The Athena press. [volume] (Athena, Umatilla County, Or.) 18??-1942, 1907-12-13
CHILD SUICIDES.
Not Numerous Here, But I'm France
They Are n Serious Problem.

Not Numerous Here, But in France
They Are n Serious Problem.
Hugo Loeb, boy of 16, recently
committed suicide in New York. A sui
eide like that is rather startling. Men
and women commit suicide, some thou
sands of them every gear, but that a
chlld-and boy of 16 is a child-can
be sad enough or bad enough or mad
enough to want to die and to take
steps to die, Is disquieting. Yet in one
country (France) this has happened
frequently enough to cause a member
Of the Paris bar, NJ Louis Proal, to
write book about It, He calls child
suicide one of the menaces of France,
and gives serious discussion to It's
causes and its prevention. According
to the statistics, out Of the SIG sui
cides in France in 1902, 80 were of
children under 16 years of age. In
other years the proportion has been
about the same, the number of child
suicides increasing as the total num-
Der increased. In 1884 France had only
twenty child suicides but then there
We're only 2,752 in ALL NJ. Proal points
out that these figures do not give all
the youthful deaths from suicide be-
cause not all Of them became known.
America has better record. While
France and parts of Germany and
Switzerland and Spain have enough
child suicides to give them cause for
worry, the census of the United States
says that the evil is not very preva-
lent here. Most of the children who
commit suicide in this country are Of
foreign BIRTH
Suicides are more frequent among
city than among country children, M.
Proal says. City children live under a
greater strain, they have less chance
for healthful play, they are more IA
miliarized with acts Of violence, and,
as a rule, they are under more pressure
at. school. NJ. Proal points out the
wrong and the foolishness Of rigorous
examinations, some of which are
enough to make a healthy child nerv-
Gus, and nervous child a wreck
Disputes among parents are another
cause Of child suicide, and poverty Is
another. But disgust with life In old
or young is almost always the sign Of
a sickly temperament, NJ Proal says,
and If a child has been 50 unfortunate
as to inherit such temperament, the
parents should try to make the child
healthy, and only good food and exer-
else and quiet and plenty Of sleep will
do that
M. Proal's book has a message for
u.s." remarked q New York woman,
who has been an educator for many
years. "There are few child suicides
In the United States, for ours Is not
the Gallic temperament, but there is
plenty of child unhappiness. The un-
happiness Of a child is tragic, the more
SC because the common delusion is that
childhood means happiness. Children
can suffer, but they can seldom explain
their sufferlngs.
"a child's sorrow may not last long,
but 1t may be bitter while 1t lasts.
think 1t was George Eliot who said
that a chlld's grief may be worse than
a grown persons while 1t endures, be
cause the child has no background of
experience, he cannot look back and
say: Other troubles have passed, and
this will pass
Sew people comprehend what mis-
cry a sensitive child may suffer from
a quarrel between its parents. The
whole foundations Of Its world are
shaken; its whole horizon is overcast.
Few people know how sensitive child