HISTOEICAL EACES 261 



find two modern Chinese authors speaking as follows. ' One 

 must not assume that such a custom is prevalent ; flagrant 

 and sometimes dramatic accounts, of which we have heard 

 so much, only hold true in certain districts and at times of 

 famine.' ^ According to Faulds infanticide was formerly common 

 in Japan.2 



It is said that infanticide was formerly characteristic of five- 

 sixths of British India. ^ Recently it was common in Central 

 India, Rajputana, Cutch Bhooj, Agra Province, Khondistan, 

 among the Jats, and in the Punjab generally.* The Mysore 

 census for 1852 showed that in a population of 3,410,382 there 

 was a 10 per cent, excess of males in the adult population in 

 spite of a 16 per cent, excess of female births.^ It is stated to 

 exist among the Nagas ^ though the evidence is conflicting.' 

 It was formerly ' very common all over the Jeypore country '.^ 

 It was especially prevalent among the Khond people,^ 

 where ' it was expressly sanctioned and promoted by their 

 religious doctrine '.^° It was also common among the Todas.^^ 

 ' Lieut. -General Walker estimated that about 33,000 female 

 children were annually put to death in Cutch and Gujerat, a rate 

 amounting to about one-fourth of the total births and therefore 

 to about half of the girls born. Watson and Kaye assert that 

 " no criminality either by law or usage was ever attached among 

 the Rajputs to infanticide. The child was smothered in milk 

 or else opium was smeared upon the mother's breasts in quantities 

 sufficient to cause immediate death." The Encyclopaedia of India 

 asserts that in one of the districts of this Province, while there 

 were 82,400 boys, there were only 35,137 girls at the 1874 enumera- 

 tion, a discrepancy which clearly showed that more than one- 

 half of the girls had been destroyed.' ^^ 



It is worthy of note that in addition to infanticide ' the wilful 

 neglect of female children operates destructively in every town 

 and village throughout the length and breadth of India '.^^ This 



' Leong and Tao, loc. cit., p. 91. ^ Faulds, loc. cit., p. 285. For Tonquin 



see Richard, History oj Tonquin, p. 757. =■ Wilkins, Hinduism, p. 431. 



* Risley, loc cit., pp. 166 and 168; Dubois, Hindu Manner.'i, vol. ii, p. 612; 

 Crooke, loc. cit., p. 1.36 ; Browne, Indian Infanticide, p. 612 ; Wilkins, loc. cit., 

 p. 431 ; Russell, Central Provinces, vol. iv, p. 419. ^ Wilkins, loc. cit., p. 432. 



« Codden, J. A. I., vol. xxvi, p. 179 ; Risley, loc. cit., p. 165. ' Hodson, 



Man, vol. xiv, p. 98. " Thurston, Ethnographic Notes, p. 504. '^ Mac- 



pherson, Memorials of Service, p. 132; Campbell, Personal Narrative, p. 139. 

 »• Macpherson, Religion of the Khonds, p. 65. " Rivers, Todas, p. 478. 



'2 Sutherland, loc. cit., vol. i, p. 144. '* Wilkins, loc. cit., p. 431. 



