Page:Brinkley - Japan - Volume 1.djvu/128

 cian held himself defiled by mere contact with a plebeian, and marriages between them were not tolerated. Great importance attached to well-established pedigrees. During the lapse of ages and in the absence of any written records, few genealogical trees could be traced clearly through all their ramifications, and the danger of admitting some strain of vulgar blood into a family imparted special advantage to marriages between children of the same father by different mothers. Confucianism proved entirely powerless to check that abuse, or to provide any general corrective for the relations between the sexes, which were frequently subserved to degrading influences. Wives had now ceased to live apart from their husbands, but concubinage was largely practised, and marital and extra-marital relations alike were severed on the slightest pretext. A woman, however, did not recover her full freedom when abandoned by her husband or protector. She was still supposed to owe some measure of fidelity to him, and if she contracted a second alliance, her new partner often found himself exposed to extortionate demands from her former mate. Another evil practice was that powerful families trafficked in the honour of an alliance with them, first dictating a marriage, and then making it a pretext for levying large contributions on the bride's parents. Loss of affection or inclination was deemed a sufficient reason for divorcing a woman, and sometimes mere suspicion of a wife's