the seducer’s or to the ravisher’s village; the latter shot somebody in the nearest settlement, and so on till the affair was decided.  In these days “violent retaliation for personal jealousy always ‘be-littles’ a man in the eyes of an African community.”  Perhaps also he unconsciously recognizes the sentiment ascribed to Mohammed, “Laysa bi-zanyatin ilia bi zani,” “there is no adulteress without an adulterer,” meaning that the husband has set the example.

Polygamy is, of course, the order of the day; it is a necessity to the men, and even the women disdain to marry a “one-wifer.”  As amongst all pluralists, from Moslem to Mormon, the senior or first married is No. 1; here called “best wife:”  she is the goodman’s viceroy, and she rules the home-kingdom with absolute sway.  Yet the Mpongwe do not, like other tribes on the west coast, practise that separation of the sexes during gestation and lactation, which is enjoined to the Hebrews, recommended by Catholicism, and commanded by Mormonism—­a system which partly justifies polygamy.  In Portuguese Guinea the enceinte is claimed by her relatives, especially by the women, for three years, that she may give undivided attention to her offspring, who is rightly believed to be benefited by the separation, and that she may return to her husband with renewed vigour.  Meanwhile custom allows the man to co-habit with a slave girl.

Polygamy, also, in Africa is rather a political than a domestic or social institution.  A “judicious culture of the marriage tie” is necessary amongst savages and barbarians whose only friends and supporters are blood relations and nuptial connections; besides which, a multitude of wives ministers to the great man’s pride and influence, as well as to his pleasures and to his efficiency.  When the head wife ages, she takes charge of the girlish brides committed to her guardianship by the husband.  I should try vainly to persuade the English woman that there can be peace in households so constituted:  still, such is the case.  Messrs. Wilson and Du Chaillu both assert that the wives rarely disagree amongst themselves.  The sentimental part of love is modified; the common husband becomes the patriarch, not the paterfamilias; the wife is not the mistress, but the mere de famille.  The alliance rises or sinks to one of interest and affection instead of being amorous or uxorious, whilst the underlying idea, “the more the merrier,” especially in lands where free service is unknown, seems to stifle envy and jealousy.  Everywhere, moreover, amongst polygamists, the husband is strictly forbidden by popular opinion to show preference for a favourite wife; if he do so, he is a bad man.