The Youngest Mother.

New Zealand Graphic, Volume XLV, Issue 22, 30 November 1910, Page 62

The Youngest Mother.

An amazing case of precocious parentage is reported in the “Lancet.’’ A special correspondent of thirt journal has sent a photograph from China of u little boy and girl, with their baby. The mother is eight years old and the father nine. It seems that the Governor of Shansi, the province in which the birth took place, sent official particulars to Pekin, but, in order to make sure of the matter, the correspondent of the “Lancet” made inquiries through a friend living in Tai-yuan-fu. The friend reported that the facts were exactly as stated in the official report, that the boy was the father of 'the child, and that the baby was about a foot long at birth. The only doubt about the age of the parents seems to be caused by the Chinese method of reckoning ages. They call a child one when it is born, so that this curious couple may possibly be a year younger than the ages given in the report. The youngest mother hitherto recorded in Western annals was nine years old. There is no record of so juvenile a father. It makes one feel a trifle sick, somehow, docsn t ill