deposited--that _avant courier_ of so much infant mortality--yet he is, and has been all along, a rosy, plump, dimpled baby, or boy, rather, for babyhood very early lost its hold on him. Too often children seem finally to emerge from the miseries and ailments of a tedious infancy and to take on, at last, individuality and distinct character at the second or third year. This child, _per contra_, having never had a sensation of illness, or of pain, save honest hunger, has seemed to be a happy little boy almost from the first, alert or thoughtful, shouting or cooing, laughing and crowing, especially after his meals and movements, studying the world of things about him by the hour, keenly appreciative of colors and of music, and preferring some sorts to others, his face crossed by vivid changes of expression, wonder, merriment, surprise, reverie--all as perfect at six months as ordinarily seen at three years. He has good color from head to foot, is pale when hungry, but the moment a bit of food is down expands to his most genial flow of spirits. Immediately after his day-time naps his cheeks are regularly flushed and rosy. His spirits become more pronounced toward each evening, reaching their high-point of talking, laughing, crowing and squealing at just about bed-time. He keeps it up for some time after being tucked away for the night, till sleep masters him; and begins where he left off early next morning. All this is good physiology. So happy day succeeds happy day, and we trust and hope that many good tendencies are getting a fair start in a harmonious and spontaneous beginning of this great work of growing up that we are fostering but not forcing. AT ONE YEAR OLD.--Everything continues as begun. Teething at times causes slight transient fretfulness, and more cold water is drunk. The bowels remain absolutely regular. The all-night sleep (never "put to sleep,") and two day-time naps are unchanged, in all thirteen or fourteen hours of sleep _per diem_. On warm days he needs _and gets_ plenty of cool water to drink, often two-thirds of a pint at a time. Talking, standing and creeping he has attained by his own unaided initiative (this on principle). As for amusements, he invents his own always, except when engaged in social exchange with his father and mother, and in these, too, we are careful that he makes at least half the advances. On particular occasions he comes in need of mothering--and gets it. On all others he simply lives with two big but highly sympathetic playfellows; and he has developed separate lines of play and talk for each. Often he chooses to alternate as between two poles of attraction, turning his face to his mother's for her sympathy between shouts to his father, or _vice versa_. From week to week we notice that the older plays are mostly dropped one by one, and fresh ones invented. All, however, are real and vivid to him.