“Under the Christian emperors concubinage was not favoured; but it subsisted as a legal institution in the time of Justinian. At last Leo the Philosopher, Emperor of the East, in a.d. 887, abrogated the laws which permitted concubinage, as being contrary to religion and public decency. ‘Why,’ said he, ‘should you prefer a muddy pool, when you can drink at a purer fountain?’ The existence of this custom, however, was long prolonged in the West among the Franks, Lombards, and Germans; and it is notorious that the clergy for some time gave themselves up to it without restraint.” The practice of adoption prevailing in ancient Rome is well known, but an account of it as it is retained in the French law may be thought curious:— “In France the usage of adoption was lost after the first race of kings: it disappeared, not only in the customary provinces, but also in the provinces governed by the written law. Re-established in 1792, adoption is now sanctioned by the Civil Code. Adoption, however, is only permitted to persons of either sex above the age of fifty, having neither children nor other lawful descendants, and being at least fifteen years older than the individual adopted. No married person can adopt without the consent of the other spouse. The privilege can only be exercised in favour of one who has been an object of the adopter’s care for at least six years during minority, or of one who has saved the life of the adopter in battle, from fire, or from drowning. In the latter case the only restriction respecting the age of the parties is, that the adopter shall be older than the adopted, and shall have attained his majority. In no case can adoption take place before the majority of the person proposed to be adopted. “The form of adoption consists of a declaration of consent by the parties before a justice of the peace for the place where the adopter resides, after which the transaction requires to be approved of by the tribunal of first instance. After adoption, the adopted person retains all his rights as a member of his natural family. He acquires no right of succession to the property of any relation of the adopter; but in regard to the property of the adopter himself, he has precisely the same rights as a child born in marriage, even although there should be other children born in marriage after his adoption. The adopted takes the name of the adopter in addition to his own. No marriage can take place between the adopter and the adopted, or his descendants, and in certain other cases specified. “The practice of adoption, which is better suited to some states of society than to others, still prevails among Eastern nations. It has never been recognised as a legal institution in England or Scotland.”