The Sun.
London, England, 1870-11-03 00:00:00

BABY FARMING-.
A meeting of gentlemen interested in the subject of baby
farming was held. on Tuesday at the rooms of. the Social
Science Association, Adam-street, Adelphi. Mr. W. T.
Charley, M.P., was called to the chair ; and in com-
mencing the proceedings he stated that the cases of Char-
lotte Winsor and Margaret Waters had directed public
attention to the question of baby farming, and
he was sorry to say that he believed those
were not isolated instances, but that thousands
of children were annually drugged or starved to death,
but it was difficult to bring the matter home so as
to punish the guilty parties. In order to meet the evil
it had been suggested that a system of registration should
be established, that there should be two registrars, one of
the children nursed and the other of the nurses. • The
Rev. Oscar Thorpe, Vicar ef Christ Church, Camberwell,
also expressed his belief that the system of baby farming
was much more prevalent than was generally supposed.
and that the lives of many infants were thereby
sacrificed. He related two or three instances which had
come under his own knowledge. In one a woman came
to a mothers' meeting, conducted by Mrs. Thorpe, with a
child only 30 hours old which she had taken from its
mother, whose name she refused to give. He considered
that the taking so young a child from the mother and
thus exposing it, was endangering its life ; and he went
to Mr. Elliott, the police magistrate at Lambeth, about
it ; but he was told that there was no law to meet
such a:- .case, though, if children were evidently
neglected, the police might be called upon to interfere.
In another case a woman had taken two children
to nurse, and he was requested by Mrs. Thorpe
to visit them, which he did. He went away for a
fortnight, and when he returned both those children were
dead and buried. Since then he had again and again met
with cases of baby farming, and it was a common thing
for the foster mother to say, " Yes, poor things, they look
sickly, and it will be a mercy when they are taken." It
seemed to him very shocking that the state of the law
should be such that children could be left in the hands of
women who were capable of deliberately compassing their
death. He moved that a society be established, to be
called " The Infant Life Protection Society," and that
the first object of the society be to promote a bill in Par-
liament for the registration and supervision of nurses,
baby-farmers, and of the children entrusted to their care.
The Rev. C. W. B. Clark, of St. Andrew's, Wells-street,
seconded the resolution in a speech in which, quoting the
words of Charles Dickens, he expressed his surprise and
sorrow that while "of all things in life there should be
nothing so preventible, as there is nothing on the face of
it so unnatural, as the death of a little child, yet it is of
all things in life ,the commonest, and the only thing we
really make, as a community, the least effort to prevent."
The resolution was passed unanimously. Mr. Ernest
Hart, the Rev. Mr. Titeombe, Mr. Manning, coroner, Mr.
Ebsworth, Mr. Curgenven, and Mr. F. Peek (the latter
of whom, it was stated, had subscribed 2100 towards the
expenses of the association), also addressed the meeting,
all supporting the object of the meeting and offering
various suggestions. Several resolutions for the appoint-
ment of a committee, and for otherwise carrying out the
object of the meeting, were carried. In the course of the
discussion it was stated that the Home Secretary had con-
sented to receive a deputation from the society on the
subject.

COMIC PAPERS.
(From Punch.)

TROP TARN.—The Oxford Political Economy Professor
is about to give a course of lectures on Money: This is
complimentary to Lord Lytton, but, considering events,
lectures on the " Lady of Lyons " would he more interest-
ing. Oxford is still a little behind the time.
PEACE WITH HONOUR. —No doubt the good Lord Gran-
vile is doing the best that ever he can to bring about an
arrangement between Germany and France, as favourable
as possible to our French friends. There is, however,
one idea of a convention embodying the principle, insisted
on by France, of the non-surrender of her Rhenish Pro-
vinces, which may not have occurred to the noble lord.
Louis' Napoleon took advantage of Italy's necessity to
obtain the cession of Savoy and Nice. Suppose the
French Government offers -Bismarck to give back those
Italian provinces to Italy, by way of a pledge that she
has renounced for ever all designs of territorial aggran-
disement, and is willing to do that to Italy which she
would wish Gerinany to do to her ?
FRENCH TELEGRAMS.—The Archbishop of Nancy, who
had fallen into th&band of the enemy, was incautiously
permitted to preach on Sunday last. His denunciation of
the sin of the Catholic soldiers of Germany, in allying
themselves with Protestants against a Catholic power,
produced such an effect that 123,371 immediately. re-
crossed the Rhine, and went home.—The entire garrison
of Paris made a sortie last night, and rushed gloriously
upon Versailles. The King, Crown Prince, Von Moltke,
Von Bismarck, and the entire staff were taken prisoners,
and are now lodged in the Conciergerie, awaiting their
trial for treason to Liberty.

