of the children born resulted "principally from the difficulty, if not the impossibility, of transporting several children of tender age from place to place on their frequent marches."1 Concerning the Abipones, Charlevoix observes "They seldom rear but one child of each sex, murdering the rest as fast as they come into the world, till the eldest are strong enough to walk alone. They think to justify this cruelty by saying that, as they are almost constantly travelling from one place to another, it is impossible for them to take care of more infants than two at a time; one to be carried by the father, and the other by the mother."2 Among the Lenguas of the Paraguayan Chaco an interval of seven or eight years is always observable between children of the same family, infants born in this interval being immediately killed. The reasons for this practice, says Mr. Hawtrey, are obvious. "The woman has the hard work of carrying food from garden and field, and all the transport to do; the Lenguas are a nomadic race, and their frequent moves often entail journeys of from ten to twenty miles a day. . . . Travelling with natives under these circumstances, one is forced to the conclusion that it would be impossible for a mother to have more than one young child to carry and to care for." Moreover, a little forethought tells the parents that their child before long will become a consumer of provisions perhaps already too scanty for the family. Savages often suffer greatly from want of food, and may have to choose between destroying their offspring or famishing themselves. Hence they often have recourse to infanticide as a means of saving their lives; indeed, among several tribes, in case of famine, children are not only killed, but eaten. Urgent want is frequently represented by our authorities as the main cause of infanticide; 5 and 4 1 Curr, Squatting in Victoria, p. 252. Oberländer, loc. cit. p. 279. Cf. Fison and Howitt, Kamilaroi and Kurnai, p. 259; Fraser, Aborigines of New South Wales, p. 5. 2 Charlevoix, History of Paraguay, i. 405, 3 Hawtrey, in Jour. Anthr. Inst. xxxi. 295. See Steinmetz, Endokannibalismus, pp. 8, 13, 14, 17. 5 Nansen, First Crossing of Greenland, ii. 330. Nelson, in Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethn. xviii, 289 (Eskimo about their statements are corroborated by the conspicuous prevalence of this custom among poor tribes and in islands whose inhabitants are confined to a narrow territory with limited resources. In the chapter dealing with human sacrifice we shall notice that infanticide is in some cases practised as a sacrificial rite. In other cases infants are killed for medicinal purposes, without being sacrificed to any divine being.1 Thus in the Luritcha tribe, in Central Australia, "it is not an infrequent custom, when a child is in weak health, to kill a younger and healthy one and then to feed the weakling on its flesh, the idea being that this will give to the weak child the strength of the stronger one." 2 A curious motive for female infanticide is also worth mentioning. That the victims of this practice are most commonly, among several peoples almost exclusively, females,3 is generally due to the greater usefulness of the men both as food-providers and in war. But the Hakka, a Mongolian tribe in China, often put their girls to a cruel death with a view to inducing thereby the soul to appear the next time in the shape of a boy.* Thus various considerations have led men to destroy their own offspring. Under certain circumstances the advantages, real or imaginary, assumed to result from the deed have been sufficiently great to silence the voice of parental love, which, as will be seen, is to be found even in the bosom of a savage father. The resistance offered by this instinct would be so much the less as the child is killed immediately after its birth, at a period of its life Behring Strait). Brough Smyth, op. cit. i. 53; ii. 386 (aboriginal tribes of Australia and Tasmania). von Kotzebue, op. cit. iii. 173 (natives of Radack). Tutuila, in Jour. Polynesian Soc. i. 263 (Line Islanders). Campbell, Wild Tribes of Khondistan, p. 140 (Kandhs of Sooradah). Marshall, A Phrenologist amongst the Todas, p. 194. Kolben, op. cit. i. 144 (Hottentots). See also Haberland, loc. cit. p. 26; Dimitroff, Die Geringschätzung des menschlichen VOL. I Lebens und ihre Ursachen bei den 1 See infra, p. 458 sq. 2 Spencer and Gillen, Native Tribes of Central Australia, p. 475. Cf. ibid. p. 52. 3 Cf. Haberland, loc. cit. p. 56 sqq. 4 Hubrig, quoted by Ploss, Das Kind, ii. 263. D D when the father's affection for it is as yet only dawning. Even where, at first, infanticide was an exception, practised by a few members of the tribe, any interference from the side of the community may have been prevented by the notion that a person possesses proprietary rights over his offspring; and, once become habitual, infanticide easily grew into a regular custom. In cases where it was found useful to the tribe, it would be enforced as a public duty; and even where there no longer was any need for it, owing to changed conditions of life, the force of habit might still keep the old custom alive. Though infanticide is thus regarded as allowable, or even obligatory, among many of the lower races, we must not suppose that they universally look upon it in this