than was common among other tribes. Huron women might appoint a
member of the council, and one of their own sex if they chose. They
could prevail upon the warriors to go to battle, or desist from it,
according to their wishes. Among the Natchez, authority descended in
an hereditary line both to male and female. It is a general rule with
the American tribes that a man should be succeeded by his sister’s
children, not by his own.
The dwellings of the Indians are huts made of the interwoven boughs of
trees, or tents covered with the skins of animals, without division of
apartments. Whole villages of women and children are often left for
weeks, while the men are absent on hunting expeditions.
The South American tribes were more docile, indolent, and soft-hearted
than those of the north. They married at an earlier period; twelve or
thirteen being the common age for a bride. It is said that the tribes
about the isthmus of Darien considered it no impropriety for women to
make the first declaration of love. When they preferred a young man,
they told him so, and promised to be very faithful, good-tempered, and
obedient, if he would take them to wife.
The women of Greenland and other countries about the arctic regions are
inured to the utmost rigor of a northern climate, and the extremity
of toil. During the long winters, many of these tribes live in snow
huts with ice windows. They consider train-oil one of the greatest of
luxuries, and would eagerly devour a tallow candle in preference to
the most delicious sweetmeats. They dress in garments of reindeer’s
skin, lined with moss, and changed so seldom, that they become filthy
in the extreme. The men hunt bears and catch seals; but when they have
towed their booty to land, they would consider it a disgrace to help
the women drag it home, or skin and dress it. They often stand and
look idly on, while their wives are staggering beneath a load that
almost bends them to the earth. The women are cooks, butchers, masons,
curriers, shoemakers, and tailors. They will manage a boat in the
roughest seas, and will often push off from the shore in the midst of a
storm, that would make the hardiest European sailor tremble.
In most countries, women enter into matrimony more readily than men,
even where their affections are not concerned. The reasons are obvious.
Women are more restrained by the laws and usages of society than men,
and the scope of their ambition is much more limited. Though marriage
subjects them to many cares and privations, it gives them in some
respects a greater degree of freedom and consideration; it likewise
generally insures protection and support, and is almost the only way
in which a woman can rise above her natural condition, with regard to
wealth and rank.
In Greenland, all this is reversed. Young girls have nothing to do but
dance and sing, and fetch water, and look to their baby brothers and
sisters; but when they marry, they become the slaves of an absolute
master, for whom they are obliged to toil and drudge, with frequent
beatings; and if left in widowhood with little children, they are
generally in extreme poverty, with none to hunt or fish for them. For
these reasons, the Greenland women are averse to marriage. When a girl
sees the relations of a young man at her father’s house, and hears them
praise his dexterity in catching seals, she begins to suspect that her
parents are about to sell her; and she often runs away and hides in
the mountains, until the women search for her, and drag her home. On
such occasions, she will remain silent and dejected for several days,
refusing to be comforted. Sometimes they make a solemn vow that they
will never marry, and shave their heads in sign of their determination.
Their hair is long, straight and black. The women wear it in a roll
on the top of the head, adorned with some gay bandage of beads, or
hanging in two long braids each side of the forehead. It is never cut
off, except to avoid marriage, or in token of deep mourning, or as a
punishment. Mothers tattoo the faces of their daughters, by drawing
threads filled with soot under the skin. They are generally short
in stature, with shoulders made very broad by the constant habit of
carrying burdens. Their complexion is tawny, and their eyes small and
sunken. Some of the old women are said to be hideously ugly; their
eyes being inflamed by the glittering of the sun on fields of ice,
and their teeth blackened by the constant use of tobacco. Some of the
inhabitants of these northern regions have their garments made wide
enough in the back to support an infant, which is kept from falling by
means of a girdle round the mother’s waist; in other places, the babe
sits behind her neck, on a broad strap fastened round her forehead.
Some of the children, it is said, are rather comely by nature, but,
from being laid carelessly in the bottom of boats, they look very much
like wild, neglected little animals.
Polygamy is not common, but is by no means discreditable. The first
wife, if she have children, is considered the head of the family. When
she dies, the junior wife takes her place, and is generally very kind
to the motherless little ones. When a man wishes to obtain a wife, he
adorns himself, his children, his house, his boats, and his darts,
in the finest manner he can, in order to render himself an object
of attraction. Widowers seldom marry under a year, unless they have
very small children, with no one to nurse them. When a man wishes
for divorce, he leaves the house, apparently in anger, and does not
return for several days; the wife understands his meaning, packs up her
clothes, and removes to her friends.
