The evidence, in short, is unanimously to the effect that the
Australian girl has absolutely no liberty of choice. Yet the
astonishing Westermarck, ignoring, _more suo_, the overwhelming number
of facts against him, endeavors in two places (217, 223) to convey the
impression to his readers that she does largely enjoy the freedom of
choice, placing his sole reliance in two assertions by Howitt and
Mathew.[173] Howitt says that among the Kurnai, women are allowed free
choice, and Mathew "asserts that, with varying details, marriage by
mutual consent will be found among other tribes, also, though it is
not completed except by means of a runaway match." Now Hewitt's
assertion is contradicted by Curr, who, in addition to his own forty
years of experience among the natives had the systematized notes of a
large number of correspondents to base his conclusions on. He says
(I., 108) that "in no instance, unless Mr. Howitt's account of the
Kurnai be correct, which I doubt, has the female any voice in the
selection of a husband." He might have added that Hewitt's remark is
contradicted in his own book, where we are told that among the Kurnai
elopement is the rule. Strange to say, it seems to have occurred
neither to Howitt, nor to Westermarck, nor to Mathew that _elopement
proves the absence of choice_, for if there were liberty of choice the
couple would not be obliged to run away. Nor is this all. The facts
prove that marriage by actual elopement[174] is of rare occurrence;
that "marriage" based on such elopement is nearly always adulterous
(with another man's wife) and of brief duration--a mere intrigue, in
fact; that the guilty couple are severely punished, if not killed
outright; and that everything that is possible is done to prevent or
frustrate elopements based on individual preference or liking. On the
first of these points Curr gives us the most comprehensive and
reliable information (I., 108):
"Within the tribe, lovers occasionally abscond to some
corner of the tribal territory, but they are soon
overtaken, the female cruelly beaten, or wounded with a
spear, the man in most cases remaining unpunished. Very
seldom are men allowed to retain as wives their
partners in these escapades. Though I have been
acquainted with many tribes, and heard matters of the
sort talked over in several of them, I never knew _but
three instances of permanent runaway matches_; two in
which men obtained as wives women already married in
the tribe, and one case in which the woman was a
stranger."
William Jackman, who was held as a captive by the natives for
seventeen months, tells a similar story. Elopements, he says (174),
are usually with wives. The couple escape to a distant tribe and
remain a few months--_rarely more than seven or eight_, so far as he
observed; then the faithless wife is returned to her husband and the
elopers are punished more or less severely. "At times," we read in
Spencer and Gillen (556, 558)
"the eloping couple are at once followed up and then,
if caught, the woman is, if not killed on the spot, at
all events treated in such a way that any further
attempt at elopement on her part is not likely to take
place."
Sometimes the husband seems glad to have got rid of his wife, for when
the elopers return to camp he first has his revenge by cutting the
legs and body of both and then he cries "You keep altogether, I throw
away, I throw away."
It is instructive to note with what ingenuity the natives seek to
prevent matches based on mutual inclination. Taplin says (11) of the
Narrinyeri that "a young woman who goes away with a man and lives with
him as his wife without the consent of her relatives is regarded as
very little better than a prostitute." Among these same Narrinyeri,
says Gason, "it is considered disgraceful for a woman to take a
husband who has given no other woman for her." (Bonwick, 245.) The
deliberate animosity against free choice is emphasized by a statement
in Brough Smyth (79), that if the owner of an eloping female suspects
that she favored the man she eloped with, "he will not hesitate to
maim or kill her." She must have no choice or preference of her own,
under any circumstances. It must be remembered, too, that even an
actual elopement by no means proves that the woman is following a
special inclination. She may be merely anxious to get away from a
cruel or superannuated husband. In such cases the woman may take the
initiative. Dawson (65) once said to a native, "You should not have
carried Mary away from her husband"; to which the man replied, "Bael
(not) dat, massa; Mary come me. Dat husband wurry bad man: he waddy
(beat) Mary. Mary no like it, so it leabe it. Dat fellow no good,
massa."
Obviously, Australian elopement not only gives no indication of
romantic feelings, but even as an incident it is apt to be prosaic or
cruel rather than romantic, as our elopements are. In many cases it is
hard to distinguish from brutal capture, as we may infer from an
incident related by Curr (108-9). He was sleeping at a station on the
Lachlan.
"During the night I was awoke by the scream of a woman,
and a general yell from the men in the camp. Not
knowing what could be the matter, I seized a weapon,
jumped out of bed, and rushed outside. There I found a
young married woman standing by her fire, trembling all
over, with a barbed spear through her thigh. As for the
men, they were rushing about, here and there, in an
excited state, with their spears in their hands. The
woman's story was soon told. She had gone to the river,
not fifty yards off, for water; the Darling black had
stolen after her, and proposed to her to elope with
him, and, on her declining to do so, had speared her
and taken to his heels."
A pathetic instance of the cruel treatment to which the natives
subject girls who venture to have inclinations of their own was
communicated by W.E. Stanbridge to Brough Smyth (80). The scene is a
little dell among undulating grassy plains. In the lower part of the
dell a limpid spring bursts forth.
"On one side of this dell, and nearest to the spring at
the foot of it, lies a young woman, about seventeen
years of age, sobbing and partly supported by her
mother, in the midst of wailing, weeping, women; she
has been twice speared in the right breast with a
jagged hand-spear by her brother, and is supposed to be
dying."