On Foundlings and Changelings

The Foundling by Patricia Piccinini

The "baby box" has taken Europe by storm faster than the no!no!™ could have ever hoped to do.  As The Old Continent ambles down the road to serfdom, what better tool to accouter itself with than the baby box, or Babywiege?  The baby box, as pictured below, is a window-mounted air conditioning unit into which unwanted babies can be slipped for safe keeping.

Replete with privacy hedge!!!

Once a baby is placed into the unit, a silent alarm goes off notifying a wet nurse in a remote location.  Acting on behalf of the European Union, she comes to retrieve your baby, whereupon she gives it a quick meal and ships it by refrigerated freight (safety first!) to the U.N. Committee on the Rights of the Child.  Once there, the philosopher kings in this committee's hire decide the fate of the baby.  This, for example, is how Barack Obama was selected to become President of the United States.

Originally, the Babywiege was inspired by the Foundling Wheel.  This was a rotating window / outdoor confessional into which you could secretly dump your sin baby during medieval times.   These were always adjoined to churches, as a practical matter.

Wheel, Of, FOUNDLINGS!!!!!

This new system is not perfect however, despite all appearances.  The obvious problem - which nobody seems to want to confront - is the changeling issue.  Modern Babywiegen offer foundlings no protection against sequestration by Norwegian fairies.  It is well known that these forest spirits have not ceased in their efforts to replace perfectly healthy babies with free-loading troll babies.  The foundlings would have enjoyed the protection of the Catholic Church in times past; yet, today's simple tin boxes confer no such divine protection, especially against creatures of Pagan lore.  More problematic still is that the wet nurse can only walk as fast as her swollen ankles can take her; the fairy, however, flits Mercurially on the wind.  Advantage changeling.  Are these the kinds of odds you'd want to give the most vulnerable members of your society?