Chapter XIV (1)

THE CHILD AS MEMBER AND BUILDER OF SOCIETY.

In great states, children are always trying to remain children, and the parents wanting to make men and women of them. In vile states, the children are always wanting to be men and women, and the parents to keep them children.--_Ruskin_.

Children generally hate to be idle; all the care is then that their busy humour should be constantly employed in something of use to them.--_Locke_.

Look into our childish faces;
See you not our willing hearts?
Only love us--only lead us;
Only let us know you need us,
And we all will do our parts.--_Mary Howitt_.

[Greek: Anthropos Phusei zoon politikon] [Man is by nature a political (social) animal].--_Aristotle_.

Never till now did young men, and almost children, take such a command in human affairs.--_Carlyle_.

Predestination and Caste.

"Who can tell for what high cause
This darling of the Gods was born?"

asks the poet Marvell. But with some peoples the task of answering the question is an easy one; for fate, or its human side, caste, has settled the matter long before the infant comes into the world. The Chinese philosopher, Han Wan-Kung, is cited by Legge as saying: "When Shuh-yu was born, his mother knew, as soon as she looked at him, that he would fall a victim to his love of bribes. When Yang sze-go was born, the mother of Shuh-he-ang knew, as soon as she heard him cry, that he would cause the destruction of all his kindred. When Yueh-tseaou was born, Tzewan considered it was a great calamity, knowing that through him all the ghosts of the Johgaou family would be famished" (487. 89).

In India, we meet with the Bidhata-Purusha, a "deity that predestines all the events of the life of man or woman, and writes on the forehead of the child, on the sixth day of its birth, a brief precis of them" (426. 9). India is _par excellence_ the land of caste, but other lands know the system that makes the man follow in his father's footsteps, and often ignores the woman altogether, not even counting her in the census of the people, as was formerly the case even in Japan and China, where a girl was not worthy to be counted beside the son. Of ancient Peru, Letourneau says: "Every male inherited his father's profession; he was not allowed to choose another employment. By right of birth a man was either labourer, miner, artisan, or soldier" (100. 486). Predestination of state and condition in another world is a common theological tenet, predestination of state and condition in this world is a common social theory.

Vast indeed is the lore of birth-days, months and years, seasons and skies--the fictions, myths, and beliefs of the astrologist, the spiritualist, the fortune-teller, and the almanac-maker--which we have inherited from those ancestors of ours, who believed in the kinship of all things, who thought that in some way "beasts and birds, trees and plants, the sea, the mountains, the wind, the sun, the moon, the clouds, and the stars, day and night, the heaven and the earth, were alive and possessed of the passions and the will they felt within themselves" (258. 25). Here belongs a large amount of folk-lore and folk-speech relating to the defective, delinquent, and dependent members of human society, whose misfortunes or misdeeds are assigned to atavistic causes, to demoniacal influences.

_Parenthood._

Among primitive peoples, the advent of a child, besides entailing upon one or both of the parents ceremonies and superstitious performances whose name and fashion are legion, often makes a great change in the constitution of society. Motherhood and fatherhood are, in more than one part of the globe, primitive titles of nobility and badges of aristocracy. With the birth of a child, the Chinese woman becomes something more than a mere slave and plaything, and in the councils of uncivilized peoples (as with us to-day) the voice of the father of a family carries more weight than that of the childless. With the civilized races to-day, more marriages mean fewer prison-houses, and more empty jails, than in the earlier days, and with the primitive peoples of the present, this social bond was the salvation of the tribe to the same extent and in the same way.

As Westermarck points out, there are "several instances of husband and wife not living together before the birth of a child." Here belong the temporary marriages of the Creek Indians, the East Greenlanders, the Fuegians, the Essenes, and some other Old World sects and peoples--the birth of a child completes the marriage--"marriage is therefore rooted in family, rather than family in marriage," in such cases. With the Ainos of the island of Tezo, the Khyens of Farther India, and with one of the aboriginal tribes of China, so Westermarck informs us, "the husband goes to live with his wife at her father's house, and never takes her away till after the birth of a child," and with more than one other people the wife remains with her own parents until she becomes a mother (166. 22, 23).

In some parts of the United States we find similar practices among the population of European ancestry. The "boarding-out" of young couples until a child is born to them is by no means uncommon.

_Adoption._

Adoption is, among some primitive peoples, remarkably extensive. Among the natives of the Andaman Islands "it is said to be of rare occurrence to find any child above six or seven years of age residing with its parents, and this, because it is considered a compliment and also a mark of friendship for a married man, after paying a visit, to ask his hosts to allow him to adopt one of their children" (498. 57).

