on which the
thrush