“Not all blue Gunga's mountain flood,
That rolls so proudly round thy fane,
Can cleanse the tinge of human blood,
Nor wash dark Saugor's impious stain:
The sailor, journeying on the main,
Shall view from far thy dreary isle,
And curse the ruins of the pile
Where mercy ever sued in vain!”
This iniquity was openly and fearlessly practiced in India up to
the time when the Marquis Wellesley, brother of the Duke of
Wellington, was appointed Governor-General, and India's daughters
will yet learn to revere and love the memory of that humane
and intrepid man, who, in the face of the obstacles that arose
around him on every side, when he attempted to deal with this
“custom,” never faltered till he had put the protection of Christian
law over the life of every child in India. His Excellency honestly
The Marquis Wellesley.
and bravely placed in the
hands of the magistracy
of India “A Regulation
for Preventing the Sacrifice
of Children at Saugor
and other places, passed
by the Governor-General
in Council, on the 20th
of August, 1802,” “declaring
the practice to be
murder, punishable by death.”
In British India, so far as
law could reach the case,
he made infanticide to be
regarded and punished as
in England.
We present here an outline of the countenance of this true friend of woman, as that of one whose deeds of mercy will be held in everlasting remembrance.
It is no doubt true that children have been secretly offered to
