18 THE COMMON SENSE OF THE MILK QUESTION 



tions, and their incompatibility with the function of 

 breast-nursing, nor both groups of causes combined, 

 can account for more than a moderate percentage of 

 these serious maternal failures. 



As in the case of the birth-rate, the decline of breast- 

 nursing is most strongly marked among the leisured 

 and well-to-do classes, and this fact probably accoimts 

 for the widespread opinion that love of social frivoli- 

 ties is responsible for the decline. But, while there 

 is unquestionably a good deal of degeneracy among 

 a section of our leisured class, whose unnatural orgies 

 and sensational voluptuousness warrant the belief 

 that they are abnormal in their mental development 

 and capable of almost any perversity, it is simply 

 absurd to charge that this is true of the leisured class 

 generally. To bring such an indictment against the 

 women of a whole class is out of the question. For it 

 is a serious indictment: to charge a mother with 

 deliberately sacrificing her baby for the sake of social 

 frivolities is, after all, to accuse her of being inhuman 

 and something of a monster. Such women do exist 

 and have existed in all ages, but it is impossible to 

 believe their number to be anything like so great as 

 the number of mothers who do not nurse their own 

 offspring. 



Similarly, while the industrial occupations in which 

 women are engaged away from their homes will 

 account for a good many mothers not nursing their 