Of the Hawaiian Islanders, Letourneau remarks (100. 389, 390): "Adoption was rendered extremely easy; a man would give himself a father or sons almost _ad infinitum_." In the Marquesas Islands "it was not uncommon to see elderly persons being adopted by children." Moreover, "animals even were adopted. A chief adopted a dog, to whom, he offered ten pigs and some precious ornaments. The dog was carried about by a _kikino_, and at every meal he had his stated place beside his adopted father." Connected with adoption are many curious rites and ceremonies which may be found described in Ploss and other authorities. Dr. Friedrich S. Krauss (280) has recently treated at some length of a special form of adoption symbolized by the cutting of the hair, and particularly known among the southern Slavonians. The cutting off the hair here represents, the author thinks, the unconditional surrendering of one's body or life to another. The origin of the sacrifice of the hair is to be sought in the fact that primitive peoples have believed that the seat of the soul was in the hair and the blood, which were offered to the spirits or demons in lieu of the whole body. The relation between nurse and child has been treated of by Ploss and Wiedniann (167), the latter with special reference to ancient Egypt and the Mohammedan countries. In ancient Egypt the nurse was reckoned as one of the family, and in the death-steles and reliefs of the Middle Kingdom her name and figure are often found following those of the children and parents of the deceased. The wet-nurse was held in especial honour. The milk-relationship sometimes completely takes the place of blood-relationship. The Koran forbids the marriage of a nurse and a man whom, as a child, she has suckled; the laws of the Hanafi forbid a man to marry a woman from whose breast he has imbibed even a single drop of milk. Among the southern Slavonians: "If of two children who have fed at the breast of the same woman, one is a boy and the woman's own child, and the other (adopted) a girl, these two must never marry." If they are both girls, they are like real sisters in love and affection; if both boys, like real brothers. In Dardistan and Armenia also, milk-relationship prevents marriage (167. 263).

In Mingrelia as soon as a child is given to a woman to nurse, she, her husband, children, and grandchildren are bound to it by ties more dear even than those of blood-relationship; she would yield up her life for the child, and the latter, when grown up, is reciprocally dutiful. It is a curious fact that even grown-up people can contract this sort of relationship. "Thus peasant-women are very anxious to have grown-up princesses become then foster-children--the latter simply bite gently the breasts of their foster-mothers, and forthwith a close relationship subsists between them." It is said also that girls obtain protectors in like manner by having youths bite at their breasts, which (lately) they cover with a veil (167. 263). Adoption by the letting or transfusion of blood is also found in various parts of the world and has far-reaching ramifications; as Trumbull, Robertson Smith, and Daniels have pointed out. The last calls attention to the Biblical declaration (Proverbs, xxviii. 24): "There is a friend which sticketh closer than a brother," underlying which seems to be this mystic tie of blood (214. 16).

The mourning for the death of children is discussed in another part of this work. It may be mentioned here, however, that the death of a child often entails other, sometimes more serious, consequences. Among the Dyaks of Borneo, "when a father has lost his child, he kills the first man he meets as he goes out of his house; this is to him an act of duty" (100. 238).

_Hereditary Bights._

The hereditary rights of children to share in the property of their parents have been made the subject of an interesting study by Clement Deneus (215), a lawyer of Ghent, who has treated in detail of the limitation of the patria potestas in respect to disposition of the patrimony, and the reservation to the children of a portion of the property of their parents--an almost inviolable right, of which they can be deprived only in consequence of the gravest offences. This reservation the author considers "a principle universally recognized among civilized nations," and an institution which marks a progress in the history of law and of civilization (215. 49), while testamentary freedom is unjust and inexpedient. The author discusses the subject from the points of view of history, statute and natural law, social economy, etc., devoting special attention to pointing out the defects of the system of the school of Le Play,--primogeniture, which still obtains in England, in several parts of Germany, in certain localities of the Pyrenees, and in the Basque provinces.

In the countries of modern Europe, the testamentary power of the father is limited as follows: _Austria_ (Code of 1812): One-half of parents' property reserved for children. The law of 1889 makes exception in the case of rural patrimonies of moderate size with dwelling attached, where the father has the right to designate his heir. _Denmark_ (Code of 1845): Father can dispose of but one-fourth of the property; nobles, however, are allowed to bestow upon one of their children the half of their fortune. _Germany_: No uniform civil legislation exists as yet for the whole empire. In the majority of the smaller states, in a part of Bavaria, Rügen, eastern Pomerania, Schleswig-Holstein, the _Corpus Juris Civilis_ of Justinian is in force, while the Napoleonic code obtains in Rhenish Prussia, Hesse, and Bavaria, in Baden, Berg, Alsace-Lorraine. In Prussia, the reserve is one-third, if there are less than three children; one-half, if there are three or four. In Saxony, if there are five or more children, the reserve is one-half; if there are four or less, one-third. _Greece:_ The Justinian novels are followed. _Holland:_ The Napoleonic code is in force. _Italy_ (Code of 1866): The reserve is one-half. _Norway_ (Code of 1637, modified in 1800, 1811, 1825): The father is allowed free disposal of one-half of the patrimony, but for religious charities (_fondationspieuses_) only. _Portugal_: The legitimate is two-thirds. _Roumania_ (Code of 1865): The same provision as in the Napoleonic code. _Russia_ (Code of 1835): The father can dispose at pleasure of the personal property and property acquired, but the property itself must be divided equally. In Esthonia, this provision also applies to personal property acquired by inheritance. _Spain_ (Code of 1889): The father can dispose of one-third of the patrimony to a stranger; to a child he can will two-thirds. He can also, in the case of farming, industry, or commerce, leave his entire property to one of his children, except that the legatee has to pecuniarily indemnify his brothers and sisters. _Sweden_ (Code of 1734): In the towns, the father can dispose of but one-sixth of the patrimony; in the country, the patrimonial property must go to the children. The rest is at the will of the father, except that he must provide for the sustenance of his children. _Switzerland:_ At Geneva, the Napoleonic code is in force; in the Canton of Uri, the younger son is sometimes specially favoured; in Zürich, the father can dispose of one-sixth in favour of strangers, or one-fifth in favour of a child; in Bâle, he is allowed no disposal; in the cantons of Neuchâtel and Vaud, the reserve is one-half, in Bern and Schaffhausen, two-thirds, and in Eriburg and Soleure, three-fourths. _Turkey:_ The father can dispose of two-thirds by will, or of the whole by gift (215. 39-41).

