and the
resources furnished by a large city.

The difficulties in the administration of medicine to children are in
great part the fault, either of the doctor in giving needlessly
unpleasant medicine, or of the parents or nurse who either have failed
to teach the child obedience, or who are deficient in that tact by which
hundreds of small troubles are evaded.

As far as the doctor is concerned, all medicines should be prescribed by
him in small quantities, and as free from taste and smell as possible:
or where that cannot be, the unpleasant flavour should be covered by
syrup, or liquorice, or treacle.

Bulky powders should be avoided, and the child who has learned to take
rhubarb and magnesia, or Gregory's powder without resistance, certainly
does credit to his training.

Aperients are the medicines most frequently needed in the minor ailments
of children, and a wise mother will not undertake herself the management
of serious diseases. Of all aperients castor oil is perhaps the safest,
the least irritating, the most generally applicable; it acts on the
bowels and does nothing more. The idea that it tends specially to
produce constipation afterwards is unfounded; it does not do so more
than other aperients. All aperients quicken for a time what is termed
the peristaltic action of the bowels; that is to say, their constant
movement in a direction from the stomach to the lower bowel, which, as
well as a contraction on themselves, is constantly going on in every
living animal, and continues even for some time after death. The bowels
stimulated to greater activity of movement by the aperient, become for a
time more sluggish afterwards; they rest for a while, just as after a
long walk the muscles of the leg are weary and need repose.

There are indeed aperients which do more than this, as grey powder and
calomel act upon the liver, and so by promoting an increased flow of
bile cause a more permanent excitement of the bowels, and consequently
their more prolonged activity; or as Epsom salts or citrate of magnesia,
which by their action on the blood cause a greater secretion or pouring
out of fluid from the coats of the intestines, and in this way have in
addition to their purgative property a special influence in abating
various feverish conditions.

Castor oil, senna, jalap, jalapine, and scammony are simple aperients.
They empty the bowels and nothing more, and in cases of simple
constipation, or where a child is ill