In the second case also the woman was quite unfitted to be a mother, though her character and the circumstances were as different as possible. This time the mother was highly born and educated. Though I knew her fairly well, I was unacquainted with her family history, which probably would show many features of great interest. She was of neurotic temperament, and belonged to the type I have classed as the siren woman. She had several lovers, as she was strongly sexual. By one of these men, and by mistake, a child was born. The father refused to accept the responsibilities of his fatherhood, though he did not deny that the child was his. The mother also had no love for it, and the little one would have been neglected and probably would have died. But, when about two months old, the child was taken from its mother and cared for and most tenderly loved by one of the woman’s lovers. He left her, as her indifference to her child killed his affection, but he took her child to bring up as his own son.
The third case is more usual, and shows us illegitimacy as it most commonly occurs. The events happened in the north of England, where once I lived. The girl was well known to me. She was of respectable parentage, and very beautiful; she would have made a good mother. The father did not live in the same village, and I did not know him; but I heard he was young and strong; he was the gardener at the place where the girl was servant; probably the child would have been healthy. But the girl was sent from her situation as soon as her condition was known to her Christian (!) mistress; later she was driven from her home by her fanatically religious (!) father. Thus hounded to death and to crime she sought refuge in a disused quarry; she was there for two days without food. It was winter. When we found her, her child had been born and was dead. Afterwards the girl went mad.[92]
I will add no comment, because I feel quite unable to write calmly. I can only record my belief that under a more moral public opinion and saner social organisation such crimes of mothers against their children would be impossible. Infanticide is committed always, I believe, under the biting pressure of want and despair.
The last case is in sharp contrast with all the others, and shows responsible motherhood outside of marriage. The woman here is strong and passionate and deeply maternal, but, unable to marry the man she loves, because he is married already, but to a woman who has no desire to be a mother, she chooses, therefore, to bear his child. I know several similar unions. Some of these have been temporary, some have lasted, but in each case the woman has had strength of character and a social position which have made it practicable for her thus to assert her right to motherhood. Such cases we may leave alone. I do not think any one of us should condemn such action. The immense pity is that women of this strong maternal type should by any cause be kept from marriage. They are the fittest wives and mothers.
The relation between marriage and illegitimacy is a very close one; any cause that hinders early marriage must tend to encourage the increase of illegal unions.[93] The question is, however, a very difficult one. And I am not fully convinced of the wisdom of permanent marriage being undertaken at so young an age that chance births would be prevented; at any rate, the danger would be great until our young women and young men are more sanely educated in sex. The young have very little understanding of their own need, and no experience of life; and for this reason a way might be opened up that, after marriage, would lead to even more harmful looseness of conduct. Already numerous illegitimate births are the result of unhappy marriages. This happens, perhaps, most frequently among the working classes, though I am not sure, and it may be only that among them the facts of such births are more openly known. The fear of another child to the too-hard-worked mother is often very great, and this (when the means to prevent conception are not known) causes her to refuse to have intercourse with her husband, which all too frequently sends him to another woman.
Unmarried mothers are overwhelmingly preponderant among the economically weak, in particular, among servant girls, factory workers, laundry hands, waitresses, and all classes of day workers. This does not necessarily prove greater looseness of conduct among these classes, and the more numerous illegitimate births are, of course, explained to a great extent by the fact that among the better-educated girls means to prevent conception are used; illegitimate births are also very frequently hidden. This, in particular, happens where both parents belong to the upper classes of society. It is also frequent with the gentleman father and the mother of a lower social class.
And here, before I go further, I must again give warning against the over-hasty view, that men and their uncontrolled passions are alone responsible. This opinion, once held by me in common with most women, I have been compelled to give up. Seduction cannot, I believe, be accepted, without very great caution, as the chief cause of illegitimate births. It is so comfortable to place the sins of sex on men’s passions. But I doubt very much if any woman can be made a mother against her own will. I am inclined to believe that excitement and escape from dulness, as also the joy in receiving presents, are the principal motives that at first lead girls into illegal relations.[94]
We find that paternity is acknowledged most frequently in those cases where the father belongs to a lower social level, where he loses less by open behaviour. In these classes the man, unless prevented by a pre-existing tie, usually marries the mother at a later period, and he does not despise her. The woman’s sin is not as a rule taken too tragically. If the father of her child does not marry her, it is quite possible for her to find another husband, who, as a rule, acts as a father to her love-child. For these reasons the least moral and economic dangers, alike to the child and its mother, occur when both the father and the mother belong to the working classes. This is not, however, always true.
The whole question is a difficult one; the further we inquire, the more strongly does this appear. We learn that there is no one type of the unmarried mother, no one cause of the evil of illegitimacy, no one remedy that will cure it. We cannot wisely be too hopeful. But this is not an excuse for our indifference. Our system of ignoring this question and of forcing the unmarried mother into shame, with its incredible short-sightedness and culpable lack of help and discrimination, is proved out-of-date, because we now know that it is useless. It does not prevent illegitimate births, for no law can change the sexual nature of men and women. As things stand with us at present, honourable or even decent conduct in illegal sexual relationships has a poor chance of being cultivated; but those who realise that this is the case are still very few.
It is because I have come to realise this that I have urged, with all the power I have, an open recognition of these hidden relationships as the only way to save them from disgrace and shame. I hope to have made it clear that I am not thinking of lessening responsibility in asking for a change in our law. I am not at all advocating any sentimental legislation; we have had quite enough of that. It is an intelligent insight that considers causes and their effects that we need to-day in the administration of our laws.