Choice of Room for the Confinement and Lying-in.—­ The room should be light, sunny, and well ventilated; it should not be too near a water-closet.  In the city as quiet a room as possible should be selected, and one that is well removed from the rest of the house, so that if necessary perfect quiet can be maintained.  The room should be as cheery as possible.

The dress of the mother during the lying-in consists of a merino undervest, with high neck and long sleeves, and a nightgown, which shall be open all the way down the front.  The gowns should be made of light muslin or of cambric; and there should be a sufficient number so that they may be changed every day.

Six abdominal bandages should be provided.  These are made of light muslin, and they should be eighteen inches wide and long enough to go once and a third around the patient’s hips at the sixth month of pregnancy, or about one yard and a quarter long; they may be made straight or to fit the patient at the sixth month.  This bandage is fastened down the front; it is applied directly after the labor, and adds greatly to the patient’s comfort during the lying-in.

The vulvar pads used during the lying-in are the antiseptic absorbent pads which can be obtained at any place where surgical dressings are sold; they are made of absorbent cotton, covered with cheesecloth, and sterilized.

There must be a sufficiently generous supply of sheets so that they can be changed every day, and the drawsheet as often as may be required.  Nothing is so important to a good lying-in as to have a clean, well-ventilated room, and plenty of fresh bed-linen.  Cleanliness is the first requisite to antisepsis, and this is the secret of avoiding puerperal fever.

Articles to be provided for the confinement are:  1.  An oblong douche-pan of agate-ware. 2.  An agate bed-pan. 3.  A bath thermometer. 4.  Two pieces of rubber sheeting; one, one yard square, and the other
    two yards square. 5.  Two sterilized bed-pads, 30 inches square by 3 to 4 inches thick. 6.  Three dozen antiseptic absorbent pads. 7.  One pound of sterilized absorbent cotton; twelve yards of
    cheese-cloth. 8.  Six abdominal bandages, eighteen inches wide, preferably made to
    fit the figure at the sixth month of gestation. 9.  Two hand-scrubs.
10.  Four ounces of the tincture of green soap.
11.  Bottle of corrosive sublimate tablets.
12.  Four ounces of powdered boric acid.
13.  Half a pint of good whisky.
14.  Two ounces of aromatic spirits of ammonia.
15.  Two ounces of aqua ammonia.
16.  One pint of alcohol.
17.  Two tubes sterilized white vaselin.
18.  Plenty of large and small safety-pins.
19.  Hot-water bag.
20.  New fountain syringe, to hold four quarts; with glass nozle.
21.  One small basin for vomited matter.
22.  Two very large agate basins or wash-bowls for washing doctor’s
    hands and for antiseptic solutions.