Baby carriage

“ Farther on we pass some forlorn looking negroes in a field, clearing the land. By the roadside sits the baby, a round little pickaninny in a rustic baby carriage made of a soap box on wooden wheels. We stop the car and ask if we may take the baby's picture. ”

“ A baby has more room and sleeps more comfortably in his basket or crib than in a carriage. When awake, he needs more space to roll, kick, creep, walk. In the [Pg 109] open country, he is much better off on the veranda or in the nursery with windows open, lying in his basket or pen, than rolled up in a carriage. Babies unfortunately housed in city apartments or crowded tenements must sometimes be confined in a carriage for the sake of getting to the open air. In a sunny, open-aired room or by an open window is better for a baby than down in a dusty street. ”

“ And once baby's person laundry was seen flapping on a line across a tonneau!
⁠In each car was what looked like the crowd at a large farm-auction - grandfather, father, mother, a couple of sons and two or three daughters, at least one baby in the arms of each grown-up, all jammed into two seats already filled with trunks and baby-carriages. And they were happy - incredibly happier than the smart people being conveyed in a bored way behind chauffeurs. ”

“ Motoring is not unmitigated bliss. The common belief that a body may be in only one place at one time can be easily refuted by a woman with a baby-carriage. Experience shows that such a woman, if she be put five feet from a sidewalk, with forty feet of open road behind her for an auto to pass through, will cover the forty feet backward with incredible speed and propel herself right in front of the car. ”

“ Baby's Outing.—It is always better for a baby, no matter how young, to go out in a carriage than to be carried. Young babies are much more comfortable lying full length on a pillow placed in the carriage and properly covered than when carried in the arms. ”

“ If possible get two or three obsolete baby carriages, each carriage to be manned by a boy and a man. The boy is the rider of course, but if it is possible to find a man small enough to ride in the carriage without totally demolishing it, substitute this small man for the [106] boy, for nothing looks funnier than a grown up man scrunched down into a baby carriage, with his feet dangling overboard! ”

“ The distances which have to be covered by train and bullock-cart are great, and the travelling tedious. And there are many delays and opportunities for difficulties to arise; so that when we know a baby is on its way to us we feel we want to wrap it round in prayer, so that, thus invisibly enveloped, it will be protected and carried safely all the way. Once a little child, travelling to us from a place as distant, counting by time, as Rome is from London, was observed by some Brahman men, who happened to be at the far end of the long third-class carriage. ”

“ The youngest of all shift for themselves at a very early age. One father told me that they brought their baby, two months old, down to the shucking shed at four o’clock every morning and kept it there all day. Another told me that they locked a baby of six months in the shack when they went away in the morning, and left it until noon, then left it alone again all the afternoon. A baby carriage with its occupant half smothered under piles of blankets is a common sight. Snuggled up against a steam box you find many a youngster asleep on a cold morning. ”

“ They show a curious interest in everything connected with trains and make these the nucleus of an exquisite system of sexual symbolism.”
Be this as it may. The fact is that all the little ones want to become drivers of some vehicle, that they can play driver, rider, chauffeur, car, train, etc., for hours at a time, that in the first years of their lives their fantasies are fixed only on objects possessing the power of motion, beginning with the baby-carriage and ending with the aeroplane. ”

“ All through the summer months the children are kept down on the street so that they can have the fresh air. The baby is generally in his carriage, but the two-year-old child runs about, and he must be carefully watched, for there is danger of his falling under the horses' feet. Sometimes the little mother is careless and one of the youngsters is lost. ”

“ At this age when taken out he should lie out straight in a heavy folded blanket, or hair pillow, having a small thin pillow under his head; a hot water bag should be near his feet; a light woolen blanket or afghan should be put into the carriage and the baby placed upon it, then it should be carefully wrapped around him and the outer carriage robe tucked in. These wraps should be modified according to the weather. Babies should not perspire much for they will take cold readily ”

“ The daily outing secures them better appetites, quiet sleep, and calmer nerves. Let them be properly clothed and protected in their carriages, and all weathers are good for them.
Children who take their naps in their baby-carriages may with advantage be wheeled into a sheltered spot, covered warmly, and left to sleep in the outer air. They are likely to sleep longer than in the house, and find more refreshment in their sleep. ”

“ The great wagons struggling upward, tumbling downward from mountain precipice into mountain gorge, hold under their shaking covers every type of westward moving human life. Here is the mother sitting in the wagon-front, her blue eyes gazing outward, wistfully and far, the baby lying on her lap; one wants to touch the baby’s head, it looks so alive and tender and shelterless in all that dust and turmoil of travel. ”

“ Then the two nurses tumble out; and the enthusiasm swelling into madness, the whole family are swept up stairs as on a cloud; while the idlers press about the carriage, and look into it, and walk round it, and touch it. For it is something to touch a carriage that has held so many people. It is a legacy to leave one's children. ”

“ But there were other things as well in the little vehicle: apples and pears which the two children had picked up on the way and out of which they had taken a bite or so, and a wholly naked doll with only one leg and a face entirely soiled and besmeared, and which sat self-satisfied in this carriage like a dainty young lady and allowed herself to be transported in this way. This small vehicle after sundry difficulties and delays at last arrived in the shade of a high growth of underbrush which luxuriated there at the edge of the big field, and now it was time to take a look at the two drivers. ”

“ For a short trip you had better plan on carrying food for yourself and your youngster.
Going by Car?
Families going to strange cities to establish new homes are still able to obtain gasoline with which to travel by car. A few tips on automobile travel may therefore be of value.
Proper care of your baby when traveling by car can be summed up in this way: Clean milk, clean water, clean food, and as little change as possible from the regular schedule to which he is accustomed.
Most young children enjoy riding in an automobile although they do get tired and bored on long trips. ”

