In the same country, a child born before marriage is rendered legitimate by the subsequent marriage of the parents. This is not the case in England.
A child born during wedlock is legitimate, although the date of conception may be before marriage. A child born after the death of its mother is held to be legitimate. A child may, as Taylor remarks, be conceived before marriage, and born after the death of the mother, and yet be legitimate, though neither conceived nor born in wedlock.
The Code Napoleon prohibits the contraction of a second marriage until ten months after the death of the first husband; and this is also the case in Germany. The Anglo-Saxon law prohibits remarriage for twelve months. In Britain no time is fixed by law.
Duration of Pregnancy.—The consideration of this subject is of importance in its relation to the legitimacy of a child.
The natural period of human gestation is usually stated at forty weeks, ten lunar or nine calendar months, or 280 days. In Prussia, the period is extended to 302 days, and in the Code Napoleon to 300; in Scotland, ten months is held as the limit.
The duration of human gestation is subject to considerable variation; in some females it is always protracted; in others, always premature. Several modes of calculation are adopted by women:
1. Ascertained date of impregnation from one coïtus.
2. Supposed sensations of female at time of conception.
3. Suppression of the catamenia. This is open to the objection, that causes other than that of impregnation may arrest them. The catamenia may be stopped by cold or other causes for two or three months, and then, before their return, pregnancy may occur, thus upsetting all calculations. The usual mode of calculation is from two weeks after the last menstruation, and the period so fixed is corrected by the time at which quickening occurs.
4. Period of quickening. (a) Quickening supposed when pregnancy is absent. (b) Pregnancy without quickening. (c) Variations in the time of its occurrence.