Nervous children, and only children, on the other hand, show the opposite extreme.  Nevertheless, the mother of a nervous and delicate child—­a child, that is to say, who, even if he is not permanently an invalid, nevertheless never seems quite well and lacks the robustness of other children—­should realise clearly how much of this sensitiveness is due to the atmosphere of unrest and too great solicitude which surrounds him.  It is a matter of universal experience that excess of care for only children has a depressing influence which affects their character, their physical constitution, and their entire vitality.  At all costs we must hide our own anxieties from the child, and we must treat his illnesses in as matter-of-fact a way as possible.

When illness comes, his daily routine should be interrupted as little as possible.  In dealing with nervous children, it is often better to lay aside treatment altogether rather than to carry out a variety of therapeutic procedures which have the effect of concentrating the child’s mind upon his symptoms.  When we grown-up people are sick, we often find a great deal of comfort in submitting ourselves to some form of treatment.  We have great faith, we say, in this remedy or in that.  It is our remedy, a nostrum.  The physician knows well that the opportunities which are presented to him of intervening effectually to cut short the processes of disease by the use of specific cures are not very numerous, and that often enough the justification for his prescription is the soothing effect which it may exercise upon the mind of the patient, who, believing either in the physician or in his remedy, finds confidence and patience till recovery ensues.  As a rule this form of consolation is denied to little children.  They have no belief in the efficacy of the remedies which are applied with such vigour and persistence.  Indeed, it is not the child, but his anxious mother, who finds comfort in the thought that everything possible has been done.  Therefore, a prescription must be written and changed almost daily, the child’s chest must be anointed with oil, and the air of the sick-room made heavy with some aromatic substance for inhalation, and all this when the disturbance is of itself unimportant, and owes its severity only to the undue sensitiveness of the child’s nervous system.

The very name of illness should be banished from such nurseries.  Everything should be done to reassure the child and to make light of his symptoms, and we can keep the most scrupulous watch over his health without allowing him to perceive at all that our eye is on him.  With older children the evil results of suggestions, unconsciously conveyed to them by the apprehension of their parents, become very obvious.  The visit of the doctor, to whom in the child’s hearing all the symptoms are related, is often followed by an aggravation which is apt to be attributed to his well-meant prescription.  The harm done by