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A rupture of the navel ought always to be treated early—the earlier the better. Ruptures of the navel can only be cured in infancy and in childhood. If it be allowed to run on until adult age, a cure is impossible. Palliative means can then only be adopted.

The best treatment is a Burgundy pitch plaster, spread on a soft piece of wash-leather about the size of the top of a tumbler, with a properly adjusted pad (made from the plaster) fastened on the center of the plaster, which will effectually keep up the rupture, and in a few weeks will cure it. It will be necessary, from time to time, to renew the plaster until the cure be effected. These plasters will be found both more efficacious and pleasant than either a truss or an elastic bandage; which latter appliances sometimes gall, and do more harm than they do good.

20. If a child has a groin rupture (an inguinal rupture), can that also be cured?

Certainly, if, soon after birth, it be properly attended to. Consult a medical man, and he will supply you with a well-fitting truss, which will eventually cure him. If the truss be properly made (under the directions of an experienced surgeon) by a skillful surgical-instrument maker, a beautiful, nicely fitting truss will be supplied, which will take the proper and exact curve of the lower part of the infant’s belly, and will thus keep on without using any under-strap whatever—a great desideratum, as these under-straps are so constantly wetted and soiled as to endanger the patient constantly catching cold. But if this under-strap is to be superseded, the truss must be made exactly to fit the child—to fit him like a ribbon; which is a difficult thing to accomplish, unless it be fashioned by a skillful workman. It is only lately that these trusses have been made without under-straps. Formerly the under-straps were indispensable necessaries.