To begin well, the parents must bear in mind, before the baby’s beginning, that the life of the little one will be in great measure determined by what they are, not by what they may hope to be, though even this has its influence. It is a well-known fact in heredity that transient states of body and mind, are not those which are most often entailed upon offspring, but the permanent states and conditions. What the mother eats, what she thinks, what she enjoys, what habits she allows to control her, will shape largely the little life, and make her after task in body-building a difficult, or a comparatively easy one. Given a good foundation, and the superstructure which rises upon it will be solid and enduring, and as beautiful as the architect desires. Suppose the little one is not well-born, it becomes the duty of the parents to choose its food, its dress, its plays, its surroundings, that they may make good as fast as possible, the defects known to exist in it. To do this most effectively, they will need to counsel often with their medical adviser, and become themselves conversant with the laws of hygienic living. That very much can be done along these lines is a well attested fact, and is beautifully illustrated in our Foundlings’ Homes, where little ones coming out of all sorts and conditions of society, and many of them with the worst possible heredity, are trained out of the evil ways toward which they incline physically, and into the upward way which makes the perfect man and woman. Therefore we have no reason to be discouraged, if we have not the most perfect model to begin with, but must instead do some molding and trimming off here and there before it stands forth the fair thing we desire. The baby’s clothing has much to do with its proper development, as already indicated. The food for the best development of the physical nature has also been emphasized, but some further remarks will not be out of place. I pity the little one that is cheated out of its rightful heritage, its mother’s breast. This is a day of bottle-fed babies, to the sorrow of the babies, and the loss to the mother of many hours of sweet comfort comparable with nothing else she may ever have, while the wee thing is taking its life from her breasts, and she is thinking high thoughts of its future and what she shall be to it. The mother who nurses her baby is much to blame, if she does not drink in the sweet lessons which come to her, of moral as well as physical dependence, while the little one hangs upon and nestles in her bosom; and she does not dream of what she misses, if she puts it off without a thought or a care of this, the sweet lessons of cuddling, nursing motherhood. If the little thing must be bottle-fed, hold it in your arms, as nearly in its natural position as possible, and cuddle it, while you hide as far as may be the ugly, unsympathetic substitute, the nursing-bottle.