light. Mr. McLennan grossly exaggerated its prevalence when he asserted that female infanticide is "common among savages everywhere." Among a great number of them it is said to be unheard of or almost so,2 and to these belong peoples of so low a type as the Andaman Islanders, the Botocudos, and certain Californian tribes." The Veddahs 4 of Ceylon have never been known to practise it. Among the Yahgans of Tierra del Fuego, Mr. Bridges informs me, it occurred only occasionally, and then it was almost always the deed of the mother, who acted from "jealousy, or hatred of her husband, or because of desertion and wretchedness." Mr. Fison, who has lived for a long time among uncivilised races, thinks it will be found that infanticide is far less common among the lower savages than it is among the more advanced tribes. Considering 1 McLennan, Studies in Ancient History, p. 75. 2 See Westermarck, History of Human Marriage, p. 312 sq.; and, besides the authorities there referred to, Dorsey, 'Omaha Sociology,' in Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethn. ii. 369; Kirke, Twenty-five Years in British Guiana, p. 160; Chalmers, Pioneering in New Guinea, p. 163; Hodgson, Miscellaneous Essays, i. 123 (Bódo and Dhimáls); Baumann, Durch Massailand zur Nilquelle, p. 161 (Masai). 8 further that the custom of infanticide, being opposed to the instinct of parental love, presupposes a certain amount of reasoning or forethought, it seems probable that where it occurs, it is not a survival of earliest savagery, but has grown up under specific conditions in later stages of development.1 It is, for instance, very generally asserted that certain Indians in California never committed infanticide before the arrival of the whites; 2 and Ellis thinks there is every reason to suppose that this custom was practised less extensively by the Polynesians during the early periods of their history than it was afterwards.3 4 Where infanticide is not sanctioned by custom, the occasional commission of it has a tendency to call forth disapproval or excite horror. The Blackfeet are said to believe that women who have been guilty of this crime will never reach the happy mountain after death, but are compelled to hover round the seats of their crimes, with branches of trees tied to their legs. Speaking of another North American tribe, the Potawatomis, Keating observes" In a few instances, it is said that children born deformed have been destroyed by their mothers, but these instances are rare, and whenever discovered, uniformly bring them into disrepute, and are not unfrequently punished by some of the near relations. Independently of these cases, which are but rare, a few instances of infanticide, by single women, in order to conceal intrigue, have been heard of; but they are always treated with abhorrence." 5 Among the Omahas "parents had no right to put their children to death." The Aleuts believed that a child-murder would bring misfortune on the whole village." The Brazilian Macusis and Botocudos look upon the deed with horror. At Ulea, 9 6 8 3 of the Caroline Islands, "the prince would have the unnatural mother punished with death."1 So, too, Herr Valdau tells us of a Bakundu woman who, accused of infanticide, was condemned to death.2 In Ashanti a man is punished for the murder of his child. Among the Gaika tribe, of the Kafirs, the killing of a child after birth is punishable as murder, the fine going to the chief.* Nay, even peoples among whom infanticide is habitual seem now and then to have a feeling that the act is not quite correct. Mr. Brough Smyth asserts that the Australian Black is himself ashamed of it; and Mr. Curr has no doubt that he feels, in the commencement of his career at least, that infanticide is wrong, as also that its committal brings remorse." The custom of infanticide in most cases requires that the child should be killed immediately or soon after its birth. Among certain North American Indians "the right of destroying a child lasted only till it was a month old," after which time the feeling of the tribe was against its death." Ellis says of the Society Islanders :-" The horrid act, if not committed at the time the infant entered the world, was not perpetrated at any subsequent period. . . . If the little stranger was, from irresolution, the mingled emotions that struggled for mastery in its mother's bosom, or any other cause, suffered to live ten minutes or half an hour, it was safe; instead of a monster's grasp, it received a mother's caress and a mother's smile, and was afterwards nursed with solicitude and tenderness.' Almost the same is said of other South Sea Islanders and of tribes inhabiting the Australian continent.10 That the custom of infanticide is generally "8 9 1 von Kotzebue, op. cit. iii. 211. 2 Valdau, in Ymer, v. 280. 3 Bowdich, Mission from Cape Coast Castle to Ashantee, p. 258. 4 Maclean, Compendium of Kafir Laws and Customs, p. III. 5 Brough Smyth, op. cit. i. 54. 6 Curr, The Australian Race, i. 100. 7 Schoolcraft, quoted by Sutherland, op. cit. i. 119. 8 Ellis, Polynesian Researches, i. 255. 9 Waitz-Gerland, op. cit. vi. 138, 139, 638. Angas, Savage Life and Scenes in Australia and New Zealand, i 313. 10 Ploss, Das Kind, ii. 255. Spencer and Gillen, Native Tribes of Central Australia, p. 51. Iidem, Northern Tribes of Central Australia, p. 608. |