(From Fun.)
INTERVENTION. —Moltke :—" My heart bleeds for my
men. Bombard ! " Bismarck :—" Mine for the doomed
city. Starve !" Britannia :—" Cannot I help you out of
the difficulty, gentlemen?"
TROUBLED WATERS.—George Francis Train is going to
save the Republic, and " preserve the sinking ship of
of state." It's not to be done by throwing Train-oil on
the waters.

( From Judy).
SHAKSPEARE. —Some time since we heard a good deal
about " the Occupation of Rome." Things have got
quieter lately in the Papal States, which, a lately issued
Post-office circular tells us, "now form part of the Italian
Kinqdom." The " Occupation of Rome," therefore, is
now like Othello's—gone /

The Queen has been pleased, on the nomination
of the Marquis of Nornianby, to appoint Colonel William
Chester Master, C. 8., late sth Foot, one of her Majesty's
Honourable Corps of Gentlemen-at-Arms, vice Captain
S. L. A. B. Messiter, deceased. —Gazette.

THE FIRST PASSENGER RAILWAY IN THE CHAN-
NEL ISLANDS.—On Tuesday, at Jersey, Major General
Guy, Lieutenant-Governor of the island, opened the line,
which is only four miles long, extending from St. Helier
to St. Aubyn, running round St. Aubyn's Bay, at high
water mark.

CONTAGIOUS DISEASES ACTS, 1806 AND 1869.
The Lords Commissioners of the Admiralty have ap-
pointed Charles Robert Larkin, Esq., M.R.C.S. and
L.S.A., to be Assistant Visiting Surgeon at Sheerness.
under the above-mentioned Acts, vice Harris, resigned.
EXPLOSION AT SEA AND Loss OF LlFlo.—Early
on Tuesday morning the steamer Garlick, belonging to
Messrs. Thompson and Son, Glasgow, and running between
Scotland, Fleetwood, Lytham, &c., met with a severe
accident whilst bringing a vessel laden with Indian corn
up the channel between Southport and Lyt, her
boiler exploded. She was torn up in several parts, and
afterwards run upon a sandbank and sank. The captain
and four seamen who were the only persons on board,
went down.with her and were drowned.
Inisn RAILWAYS.—Mr.Grierson, traffid manager of
the Great Western Railway, England, arrived in Water-
ford on Saturday, and had an interview with the commit
tee of the Waterford and Limerick Railway in reference
to leasing the latter line to the former cbmpany. The
committee, accompanied by the secretary of the Water-
ford and Limerick Company, left Waterfoid for Dublin
on Tuesday to meet the direct ors of the Great Southern
and Western Company with the same object.
THE BUTCHERY OF ABLis.—An account of the
terrible tragedy which happened at the village of Ablis
is given by a German Hussar who was an eyewitness.
He says :—" As you already. know, the 4th Squadron of
the Schleswig-Holstein Regiment of Hussars, No. 16, on
the night of the 7th and morning of the Bth of October,
were attacked while in quarters at an advanced post by
Gardes Mobiles, and were all massacred, with the. excep-
tion of 48 men and 12 horses. The attack was made at
half-past 3 o'clock, and the patrols placed in advance of the
squadrons to the number of 60 men, were driven back. The
town was attacked at the same time on three sides. The
three stables which the Hussars had in the interior of the
town were surrounded while the Hussars were saddling
their horses. Men and horses were then shot together,
the shots being discharged at random through apertures
and stable doors. The Hussars protected themselves
with their carbines as well as they could, this being the
only thing they could do. But, at last, seeing the use-
lessness of fighting in self-defence, they took to flight,
climbing over walls to the neighbouring woods, and in
this way the sixty-eight men escaped. The officers, who
had their homes in a stable apart from the others,
escaped, the captain only being wounded. We were
alarmed when this news was brought to us, and at once
the brigade, with artillery and a company of Bavarian
Jagers, returned to the town which was two and a
half miles off. There the order was given to plunder
and destroy all stores and forage, as well as cows, and
then our Hussars set on fire every house, with the out-
houses, wood stacks, and hay and stra
whole straw ricks, and the
town, which had a population about of 6,000
converted into a heap of ashes. Women,
inhabitants,
toaf
ntthse ,
was
as
children, and old men were permitted to leave half-an-
hour before the place was set on fire, while there was yet
time to escape. The men were not spared, but were posi-
tively shot or cut down, and till late in the night the
flames rose high into the sky. It was a day such as has
been seldom recorded in the history of the world, and,
indeed, there will be a universal clamour against it,"