Page:The evolution of marriage and of the family ... (IA evolutionofmarri00letorich).pdf/151

 necessary phases; in short, that in attempting to construct a science of sociology we are not pursuing a chimera.

I resume, therefore, my enumeration. Among the indigenous tribes of India polygamy is widely spread, without, however, being universal; for each one of these small peoples has evolved, as it has been able, more or less rapidly. Some among them are polyandrous, and even monogamous. Often enough polyandry co-exists with polygamy, the one appearing as moral as the other.

With all these aborigines, marriage, or what we are pleased to call so, is generally concluded by purchase, and the price of the woman naturally oscillates according to the law of supply and demand. Most often it is represented by poultry, pigs, oxen, or cows, given to the parents. From this manner of procuring wives it seems that, there also, polygamy is the luxury of the rich or of chiefs. Among the Mishmis these privileged individuals sometimes possess sixty wives. The Mishmi husbands form a rare exception on one point—they are not at all exacting about the fidelity of their wives; they consider them as slaves or servants, and provided they continue to benefit their masters by their work, the latter willingly shut their eyes to their intrigues.

Among these polygamous tribes, which it would take too long to enumerate, may be counted the Miris, the Dophlas, the Juangs, the Khamtis, the Singphos, etc.

We must again note in certain tribes, the Khamtis, for example, the monogamic pre-eminence of the first wife. It is one of those sociological analogies of which I have already spoken, and it is important to point it out.

Polygamy still prevails with the mountaineers of Bootan, concurrently with polyandry. It is often incestuous; a man willingly marries two sisters, the one an adult, the other younger. But no other incest is recognised or punished except that committed between son and mother.

Farther north, among the Ostiaks, a man feels no repugnance to marrying several sisters, and, in general, polygamy is very widely spread among the nomad Mongols. A Yakout, for example, if obliged to make frequent