252 MARRIAGE AND DISEASE. 



marriages most common. The pale, wan, sad-eyed 

 factory-hand, or other city toiler of either sex, with- 

 out a single penny put past for the rainy day, at 

 any age from twelve and fourteen upwards, under- 

 takes all the cares and responsibilities of the married 

 state, with a lightness of heart which can only arise 

 from ignorance or carelessness, or both. To these 

 children, children are born, two-thirds of whom, 

 happily, die in infancy, while the other third live 

 a charge upon their fellows. No doubt can exist 

 that these child marriages take almost equal rank 

 with want of fresh air and sunlight, poverty and 

 drunkenness, as agents in the production of that 

 general deterioration and decay, which exterminate 

 our poor city dwellers within three or four genera- 

 tions. 



According to the last Annual Report of the Eegistrar- 

 General, there were during the year 1889, 94,040 

 men of twenty-one and under, married. Of these, 

 80,905 had gained their majority, 8769 were twenty 

 years of age, 3576 were nineteen, 728 were lads of 

 eighteen, 59 and 3 were boys of seventeen and six- 

 teen respectively. On turning to the women, we find 

 that no less than 42,170 were married of twenty 

 years of age and under. Of these, only 19,223 were 

 twenty, 14,129 were nineteen, 7159 were eighteen, 

 1472 were seventeen, 167 were sixteen, and 20 

 were fifteen.* But this is not the worst. Had 



* In 1888 two brides were fourteen, and one had reached the 

 wifely age of thirteen years. 



