312 Of the Checks to Population Bk. ii. 



or false shame. It is not to be doubted that if 

 the children received into these hospitals had 

 been left to the management of their parents, 

 taking the chance of all the difficulties in which 

 they might be involved, a much greater propor- 

 tion of them would have reached the age of man- 

 hood, and have become useful members of the 

 state. 



When we look a little deeper into this subject, 

 it will appear that these institutions not only fail 

 in their immediate object, but by encouraging in 

 the most marked manner habits of licentiousness, 

 discourage marriage, and thus weaken the main 

 spring of population. All the well-informed men, 

 with whom I conversed on this subject at Peters- 

 burg, agreed invariably that the institution had 

 produced this effect in a surprising degree. To 

 have a child was considered as one of the most 

 trifling faults which a girl could commit. An 

 English merchant at Petersburg told me, that a 

 Russian girl living in his family, under a mistress 

 who was considered as very strict, had sent six 

 children to the foundling hospital without the loss 

 of her place. 



It should be observed, however, that generally 

 speaking six children are not common in this kind 

 of intercourse. Where habits of licentiousness 

 prevail, the births are never in the same propor- 

 tion to the number of people as in the married 

 state ; and therefore the discouragement to mar- 

 riage, arising from this licentiousness, and the 

 diminished number of births, which is the conse- 



