"if there are plenty of girls they are married as early
as possible (at the age of eight to ten), as far as
possible to one and the same man, for as it is the duty
of the women to provide food, a man who has several
wives can enjoy his leisure the more thoroughly."
And Lindsay Cranford testifies (_Jour. Anthrop. Inst_., XXIV., 181)
regarding the Victoria River natives that,
"after about thirty years of age a man is allowed to have as
many women as he likes, and the older he gets the younger
the girls are that he gets, probably to work and get food
for him, for in their wild state the man is too proud to do
anything except carry a woomera and spear."
Under these circumstances it is needless to say that there is not a
trace of romance connected with an Australian marriage. After a man
has secured his girl, she quietly submits and goes with him as his
wife and drudge, to build his camp, gather firewood, fetch water, make
nets, clear away grass, dig roots, fish for mussels, be his baggage
mule on journeys, etc. (Brough Smyth, 84); and Eyre (II., 319) thus
completes the picture. There is, he says, no marriage ceremony:
"In those cases where I have witnessed the giving away
of a wife, the woman was simply ordered by the nearest
male relative in whose disposal she was, to take up her
'rocko,' the bag in which a female carries the effects
of her husband, and go to the man's camp to whom she
had been given."