[To nix EDITOR Or THII "SPECTATOR:1
SIR,—Whilst also upholding the rights of parents, I cannot see that the Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Children deserves to be brought to book over the case of Alice Carter, knowing what I do, as a medical man, of the good results following surgical repair of the cleft palate. Everyone is aware how cruel are the jibes such a one is exposed to during childhood, and how, in later life, the effect of this is never entirely thrown off. Therefore why should it be improper for the N.S.P.C.C. to protect the child from one whom all must acknowledge as an unwise and a callous parent, and guilty, in this act of his, of indirect cruelty ? No one wants to destroy parental responsibility, and least of all the N.S.P.C.C., for its work is and has been to awaken that sense in those dead to it. If the society is wrong in a legal sense—and I am not sure that it is—it is not wrong in heart. It did its best to ameliorate the
condition of the child before it became too late. You, Sir, say, that " medical science is not infallible, and is apt to be affected by fashions," a truth which no one can deny. Yet it is hardly applicable to a case of this kind, where Nature simply fails to bridge an arch over, and is helped mechanically by the surgeon to do so. Fashion can never change here, as long as Nature remains the same.—I am, Sir, &c., P. 0. WA TEIN BROWNE, M.B.C.M.
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