Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1873-01-25
Domestic Relations OF DiRerant ya.
fiona.

jhat mOnogamy Is not the only kind Of mar
rage, We are, indeed, early taught by our Bible
lessons. But though the conception of polyg-
amy Is thus made somewhat familiar, ii does not
occur to rs that polyandry Is also possible ar
learning that 1t not only exists, but was once OK
uemely general. When we contemplate these
marital institutions unlike our own, we cannot
al t,rss imagine that they can be Practced with
practice ours. Yet, Livingston narrates that in
tribe bordering Of the central African Ia kes
the women were quite Disguised on learning that
In England a man has only one wife, This is a
feeling by no means peculiar to them. An in
telligent Kandyan chief, with whom Mr. BAILEY
visited these veddahs, was perfectly scandal
one wife; and never parting until separated by
death. 1t was, he said, '.just like the wander,
COS" (monkeys.) Again, one would suppose thai, ,
polyandry, in its several varieties, exhausted the
possible forms Of marriage. An utterly unex-
pected form is furnished US by one Of the African
days in tho week-commonly for four DAYS II,
the week, which Is said to be sthe custom in
the best families" the wife during the Off-days
being regarded as an independent woman, who
prised, too, on reading that by some of the hill
tribes Of India unfaithfulness on the part of the
husband hush is held to be grave offense, but un-
We assume as self-evident, that good usage of a
wife By q husband implies, among other things.
absence Of violence; and hence IL seems scarcely
teriOn holds. Yet, 1t does 50 among the Tartars
"a nurse maid of mine," writes Mrs. Anderson
In her Tartar Steppes, cleft me to be married,
chalnick of the place to make a COMPLAINS
against her husband. He inquired into the mat
ter, when she cOOlly told him her husband dill
not love her. He asked how she knew he did
not love her; because she replied, he never
whipped me-" A statement which might be
rejected as incredible; were it not for the analo-
g9as fact that among the South African races a
white master who does not thrash his men ia
ridiculed and reprOached by them as not worthy
TO be called master. Among domestic Gus
toms, again, who, II he had been set to imagine,
al possible anomalies, would have hit upon that
which IL found among the Basaues and has
existed among other races--the custom that ON
the birth Of q child the husband goes to bed anil
receives the congratulations Of friends. while
his wife returns to her household work? Or who
among the results Of having son born. womb
dream Of that which occurs among POlynesiau
races, where the father is forthwith dispOssessed
Of his property, and becomes simply a Guardian
Of II on behalf OF the infant? The varieties OF
nlial relations, and Of accompanying sentiment,
continually show US things equally strange. and
ut first equally unacc0untable. 1t seems hardly
credible that IL should anywhere be Thought 4
duty on the part Of children to bury Their ma
rents alive. Yet 1t is 50 thought among the III
jams, OF whom we read also that the parents
tnus put out OF the way, 60 to their graves with
smiling faces. Scarcely less incredible does II
seem that mans affections should be REGARDED
- more fifty shown towards the children. Yer
the hill tribes Of india supply an example,