About Babies [pp. 344]

344APPLETONS' JO URNAL OF POPULAR [JUNE 12.
it. It is the unity in fitness of things which constitutes, not
only strength, but goodness and beauty. Let society abandon
these, and moral evils surely result. It is chiefly among the
cultured and luxurious classes of great cities that that moral
degradation of women is observed, which consists in the aboli tion of the maternal instinct, and which leads directly to the
crimes of infanticide and abortion. It is doubtless true that in
certain countries the excess of females is met by female infan ticide; but, in all large and luxurious communities, both abor tion and infanticide are extensively and openly practised by
women.
That these crimes are not wholly due to pressure on the
means of subsistence, is clearly shown by the fact that they are
comparatively rare in poor countries like Ireland, and that they
originate in physical causes connected with civilization is shown
by the fact that domestic animals are apt to kill and eat their
offspring. Even petted hens, when sitting, will chip and eat
their eggs. If we inquire into motives, it is usually found that,
with the defect of the maternal'instinct, there is conjoined a
selfish egotism and self-indulgence on the part of the woman.
Thus it is said to be universal amongst the higher classes of
Turkey, that the woman, after bearing two children, for the
future provokes abortion, partly to preserve her form and beauty, and partly to diminish the number of her descendants. And
Dr. Storer shows that the practice of abortion by the native
American women of Massachusetts and New York is so limiting the increase of the native population, that it is maintained
chiefly by immigration. He says: "The number and success
of professed abortionists is notorious.... Hardly a newspaper
throughout the land that does not contain their open and
printed advertisements, or a drug-store whose shelves are not
crowded with their nostrums, publicly and unblushingly displayed."
It appears, too, that insanity and maternal deaths are increased by the practice. Dr. Storer further adds the significant fact, that'the feminine instincts of these women are so
blunted, that many are not conscious that to practise abortion
for the purpose of destroying their offspring is a crime. In no
country, perhaps, is there more chivalrous respect paid to women than in the United States, yet in this selfish egotism according to -Dr. Storer, they exceed the women of even the most
luxurious cities of the Old World.'
That another fundamental feminine instinct is enfeebled, is
further proved by the fact that it is in these luxurious cities of
the United States a vigorous agitation has been of late carried
on by women for the absolute equality of women with men in
education, trades, professions, and political power. All these
facts point to the conclusion that luxury is causing a physical
degeneration and moiral deterioration. Dr. Storer regrets this
destruction of human life by abortion; but the practice, criminal as it is, checks proportionately the increase of an immoral
and degraded population.
While, however, men are clamoring against women, and insisting that they shall be better educated, it would be well if
.they looked to their own condition in this respect. The means
.of education are universal in the United States; but there, even
more than in modern Europe, speculative theology, philosophy,
and ethics, produce their bitter fruits in the development and
pursuit of mysticisms and crazes of every kind, to the neglect
of the laws of Nature and the science of those laws. Nor are
signs wanting in this country of the same unsocial tendencies.
In a letter addressed to Mrs. McLaren, President of "the National Society for Women's Suffrage," Mr. J. S. Mill announces
as a "fact, that political freedom is the only effectual remedy
for the evils which women are conscious that women suffer."
This principle of political economy, so broadly and unreservedly stated, must be held to be the legitimate product of that kind
of speculative philosophy of which Mr. Mill is the ablest and
most authoritative living expounder; and therefore, although
not perhaps intended to be so absolutely dogmatic as it appears,
serves well, by what it omits, to contrast speculative philosophy, when practically applied to man's. welfare, with the more
cautious conclusions of an inductive mental science, founded
on the widest and deepest observation of the order and laws
of Nature.
ABOUT BABIES.
N one of the street-cars of the metropolis, a few evenings
since, was a lady with a baby.
One of the blue-eyed, crowing, happy babies, disarranging
its white robes and rumpling its blue ribbons with all the abandon of a baby that is secure in ever-fresh supplies both of love
and clothes. The mother was evidently a stranger to the other
ladies in the car; yet all of them smiled when they looked in
her direction, and many of them spoke to her and seemed to
love her for the sake of the beautiful child.
The opening instinct of womanhood seems to be the love of
babies, and the girl must be a very little one who does not want
a doll to which she can play the sweet part of mother. The
depth and purpose of the instinct are revealed to us in the petition of the little miss of five years, who happens to be an
only child —" Mammna, I want a baby to play with, a ineat baby.
mamma."
No kinder blessing was ever bestowed than in the close of
Fanny Fern's letter to the then newly-married Princess Royal
of England: "And when, brightest of all others, the crown of
maternity shall descend upon your youthful brow, God grant
you that nicest of all places on earth to cry in-a mothler's
bosom! "'
Yet, while the instinct of maternity is peculiar to woman,
and marks her sex more plainly than rounded limbs or gentle
manners, it is not to women and girls alone that the love of
babies is confined.
It was once the lot of the writer to dwell in the white tents
of Camp Ilarrison, in Georgia-in that lower part of the State
where families are always far between, and much more so in
war-times. For long weeks we had not seen a woman ov a
child.
At last the railroad through the camp was repaired, and in
the first train there was a lady, with just such a wide-awake,
kicking baby as the later one of the metropolis. Some hundreds of rough soldiers were around the cars, and Captain
Story, of the 57th Infantry, was the biggest and roughest
among them, if we judge of the tree by its bark.
The lady with the baby in her arms was looking fiom a window, and he took off his hat and said, "Madam, I will give you
five dollars, if you will let me kiss that baby." One look at his
bearded face told her that there was nothing bad in it, and, saying, with a pleased laugh, "I do not charge any thing for kissing my baby," it was handed over. The little one was not
afraid, and the bushy whiskers, an eighth of an ell long, were
just the play-house it had been looking for.
More than one kiss did the captain get firom the little red
lips, and there was energy in the hug of the little round arms.
Then other voices said, "Pass him over here, cap!" and, before
the train was ready to move, half a hundred men had kissed
the baby. It was on its best behavior, and crowed, and kicked,
and tugged at whiskers, as only a happy baby can. It was an
event of the campaign; and one giant of a mountaineer, who
strode past us with tread like a mammoth, but with teardimmed eyes and quivering lips, said, "By George, it makes
me feel and act like a fool; but I've got one just like it at
home."
Other lands have owned the power of this young immortality, and the llindoo hails the little stranger with the words,
"Young child, as thou hast entered the world in tears when
all around thee smiled, so live as to leave the world in smiles
while all around thee weep." "
APPLETO,N'S, JO IURNAL OF POPULAR
[JuNET 12,
344