thoughtlessness or foolish pride of these dissolute gray-beards, who
prodigalize the last breath of their life in search of depraved
voluptuousness."

The parents, the perpetrators of such an outrage against nature, are
not the only sufferers. Look at the children which they bring into the
world! Let Dr. Gardner speak again:--

"Children, the issue of old men, are habitually marked by a serious
and sad air spread over their countenances, which is manifestly very
opposite to the infantile expression which so delights one in the little
children of the same age engendered under other conditions. As they
grow up, their features take on more and more the senile character;
so much so that every one remarks it, and the world regards it as a
natural thing. The old mothers pretend that it is an old head on young
shoulders. They predict an early death to these children, and the event
frequently justifies the horoscope. Our attention has for many years
been fixed upon this point, and we can affirm that the greater part
of the offspring of these connections are weak, torpid, lymphatic, if
not scrofulous, and do not promise a long career."

In old age the seminal fluid becomes greatly deteriorated. Even at the
best, its component elements could only represent decrepitude and
infirmity, degeneration and senility. In view of such facts, says Dr.
Acton,--

"We are, therefore, forced to the conclusion that the children of old
men have an inferior chance of life; and facts daily observed confirm
our deductions. Look but at the progeny of such marriages; what is its
value? As far as I have seen, it is the worst kind--spoilt childhood,
feeble and precocious youth, extravagant manhood, early and premature
death."

Unions of an opposite character to those just considered, wherein a
young man marries a woman much older than himself, are more rare than
those of the other class. They are, perhaps, less deplorable in their
physical effects, but still highly reprehensible. They are seldom
prompted by pure motives, and can be productive of no good. Children
resulting from such unions are notably weak, unbalanced, and sorry
specimens of humanity.

We have scarcely referred to the domestic misery which may result from
these disgraceful unions. If a young girl is brought home by a widower
to preside over his grown-up daughters, perhaps old enough to be her
mother, all the elements are provided for such a domestic hell as could
only be equale