n% SEX OF THE F(ETUS. 



no marked influence on the proportion of the sexes, there is no rea- 

 son why we should be surprised at it; for men and women are 

 placed in the same circumstances. That merely proves that abso- 

 lute force is not in this case one of the essential conditions, but it 

 does not in any respect diminish the important bearing of the rela- 

 tive force of the couple. 



393. There is no one who has failed to remark that births are 

 more numerous at certain times and in certain countries, and more 

 rare in others; but no attempt has been made to explain these appa- 

 rent anomalies, nor prove that they were in some degree fixed in 

 their recurrences. M. Villerme has taken upon himself this double 

 care; in a memoir read to the Academy of Sciences, he says that 

 out of a total of 7,651,437 births, reduced (ramenees) to 12,000, 

 1093 took place in January, 1136 in February, 1117 in March, 

 1057 in April, 1000 in November, 981 in December, 981 in Sep- 

 tember, 964 in October, 965 in May, 927 in August, 896 in June, 

 and 884 in July, and that, consequently, the relative frequency of 

 conceptions is far from being the same at all seasons of the year. 



394. M. Villerme, always relying on calculations, in the same 

 way passes successively in review the influence of holidays and pub- 

 lic rejoicings, the first period of marriage, fasts and privations, tem- 

 perature, latitude, vegetable or animal regimen, prosperity, civilisa- 

 tion, liberty, the poverty and the calamities of the population, on the 

 number of fecundations, and demonstrates that many more children 

 are born under a fine climate, in countries where the arts, industry, 

 commerce and the sciences flourish, where the air is salubrious and 

 the earth fertile, than in the contrary conditions; that famine and 

 years of scarcity, especially occasion extraordinary changes in the 

 rate of population, &c. 



In regard to the faculty of procreating at will children that shall 

 be beautiful, endowed with great genius, and without bad passions, 

 I can only refer the reader to the Callipedie of CI. Quillet, to the 

 Megalanthropo genie of M. Robert, or lastly to the Traite de la 

 Philopedie> 