In Prance, article 913 of the civil code forbids the father to dispose, by gift while living, or by will, of more than one-half of the property, if he leaves at his death but one legitimate child; more than one-third, if he leaves two children; more than one-fourth, if he leave three or more children. In the United States great testamentary freedom prevails, and the laws of inheritance belong to the province of the various States.

Among the nations of antiquity,--Egyptians, Persians, Assyrians, Chinese,--according to Deneus (215. 2), the _patria potestas_ probably prevented any considerable diffusion of the family estates. By the time of Moses, the Hebrews had come to favour the first-born, and to him was given a double share of the inheritance. With the ancient Hindus but a slight favouring--of the eldest son seems to have been in vogue, the principle of co-proprietorship of parent and children being recognized in the laws of Manu. In Sparta, the constitution was inimical to a reserve for all the children; in Athens, the code of Solon forbade a man to benefit a stranger at the expense of his legitimate male children; he had, however, the right to make particular legacies, probably up to one-half of the property. Deneus considers that the _penchant_ of the Athenians for equality was not favourable to a cast-iron system of primogeniture, although the father may have been able to favour his oldest child to the extent of one-half of his possessions. In ancient Rome (215. 4-16), at first, a will was an exception, made valid only by the vote of a lex curiata; but afterwards the absolute freedom of testamentary disposition, which was approved in 450 B.C. by the Law of the Twelve Tables,--_Uti legassit super pecunia tutelage suce rei, ita jus esto,_--appears, and the father could even pass by his children in silence and call upon an utter stranger to enjoy his estate and possessions. By 153 B.C., however, the father was called upon to nominally disinherit his children, and not merely pass them over in silence, if he wished to leave his property to a stranger. For some time this provision had little effect, but a breach in the _patria potestas_ has really been made, and by the time of Pliny the Younger (61-115 A.D.), who describes the procedure in detail, the disinherited children were given the right of the _querula inoffidosi testamenti,_ by which the father was presumed to have died intestate, and his property fell in equal shares to all his children. Thus it was that the right of children in the property of the father was first really recognized at Rome, and the _pars legitima,_ the reserve of which made it impossible for the children to attack the will of the father, came into practice. In the last years of the Republic, this share was at least one-fourth of what the legitimate heir would have received in the absence of a will; under Justinian, it was one-third of the part _ab intestate,_ if this was at least one-fourth of the estate; otherwise, one-half. The father always retained the right to disinherit, for certain reasons, in law. With this diminution of his rights over property went also a lessening of his powers over the bodies of his children. Diocletian forbade the selling of children, Constantine decreed that the father who exposed his new-born child should lose the _patria potestas,_ and Valentinian punished such action with death. Among the ancient Gauls, in spite of the father's power of life and death over his offspring, he could not disinherit them, for the theory of co-proprietorship obtained with these western tribes (215. 16). With the ancient Germans, the father appears to have been rather the protector of his children than their owner or keeper; the child is recognized, somewhat rudely, as a being with some rights of his own. Michelet has aptly observed, as Deneus remarks, that "the Hindus saw in the son the reproduction of the father's soul; the Romans, a servant of the father; the Germans, a child" (215. 17). At first wills were unknown among them, for the system of co-proprietorship,--_hoeredes successoresgue sui cuique liberi et nullum testamentum,_--and the solidarity of the family and all its members, did not feel the need of any. The inroad of Roman ideas, and especially, Deneus thinks, the fervour of converts to Christianity, introduced testamentary legacies.

The Goths and Burgundians, in their Roman laws, allowed the parent to dispose of three-fourths, the Visigoths one-third or one-fifth, according as the testator disposed of his property in favour of a child or a stranger. The national law of the Burgundians allowed to the father the absolute disposal of his acquisitions, but prescribed the equal sharing of the property among all the children. The ripuarian law of the Franks left the children a reserve of twelve sons, practically admitting absolute freedom of disposition by will (215. 18). The course of law in respect to the inheritance of children during the Middle Ages can be read in the pages of Deneus and the wider comparative aspect of the subject studied in the volumes of Post, Dargun, Engels, etc., where the various effects of mother-right and father-right are discussed and interpreted.

