Papers Upon Hindoo Infant...
The Times, 1824-12-30T00:00:00

IlContinued from The Timses of thie 25th of October.l tTho-Igh there can be no difference of opinion regarding the enormity of the crime of infanticide, it is a practice ckWhich, at some time or other, has prevailed in almost every countryr in the world. It undloubtedly forned part of the ,poicy of the Grecian republies, and is generally supposedi to have been adopted at an early period into that of Rome, It was customary with the inhabitants of Pliceni- cia and Syria, and wvas not unknown to their colonists of 4rarthage, who sacrificed their chil(dreni without scruple to %the go1s, whenever they wishe(l to avert bad, or obtain goodl fortune. It existed also among the barbarians of Gaul .aid Gc rmany ; and, as our readers may see by referring to Br. M ilthus's E.tsay on Pojndation, continues at this very ,iay to exist among various savage nations both in Asia and America. Theculstom, however, of preserving all male, and mlirdering all female, chilIren, seems to be confinedt xcclusively to the natives of India; and though it is fol- Jowed in various parts of that continent, as, for instance, by the Rsjkoonmars of Benares, the Rajpoots of Malwa, the Hlatchvrms of Jevpore, &c., prevails most extensively amnong $'ie Jahrcjah tribes inhabiting the peninsula of E:attywar, y the province of Guzerat, who are sitbordinate to the -ritish and Guicowar Gtevernmnents. Lieutenant-Colonel Walker, who investigated this sulaect w:ith great diligence and minuteness, is of opinion, that this urnatural custom has not existed for more than So0 years in t.at part of India, and censiders it as a consequence of one of the eamly Mahomedan Ihvasions of Guterat. Hesupposes that ,-Ae Jahr6,ahs resorte(l to it upon the subiugation of their territ6ries by the early Mahornedan invadcms, in order to rDVid the necessitv of bestowing their daughters upon them in maernage, and quotes some recent anecdotes, which cer- tainly render that iupposition not at all improbable. The lrractice is in direct opposition to the doctrines of the h-naster, 'whiclh extends the greatest protection to women and children. One of the texts relating to them contains such an extraordinar'y specimen of the anti- Ql4imaatw4q>rding to our notions of morality, that we caniio.veirain from quoting it for the amusement I' oui readers:-" To kill one hundred cows," says the <;' qqir' " is equal to killing one Bramin; to kdll one hun- tetamins is equal to killing one woiaman; to kiN one tZ..<i-omen is equal to- killing one chiJd; and to kiU 4one 1i)rrxdred children is equal-to telling an untruth!!" which is elsewlhere describd as an offence too heinous for comp?rison. The punishmentassigned to the crime of killing a child is nearly as singalar as the text whioh denources it as a. Grime. The perpetrator of it is to be damned to a peculiar kind of hell, where he is to be infested with as marty inaggots as he may have hairs on his body, is to be born again a leper, and is to be debilitated in all his mem- bers. To get rid of the terror excited by sueh a punish- ment, the itajgors, or familyBraini of the Jahrejabs, who saw that the practice Of mfanticide was well calculated `o prevent the invadYers and the invaded from amalgamat- ing into one people, undertook to load themselves with the the guilt of it, and to become in their own persong respolsibe for its consequences; and the wretched- ly poEr and degraded state to which they are now - reduced, is considered by the Jahrejahs as a mark of the wrath of Heaven for their baving the weight of such a crime ,upon their heads. In the course of time, the cause which had led to this practice ceased to exist, but not so the prac- ;qttice itself. One of the most sacred duties of a Hindoo father is to get his daughter affianced at an early age, as celibacy is an indelible disgrace aeordini to their tenets. The Jahrejahs, who have an extravagant idea of their own impor-tanc,, had always found it difficult to gain what they considered suitable matebes for their daughters. Now this practice rid them at once of all care, vexation, and expense -upon that score: and their pride and avarice consequently 'became enlisted1 in its support. They seon began to regard it as atn honourable distinction; and some of their wives, who nre of necessity taken from another tribe, absolutely defended it to Colonel Walker as one of the ancient privi- leges of their caste. The consequence is, that every female child is put to death the instant itis born, unless the father expressly apphizes is wifethat he wishes it to be preserved- a eircumstance, however, whieh some years ago was consi- dered so disgracefu1, that not more than seven instances of it vcre known in 5,000 families. To rcnder the practice, if possible, more atrocious in our eyes, the mother is in general the executioner of her oftspring. She has not, however, any fixed mode of (destroying it. The urnul way is to put opium into its mouth, or to prevent its respiration by drawing the 'umbilical cqrd over ita face. Any other method might be adopted, and God knows, as one of the natives rather poeti- cally expressed it, " that there is no difficulty in blasting a flo'ier." So callous have the.feelings.of the Jahrejabs be- come- tothe practice, that if one of them were asked regard- ing the resuit of the pregnancy of his wife, and answered Athat she had produced nothing, it would, in the idiom of the sountry, be