Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review Volumes 32 and 33.djvu/219

Rh the general rule that a son-in-law is bound to marry his father-in-law's widow for the sake of enjoying her property; indeed, it extends the rule by showing that the obligation exists even when the widow is not the mother, but only the stepmother of the man's own wife.

But the case in question is exceptional in another respect in so far as it seems to imply that, when the widow has an unmarried daughter, the man who marries the widow is bound to marry her daughter also. This obligation, so far as I remember, is not mentioned by any other of our authorities on Garo law. It is with reference to this obligation, implied, but not definitely stated, in a single instance, that Mr. Hodson can affirm, quite correctly, that "in the case cited marriage with the daughter was a consequence, not a cause, of the marriage with the widow." But in saying so he has overlooked the general custom (clearly implied in the sentences which he has omitted from his quotation) that marriage with a man's widow is a consequence of a previous marriage with his daughter. Hence, if my interpretation of the particular case under discussion is correct, we may say that in this case both the marriage with the widow and the marriage with her daughter were, or rather would have been, if the man had consented to them, direct consequences of his previous marriage with a daughter of the deceased first wife. But, as Mr. Hodson observes, the story is not quite clear; hence any interpretation of it is necessarily somewhat precarious.

(4) Major A. Playfair, our highest authority on Garo law and custom, writes as follows:

"I have mentioned that there is an exception to the rule that a girl may choose her husband. This exception occurs when one daughter of a family is given in marriage to the son of her father's sister. Should she not have such a cousin, she must marry a man of her father's 'motherhood,' who is chosen for a substitute. The daughter's husband then becomes his father-in-law's