Unpee many aspects, Shanghai is a sort of paradise for foreign children. In the first place, death at a very early age is the rare exception, as anyone may see by comparing the largo birth rate with the very small death rate as set forth annually in the Health Oficer's reports to the Municipal Council. There can be little or no error in the number of deaths recorded, whereas it would be impossible to ascertain precisely the number of births. But cowman knowledge of what is going on in the Settlements, without any aid from statistics, suffices to assure us that in proportion to the number of foreign residents the number of new arrivals born in the place is extremely large. Without formal proof, therefore, we may safely assume that the percentage of mortality among infants is trifling. In Manchester, on the other hard, one infant in every five dies year of its birth, and one half born there are dead soon after their fifth year. In Berliv, one out of every three dies within the first year, and one half of all born die within two years and a half, The cases are not strictly comparable, bat making every necessary allowance, it is certain that taking at random any newly born child in Shanghai, its chances of survival are far grenter than those of an infant taken also at random in any great European city. In all the various reports about tke health of Shanghai, published periodically, we see noted the absence of those diseases which, attacking children at home just as they emerge from infancy, prove so fatal, therefore in escaping alike the, peri which beset the curliest period of faves, ad those which threaten child. hood, children in Shanghai enjoy much more favourable conditions than fall to the lot of young people in other places. Once fairly embarked apon life there is hardly a foreign child in Shanghai to whom existence is not rendered extionally delightful. Nowhere are gifs of toys more lavishly scattered on all occasions, whether domestic festivals or feasts of the Church.
Unmarried men prepare themselves for the responsibilities of wedded life by consulting the tastes and appetites of all the little folk of their acquaintance. In solid eating, boys and girls are on footing of perfect equality; but we suspect that in toys and other gifts little girls have the advantage, There are at least a dozen men in the place each with at least a dozen sual lady-loves, upon whose gratitude they make constant calls. Well treated native servants are, too, asa rule devoted to foreign children, and diligently discharge their share of the task of making life rose colour for them. Even the climate at its most trying periods, when it does not pro-dace actual illness, seems to sit lightly on them. At all events, while adults are to be seen groaning under punkahs, the children of the house are as likely as not chasing one another along cool corridors and shaded verandahs. Taking everything into consideration, it would seem as though Shanghai were as desirable a place as any other that could be mentioned in which to bring up foreign children to the ago: of tivelve or fourteen, if only there were thoroughly satisfactory means provided for educating them.
On previous occasions we wrote at length on this subject of education as applied to advanced children. Some. thing, however, remains to be said about what is even more important, namely, the earliest home treatment of the young. For.as this must be [mainly moral, it is of capital importance that it should run in the right direction, Taking the general average of child. ren as they are found in' England, if anyone who knows anything about them were asked what are their besetting sins, he would probably answer, cruelty, thieving and lying. About cruelty to animals and tyranny over children younger than themselves, there is little to be said, and the remedy, which should very seldom take the form of corporal punishment, is tolerably obvious. Hero, there is comparatively little temptation to petty larcenies, for foreign children in China are so abundantly indulged that their palates or stomachs can but rarely urge them to confound the rights of maam and trium, But lying seems to come naturally to children everywhere, and the habit is fostered wherever punish. ment follows mere childish peccadilloes or the carelessness which brings accidents about. It would be hard to say whether Chinese servants are less trathfal than the same class in Europe. We do not think they are, but children are perhaps more with them, become more attached to them, and are thus rendered more subject to their influence for good or bad. In passing, we may remark that the charge frequently brought against boys and amahs of put ting vicious thoughts into the minds of children and obscene language into their months, is, so far as our experience goes, absolutely unfounded. We speak of course of the best class of servants. But to one abominably bad habit native nurses are addicted, namely, that of ening children into quiet by threats of fantastic monsters, a habit which no doubt frequently predisposes infants to nervous affections, while it certainly tends to obliterate in their minds the distinction between the real and the unreal. It encourages the imagination to become unruly. at the very time when the judgment should be sedulously cultivated, Children, especially when thus stimulated, speedily acquire the habit of painting phantoms upon the darkness, and the power of semi-voluntarily
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.