How can the sugar be increased?  By adding milk or granulated sugar to the cows’ milk.

[578 Mothers’ remedies]

How much milk sugar is added to twenty ounces of food?  About one ounce will do for the first three or four months.  This makes it between six and seven per cent sugar.

How should you prepare the sugar?  Dissolve it in boiled water and strain if there is a deposit after standing, by pouring it through a layer of absorbent cotton one-half inch thick placed in an ordinary funnel.

Is not granulated (cane) sugar recommended also?  Yes; but all infants cannot use it.  It is cheaper, but a good article of milk sugar should be bought.  It costs from twenty to sixty cents per pound.  The cheap variety contains many impurities.

But if cane sugar is used, how much is needed?  Usually about one-half or a little over one-half as much as milk sugar, or about one half ounce to twenty ounces of food.

What occurs if too much is used?  The sugar is likely to ferment in baby’s stomach and cause colic.  The milk is made too sweet.

If you continue to overfeed granulated sugar, what happens?  Gas, colic, restlessness, uneasiness, lining of the bowels becomes reddened and irritated; the redness shows externally around the rectum, and in severe cases around the hips.

Unless the amount of sugar is now reduced, what occurs?  There follow frequently watery, splashy stools with much gas and foul odors.

Is cane or granulated sugar safe to use after six months?  It does not usually produce so much trouble later on.

Suppose milk sugar produces irritation?  The quantity used should be reduced to one ounce to twenty-five ounces of food or even less for a short time.

As a rule should milk sugar be preferred the first six months?  Yes.

What are the best grades of milk sugar?  Merck’s, Mallinkrotz’s, or Squibb’s.

Is sugar added to sweeten and make the milk palatable?  No; although it does that, its use is to furnish one of the needed elements for the growth of the baby, and it is required by young infants in the largest quantity.

How do we know that this is true?  Because in good mothers’ milk the amount of sugar is greater than that of the fat, proteids, and salts combined.

As cows’ milk has nearly three times as much proteids (curds) and salts as mothers’ milk, how can these be diminished?  By diluting the cows’ milk.

How much should cow’s milk be diluted for a very young infant?  Diluted twice will give almost the same proportion of proteids present as in mothers’ milk, but as the proteids of cows’ milk are so much harder for the infant to digest, the milk should, in the beginning, be diluted five or six times for most infants.

[All about baby 579]

Does the diluted cows’ milk with lime-water and sugar added resemble mothers’ milk?  No; for this mixture does not contain enough fat.