Amoy (Xiamen), Fukien province, China: foundling children outside a foundling hospital. Photograph by John Thomson, ca. 1870.

Ten children sitting outside a lean-to building with straw walls. a woman standing in the doorway on the right hand side. In the 19th century, as result of extreme poverty and war, female infanticide was particularly high in Amoy. A local merchant set up a foundling hospital to care for unwanted children. Often the locals sold their girls to the hospital for as little as five pence, whereas a boy might fetch as much as three pounds. Anyone wishing to adopt a child, however, could go to the hospital and be given one free of charge, provided he could show he was perfectly respectable