In these northern regions the dances are pantomimes, consisting of
violent writhings, stampings, and contortions. They are particularly
fond of imitating the animals they are accustomed to pursue. The bear
has been called their dancing-master, for they imitate, with wonderful
accuracy, his motions and attitudes, in all possible situations. Their
skilful female dancers are so rapid and violent in their movements,
that they appear to a civilized eye more like furies or maniacs than
any thing else.
The Greenlanders and Esquimaux are generally good-humored and friendly,
and, like all savages, extremely hospitable. Men, women, and children,
who are obliged to live huddled together in small apartments, cannot
be expected to have any considerable degree of refinement, or even
decency, in their habits; but their perilous mode of life tends to
develope a kind of instinctive intelligence. Captain Lyon mentions
one female, in particular, named Iligliuk, whom her countrymen called
“the wise woman.” She was frequently on board his ship, and gave some
valuable geographical knowledge of the country, in the form of a rude
map; but she soon became very proud and disdainful, in consequence of
the attentions that were paid her.
The tribes of these frozen regions have generally great faith in magic,
and place much reliance on information obtained from male and female
sorcerers, who go about dressed in a fantastic manner, and assuming a
frenzied deportment, as if under the influence of evil inspiration.
Intoxication is a common vice with both sexes; and both have an
excessive love of chewing and smoking tobacco.
In the Russian settlements, there is a tribe which have a strange
manner of courtship. When a young man has chosen a girl, he goes to
her relations, and offers “to drudge for them,” till he can secure the
object of his affections. The young woman is immediately wrapped up
in a multiplicity of garments, that scarcely leave her face visible;
and the lover has no hope of obtaining his prize, until in some lucky
moment he catches her off her guard, and is able to touch her uncovered
hand, arm, neck, or face. It is necessary that she should confess the
fact, and affirm that she was taken by surprise. It is difficult to
perform this task; for her female relations keep near her night and
day, and if the young man attempts to tear off the teasing envelopes,
he gets a sound beating, and is liable to be dismissed in disgrace.
Sometimes two or three years expire before he attains his object; and
in the mean time, he is bound to perform, with the utmost industry and
submission, any labors her relations choose to impose upon him. Soon
after the long-desired triumph is obtained, the damsel consents to be
his wife, and her friends, without any further ceremony, commemorate
the event by a feast.
The European settlers of South America are principally Spanish and
Portuguese. They retain the language, manners, and customs of their
ancestors; but if the report of numerous travellers be correct, the
state of morals is worse than in the old countries. We find the same
ceremonious observance of etiquette--the same exaggerated phrases to
express courtesy, friendship, or love--the same chivalrous bearing
toward ladies--the same pageantry in religious festivals--and the same
universal practice of taking the _siesta_, or afternoon’s sleep, which
prevail in Spain and Portugal.
An enervating climate, an accommodating religion, and the degrading
system of slavery, have all combined to produce an unfavorable
influence on the moral and intellectual character of the people.
Slavery is indeed nearly abolished, except in Brazil; but a long time
will probably elapse before its baneful effects cease to be visible on
the manners and habits of those, who have been accustomed to breathe
its polluting atmosphere. The South American women are generally
ignorant and indolent, and more governed by passion than by principle.
Public opinion is by no means rigid concerning the conduct of married
women; but individual revenge is not unfrequently taken, in the form of
duels and assassinations. Captain Cochrane, speaking of Colombia, says:
“The majority of the women are by no means handsome. They certainly
have fine eyes and dark hair; but neither features, complexion, nor
figure are good, compared with those of Europeans. Some few have, when
young, a little bloom on their cheeks; but in general a sallow or
Moorish cast of face meets the eye. The men are far handsomer than the
women, and their dark complexions are more agreeable to the eye. They
are also better educated, being generally able to _read and write_.”
M. Depons describes the women of Caracas as “generally below the middle
size; mild, tender, and seductive; with jet-black hair, alabaster
skins, eyes large and finely shaped, and carnation lips. Their
attire is rather elegant. They feel a kind of vanity on being taken
for French; but whatever resemblance there may be in the dress, there
is too little gracefulness to permit the illusion to subsist. Their
principal morning occupation is going to mass, and a great portion
of the rest of the day is spent lounging on sofas, or gazing at the
windows. Their education is limited to learning a number of prayers,
reading badly, spelling worse, and playing by rote a few tunes on the
guitar and piano-forte. But in spite of their defective education, the
women of Caracas know how to unite social manners with decent behavior,
and the art of coquetry with the modesty of their sex.”
