A CHAPTER FOR MARRIED PEOPLE 551 



''We may forgive the poor, deluded girl— seduced, 

 betrayed, abandoned— who in her wild frenzy, destroys 

 the mute evidence of her guilt. We have sympathy 

 and sorrow for her. But for the married shirk who 

 disregards her divinely ordained duty, we have nothing 

 but contempt, even if she be the lordly woman of 

 fashion, clothed in purple and fine linen. If glittering 

 gems adorn her person, within there is foulness and 

 squalor. ' ' * 



Not a Modern Crime.— Although this crime has 

 attained remarkable proportions in modern times, it 

 is not a new one by any means, as the following para- 

 graph will suffice to show: 



''Infanticide and exposure were also the custom 

 among the Eomans, Medes, Canaanites, Babylonians, 

 and other Eastern nations, with the exception of the 

 Israelites and Egyptians. The Scandinavians killed 

 their offspring from fantasy. The Norwegians, after 

 having carefully swaddled their children, put some 

 food into their mouths, placed them under the roots 

 of trees or under the rocks, to preserve them from 

 ferocious beasts. Infanticide was also permitted 

 among the Chinese, and we saw, during the last cen- 

 tury, vehicles going round the streets of Pekin daily 

 to collect the bodies of the dead infants. To-day there 

 exist foundling hospitals to receive children abandoned 

 by their parents. The same custom is also observed 

 in Japan, in the isles of the Southern Ocean, at Ota- 

 heite, and among several savage nations of North 

 America. It is related of the Jaggers of Guinea that 

 they devour their own children." t 



The Greeks practiced infanticide systematically, 

 their laws at one time requiring the destruction of 

 crippled or weakly children. Among all the various 



* Gardner , t Burdach , 



