Three years ago a charitable institution called the Yuh ug Trang, or Infant Refuge, was established at Foochow, with the objector rearing female infants of poor people, who, without this help, would have recourse to the crime of female infanticide which has attained to terrible dimensions in and about that great city. Already this charity has saved the lives of hundreds of innocents who would without its help have infallibly. been drowned. It may be said that if people cannot afford to rear their own daughters, they might confide them in infancy to the care of the houses into which they are betrothed. But this, when tried, has ved nothing wore nor less than consigning them to bitter slavery. as man} parents in China act as if they thought it a duty to cruelly oppress their son's wives when they arrive at the paternal house even as grown-up women, and all the more when they are brought in as helpless chiviten. There ale, says the proverb three classes of people who take the palm for cruelty; stage actors, towards their apprentices; brothel-keepers, to girls sold to them to be brought up to a life of disgrace; and gaolers, towards their prisoners; but these step-mothers are, we think, as bad as any of the three.—Shén Pao,
Text read from the printed page and cleaned; old type leaves the occasional error.