From T. M. Coan   24 April 1875

Mr. Charles Darwin,

Dear Sir:

Since receiving your enquiries of last summer respecting infanticide I have met with two passages upon the subject which I here transcribe, thinking that they may interest you if you have not already come across them.¹

The first is from the Journal of Sir James Mackintosh, in his Life (London, E. Moxon, 1834, vol. II, p. 86). “14^th. (February, 1811, at Bombay I think:) Captain Williams … is just returned from an extensive survey of Guzzerat. He confirms the account of the destruction of almost all female children, by the Jarejahs, a tribe of Rajpoots, of considerable consequence. They drown them immediately after birth, in milk, poured into a hole in the ground. Some few have been preserved. They procure wives from other tribes of Rajpoots. The motive which produces this barbarous usage is not very satisfactorily explained. They allege, as an excuse, the same combination of pride & poverty which made nuns of all poor gentlewomen in Catholic countries. They say that they destroy these daughters because they are unable to defray those great expenses at marriage which their rank requires. It is observable that here, as in almost all other cases where children are murdered, it is immediately after birth. To kill a child of six months old, would require a barbarity, even in a stranger (not to speak of a mother), of which human nature is very rarely capable.”²

The other passage is from J. S. Polack’s “New Zealand”, (London, 1838,) vol. 1, p. 381. He says: “Boys are seldom or never destroyed, except in temporary fits of insane passion”; & in the same chapter, XI, he gives several items of information bearing indirectly upon your question.³ Mr. Polack was in New Zealand between 1831 & 1837.

Very sincerely yours | Titus M. Coan.

24^th April 1875