_Subdivisions of Land._

In some cases, as in Wurtemburg, Switzerland, Hanover, Thuringia, Hesse, certain parts of Sweden, France, and Russia, the subdivision of property has been carried out to an extent which has produced truly Lilliputian holdings. In Switzerland there is a certain commune where the custom obtains of transmitting by will to each child its proportional share of each parcel; so that a single walnut-tree has no fewer than sixty proprietors. This reminds us of the Maoris of New Zealand, with whom "a portion of the ground is allotted to the use of each family, and this portion is again subdivided into individual parts on the birth of each child." It is of these same people that the story is told that, after selling certain of their lands to the English authorities, they came back in less than a year and demanded payment also for the shares of the children born since the sale, whose rights they declared had not been disposed of. On the islands of the Loire there are holdings "so small that it is impossible to reduce them any less, so their owners have them each in turn a year"; in the commune of Murs, in Anjou, there is "a strip of nine hectares, subdivided into no fewer than thirty-one separate parcels." The limit, however, seems to be reached in Laon, where "it is not rare to find fields scarce a metre (3 ft. 3.37 in.) wide; here an apple-tree or a walnut-tree covers with its branches four or five lots, and the proprietor can only take in his crop in the presence of his neighbours, to whom he has also to leave one-half of the fruit fallen on their lots." No wonder many disputes and lawsuits arise from such a state of affairs. It puts us in mind at once of the story of the sand-pile and the McDonogh farm. The exchange or purchase of contiguous parcels sometimes brings temporary or permanent relief (215. 112, 113).

The following figures show the extent to which this Lilliputian system obtained in France in 1884, according to the returns of the Minister of Finance:--

NATURE OF PROPERTY. ABSOLUTE PER TOTAL PER NUMBER OF CENT. HECTARES. CENT. HOLDINGS. Less than 20 ares (100 ares = one hectare) 4,115,463 29.00 Less than 50 ares 6,597,843 47.00 1,147,804 2.31 Less than 1 hectare ( =2-1/2 acres) 8,585,523 61.00 2,574,589 5.19 Less than 2 hectares 10,426,368 74.09 5,211,456 10.53 From 2 to 6 hectares 2,174,188 15.47 7,543,347 15.26 From 6 to 50 hectares 1,351,499 9.58 19,217,902 38.94 From 50 to 200 hectares 105,070 0.74 9,398,057 19.04 More than 200 hectares 17,676 0.12 8,017,542 16.23

Totals..................... 14,074,801 100.00 49,388,304 100.00

Deneus gives other interesting figures from Belgium and elsewhere, showing the extent of the system. Other statistics given indicate that this parcelling-out has reached its lowest point, and that the reaction has set in. It is a curious fact, noted by M. Deneus, that of the 1,173,724 tenant-farmers in the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland in the year 1884, no fewer than 852,438 cultivated an acre or less.

_Younger Son._

Mr. Sessions, in his interesting little pamphlet (351) calls attention to the important _role_ assigned in legend and story to the "younger son," "younger brother," as well as the social customs and laws which have come into vogue on his account. Sir Henry Maine argued that "primogeniture cannot be the natural outgrowth of the family, but is a political institution, coming not from clansmen but from a chief." Hence the youngest son, "who continues longest with the father, is naturally the heir of his house, the rest being already provided for." Mr. Sessions observes (351. 2): "Among some primitive tribes, as those of Cape York [Australia] and the adjacent islands, the youngest son inherited a double portion of his deceased father's goods. Among the Maoris of New Zealand he takes the whole. Among some hill tribes of India, such as the Todas of the Neilgherries, he takes the house and maintains the women of the family, whilst the cattle, which represent the chief personalities, are equally divided. The Mrus and Kolhs and Cotas have similar customs." Somewhat similar to the code of the Todas was that of the Hindu Aryans, as embodied in the laws of Manu, for "the youngest son has, from time immemorial, as well as the eldest, a place in Hindu legislation." The succession of the youngest prevails among the Mongolian Tartars, and "when in Russia the joint family may be broken up, the youngest takes the house." The right of the youngest was known among the Welsh, Irish, and some other Celtic tribes; the old Welsh law gave the youngest son the house and eight acres, the rest of the land being divided equally between all the sons. Mr. Sessions calls attention to the fact that, while in Old Testament Palestine primogeniture was the rule, the line of ancestry of Christ exhibits some remarkable exceptions. And among primitive peoples the hero or demi-god is very often the younger son.

Under the name of "Borough English," the law by which the father's real property descends to the youngest son alone, survives in Gloucester and some few other places in England,--Lambeth, Hackney, part of Islington, Heston, Edmonton, etc.

Another interesting tenure is that of gavelkind, by which the land and property of the father was inherited in equal portions by all his sons, the youngest taking the house, the eldest the horse and arms, and so on. This mode of tenure, before the Conquest, was quite common in parts of England, especially Wales and Northumberland, still surviving especially in the county of Kent. Many things, indeed, testify of the care which was taken even in primitive times to secure that the youngest born, the child of old age, so frequently the best-loved, should not fare ill in the struggle for life.

_Child-Nurses._

One important function of the child (still to be seen commonly among the lower classes of the civilized races of to-day) with primitive peoples is that of nurse and baby-carrier. Even of Japan, Mrs. Bramhall gives this picture (189. 33):--

"We shall see hundreds of small children, not more than five or six years of age, carrying, fast asleep on their shoulders, the baby of the household, its tiny smooth brown head swinging hither and thither with every movement of its small nurse, who walks, runs, sits, or jumps, flies kites, plays hop-scotch, and fishes for frogs in the gutter, totally oblivious of that infantile charge, whether sleeping or waking. If no young sister or brother be available, the husband, the uncle, the father, or grandfather hitches on his back the baby, preternaturally good and contented."