The festivals of the Roman Catholic religion are sufficiently numerous
to employ a large portion of the time of its votaries; and they are
observed with as much pomp in the New World, as in the Catholic
countries of Europe. Corpus Christi day is celebrated with unusual
magnificence. It is announced the preceding evening by artificial
fireworks. The windows of the houses are adorned with gay festoons
of silk and ribbons; jewellers sometimes display their whole stock
of sparkling gems, exposed in glass cases on the outer walls of the
building; at the corners of the streets, through which the procession
is to pass, are altars richly ornamented with jewels and flowers;
and puppet-shows, with curious animals of various sorts in cages,
are ranged on all sides. As soon as the sound of the bell is heard
announcing the approach of the procession, all leave their games,
and kneel in the street. “At the head of the procession, are chariots
dragged along by men; in one is king David, with the head of Goliath
in his hand; in another, Esther; in a third, Mordecai; Joseph next
makes his appearance upon a horse richly caparisoned, and followed by a
great number of guards; these, however, are only mounted on pasteboard
chargers. All these personages are the children of the principal
inhabitants of the city. To obtain the honor of acting a part in this
imposing spectacle, is a great desideratum; and those who are honored,
by having their children nominated, neglect no kind of expense:
rivalling each other in splendor, they lay pearls, diamonds, emeralds,
and rubies under contribution, and put their imagination to the rack,
in order to render the dresses of the actors more magnificent. The most
beautiful girls in the city walk between two rows of priests, some
carrying the ark, and the show-bread, others incense or baskets of
flowers. To these succeed young Indians, who, to the sound of a flute
and tabor, perform wild fantastic dances. The procession is closed by a
detachment of troops, with arms and colors reversed.” These religious
solemnities generally conclude with fireworks, concerts, balls, and
masquerades.
Doctor Walsh thus describes the great convent of Ajuda, in Rio de
Janeiro: “At the end of the chapel is a large quadrangle, entered by a
massive gateway, surrounded by three stories of grated windows. Here
female negro pedlers come with their goods, and expose them in the
court-yard below. The nuns, from their grated windows above, see what
they like, and, letting down a cord, the article is fastened to it; it
is then drawn up and examined, and, if approved of, the price is let
down. Some that I saw in the act of buying and selling in this way,
were very merry, joking and laughing with the blacks below, and did
not seem at all indisposed to do the same with my companion. In three
of the lower windows, on a level with the court-yard, are revolving
cupboards, like half-barrels, and at the back of each is a plate of
tin, perforated like the top of a nutmeg-grater. The nuns of this
convent are celebrated for making sweet confectionary, which people
purchase. There is a bell which the purchaser applies to, and a nun
peeps through the perforated tin; she then lays the dish on a shelf of
the revolving cupboard, and turns it inside out; the dish is taken, the
price laid in its place, and it is turned in. While we stood there, the
invisible lady-warder asked for a pinch of snuff; the box was laid down
in the same way, and turned in and out.”
The disposition to take the veil, even among young girls, is not
uncommon in Brazil. The opposition of friends can prevent it, until
they are twenty-five years old; but after that time they are considered
competent to decide for themselves. The same writer describes the
initiation of a young lady, whose wealthy parents were extremely
reluctant to have her take the vow. She held a lighted torch in her
hand, in imitation of the prudent virgins; and when the priest
chanted, “Your spouse approaches; come forth and meet him,” she
approached the altar, singing, “I follow with my whole heart;” and,
accompanied by two nuns already professed, she knelt before the bishop.
“She seemed very lovely, with an unusually sweet, gentle, and pensive
countenance. She did not look particularly or deeply affected; but when
she sung her responses, there was something exceedingly mournful in the
soft, tremulous, and timid tones of her voice. The bishop now exhorted
her to make a public profession of her vows before the congregation,
and said, ‘Will you persevere in your purpose of holy chastity?’
She blushed deeply, and, with a downcast look, lowly, but firmly
answered, ‘I will.’ He again said, more distinctly, ‘Do you promise to
preserve it?’ and she replied more emphatically, ‘I do promise.’ The
bishop said, ‘Thanks be to God;’ and she bent forward and reverently
kissed his hand, while he asked her, ‘Will you now be blessed and
consecrated?’ She replied, ‘Oh! I wish it.’
“The habiliments, in which she was hereafter to be clothed, were
sanctified by the aspersion of holy water: then followed several
prayers to God, that ‘As he had blessed the garments of Aaron, with
ointment which flowed from his head to his beard, so he would now bless
the garment of his servant, with the copious dew of his benediction.’
