"CHILDLESS" FRANCE.

Star (Christchurch), Issue 7506, 13 September 1902, Page 1

"CHILDLESS" FRANCE.

Rebellion of Modern "Women Against Froauent Maternity. (Nineteenth Century,) The causes of the excessive decline in the rate of natality throughout France are complex, but in the main not obscure. The passion for economy, hymned by M. Hanotaux fbr so many good reasons, has its sordid and joyless sidle, and the increase of French investments means the limitation of French families. "Moms on a d'enfants mieux on vit," is becoming a universal maxim^ and is far from applying to the peasants only from whom M. Hanotaux quotes it. Still less exclusively applicable to that class are the words he significantly adds : " Des instructions se transmettent a l'oreille des meres aux filles." The rebellion of modern women against frequent maternity is a silent revolution, but it is among the most significant that has ever been known in the world. French women are, of course, even more sensitive than their sisters elsewhere to the sacrifice of social activity and youthful charm that motherhood compels. * Whether that particular factor in restraint of population will be in the long run more severe in France than in the Anglo-Saxon countries may be doubted. All the signs suggest that in a few decades the rebellion against maternity will reach a more alarming stage in Australia and among the population other than immigrant of the United' States than in France. But at present thrift and anti-maternal egoism operate with special force in France. Twenty-two per cent of all marriages in Paris and 12 per cent of all those in the provinces are childless. The total' number of unions without offspring is no less than 1,800,000. For the rest, the vast proportion of all families are those with one child or two. It would be idle, from the point of view of the preservation of international power as distinguished from the promotion of individual well-being, to attempt any palliation of the gravity and difficulty of this question. But it is far less threatening than is generally assumed. * *