Pittsburg dispatch. [volume] (Pittsburg [Pa.]) 1880-1923, 1890-06-15
SOUTH SEA LOVERS.
In New Britain the Youth Wins His
Bride at Public Auction.
HE PAYS NINE PIGS IF SHE is FAT.
A System by Which He is Allowed to Wed
Only One Girl in Four.
MOTHERs-IN-LAw STRICTLY TABOOED
WRITTEN FOR THE DISPATCH.

thoAr miuos up W marry, pc..5 safoSSS Va
the western half of the great South Sea and
possibly cannibals, the affair is not as easy
of accomplishment as on first glance it
might seem to those who, without exper-
ience of its complex multitude of petty re-
strictions and rude ceremonies, look upon
savage freedom as the best instance OF SIM
plicity of fashion and absence of all conven-
tionality. No judgment could be more
erroneous. The conventions of civilized life
may be put aside by those upon whom they
bear heavily and no particular harm will re-
suit therefrom; the conventions of savage
life form a containing wall too high for the
savage to look over, too stout for him to
break through.
It would seem that the greater the SIM
plicity of the barbarism the more fixed is the
power of its daily round of etiquette. Moth
ing In Melanesian life is less easy of accom-
plishment than matrimony, yet at the same
time no other communities show such simple
conditions of life in general. Students of
the manners and customs Of the islanders
find here ceremony and there formal
phrase, which lead directly to the custom of
polyandry, in which the woman has plur-
ality of husbands Yet polygamy is now the
rule among the Melanesians, who perhaps,
have migrated from some land where poly
andry was a necessity of life to one where
the conditions were less severe.
THE TYPICAL ooURTsHIP.
New Britain gives the explanation Of that
which is faint in other islands; there the
Melanesian stock is the purest and there it
is most difficult for two young people, or
three or four for the matter of that since
polygamy rules, to become one. Every New
British community is sharply divided into
two clans, known respectively as the Mara
mara and the Pikalaba. They are most
intimately associated in all the business and
pleasure of life, they live in the same houses,
in fact, no household can exist without hay-
ing representatives of each clan. That there
may never be any doubt OF the clan to which
any particular individual belongs the device
of the clan is prominently displayed IN
tattooed lines upon his back and breast. Far
from being a division of the community,
these two clans tend toward its closer union,
for no person may marry member OF his
own clan but must choose from the other.
This plan is still further complicated by
the subdivision of each clan into four co-or-
dinate groups which are named respectively
after some fish, plant bird or beast. The
natural object whose name Is borne by each
group, becomes in some sort its totem and in
tattooing upon the body and in rude carving
upon the doorway is displayed as device.
The groups in each clan which bear kim
dred device are looked upon as too closely
related to allow intermarriage between men,
bers of each although their clans are dis
tinct. Likewise the individual must not
marry into the group of either parent or one
cognate Herewith in the other clan.
A VERY DESIRABLE CATCH.
This may seem far from clear, a concrete
example will serve for illustration. Re-
member that there can be no doubt about
the clan and group of any individual, for
the most cursory glance at his body will at
once show his position. Lumie, we will take
for example, young man who has built for
himself house, who owns q whole fishing
net and has the equity OF a yam plantation
orr SO and many coacoanuts. His house
seems lonely and he wants wife. This is
how he goes to work:
His own father belonged to the Pikalaba
clan and the fish group, his mother was a
Maramara of the plant group; thus he, in
heriting nothing from his father and every-
thing from his mother, is likewise a Mara
mara plant. He is therefore debarred from
marriage with any member of plant or fish
group, but must restrict his choice to the
Pikalaba birds and beasts. say to one-fourth
Of the girl population of his town. This is
indeed no great hardship to him, for he has
known from his earliest childhood that
some of the maidens were positively pro-
hibited to him and by the time his thoughts
bend toward matrilnony he must have be-
come resigned to his fate and is prepared to
conine his attentions to every fourth girl.
A young man SO prosperous as Lumie seems
to be could not be expected to mate with
hnt ba dan of 70 lu
wealthy as his own. The poorer girls whom
he will see about the town may become
wives to him, but they must wait until he
has made selections OF his chief wife and
then they without any ceremony are sum-
moned to take the minor positions, which
are in little different from slavery.
THE GIRLS ARE ALL Gagged.
But of the maidens Of high degree he has
no view. for they are all carefully Gagged at
their seminary in the bush under the pro-
lection of the dread fabu. Upon a morning
early the women of the town are in commo-
ton; they have learned through some mys-
terious channel that girl will on that day
be brought home from her seclusion OF from
six to eight years. Who the debutante
may be they do not know, but they glee-
fully spread their news about the town. All
other plans must yield to the great event;
the fishers on this day draw no nets. the
warriors grant one days respite to the
towns on either hand-all busy themselves
with guessing who it is whose education has
been completed and in absurd speculation
as to what she will fetch.
As the sun climbs high aud nearer to its
midday point the villagers flock out along
the path which leads to the girls retreat
and crowd about the latticed hedge from
which dangle the cloth streamers and fllet
of hair which mark the tabu; we'll to the
front will be found Lumie and any others
who may be ready Tor marriage. Upon the
other side of the sham bulwark people are
heard moving about and at the moment of
high noon the guardian of the young girls
appears and leads into view her charge, who
perhaps would blush if she were not as
black as q bag of SCOT. After one moment
of interested inspection a murmur of dis
satisfaction arises from many of the young
men who find her to belong to clan and
group prohibited to them. But not from
Lumie. He spies upon her breast the
Pikalaba mark and tattooed above 1T the
outstretched wings of bird, BY this he
knows that she is eligible.
THE FArTER THE BETTER.
Led by the chief and by all the young
men who seek to marry her, the young
woman goes down to her old home in the
village and mods and speaks to those whose
faces are vet familiar after her long absence.
She sits upon a small mat before her fathers
door to receive her friends and at her side
sits her guardian who now and again con-
descends to gratihed smile when 'one and
another compliment her upon the fatness of
her charge. Meanwhile feast is preparing
in the house behind her to which all the
,r;Ilooa Ia invited Tn the hiob most of