Babies and very young children ought to be fed carefully in this country. Yet frequently we see tiny babies eating fish and meat, and often raw vegetables and green fruit. The stomachs of such little children are very small and weak. Their natural food is milk, and if we give them anything else than this, we should choose it very carefully. It should be the best that we can get, perfectly clean, and easy to digest. Not until people are more careful about these matters will the children in the islands have a fair chance to grow up to healthy manhood and womanhood. QUESTIONS. Why is fruit that is too ripe unfit to eat? How do we select oranges that are fresh and good? Why should we be careful to wash all fruit and vegetables before we eat them? Why is spitting in public places a filthy habit? How may it be dangerous to others? Why should meat not hang in the open air in tropical countries? How do flies carry disease? Why is it injurious to eat meat that has just been killed? Why is it not a good plan to buy dead fish? Why are crabs and shellfish a poor sort of food? What does good rice look like? What kinds of rice should be avoided? What sort of food and drink are best for the tropics? How ought babies and young children to be fed? CHAPTER IV. ALL AROUND THE HOUSE. The English people have a saying: “Every man’s house is his castle.” In his own house a man ought to be safe, if he is to be so anywhere, and there he ought to feel sure that his family is safe. With his strong right arm he will keep all enemies away; will fight, if need be, for the safety of his castle. It would be a very mean man who would not do this. We should think even a child a coward who did not help to defend his home. But while we defend the front door, we must not let enemies creep in at the back. Now, the deadliest enemy of human life in the tropics is dirt. We have to fight hard against dirt of every sort. Let us see, to-day, about building a house and keeping our enemy out of it. Every country must have its own particular kind of a house. The house suitable for a cold country would not do at all in the country where we are now. We do not need walls built so as to keep out cold and winds. We have no use for fires to fight off frost and chill. But houses in countries where the winters are cold and snowy must have thick walls; they must have carpets on the floors and heavy curtains at the windows. There must be fires in the houses, to keep people warm. If the houses were not warm, people would suffer from cold and many would die. Nevertheless, while they do not need to be built for warmth, our houses in the tropics ought to be as carefully built as are the homes in winter lands. That they are not so built is one reason why so many little children die here,—many more than in America, for instance. [Illustration: