The wolf and the fox, the latter dreaded as an uncanny beast, are very
widely distributed.

Still less would there be any ground for establishing a Society for the
Prevention of Cruelty to Children, the very name of which would make
an ordinary, unsophisticated Chinaman stare. Chinese parents are, if
anything, over-indulgent to their children. The father is, indeed,
popularly known as the "Severe One," and it is a Confucian tradition
that he should not spare the rod and so spoil the child, but he draws
the line at a poker; and although as a father he possesses the power of
life and death over his offspring, such punishments as are inflicted are
usually of the mildest description. The mother, the "Gentle One," is,
speaking broadly, a soft-hearted, sweet-natured specimen of humanity;
one of those women to whom hundreds of Europeans owe deep debts of
gratitude for the care and affection lavished upon their alien children.
In the absence of the Severe One, it falls to her to chastise when
necessary; and we even read of a son who wept, not because his mother
hurt him, but because, owing to her advanced age, she was no longer able
to hit him hard enough!

Among other atrocious libels which have fastened upon the fair fame
of the Chinese people, first and foremost stands the charge of
female infanticide, now happily, though still slowly, fading from
the calculations of those who seek the truth. Fifty years ago it was
generally believed that the Chinese hated their female children, and got
rid of them in early infancy by wholesale murder. It may be admitted
at once that boys are preferred to girls, inasmuch as they carry on
the family line, and see that the worship of ancestors is regularly
performed in due season. Also, because girls require dowries, which they
take away with them for the benefit of other families than their own;