The extent to which, in America, as well as in Europe, to-day, young children are entrusted with the care of infants of their family, has attracted not a little attention, and the "beyond their years" look of some of these little nurses and care-takers is often quite noticeable. The advent of the baby-carriage has rather facilitated than hindered this old-time employment of the child in the last century or so. In a recent number (vol. xvii. p. 792) of _Public Opinion_ we find the statement that from June 17, 1890, to September 15, 1894, the "Little Mothers' Aid Association," of New York, has been the means of giving a holiday, one day at least of pleasure in the year, to more than eight thousand little girls, who are "little mothers, in the sense of having the care of younger children while the parents are at work." In thrifty New England, children perform not a little of the housework, even the cooking; and "little mothers" and "little housekeepers" were sometimes left to themselves for days, while their elders in days gone by visited or went to the nearest town or village for supplies.

_Child-Marriages._

"Marriages are made in heaven," says the old proverb, and among some primitive peoples we meet with numerous instances of their having been agreed upon and arranged by prospective parents long before the birth of their offspring. Indeed, the betrothal of unborn children by their parents occurs sporadically to-day in civilized lands. Ploss has called attention to child-marriages in their sociological and physiological bearings (125.1. 386-402), and Post has considered the subject in his historical study of family law. In these authorities the details of the subject may be read. In Old Calabar, men who already possess several wives take to their bosom and kiss, as their new wife, babes two or three weeks old. In China, Gujurat, Ceylon, and parts of Brazil, wives of from four to six years of age are occasionally met with. In many parts of the world wives of seven to nine years of age are common, and wives of from ten to twelve very common. In China it is sometimes the case that parents buy for their infant son an infant wife, nursed at the same breast with him (234. xlii.). Wiedemann, in an article on child-marriages in Egypt (381), mentions the fact that a certain king of the twenty-first dynasty (about 1100 B.C.) seems to have had as one of his wives a child only a few days old. From Dio Cassius we learn that in Rome, at the beginning of the Empire, marriages of children under ten years occasionally took place.

In some parts of the world the child-wife does not belong to her child-husband. "Among the Reddies, of India," Letourneau informs us, "a girl from sixteen to twenty years of age is married to a boy of five or six. The wife then becomes the real wife of the boy's uncle, or cousin, or of the father of the reputed husband. But the latter is considered to be the legal father of the children of his pretended wife." So it is only when the boy has grown up that he receives his wife, and he, in turn, acts as his relative before him (100. 354). Temple cites the following curious custom in his tales of the Panjâb (542. I. xviii.):-- "When Raja Vasali has won a bride from Raja Sirkap, he is given a new-born infant and a mango-tree, which is to flower in twelve years, and when it flowers, the girl is to be his wife." The age prescribed by ancient Hindu custom (for the Brahman, Tshetria, and Vysia classes) is six to eight years for the girl, and the belief prevailed that if a girl were to attain her puberty before being married, her parents and brothers go to hell, as it was their duty to have got her married before that period (317. 56). Father Sangermano, writing of Burma a hundred years ago, notices the "habit of the Burmese to engage their daughters while young, in real or fictitious marriages, in order to save them from the hands of the king's ministers, custom having established a rule, which is rarely if ever violated, that no married woman can be seized, even for the king himself" (234. xlii.). The child-marriages of India have been a fruitful theme for discussion, as well as the enforced widowhood consequent upon the death of the husband. Among the most interesting literature on the subject are the "Papers relating to Infant Marriage and Enforced Widowhood in India" (317), Schlagintweit (142), etc. The evils connected with the child-marriages of India are forcibly brought out by Mrs. Steel in several of the short stories in her _From the Five Rivers_ (1893), and by Richard Garbe in his beautiful little novel _The Redemption of the Brahman_(1894).

But India and other Eastern lands are not the only countries where "child-marriages" have flourished. Dr. F. J. Furnivall (234), the distinguished English antiquary and philologist, poring over at Chester the "Depositions in Trials in the Bishop's Court from November, 1561 to March, 1565-6," was astonished to find on the ninth page the record: "that Elizabeth Hulse said she was married to George Hulse in the Chapel of Knutsford, when she was but _three or four_ years old, while the boy himself deposed that he was about seven," and still more surprised when he discovered that the volume contained "no fewer than twenty-seven cases of the actual marriage in church of the little boys and girls of middle-class folk." The result of Dr. Furnivall's researches is contained in the one-hundred-and-eighth volume (original series) of the Early English Text Society's Publications, dealing with child-marriages, divorces, ratifications, etc., and containing a wealth of quaint and curious sociological lore. Perhaps the youngest couple described are John Somerford, aged about three years, and Jane Brerton, aged about two years, who were married in the parish church of Brerton about 1553. Both were carried in arms to the church, and had the words of the marriage service said for them by those who carried them. It appears that they lived together at Brerton for ten years, but without sustaining any further marital relations, and when the husband was about fifteen years, we find him suing for a divorce on account of his wife's "unkindness, and other weighty causes." Neither party seemed affectionately disposed towards the other (234.26). Other very interesting marriages are those of Bridget Dutton (aged under five years) and George Spurstowe (aged six) (234. 38); Margaret Stanley (aged five) and Roland Dutton (aged nine), brother of Bridget Dutton (234. 41); Janet Parker (aged five) and Lawrence Parker (aged nine to ten). The rest of the twenty-seven couples were considerably older, the most of the girls ranging between eight and twelve, the boys between ten and fourteen (234. 28). It would Seem that for the most part these young married couples were not allowed to live together, but at times some of the nuptial rites were travestied or attempted to be complied with. In two only of the twenty-seven cases is there mention of "bedding" the newly-married children. John Budge, who at the age of eleven to twelve years, was married to Elizabeth Ramsbotham, aged thirteen to fourteen years, is said to have wept to go home with his father and only by "compulsion of the priest of the Chapel" was he persuaded to lie with his wife, but never had any marital relations with her whatever, and subsequently a petition for divorce was filed by the husband (234. 6). In the case of Ellen Dampart, who at the age of about eight years, was married to John Andrew aged ten, it appears that they slept in the same bed with two of the child-wife's sisters between them. No marital relations were entered upon, and the wife afterwards sues for a divorce (234. 15, 16).

