if
they grew on hedges, would rank but little above the berries of the
bramble.

243. But to return once more to the matter of _risk_ of life; can it be
that _nature_ has so ordered it, that, as a _general thing_, the life of
either mother or child shall be in _danger_, even if there were no
attendant at all? _Can this be?_ Certainly it cannot: _safety_ must be
the rule, and _danger_ the exception; this _must_ be the case, or the
world never could have been peopled; and, perhaps, in ninety-nine cases
out of every hundred, if nature were left _wholly to herself_, all would
be right. The great doctor in these cases, is, comforting, consoling,
cheering up. And who can perform this office like _women_? who have for
these occasions a language and sentiments which seem to have been
invented for the purpose; and be they what they may as to general
demeanour and character, they have all, upon these occasions, one common
feeling, and that so amiable, so excellent, as to admit of no adequate
description. They completely forget, for the time, all rivalships, all
squabbles, all animosities, all _hatred_ even; every one feels as if it
were her own particular concern.

244. These, we may be well assured, are the proper attendants on these
occasions; the mother, the aunt, the sister, the cousin, and female
neighbour; these are the suitable attendants, having some experienced
woman to afford extraordinary aid, if such be necessary; and in the few
cases where the preservation of life demands the surgeon's skill, he is
always at hand. The contrary practice, which we got from the French, is
not, however, _so general_ in France as in England. We have outstripped
all the world in this, as we have in every thing which proceeds from
luxury and effeminacy on the one hand, and from poverty on the other;
the millions have been stripped of their means to heap wealth on the
thousands, and have been corrupted in manners, as well as in morals, by
vicious examples set them by the possessors of that wealth. As reason
says that the practice of which I complain cannot be cured without a
total change in society, it would be presumption in me to expect such
cure from any efforts of mine. I therefore must content myself with
hoping that such change will come, and with declaring, that if I had to
live my life over again, I would act upon the opinions which I have
thought it my bounden duty here to state and endeavour to maintain.

245. Having gotten ove