The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1899-02-14
MANY POLYGAMOUS PEOPLES.
Others Than Mormons Practice Plu-
rality Within Our Domain.
(St. Louis Republic. J

(St. Louis Republic.)
Polygamy is fairly rampant within
the vast domain of Uncle Sam. not only
in the continental states and terri
tories, but in the newly acquired island
possessions. This is strictly upon the
authority of men who have made a
study of the question.
have just collected opinions from
many of the wise doctors who made a
speciality of human customs. There
are score of them in Washington.
With very few exceptions, all In
dams who adhere at all TO native beliefs
and few of them do not-are polyg-
amists de facto or de jure.'
1T is common when 1 go to an In
dams abode for the father of the fam
lily TO point to one woman and say, My
Wife indicating others of the house
hold as My wife's sisters To the In
dian this very often means that all are
wives, the oldest only being designated
as such"
THE African negro, when he arrived
in this country, was instinctively
polygamous. Plurality of wives is the
rule among negroes in Africa, especial
ly those of the west coast. who sup
piled all of our slaves. In studying ne
groes ethnologically 1 have seen many
cases of polygamy, and L know that
among the lower ones of full blood
there is much more of that sort of
thing than anyone suspects"
Polygamy is the rule among many
primitive tribes of the Philippines, and
among Mohammedans there.
What l have quoted are paragraphs
which 1 jotted down directly from as
many sources. Polygamy among prim-
tive people is a delicate question
among ethnologists. They are all
afraid of burning their bridges.
l once interviewed a full-blooded Pa
pago Indian and CHANGED the question,
What do you do with your old
maids?"
Astonishment beamed in his face He
had to be enlightened as to the mean
ing of the two words. Eve have
none," said he. Every girl is mar
ried when she is very young. Yes, there
are fewer men than women. Every
woman must have husband, or she
will starve."
The Aleuts, our Alaskan subjects, in
the Aleutian islands, allow their best
hunters the most wives. The reason
is that the men who can obtain the
most feed can best support large fam
lilies. When a wife ceases to attract
her husband she is sent back to her
family. The Eskimo commonly has
two wives. rarely more, and in spite
of the frigid climate in which they
i've, HGSDdHUS OI IHlS RATE are noticed
to bestow unusual affection upon their
spouses.
Although the native Hawaiians have
been nominally converted to Christian
ity, their marriage relations are con-
spicuously lax; and. although polyg-
amy is not practiced legally, married
men and women are equally promis-
cuous, according to good authorities.
The native Hawaiian thinks more Sc
ri U IF y, &c of
riage. Expensive marriages make an
eXtravagant funeral impossible.
The Bagobos of the Philippines are
polygamists; also the Mangyans. The
latter, primitive people of the island of
Mindoro, marry a plurality of wives
when they can afford it. Professor
Dean c. Worcester, who has been in
Washington this week, and who has
made. a personal study of the Mang-
vans, found that both men and women
remain true to their mates. All that
he could learn of their marriage cere-
mony was that the old folks get to-
gether and talk" One of these people,
begged by priest to adopt Christian
modes of life, replied that if he be-
came a Christian it would cost money
to be born, to be allowed to live, to
marry, to die and be buried. The sui
tan of Sulu, now an American subject,
is a Mohammedan, with a harem.
The fact that the Aetas. she so-called
missing Inks of the Philippines, are
monogamists, strengthens the theory
that the very lowest classes of human
ity, as well as the very highest, gen
orally remain loyal through lie to but
one mate at a time. the intermediate
classes being polygamists.
Polyandry, the marriage of one wife
to plurality of husbands, is also prac-
ticed by a considerable number of
Uncle Sans subjects. Alaska is the
hotbed of this practice. In Oonalaska,
one of the Aleutian islands. woman
often lives with two husbands.
1t has been urged that polygamy is
unnatural because of the equal distri-
button of the sexes. In the United
States there are about 100000 more
men than women, which is contrary
to the general supposition that women
are in excess. Polyandry in Alaska is
due to a minority of women. Among
the Indians of the United States proper
there is an excess of women. because
male Indians have always suffered the
greater exposure in the wars and in
the hunt. There is a theory that mix
ture of race among Indians produces
an excess of females in the birth rate.
s-A5-0-