The practice seems to have been for each of the children married to go to live with some relative, and if the marriage were not ratified by them after reaching years of consent, to petition for a divorce. In some nine cases the boy is younger than the girl, and Humfrey Winstanley was under twelve when he was married to Alice Worsley aged over seventeen; in this case no marital relations were entered upon, though the wife was quite willing; and the husband afterwards petitions for a divorce (234.2-4). Thomas Dampart, who at the age of ten years, was married to Elizabeth Page, appears to have lived with his wife about eight years and to have kept up marital relations with her until she left him of her own motion. Dr. Furnivall (234. 49-52) cites four cases of ratification of child-marriages by the parties after they have attained years of discretion, in one of which the boy and the girl were each but ten years old when married. The most naive account in the whole book is that of the divorce-petition of James Ballard, who, when about eleven years of age, was married in the parish church of Colne at ten o'clock at night by Sir Roger Blakey, the curate, to a girl named Anne; the morning after the ceremony he is said "to have declared unto his uncle that the said Anne had enticed him with two Apples, to go with her to Colne, and marry her." No marital relations were entered upon, and the curate was punished for his hasty and injudicious action (234. 45).

Dr. Furnivall (234. xxxv.) quotes at some length the legal opinion--the law on infant marriages--of Judge Swinburne (died, 1624), from which we learn that "infants" (i.e. children under seven years of age) could not contract spousals or matrimony, and such contracts made by the infants or by their parents were void, unless subsequently ratified by the contracting parties by word or deed,--at twelve the girls ceased to be children, and at fourteen the boys, and were then fully marriageable, as they are to-day in many parts of the world. Of childhood, Judge Swinburne says, "During this age, children cannot contract Matrimony _de praesenti_., but only _de futuro_"; but their spousals could readily be turned into actual marriages after the girls were twelve and the boys fourteen, as Dr. Furnivall points out.

The fifth limitation to his general statement, which the learned judge made, is thus strangely and quaintly expressed: "The fifth Limitation is, when the Infants which do contract Spousals are of that _Wit and Discretion_, that albeit they have not as yet accomplished the full Age of Seven Years, yet doth their supra-ordinary understanding fully supply that small defect of Age which thing is not rare in these days, wherein Children become sooner ripe, and do conceive more quickly than in former Ages" (234. xxxvi.).

First among the causes of these child-marriages Dr. Furnivall is inclined to rank "the desire to evade the feudal law of the Sovereign's guardianship of all infants," for "when a father died, the Crown had the right to hold the person and estate of the propertied orphan until it came of age, and it could be sold in marriage for the benefit of the Crown or its grantee." Moreover, "if the orphan refused such a marriage with a person of its own rank, it had to pay its guardian a heavy fine for refusing his choice, and selecting a spouse of its own" (234. xxxix.). Property-arrangement also figures as a cause of these alliances, especially where the bride is older than the groom: Elizabeth Hulse (aged four) was married to George Hulse (aged seven) "because her friends thought she should have a living by him" (234. 4). When Elizabeth Ramsbotham (aged 13-14) married John Bridge (aged 11-12), "money was paid by the father of the said Elizaboth, to buy a piece of land" (234. 6); according to the father of Joan Leyland (aged 11-12), who married Ralph Whittall (aged 11-12), "they were married because she should have had by him a pretty bargain, if they could have loved, one the other" (234.12); Thomas Bentham (aged twelve) and Ellen Boltoii (aged ten) were married because Richard Bentham, grandfather of Ellen, "was a very wealthy man, and it was supposed that he would have been good unto them, and bestowed some good farm upon them" (234. 32); the marriage of Thomas Fletcher (aged 10-11) and Anne Whitfield (aged about nine) took place because "John Fletcher, father of the said Thomas, was in debt; and, to get some money of William Whitfield, to the discharge of his debts, married and bargained his sonne to the said Whitfield's daughter." The "compulsion of their friends" seems also to have been a cause of the marriages of children; Peter Hope (about thirteen) married Alice Ellis (aged nine), "because it was his mother's mind, he durst not displease her" (234. 20, 23).

