Among the problems that face the mother in the first year of her child's life is a wearisome one: the problem of weaning the child. The important thing is that weaning is one of the hardest matters that stand in the child's way, and one that disappoints his hopes in his mother and his future. It is fitting, then, that every mother understand this important step in her child's life.

What are the reasons that make weaning so difficult, for mother and child alike? To answer

this you must know, O mother, the importance of nursing and sucking for the child.

The child is born with an inclina-tion to suck, and this inclination is necessary to his life. Experiments have shown that the child finds comfort and pleasure at his feeding time, and that his need for this is as important as his need for the food itself. Experiments have likewise shown that the child who finishes his feeding quickly is usually quicker to suck his thumb than children who take their

time over their feeding. Artificial pacifiers help the child to satisfy his desire for sucking, and so spare him sucking his thumb.

Thus we find that if the child is forced to give up the bottle or the breast before his need for sucking is satisfied, he rebels and cries and hastens to suck the cover, or his thumb, or his tongue instead.

Children differ as to the age at which you can wean them: some are ready for weaning near the end of the first year, without