Travels in India (Tavernier) 124.9

124.9

When a woman is delivered, and the infant, as often happens, is unwilling to take to its mother’s breast in order to suckle, it is carried outside the village and placed in a cloth, which is tied by the four corners to the branches of a tree, and is thus left from morning to evening. In this way the poor infant is exposed to the crows, which come to torment it, and some have been found whose eyes have been torn out of their heads, which is the reason why many idolaters are seen in Bengal who have but one eye, and others who have both injured or altogether gone. In the evening the infant is taken to see whether it is willing to suckle during the following night, and should it happen that it still refuses the breast, it is taken back on the following day to the same place; this is done for three days in sequence, after which, if the infant is altogether unwilling to take the breast, in the belief that it is a demon, it is cast into the Ganges, or into some other river or tank which is closer at hand. In the places where there are many monkeys these poor children are not so exposed to the attacks of crows, for this reason, that as soon as a monkey discovers a nest of these birds he climbs the tree, and throws the nest on one side and the eggs on the other.