Nashville union and American. [volume] (Nashville, Tenn.) 1868-1875, 1873-03-28
VARIOUS CUSTOMS.

The worlds FamiIy-HOme Relations
In Different Countries - The Mar
rIage Relation in Africa and Else.
where-EVidence OF fAfectiOn-A Few
Extraordinary Facts,
Herbert Spencer remarks that manogamy
is not the only kind of marriage we. are,
indeed, early taught by our Bible lessons.
But though the conception of polygamy is
thus made somewhat familiar, it does
not occur to US thst polyandry is also q
possible arrangement, and We are sur
prised on first learning that it not
only exists, but was once extremely
general. When We contemplate these mar
ital institutions unlike our own, We cannot
az first think they can be practiced with q
sense of propriety like that with which we
practice ours. Yet Livingstone naTratss
that in tribe bordering one OF the Central
African lakes, the women were quite dis
gusied on hearing that in England man
has only one wife. This is feeling by 10
means peculiar to them. An intelligent
Kandyan chief, with whom Mr.. Bsilov
ted the Veddabs, was seaRdaii'~ =; 'iSt tba
utter barbayism oslTEin"- - IN - ,,;fa ;t-o
e fus 80 tls'sS - ..ng until separated by death.
..s, he said, '.just like the wanderoos"
/ ,monkeysl. Again, one would suppose
that, as matter of course, monogamy,
polygamy and polyandry, in its several va
rieties. exhausted the possible forms Of mar
riage.
An utterly unexpected form is furnished
| rs by one of the African tribes. Marriage
among them is for so many days in the
week. commonly for four days In the week,
which is said to be the ''custom in the best
families;" the wfesdnrng the of days be-
inc REGARDED as an independent woman, who
NAV do what she pleases. We are little
SURPRISED, too, on reading that by some Of
| the hiH tribes of InGia, unfaithfulness on
the part of the husband is held to be a very
grave offence, but unfaithfulness on the
1art of The wife, a very trivial one. We
assume, as being self-evident, that good
usage of a wife by husband implies,
among other things, entire absence Of Vio-
lence; and hence it seems scarcely imagi-
uable that in some places the opposite
criterion holds. Yet it does so among the
Tartars. A nurse maid of mine, writes
Mrs. Anderson in her "Tartar Steppes,
left me to be married, and some short time
after she went to the Natchalnick of the
place 10 make a complaint against her hus-
hand. He INQUIRED into the matter, when
she coolly told him her husband did not love
her. "Because," she replied, che never
whipped her"-s statement which might DC
rejected as incredible, were it not for the
analogous fact that among the South Atrl-
can races, a white master who does Bol
thrash his men is ridculed and reproach9d
as not worthy to be called master.
Among domestic customs, again, who, Il
he has been set to imagine all possible sno-
males, would have bit upon that which u
found among the Basques, and has existed
among other races--the custom that Oh
the birth of child the husband goe'
| to bed and receives the congratulations o
his friends, while his wife returds to bel
household work? Or who, among the re
suits of having q son born, woald dream 0
that which occurs among some PolyneslaI
races, where the father is forthwith dispos
sessed of his property, and becomes simpl.
l a guardian of it on behalf of the infant
The varieties filial relations and OF &C
3 companying sentiments continually sho7
3 us things equally strange, and at first sigh
unaccountabe. 1t seems hardly credl0l
l that it should be anywhere thought duty
: on the part of children to bury their parent
= alive. Yet it is SO thought among th
D FiiiaDs, of whom we read also, that the pa
rents thus put out of the way go to The
l graves with smiling faces. Scarcely les
Incredible does it seem that mans afieC
! ton should be regarded as mora ftly showl
toward the children of others than toward
! bis own children. Yet the Hill tribes
India supply an example.