So far the evidence has related to unsatisfactory and unfortunate marriages, but, as Dr. Furnivall remarks, "no doubt scores of others ended happily; the child-husband and--wife just lived on together, and--when they had reached their years of discretion (girls twelve, boys fourteen) or attained puberty--ratified their marriage by sleeping in one bed and having children" (234. xix., 203).

Some additional cases of child-marriages in the diocese of Chester are noticed by Mr. J. P. Earwaker (234. xiv.), a pioneer in this branch of antiquarian research, whose studies date back to 1885. The case of John Marden, who, at the age of three years, was married to a girl of five is thus described: "He was carried in the arms of a clergyman, who coaxed him to repeat the words of matrimony. Before he had got through his lesson, the child declared he would learn no more that day. The priest answered: 'You must speak a little more, and then go play you.'" Robert Parr, who, in 1538-9, at the age of three, was married to Elizabeth Rogerson, "was hired for an apple by his uncle to go to church, and was borne thither in the arms of Edward Bunburie his uncle ... which held him in arms the time that he was married to the said Elizabeth, at which time the said Robert could scarce speak." Mr. Earwaker says that in the _Inquisitiones post mortem_, "it is by no means unfrequent to read that so and so was heir to his father, and then aged, say, ten years, and was already married" (234. xxi.-xxxiii.).

A celebrated child-marriage was that at Eynsham, Oxfordshire, in 1541, the contracting parties being William, Lord Eure, aged 10-11 years, and Mary Darcye, daughter of Lord Darcye, aged four. The parties were divorced November 3, 1544, and in 1548, the boy took to himself another wife. Dr. Furnivall cites from John Smith's _Lives of the Berkeleys_, the statements that Maurice, third Lord Berkeley, was married in 1289, when eight years old, to Eve, daughter of Lord Zouch, and, before he or his wife was fourteen years of age, had a son by her; that Maurice, the fourth Lord Berkeley, when eight years of age, was married in 1338-9, to Elizabeth, daughter of Hugh Lord Spenser, about eight years old; that Thomas, the fourth Lord Berkeley, when about fourteen and one-half years of age, was married, in 1366, to Margaret, daughter of Lord de Lisle, aged about seven. Smith, in quaint fashion, refers to King Josiah (2 Kings, xxiii., xxvi.), King Ahaz (2 Kings, xvi. 2, xviii. 2), and King Solomon (1 Kings, xi. 42, xiv. 21) as having been fathers at a very early age, and remarks: "And the Fathers of the Church do tell us that the blessed Virgin Mary brought forth our Saviour at fifteen years old, or under" (234. xxvii).

Even during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries child-marriages are numerously attested. Following are noteworthy cases (234. xxiii.): In 1626 Anne Clopton, aged nearly fourteen, was married to Sir Simonds D'Ewes, aged nearly twenty-four; in 1673, John Power, grandson of Lord Anglesey, was married at Lambeth, by the Archbishop of Canterbury to Mrs. Catherine Fitzgerald, his cousin-german, she being about thirteen, and he eight years old; at Dunton Basset, Leicestershire, in 1669, Mary Hewitt (who is stated to have lived to the good old age of seventy- seven) was married when but three years old; in 1672, the only daughter (aged five) of Lord Arlington was married to the Duke of Grafton, and the ceremony was witnessed by John Evelyn, who, in 1679, "was present at the re-marriage of the child couple"; in 1719, Lady Sarah Cadogan, aged thirteen, was married to Charles, Duke of Eichmond, aged eighteen; in 1721, Charles Powel, of Carmarthen, aged about eleven, was married to a daughter of Sir Thomas Powel, of Broadway, aged about fourteen; in 1729, "a girl of nine years and three months was taken from a boarding school by one of her guardians, and married to his son"; Bridget Clarke, in 1883, is reputed to have been twenty-five years old, to have had seven children, and to have been married when only thirteen; at Deeping, Lincolnshire, a young man of twenty-one married a girl of fourteen, and "it was somewhat of a novelty to observe the interesting bride the following day exhibiting her skill on the skipping-rope on the pavement in the street." Mr. Longstaff, who has studied the annual reports of the registrar-general for 1851-81, finds that during these thirtyone years, "out of 11,058,376 persons married, 154 boys married before 17, and 862 girls before 16. Of these, 11 boys of 15 married girls of 15 (four cases), 16, 18 (two cases), 20, and 21. Three girls of 14 married men of 18, 21, and 25. Five girls of 15 married boys of 16; in 29 marriages both girl and boy were sixteen" (234. xxxiii).

Further comments upon infant marriages may be found in an article in the _Gentleman's Magazine_, for September, 1894, the writer of which remarks: "Within recent years, however, the discovery has been made, that, so far from being confined, as had been supposed, to royal or aristocratic houses, infant marriages were, in the sixteenth century, common in some parts of England among all classes" (367. 322).

It was said "marriages are made in heaven," and that some times children are married before they are born; it might also be said "marriages are made for heaven," since some children are married after they are dead. In some parts of China (and Marco Polo reported the same practice as prevalent in his time among the Tartars) "the spirits of all males who die in infancy or in boyhood are, in due time, married to the spirits of females who have been cut off at a like early age" (166. 140).

As Westermarck observes, "Dr. Ploss has justly pointed out that the ruder a people is, and the more exclusively a woman is valued as an object of desire, or as a slave, the earlier in life is she chosen; whereas, if marriage becomes a union of souls as well as of bodies, the man claims a higher degree of mental maturity from the woman he wishes to be his wife."

