448 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



difficulty experienced in rearing tbem. To it the infanticide so com- 

 mon among the uncivilized and semi-civilized is, of course, mainly due 

 the burial of living infants with mothers who have died in child- 

 birth ; the putting to death one out of twins ; the destruction of 

 younger children when there are already several For these acts 

 there is an excuse like that commonly to be made for killing the sick 

 and old. When, concerning the desertion of aged people by wander- 

 ing prairie tribes, Catlin says, " It often becomes absolutely necessary 

 in such cases that they should be left, and they uniformly insist upon 

 it, saying, as this old man did, that they are old and of no further use, 

 that they left their fathers in the same manner, that they wish to die, 

 and their children must not mourn for them " when, of the Nascopies, 

 Heriot tells us that in his old age " the father usually employed as his 

 executioner the son who is most dear to him " when, in Kane, we 

 read of the Assiuiboin chief who " killed his own mother," because, 

 being " old and feeble," she " asked him to take pity on her and end 

 her misery" there is suggested the conclusion that, as destruction of 

 the ill and infirm may lessen the total amount of suffering to be borne 

 under the conditions of savage life, so may the destruction of infants, 

 when the region is barren or the mode of life so hard that the rearing 

 of many is impracticable. And a like plea may be urged in mitigation 

 of judgment on savages who sell or barter away their children : the 

 needs of the younger ones possibly, in some cases, prompting this 

 saci'ifice of the elder. 



Generally, then, among uncivilized peoples, as among animals, 

 instincts and impulses are the sole incentives and deterrents. The 

 status of a primitive man's child is like that of a bear's cub. There is 

 neither moral obligation nor moral restraint ; but there exists the 

 unchecked power to foster, to desert, to destroy, as love or anger 

 moves. 



To the yearnings of natural affection are added in early stages of 

 progress certain motives, partly personal, partly social, which help to 

 secure the lives of children ; but which, at the same time, initiate dif- 

 ferences of status between children of different sexes. There is the 

 desire to strengthen the tribe in war ; there is the wish to have a 

 future avenger on individual enemies ; there is the anxiety to leave 

 behind one who shall perform the funeral rites and continue oblations 

 at the grave. 



Inevitably, the urgent need to augment tlie number of warriors 

 leads to preference for male children. On reading of such a militant 

 race as the Chechemecas, that they " like much their male children, who 

 are brought up by their fathers, but they despise and hate the daugh- 

 ters;" or of the Panches, that, when " a wife bore her first girl-child, 

 they killed tl)e child, and thus they did with all the girls born before 

 a male child," Ave are shown the effect of this desii'e for sons ; and 



