In a similar manner mercenary marriages are not so numerous with us as in other countries. Many men marry, it is true, with ulterior motives daughters of wealthy or influential families; and these latter naturally do their best to promote the interests of their sons-in-law. By judicious marriages young men have risen to high and influential positions in official and commercial circles. But marriages that are crudely, unblushingly mercenary are rare for the simple reason that it is not the common custom to give away daughters with large dowries. The wives bring with them plenty of dresses and personal articles, but seldom money, though their fathers may give them something to start with when they marry. There is still a strong prejudice against dowries; and a man who marries a woman with a _dot_ is often considered very mercenary and, still worse, even suspected of having taken the money as an offset against some personal defect in his wife. There is of course the possibility that the wealthy parent would help his daughter in difficulties and when the worst came to the worst, keep her and her family from starvation. But the most effectual way in which a man may make money by marriage is to get adopted as a husband by a wealthy family; it is indeed the only means a poor man has of acquiring wealth without any exertion on his part; the difficulty is to find a well-to-do family willing to adopt him. If he has nothing to expect from his father, he need not hope for a legacy from an uncle, aunt, or any other relative, as an estate is seldom allowed to go out of the family. A bachelor or a childless person adopts some one to succeed to his name and property. In the same way a settlement is seldom made on the wife. A widow is, as long as she remains in the family, maintained by her son or daughter’s husband. Until recently she had, if she wished to remarry, first to return to her own family and become a spinster again, so to speak, by re-assuming her maiden name; but the new Civil Code allows her to marry direct from the family in which she has become a widow; this is merely to save her the trouble of needlessly removing to her old home. She must, however, secure the consent of the heads of her own family and her late husband’s to her second marriage. As the widow brings from her husband’s home only her clothes and other personal property, she is not courted by fortune-hunters. A girl does not in Japan give her hand to a dotard with the object of enjoying his property after his death with a husband more suited to her age. CHAPTER XVII. CHILDREN. Child-life—Love of children—Desire for them—Child-birth—After-birth—Early days—The baby’s food—The “first-eating”—Superstitions connected with infancy—Carrying of babies—Teething—Visits to the local shrine—Toddling—Weaning—The kindergarten and primary school—The girls’ high school—The middle school—The popularity of middle schools—Hitting—Exercises and diversions—Collections.