In so civilized a nation even as the United States, the "age of consent" laws evidence the tenacity of barbarism. The black list of states, compiled by Mr. Powell (180. 201), in a recent article in the _Arena_, reveals the astonishing fact that in three states--Alabama, North Carolina, South Carolina-the "age of consent" is _ten_ years; in four states, twelve years; in three states, thirteen years; in no fewer than twenty states, fourteen years; in two states, fifteen years; in twelve states, sixteen years; and in one state (Florida), seventeen years. In Kansas and Wyoming alone is the "age of consent" eighteen years, and it is worthy of note that Wyoming is the only state in the Union in which women have for any considerable length of time enjoyed the right to vote on exactly the same terms as men. In England, the agitation set going by Mr. Stead, in 1885, resulted in, the passage of a law raising the "age of consent" from thirteen to sixteen years. It is almost beyond belief, that, in the State of Delaware, only a few years ago, the "age of consent" was actually as low as seven years (180.194)! Even in Puritan New England, we find the "age of consent" fixed at thirteen in New Hampshire, and at fourteen in Connecticut, Vermont, and Maine (180. 195). It is a sad comment upon our boasted culture and progress that, as of old, the law protects, and even religion fears to disturb too rudely, this awful sacrifice to lust which we have inherited from our savage ancestors. There is no darker chapter in the history of our country than that which tells of the weak pandering to the modern representatives of the priests of Bacchus, Astarte, and the shameless Venus. The religious aspect of the horrible immolation may have passed away, but wealth and social attractions have taken its place, and the evil works out its destroying way as ever. To save the children from this worse than death, women must fight, and they will win; for once the barbarity, the enormity, the inhumanity of this child-sacrifice is brought home to men they cannot for their own children's sake permit the thing to go on. Here, above all places else, apply the words of Jesus: "Whoso shall cause one of these little ones which believe on me to stumble, it is profitable that a great millstone should be hanged about his neck, and he should be sunk in the depths of the sea." The marriage-laws of some of the states savour almost as much of prehistoric times and primitive peoples. With the consent of her parents, a girl of twelve years may lawfully contract marriage in no fewer than twenty-two states and territories; and in no fewer than twenty, a boy of fourteen may do likewise. Among the twenty-two states and territories are included: Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont; and among the twenty, Connecticut, Delaware, Maine, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, Rhode Island, Vermont. In some of the Southern States the age seems to be somewhat higher than in a number of the Northern. The existence of slavery may have tended to bring about this result; while the same fact in the West is to be accounted for by the vigour and newness of the civilization in that part of the country.

_Children's Rights._

Where, as in ancient Rome, for example, the _patria potestas_ flourished in primitive vigour,--Mommsen says, "all in the household were destitute of legal rights,--the wife and the child no less than the bullock or the slave" (166. 229), children could in nowise act as members of society. Westermarck (166. 213-239) shows to what extent and to what age the _mundiwm_, or guardianship of the father over his children, was exercised in Rome, Greece, among the Teutonic tribes, in France. In the latter country even now "a child cannot quit the paternal residence without the permission of the father before the age of twenty-one, except for enrolment in the army. For grave misconduct by his children the father has strong means of correction. A son under twenty-five and a daughter under-twenty-one cannot marry without the consent of their parents; and even when a man has attained his twenty-fifth year, and the woman her twenty-first, both are still bound to ask for it, by a formal notification." Westermarck's observations on the general subject are as follows:--"There is thus a certain resemblance between the family institution of savage tribes and that of the most advanced races. Among both, the grown-up son, and frequently the grown-up daughter, enjoys a liberty unknown among peoples at an intermediate stage of civilization. There are, however, these vital differences: that children in civilized countries are in no respect the property of their parents; that they are born with certain rights guaranteed to them by society; that the birth of children gives parents no rights over them other than those which conduce to the children's happiness. These ideas, essential as they are to true civilization, are not many centuries old. It is a purely modern conception the French Encyclopaedist expresses when he says, 'Le pouvoir paternel est plutot un devoir qu'un pouvoir'" (166. 239).

_The Child at School._

It was in this spirit also that Count Czaky (when Minister of Education in Hungary), replying to the sarcastic suggestion of one of the Deputies, during the debate on the revision of the curriculum of classical studies, that "the lazy children should be asked whether they liked to study Greek or not," said that "when it became necessary, he would willingly listen to the children themselves." That children have some rights in the matter is a view that is slowly but surely fixing itself in the minds of the people,--that the school should be something more than an intellectual prison-house, a mental and moral tread-mill, a place to put children in out of the way of the family, a dark cave into which happy, freedom-loving, joyous childhood must perforce retire from that communion with nature which makes the health of its body and the salvation of its soul. This false theory of education is vanishing, however tardily, before the teachings of the new psychology and the new anthropology, which demand a knowledge of what the child is, feels, thinks, before they will be party to any attempt to make him be, feel, think, something different. The school is but a modified form of society, of its fundamental institution, the family. Dr. Eiccardi, in the introduction to his _Antropologia e Pedagogia_,-in which he discusses a mass of psychological, sociological, and anthropological observations and statistics,--well says (336. 12):--