As a rule, Japanese are very kind to children and very fond of them; usually they are allowed their own way a good deal when small and spoiled so that very severe discipline is administered later in an effort to correct this. Among the lower classes children are very often looked upon as a sort of insurance or investment against old age; also the system of ancestor worship makes it a highly desirable thing to have children, particularly sons. For these reasons children are looked upon with great favour and large families are the rule. Infanticide is now a crime and is so strictly and severely punished that it cannot be said to be common, although it does exist to some extent. However, up to about fifty years ago this was not the case; it was not a crime and was very common. The father of a family had supreme power over the family, even including the power of life and death, and was free to do with his children almost as he chose. In regions where the people were poor, infanticide was the regularly recognized means of preventing large families. The following incident illustrates this very well: In a certain section in northern Japan was a district where so little could be produced that the people were very poor and no family had more than one or two children, infanticide being regularly practised. The feudal lord of the district, being a wise man, decided to remedy this condition, which he proceeded to do by a system of irrigation which made the district quite fertile; immediately the size of the families rose to eight and ten and infanticide disappeared. With regret for my long delay in answering, which has been due to an effort to find some books on this subject, and trusting that this may be of some slight use to you, I am, Yours very truly, J. K. CALDWELL, _Assistant Japanese Secretary_. AMERICAN CONSULATE-GENERAL, SANTO DOMINGO, D. R., December 16, 1913. MR. GEORGE HENRY PAYNE, NEW YORK, N. Y. SIR: In reply to yours of November 1, 1913, I have not been able to find any material of interest in regard to the attitude of the natives before the landing of Columbus. The ruthless attitude of the Spaniards toward the natives is well known, and apparently neither women nor children were spared. The treatment of the natives resulted in their rapid decrease in number, and as early as 1510 the traffic in African slaves was begun and long continued.