232 PRENATAL CULTURE. 



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spoke to the mother of her boy's morbid tendency 



and was told in a very frank but indifferent manner, 



A Mother's that before the birth of the child the husband was 



qr . r 



making money but was unwilling to share it with 

 his wife. She would therefore sit up working at 

 night until the husband was sound asleep and 

 then take from his pockets as much change as she 

 dared without fear of discovery. In this way she 

 pilfered over one hundred dollars without being 

 detected. The boy, she said, was an exceptionally 

 cute thief; he would go into his father's store, 

 watch for an opportunity to get into the show- 

 case or money-drawer, quietly slip something into 

 his pocket, then walk out looking as innocent as 

 if he had never thought of doing wrong. 



As the parents of this child are considered hon- 

 est, when he has to be sent to the reform school 

 Who is to Blame. or state ' s prison his crime will generally be at- 

 tributed to bad company or environments. Most 

 persons knowing the family will blame the boy, 

 but God knows that the mother, through her own 

 dishonesty, made it easy for him to do wrong and 

 difficult to do right. 



The social feelings seem most susceptible to 

 maternal impressions during the fifth, sixth and 

 The Social seventh months. This, therefore, is the time for 

 Feelings, ^ mo ther to exercise her social nature, if she 



would have her child well endowed with these 

 feelings. She should cultivate a pure, sweet love, 

 and parental affection, and go sufficiently into 

 society to call all the social instincts into action. 

 If these feelings are abnormally strong, an oppo- 

 site course should be pursued. 



Most prospective mothers are prone to avoid 



