354: 



THE NATIONAL GEOGRAPHIC MAGAZINE 



Photograph by IT. C. Ellis 



A WARD POR Till; CHILDREN OP THE POOR: PRANCE ENDEAVORS TO SAVE EVERY 



BABY WITHIN ITS BORDERS 



The dowry custom in France has its good points, for it prevents hasty and poverty- 

 ridden marriages ; on the other hand, it is bad, for it deters marriage in a land where children 

 are sorely needed and causes the French family to be small, so that the one or two children, 

 when grown, may possess the proper financial attractions for marriage. 



kind, he generally says so frankly; if the 

 Trinity is beyond his conception, he does 

 not camouflage his skepticism ; unlike 

 many Americans, he accepts few theories 

 on faith, and what he cannot understand 

 or accept he candidly rejects. 



In the Frenchman, then, we find an 

 unusual love of philosophy and a certain 

 worship of reason which, are rather dis- 



couraging to us more loosely thinking, 

 more sentimental, Americans. Perhaps 

 our tendency is to take too many ideas, 

 facts, and things for granted; but the 

 Frenchman, even of the lower middle 

 classes, is always searching for a reason, 

 an explanation, a more thorough under- 

 standing of this and that. 



If at the table of my French hostess 



