_Rough-on-Rats_ or _Paris Green_: Give an emetic of mustard water, chloride of iron, or magnesia, or baking soda, or water of ammonia. Follow this with white of egg, sweet-oil, or milk. Later give castor-oil to keep the bowels open. _Corrosive sublimate_: Administer emetic of mustard water, followed by white of egg or milk. Castor-oil to open the bowels. Try first the emetic of mustard water. If it does not work send to the nearest druggist for permanganate of potash, diluted. Give a dose of four or five grains with strong coffee. _Matches_: Give the emetic; and then permanganate of potash, diluted, four or five grains; following this with epsom salts or magnesia to open the bowels. Never give milk, sweet-oil, castor-oil to a child who has eaten matches. In order to meet these various emergencies, the mother should have the following supplies in or near the nursery: Package of sterile gauze (5 yards). Sterile gauze bandages—½ dozen in assorted lengths. 1 lb. absorbent cotton, in small rolls. 1 bottle corrosive sublimate tablets (7½ grains). 1 bottle of creolin. 1 bottle of sweet-oil. 1 bottle of castor-oil. 1 jar of vaseline, or lard. Mustard flour for making an emetic. The various antidotes mentioned in connection with poisons. This represents a comparatively small investment, yet it is invaluable for the mother to use while waiting for the arrival of the physician. One of the real terrors of the nursery is the realization that the baby has swallowed something more or less dangerous to his digestive organs—safety-pins, tacks, pennies, buttons, etc. Nature provides to a certain extent for carrying such things off. Food and juices form a coating around these foreign objects. Do not make the mistake of administering drastic cathartics. It is far better to give the child coarse food, such as bran, whole wheat, graham-flour bread, oatmeal, and other coarse cereals, and plenty of potatoes. Watch the stools, and if an object, like a safety-pin or a tack, does not pass within a reasonable time, take the baby to an X-Ray specialist and the foreign body will be located. This does not always mean an operation. Very frequently, if the object is not passed off in the bowels, it is located in some part of the child’s anatomy where it will do no harm. The most careful of mothers have to face nursery emergencies in raising their children. The most important thing to remember is that coolness and courage are as useful in saving the child’s life as the remedies named in this chapter. This is particularly true in cases like croup, convulsions, or poisons, when, in the excitement of the moment, the mother may scald her child, or give what she thinks is an antidote but which in reality hastens the fatal action of the poison. Children pass successfully through many of these emergencies; the mother should never give up hope until the family physician has told her that there is nothing more to be done. CHAPTER XV