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. 4 5 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 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 3 Man, in Jour. Anthr. Inst. xii. 329. 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. iii. 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 Nilquelle, p. 161 (Masai). cur 8 Wied-Neuwied, op. cit. ii. 39. Keane, in Jour. Anthr. Inst. xiii. 206. 5 Powers, op. cit. pp. 192, 271, 382. 6 Sarasin, Ergebnisse naturwissenschaftlicher Forschungen auf Ceylon, iii. 469, 539. 7 Bridges, in a letter dated Downeast, Tierra del Fuego, August 28th, 1888. 8 Fison and Howitt, Kamilaroi and Kurnai, p. 134 sqq. Cf. Farrer, 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. It is, for instance, very generally asserted that certain Indians in California never committed infanticide before the arrival of the whites; 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. 4 2 3 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."6 The Aleuts believed that a child-murder would bring misfortune on the whole village. The Brazilian Macusis 8 and Botocudos look upon the deed with horror. At Ulea, Primitive Manners and Customs, p. 2 Powers, op. cit. p. 207. Cf. ibid. p. 183. Ellis, Polynesian Researches, i. 249. 4 Richardson, in Franklin, Journey to the Shores of the Polar Sea, p. 77. 5 Keating, op. cit. i. 99. Dorsey, in Ann. Rep. Bur. Ethn. iii. 268. 7 Dall, op. cit. p. 399. 8 Waitz, op. cit. iii. 391. of the Caroline Islands, "the prince would have the unnatural mother punished with death." So, too, Herr Valdau tells us of a Bakundu woman who, accused of infanticide, was condemned to death." 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." 5 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." 8 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 1 von Kotzebue, op. cit. iii. 211. 2 Valdau, in Ymer, v. 280. 3 Bowdich, Mission from Cape Coast Castie to Ashantee, p. 258. Maclean, Compendium of Kafir Laws and Customs, p. 11. 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. "2 restricted to the destruction of new-born babies also appears from various statements as to the parental love of those peoples who are addicted to this practice. In Fiji "such children as are allowed to live are treated with a foolish fondness.' Among the Narrinyeri, "only let it be determined that an infant's life shall be saved, and there are no bounds to the fondness and indulgence with which it is treated"; and with reference to other Australian tribes we are told that it is brought up with greater care than generally falls to the lot of children belonging to the poorer classes in Europe. Among the Indians of the Pampas and other Indians of that neighbourhood, who abandon deformed or sickly-looking children to the wild dogs and birds of prey, an infant becomes, from the moment it is considered worthy to live," the object of the whole love of its parents, who, if will submit themselves to the greatest privations to satisfy its least wants or exactions." 5 Madagascar, according to Ellis, "nothing can exceed the affection with which the infant is treated by its parents and other members of the family; the indulgence is more frequently carried to excess than otherwise."" From these and similar facts, as also from the general absence of statements to the contrary, I conclude that murders of children who have been allowed to survive their earliest infancy are very rare, though not quite unknown,' among the lower races. necessary, In The custom of infanticide prevails, or has prevailed, not only in the savage world, but among semi-civilised and civilised races. In the poorest districts of China female infants are often destroyed by their parents immediately after their birth, chiefly on account of poverty. Though disapproved of by educated Chinese, the practice is treated with forbearance or indifference by the mass of the people, and is acquiesced in by the mandarins." "When seriously appealed to on the subject," says the Rev. J. Doolittle, though all deprecate it as contrary to the dictates of reason and the instincts of nature, many are ready boldly to apologise for it, and declare it to be necessary, especially in the families of the excessively poor.' However, infanticide is neither directly sanctioned by the government, nor agreeable to the general spirit of the laws and institutions of the Empire; and it is prohibited both by Buddhism and Taouism. According to Dr. de Groot, the belief that the spirits of the dead may, with authorisation of Heaven, take vengeance on the living, has a very salutary effect on female infanticide in China. "The fear that the souls of the murdered little ones. may bring misfortune, induces many a father or mother to lay the girls they are unwilling to bring up in the street for adoption into some family, or into a foundling-hospital." 4 In ancient times the Semites, or at least some of them, not only practised infanticide, but, under certain circumstances, approved of it or regarded it as a duty. According to an ancient Arabic proverb, it was a generous deed to bury a female child; and we read of 'Oṣaim the Fazarite who did not dare to save alive his daughter Lacîța, without concealing her from the people, although she was his only child. Considering that among the 8 7 1 Gutzlaff, Sketch of Chinese History, i. 59 Wells Williams, Middle Kingdom, ii. 240 sqq. Douglas, Society in China, p. 354 sqq. Doolittle, Social Life of the Chinese, ii. 206. 2 Doolittle, op. cit. ii. 203, 208 sq. Wells Williams, op. cit. i. 836; ii. 242. Douglas, Society in China, p. 354. Ploss, Das Kind, ii. 262. 3 Doolittle, op. cit. ii. 208. 4 Staunton, in his translation of Ta Tsing Leu Lee, p. 347 n.* 5 Thai Shang, 4. Giles, Strange Stories from a Chinese Studio, ii. 377. Douglas, Confucianism and Taouism, p. 267. Indo-Chinese Gleaner, iii. 164 6 de Groot, Religious System of China, (vol. iv. book) ii. 457 sqq. 7 Freytag, Arabum Proverbia, i. 229. 8 Robertson Smith, Kinship and Marriage in Early Arabia, p. 293. |