FERTILITY AND ILLEGITIMACY RATES.

1880–2.1890–2.1900–2.
Legitimate Fertility306·4296·5252·7Legitimate Births per 1,000 Married Women aged 15 to 45.
Illegitimate Fertility16·116·311·3Illegitimate Births per 1,000 Unmarried Women aged 15 to 45.
The Hague.
1880–2.1890–2.1900–2.
Legitimate Fertility346·5303·9255·0
Illegitimate Fertility13·413·67·7[[2]]
Rotterdam.
1880–2.1890–2.1900–2.
Legitimate Fertility331·4312·0299·0
Illegitimate Fertility17·416·513·1

[2]. Lowest figure for the Continent.

The Neo-Malthusian propaganda in Holland is founded on feministic and economic grounds. Birth Control is the pivot around which both of these important movements must swing. Mr. S. Van Houten, late Minister of the Interior of the Netherlands, says: “Wage-slavery exists as a consequence of the carelessness with which the former generation produced wage-slaves; and this slavery will continue so long as the adult children of these wage-slaves have nothing better to do than to reproduce wage-slaves.”

There has been marked improvement in the labor conditions in Holland during these last ten years especially, wages having increased and hours of labor decreased, with the cost of living taking a comparatively very small rise.

There is perhaps no country in Europe where the educational advantages are so great as in Holland. Many English women and widows with children, living on small incomes, move to Holland on account of the splendid education to be obtained in the public schools.

That the Birth Control propaganda has been a success in Holland any one travelling through that delightful, clean, and cheerful country can testify. There is no doubt that at first there were objections and abuses, but, in the words of Dr. Rutgers, “Certainly there are abuses, but the abuses of knowledge are never so enormous as the abuses of ignorance. And hygiene is the highest form of morality.”

Following are the methods, reprinted from the practical pamphlet given out by the Neo-Malthusian League of Holland:—

Confidential.