Woman (La femme) / from the French of J. Michelet ; translated from the last Paris ed. by J.W. Palmer.

  • Jules Michelet
Date:
1860
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Woman (La femme) / from the French of J. Michelet ; translated from the last Paris ed. by J.W. Palmer. Source: Wellcome Collection.

Provider: This material has been provided by the National Library of Medicine (U.S.), through the Medical Heritage Library. The original may be consulted at the National Library of Medicine (U.S.)

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    Infantine and happiest life of all, and all engrossed in love! Who can remember it without regret ? IV. THE FRAIL AND SACRED CHILD. When we consider how few children live, we are filled with :i desire to render them happy, at whatever cost. One fourth die in their first year — that is, before they have lived, before they have received the divine baptism of light which transfigures the brain in the first twelve months. One third die before the second year—almost before they have known the sweet caresses of woman, or recognised in a mother the best of earthly blessings. One half (in many countries) do not reach puberty—the first dawn of love. Overwhelmed by precocious labors, by dry studies, and severe discipline, they never attain that second birth of happiness and enchantment. The best foundling hospitals may be said to be the ceme- teries; in the hospital at Moscow, out of the 37,000 children received in twenty years, only 1000 were saved; and in that of Dublin, 200 out of 12,000—that is, one-sixtieth. What shall I say of the Paris institution ? I have seen and admired it, but its results are not very accurately known. In it are brought together two very different classes of children : ]. orphans, who are received there after being reared—and these stand some chance of living; 2. foundlings, properly so called, children brought thither at birth; these are sent away to be nursed, and their life is prolonged for some months. Let us speak only of the happy ones, of those who are sur- rounded by tenderness and foreseeing care. Look at them : all are pretty at four years of age, and ugly at eight; as soon as we bemn to refine them, they change, become vulgar, and