When the garment was thus blessed, the girl retired with it; and having
laid aside the dress in which she had appeared, she returned, arrayed
in her new attire, except her veil. A gold ring was next provided, and
consecrated with a prayer, that she who wore it ‘might be fortified
with celestial virtue, to preserve a pure faith, and incorrupt fidelity
to her spouse, Jesus Christ.’ He last took the veil, and her female
attendants having uncovered her head, he threw it over her, so that it
fell on her shoulders and bosom, and said, ‘Receive this sacred veil,
under the shadow of which you may learn to despise the world, and
submit yourself truly, and with all humility of heart, to your Spouse;’
to which she sung a response, in a very sweet, soft, and touching
voice: ‘He has placed this veil before my face, that I should see no
lover but himself.’
“The bishop now kindly took her hand, and held it while the following
hymn was chanted by the choir with great harmony: ‘Beloved Spouse,
come--the winter is passed--the turtle sings, and the blooming vines
are redolent of summer.’
“A crown, a necklace, and other female ornaments, were now taken by the
bishop and separately blessed; and the girl bending forward, he placed
them on her head and neck, praying that she might be thought worthy ‘to
be enrolled into the society of the hundred and forty-four thousand
virgins, who preserved their chastity, and did not mix with the society
of impure women.’
“Last of all, he placed the ring on the middle finger of her right
hand, and solemnly said, ‘So I marry you to Jesus Christ, who will
henceforth be your protector. Receive this ring, the pledge of your
faith, that you may be called the spouse of God.’ She fell on her
knees, and sung, ‘I am married to him whom angels serve, whose beauty
the sun and moon admire;’ then rising, and showing with exultation
her right hand, she said, emphatically, as if to impress it on the
attention of the congregation, ‘My Lord has wedded me with this
ring, and decorated me with a crown as his spouse. I here renounce
and despise all earthly ornaments for his sake, whom alone I see,
whom alone I love, in whom alone I trust, and to whom alone I give
all my affections. My heart hath uttered a good word: I speak of the
deed I have done for my King.’ The bishop then pronounced a general
benediction, and retired up to the altar; while the nun professed
was borne off between her friends, with lighted tapers, and garlands
waving.”
Doctor Walsh observes, that the spectators did not seem to be at
all impressed with the solemnity of this ceremony, but laughed and
joked about it with a degree of levity not entirely consistent with
delicacy. It is a notorious fact that the South Americans have little
hearty faith in the religion they profess. The French philosophy
taught in their schools has destroyed this, without introducing any
thing better. Women are very regular in their attendance at mass; but
men give themselves little trouble about it, unless some love-affair
attracts them to the church. Girls often marry as young as twelve
or fourteen. Ambitious parents there, as elsewhere, are desirous to
have their children form matches of interest; but the natural ardor
and sensibility of the people is opposed to this. With all the fervid
romance of olden time, they fall in love at the first glance; and
while the paroxysm endures, “the world is divided into two parts--that
where the beloved object is, and that where she is not.” It is no
uncommon occurrence for the daughters of wealthy families to leave
the luxuries of their father’s house, for the sake of some young man,
whose industry will afford them merely a comfortable subsistence.
The enthusiastic character of the people sympathizes so readily with
such disinterestedness, that a law was recently passed in Brazil to
prevent rich fathers from disinheriting their children under such
circumstances, unless some important charge could be substantiated
against the moral character of those they married. It is much to be
regretted that the matrimonial vow is often as lightly broken, as it
was fervently uttered.
In large cities, French dress and manners prevail to a considerable
extent; but in the provinces women frequently follow the Spanish custom
of wearing the mantilla, and covering the face, so as to leave only one
sparkling eye visible. They likewise ride on horses, or mules, after
the fashion of men. The laboring class are principally blacks, or some
of the various shades between black and white; and here as in other
countries, the free negro is almost as much paralyzed and degraded as
the slave himself, by the effects of that lazy and pernicious system.
The prejudice with regard to color is much less strong than in North
America. The descendants of Africans have a wider field opened for the
exercise of such abilities as God may have given them; and both sexes
sometimes form highly respectable marriages with the European race.
Because the prevailing character of South American women is ignorant
and voluptuous, it must not be supposed that there are not numerous
exceptions. Even the cities, which are always worse than villages,
contain many virtuous, modest, and honorable families; and during
the frequent struggles for independence, ladies in various parts of
South America have often manifested a sublime degree of firmness and
patriotism.
* * * * *