2-982-077 - The Print Collector/Heritage Images

"The Spoiled Child" by M. Piot, from a photograph by the Berlin Photographic Company, 1876. 'It is a thousand pities that ever any little child should be spoiled, but especially the lovely infant whom M. Piot has depicted, with those dark eyes of the deepest feeling, those full lips and soft, round cheeks, inviting the kiss which she is too naughty to deserve or to receive. This wilful little woman must not be allowed to have her own way, or she will grow up a perfect torment and terror...fit only to be made a heroine of modern romance in the hands of some contemporary literary patroness of female moral monstrosities...It is frightful to think of her between sixteen and twenty-six years of age, if she be indulged in such fits of passion at three or four; and we hope that her governess or nursemaid will have been duly authorised to chasten this vehemence of disposition before it is too late'. From "Illustrated London News", 1876.