the
red papers being torn down, after the birth of the infant, and soaked in
water, when as the red disappeared from the paper, so the child's face
assumed a natural hue. Lord Avebury also speaks of _la couvade_ as
existing among the Chinese of West Yun-Nan. (_Origin of Civilisation and
Primitive Condition of Man_, p. 18)."

Dr. J.A.H. Murray, editor of the _New English Dictionary_, wrote, in
_The Academy_, of 29th October, 1892, a letter with the heading of
_Couvade, The Genesis of an Anthropological Term_, which elicited an
answer from Dr. E.B. Tylor (_Academy_, 5th November): "Wanting a general
term for such customs," writes Dr. Tylor, "and finding statements in books
that this male lying-in lasted on till modern times, in the south of
France, and was there called _couvade_, that is brooding or hatching
(_couver_), I adopted this word for the set of customs, and it has since
become established in English." The discussion was carried on in _The
Academy_, 12th and 19th November, 10th and 17th December; Mr. A.L. Mayhew
wrote (12th November): "There is no doubt whatever that Dr. Tylor and
Professor Max Mueller (in a review of Dr. Tylor's book) share the glory of
having given a new technical sense to an old provincial French word, and
of seeing it accepted in France, and safely enshrined in the great
Dictionary of Littre."

Now as to the origin of the word; we have seen above that Rochefort was
the first to use the expression _faire la couvade_. This author, or at
least the author (see _Barbier, Ouvrages anonymes_) of the _Histoire
naturelle ... des Iles Antilles_, which was published for the first time
at Rotterdam, in 1658, 4to., writes: "C'est qu'au meme tems que la femme
est delivree le mary se met au lit, pour s'y plaindre et y faire
l'acouchee: coutume, qui bien que Sauvage et ridicule, se trouve
neantmoins a ce que l'on dit, parmy les paysans d'vne certaine Province de
France. Et ils appellent cela _faire la couvade_. Mais ce qui est de
facheus pour le pauvre Caraibe, qui s'est mis au lit au lieu de
l'acouchee, c'est qu'on luy fait faire diete dix on douze jours de suite,
ne luy donnant rien par jour qu'vn petit morceau de Cassave, et un peu
d'eau dans la quelle on a aussi fait boueillir un peu de ce pain de
racine.... Mais ils ne font ce grand jeusne qu'a la naissance de leur
premier enfant ..." (II. pp. 607-608).

Lafitau (_Maeurs des Sauvages Ameriquains_, I. pp. 49-50) says on the
authority of Rochefort: "J