tantamount to a confession that she had given jbirth to a female child, an(d had instantly deprived it of it; existence. It appears from the papers now before us, that this in- human practice of the Jahrejahs became known to the Go- vernment of Bombay in the year 1800. It seenis to have excized but little abhorrenceitn their minds, since it. was not till the year 1805 that they deigned to notice it oGicially. In the course of that year they wrote to Colonel (then Major) W 'Walker, who had been the resident atBatoda from the year t 1801, and instructed him to inquire into the extent to which i t prevailed; and in the course of the year 1807, they direeted him to obtain the renunciation of it, if possible, from the na- tivenL. TheColonel,whohad discoveredin theinterimthat tbe nu-mber of female infanticides, according to the highest ac- couiit, amounted to 5,000 annually, and according to the lowst, to 1,000 or 1,100, undertool the task with a zeal and alacrity that will ever do honour to his- memory, and Writh a perseverance of spirit, which may serve as an exam- ple to all future labourerr in the cause of humanity. The difficulties which he had to- encounter were great and for- ,midable; and his efforts to surmount them were met, thougli not with active, still with silent opposition. Our limits wvill not permit us to enter into a detailed account of , theLn; we can only say that his uniform endeavour, from irst to last, was to persuade-some chieftain of note-to con- sent to the abolition of infanticide in his own family. His negotiations were long in vain. Comspromises the most disgraceful were repeatedly offered to him, and were by him as repeatedly rejected, from a conviction that any spe- cies of mbodification in bis demands must be fatal to the objtuct which he had in view. So desperate did his chanec of mucceeding appear at the close of September, 1807, that his -native agent, Sewajee, wrote to him that the accomplish- ment of his objectcould onlybe effected by fbrce,and that the *employmentofitwould only be advisabLeand proper. Colonel Walkor, however, wras not to be deterred from exertion by sucli a declaration, nor to be persuaded into compliance with the advice it contained by any views of short-sighted policy. To butcher whole massesof our fellow-creatures with a view of teaching the principles and feelings of hubxian nature to tlicir surnvors, is too preposterous an idea to enter for a moment into the mind of an enlightened man; and the triumph of reason over ignorance is a brief and fallacious triumph, if it be accomplished by the assistance of physical force. Colonel lValker wvas well aware of that circumstance, and. contrived by degrees to turn the attention of the coun- try to the propriety of a custom, which appeared never be- fore to Ihave been questioned. The subject was discussed frequeiy in the public cuteherry-the enormity of the practice s-as exposed-the prejudices of the people were shak'en-better feelings began to display themselves-and an abhorrence of infanticide was slowly, but gradually excited -rmnng those who at first appeared insensible to the senti- iments of nature and humanity. Jehajee, the Rajah of Nlaorbee, was prevailed upon to promise to preserve hia dsavghters, provided tvwo other individuals of rank, Jam Jehiajee, chief of Noannugger, and Dewajee, chief of Gondal, could be induced to do likewise. Fortunately, -neir compliance was obtained, and Jehajee, who there is reason to suspeet had reckoned upon the opposition -of the chieftains he had named, felt hirnself bound in hioneur to affix his signature to an instrument engaging himi to renounce infanticide for ever. As the pride of the lower Jahrejahs is to support the customs of their clan, and asone of these customs is to foUow the steps of their great relations implicitly in every act, it will not appear surprising that every Jabrejah chieftain in Kattywar signied readily, and without offering any objection, a similar instru- mrent. It -bound them to exclude from their caste any person who in future should practise infanticide, and to catsc him to be punished in such other manner as was prescribed in the Shaster, or as seemeed good to the wisdom of the Briiish and Guioowar Government. This engage- ment, we ought to state, was signed in the beginning of January, 1S08; and Colonel WValker, in communicating tbat gratifying -intelligence to the Bomnbay Government, inf-armed tihenl that t_e difficulty which lie hall found in persuading the Jahrejahs to relinquish this baneful custoum - an, in };is opinion, a proof of the sincerity with which they intended to observe their renunciation ef it; as it showed that it had been rather producedt by their coivic- tioon of its ivmpropriety than by their desire to comply with the mnandates of Government. Ont the receipt of this despatch, the Governor in Council of Bombay addressed a complimentary letter- to Colonel I iflker, on the success of his exertions, and recommended him to be dil5geRttp en.urjng the faltlful adhtetpco of,qke Jahreahs fof thie few first tiearus to the ailut-sry stipulaiWi6ns vhich they had beenl induced to subscribe. They likewise informedl hil, that the first instances of the transgression of them " ought not to he treated with mulch indgwence"- (indeed !)