What can be its meaning? What topsy-turvydom of the human brain can have originated it? Mr. Tylor, in his _Early History of Mankind_, says that it proceeded from a notion that the woman was a mere machine for the turning out of babies, and that the babes were not in the least supposed to belong to her, but to the father. Also that the child was part and parcel of the father, a feeble and frail parcel, and that the utmost precaution had to be taken to keep the male parent in health lest the child should suffer. If the father were to take a pinch of snuff, the infant would sneeze its brains away; if he were to eat solid food, the babe would suffer indigestion. A missionary found it impossible to persuade his Indian servant to eat anything but slops directly after the birth of a son and heir, as he was persuaded heavy diet would injure the child. Then the missionary belaboured his servant with a stick, and sent him to look at his infant smiling in its sleep, and so convinced the man of his delusion. This may be the explanation. I cannot say. Mankind does many things out of sheer cussedness. CHAPTER V ORTHEZ Court of the counts of Foix--Froissart--Gaston Phœbus--Kills his son--And a cousin--Death of Phœbus--Evan de Foix--The bastards of Phœbus--Tragic death of Evan--Bridge over the Gave--Jeanne d’Albret--Her despotic actions--Flight to La Rochelle--Charles sends La Terride into Béarn--Jeanne invites Montgomery to her aid--He enters Béarn--Takes Orthez-- Massacre--The castle capitulates--Broken faith--Murder of ten barons--Slaughter of priests and monks--Catholic worship forbidden--Death of Jeanne--Castle of Belocq--Puyôo-- Battlefield of Orthez--Retreat of Soult. Orthez has little to occupy it save to brood over its past. It is a dull town, without characteristic features, and it sulks because Pau the parvenue is flourishing, and flaunting, whilst itself, the venerable Orthez, the once capital, sits as a widow, desolate. Till the fifteenth century it was the residence of the Court of the counts of Foix and viscounts of Béarn, whose castle of Moncada occupied the height above the town. A splendid pile it was, erected by Gaston VII, in 1240, after the pattern of a Spanish castle of the name that he had taken. This had proved to him a hard nut to crack, and he hoped to make the new Moncada by additional works wholly uncrackable. But the tooth of Time has broken it completely, and nothing of it now remains save the keep. [Illustration: THE BRIDGE, ORTHEZ]