“ It is the undying spirit of youth in you that makes you want to pack your outfit and take to the open road. So why deprive the kids of their rightful heritage, the right to fill their lungs with clean country air and to stretch their strong little [29] legs where there is plenty of room for them to stretch?
They may get restless, but the week-ender will not be likely to travel far enough for them to need anything more to occupy their attention than the passing landscape until the destination is reached. Even take the baby and swing a little hammock for it at one side or across the car. ”

“ A fine, mild day had been chosen for the journey, and if any of you who read this story have ever known what it was to be very ill and to get better again, you can picture to yourselves our little boy’s delight at being out once more and able to enjoy the open air and the bright spring sunshine. Even the drive in the four-wheeler was full of pleasure, and once he was comfortably settled in the railway carriage, in a corner by the window, you may be sure his face beamed with satisfaction. ”

“ Keep handy at all times a small emergency diaper kit in a rubber-lined bag, so you can stop anywhere and take care of the baby if necessary.
Keeping baby comfortable.
—Adjustable canvas seats are available, chiefly for use in automobiles, but they are very helpful for train travel, too. They are light and can be folded and put in a suitcase. Some come in their own carrying cases. They give the child a restful change from the car seat.
14 Sleeping in the coach.
—If you travel by coach, the chances are you are going to have to sleep with your baby cradled in your arms. ”

“ As if by magic, our travelers soon found themselves in a first-class carriage, with all their luggage piled on the roof, flying along with great rapidity, while hedges, fields and farm-houses, seen dimly in the half light, reeled past on either side. Though it was ten o’clock post meridian, yet in these northern latitudes, and at this season, it was still twilight. The carriage in which our travelers found themselves was in many respects like the inside of a large family coach, only it was much more capacious than any such vehicle. ”

“ From before the train started he begun stirring and whimpering—that way a baby does when it wants nothing in the world but a hand to be laid on it. Isn't it as if its mother's hand was a kind of healing that big folks forget about needing? By the time the train was out on the road in earnest, the little chap, he was in earnest, too. ”

“ Today I want to talk about our latest efforts to make car travel even safer for our smallest and most vulnerable passengers. Over the past 20 years, child car seats have become a fact of life for millions of parents. Where once small children bounced around freely and dangerously in our cars, today the majority ride in car seats, whether for quick errands to the grocery store or long cross-country journeys. ”

“ Every second the distance between the carriages diminishes. Occasionally more fashionable equipages mingle in the oft-interrupted procession. The carriages no longer dash along. Finally, about five or six hours before dark, the individual horses and carriages condense into a compact line, which, arresting itself and arrested by new vehicles from every side street, obviously belies the truth of the old proverb: "It is better to ride in a poor carriage than to go on foot." ”

“ With sighs of satisfaction, will this Baby in the Train! 169
O bold Directors, build a car to take such household pets!
And fit it up with cots and cribs and rocking basinettes,
And lullabies and picture-books and bon-bons, cakes, and toys,
To soothe the savage bosoms of these little girls and boys.
Brim high the cup with caudle then! Let Soothing Syrup flow!
Let roasted mutton deck the board, and milky rice also!
And let all Railway Companies immediately maintain
A separate compartment for the Baby in the Train! ”

“ These children, trained as they are, can keep up with a carriage at a seven-mile an-hour pace, and, bare-headed and bare-footed, they do it, two on each side. They make no appeal; they say nothing, either by word or look; they simply run by the side of the carriage, as though it were a race intended as a test of the endurance of Swiss children against Swiss horses. After ten minutes of this, you begin to feel some concern for the children, and you ask the courier what they want. ”

“ Almost every female carries a baby, and some females carry two. There are children in heaps at the corner of the street, children on the doorsteps, children in the gutter, children under the wheels of hansom cabs, up the lamp-posts, hanging over the window-sills, crowding the staircases, lying in the areas, rolling with the cabbage-stalks under the stalls, swarming and crawling all day long among the crowd, laughing, crying, screaming, and playing, unheeded, uncared for, unowned. ”

“ If toddlers are part of your carload, you will have amusement problems. Gather together a number of small toys and place them in a box of their own. If yours is a two-seated automobile, allow the youngster to change his seat often. ”

“ When boys are confirmed, they wear white suits, with a cape lined in scarlet or blue satin and trimmed with gold braid. If the family has enough money, they may hire a horse-drawn carriage. The driver wears a tall black stovepipe silk hat and the carriage doors and horses' bridles are decorated with white flowers. ”

“ The system of having appointment classes, will spare the public the ugly sight of seeing horses driven in quite inappropriate carriages, such as a fat hackney in an American speed wagon, and so on, thus a great impetus will be given to the carriage trade. Then there will be the ladies' 'George the Fourth' phaeton class, a low two-horse carriage with a seat for a servant behind, which is the proper carriage for ladies driving, instead of a high dogcart, or any two-wheeled carriage, which is only fit for a publican's wife out on a bank holiday. ”

“ In our country, owing to our artificial and unclean attitude, the mother-to-be, particularly during the later months, stays at home so far as possible, and does not go from place to place. When going about entails battling with crowds on public conveyances, this is wise. But the easy effort of walking or of riding in the old fashioned horse carriage from place to place on an extended journey, is ideal, and sometimes appears to have beneficial reactions on the character and quality of the child that is coming. ”

“ Children, who are always the most delicate test of sanitary conditions, generally cannot enter a close carriage without being sick—and very lucky for them that it is so. A close carriage, with the horse-hair cushions and linings always saturated with organic matter, if to this be added the windows up, is one of the most unhealthy of human receptacles. ”