-" but should rather be punished by a moderate fmne, to be always imposed with the privity of the British G,overn>nent through the Resident." They also directe(il him to ajiply the ainount of finas so collected to the relief of such indigene Tahrejahs as should be known to fulfil the letter and spirit of their ngagements ; and after stating that the extirp tionof infanticide was an object highly salutary anl indiispensable in all respects, they conclud1e(d by dlesiring him to submit to them, exclusive of any inter- mediate reports he might think necessary, one general state.- ment, on the last (lay of each year, of the manner in which the natives had violate/l or observed their engagements, and also of the number of femnale children which had be?n saved to the community in tlle interini. T're letter (liseloses the whole of the measures taken by the Bombay Government to suppress this horrid practice in Guzerat ; and it does appear to us a little ex- traordiniary, that, after they ha(l obtained from the Jahrejah chieftains a voluntar y renunciation of infanticide, similar to that signed in 1789 by the Rajkoomars of Benares, it did not followv up that renunciation by a declaration similar to that issued in 1795 apd 1802-that all persons violating it, would, upon conviction, be deemed guilty of marder, and he punished accordingly. Instead of pursuing that vigorous and decisive course,theyalloweda modle of punish- ment to be a-dopted, which more than any other was ealct- lated to defeat the object which they hact in view. They first of all left partof it-we mean the expulsion from caste- to be inflicted by the natives, when they must have known, that there were no practicable means of enforcing it, should the natives be averse to its inflictioni; they then left the remainder of it indefinite in its nature and uncertain in its amount-a proceedingwhich is always more likely to pro- mote than repress the growth of crim*e; anid they, last of all, fixed it "' a a moderate sumn oJ money," thereby legal- izing the practice among tuchl of the Jabrejabs as wvere rich enough to pay it; and destwoyinga notion which it was essential to cherish-that the British Government sought to abolish the practice from none but disinterested motives. It is true, that the money thus collected was to be applied to the specific purpose of remunerating- such fathers as did not sacrifice the lives of their female children; but, independently of the diffi&'alty which there would always be in making the payers of the fines believe that they were really ho appropriated, the actual appropria- tion of them to such a purpose was highly objectionable. Little good can be expected from a people whose Govern- rment finds it pecessary to bestpw pecuniary rowardls on its subjeeis to induce ihem to perform the ordlinary duties of social life.- A wvise statesman will of course puinish those who violate them; but none, save a fool,will endeavour to encourage them. to virtue by enlisting avarice and cupidity on its side. Besides, a pecaniary fine in a country where publicity is not given to judicial proceedings, is a punish- ment which acts only ona the party who pays it: it is not useful by way of example, the only legitimate end of all punishment; it may be heard of in the private circle to which the individual who pays it belongs, but it is lost up- on the large masses of unreflecting men, of which the so- ciety of every country is necessarily composed. The punish- ment, however, of death, which even those legislators who are not abstemious of blood allow to be legitimately in- flicted on those by whom blood has been shea, never fails, by its awful pomp and preparation, to create some sensa- tion even in the -breasts of those least given to reflection, and wvould, in this case. appear a just retaliation up- on those who have remorselessly cut asunder the dear- est ties of nature, after a(dmitting the gpilt of the practice in the strongest and most unequivocal terms. It would not only be a libel'on the reasoning powers of rmtan, but also a perversion of fact, to say that such a pu- nishment for such a crimne wonld not be agreeable to the feelings of niatural justice in India. The practice is not founded in religio'n; it is disavowed by the great body of ehe people; it prevails only among separate 'and detached tribes; and is too odious to be considered as a fit sabject fcr the ex.erciseoftcnlency. Many of the Rajpoot princes who forrieriy fo1lgwed1it, became so convinced of itsi enor- razty,ibat thcy pi-Tited it upon pain of death of their own iBcord, and iwitm our interference;' and Sir J. Maleo2r, asisures u tl. di"tiough he invariably refused to see thc> whibeo.mittpI is species of murder, and ex- pressed the tngcsuIlbiirence of it on all occasions, he nesterfouri that 'i.l ,of4ii2deos were of'ended by the sentimeniihlcliidselt it Es- duty to make public. So powerful is,t 't- .lium whenever there is an oppor- tunity of ? The Emperd 0c2a t.l hbout 200 years ago, ordered that this barbarous pr s1lo be discontinued throughout India, and enacted, that w iavg'Lhould cahiinit it in future should be put to thie torture. (P. 121.) The lahv v;aa not enforced, in conse- quence of the disturbed stat ef the country, whiclh shortly followxed. The present Rajah of Perthaugim-, who is a Hindoo, abolished fe- male infanticide ithin his territories 38 years ago. Bishee Sing, Rawmul of Banswarra, pro.lribi d it wthin his territories about the sarme time. It prevails there now only to a very limited extent._ Vide Malcolm's Account of Centra: India, vol ii., p. 210. (To be oontinued.) PAPERS UPON JHNYDoO IN?FANTyDB.