It is a good thing for the children that they should be removed from the care of parents who are cruel to them either by neglecting or by maltreating them, and it is well that those who are inclined to carelessness should know that their conduct may form the subject of complaint; but a person may be physically fit to have children and mentally incapable of taking care of them. A large proportion of those women who have been convicted of cruelty to children are in this sad case. The evidence has been of the clearest that they have squandered their substance, indulged their appetites, and shamefully ill-used their offspring, but only after they have been placed out of the reach of drink is it possible to say whether at their best they are capable of undertaking the obligations they have incurred by becoming mothers. In some cases their mental condition has been so bad as to justify their removal to lunatic asylums; in other cases the mental defect is quite perceptible and is obviously such as to unfit them for their duties, but is not sufficiently marked to enable them to be cared for by the lunacy authority. Drink has been held accountable for their conduct and it has had a share in its causation, but it has masked the permanent flaw behind it, whether that defect has existed before the subject gave way to drink or has resulted from drink. In the case of these women it is a serious matter to allow them to return to duties they are unfit to discharge, especially as there is a probability that the condition of the family may be aggravated by its increase. Among women convicted of cruelty to children there are very few who are not mentally defective as far as my experience goes.