Sta,—Any parent who is so unhappy as to have to
leave a child in hospital can only hope that whilst its bodily ills are being tended its mind will not suffer irreparable damage. When I collected my three- year-old daughter from a six-week sojourn in a children's hospital, I was told that though she had " fretted " at first—she had, I understand, wept for three whole days—she was now anxious to remain in hospital. She certainly eyed me strangely. On our long journey home she scarcely spoke, except to say, " Is Mummy at home?" It was only much later, weeks afterwards, when she had regained some sense of security, that we learned that she had been informed by some of her fellow-patients of the ultimate fact of life, namely death, and that she had been per- suaded that all of us at home were dead. From infancy she had been accustomed to having a small piece of silky material to handle as she went to sleep, a source of tactile comfort. The nurses were most under- standing about this when I told them. When I had gone they took it from her and told her that she was " too old for that sort of thing "—too old at three, and with your heart breaking I I will not trespass further on your space to describe what else we learned in the ensuing weeks when she played at " hospitals " with her dolls.—Yours faithfully,
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