MARRIAGE AND CHILD BEARING
Young girls betrothed—The bespoke money—Marriage money—Dressing the new
wife—A large looking-glass—A woman can choose her husband—Divorce—No
great desire for children—Storage for baby spirits—Treatment of
twins—Snake omen—Woman’s totem—The mother-in-law—Polygamy and its
results—Monogamy and its results—Better morality—More children—Purer
women—Better home-life.
Young girls and even babies are betrothed in marriage, and payments made
for them long before they are old enough either to understand the
contract or give their consent. On the marriage money being completed
the man takes a brass bracelet, and in the presence of witnesses he puts
it on the child’s arm, saying, “This is my wife.” When the girl arrives
at a suitable age, and sometimes even before puberty, she is taken by
her parents, together with some sugar-cane wine, to her husband, and
handed over to him; and on the man giving the parents a present the
transaction is completed. Should, however, the child die, another is put
in her place; but if that is impossible, the money is returned.
Sometimes a girl objects to being handed over in this way to a man whom
she dislikes, and if her protests are disregarded she will run away to a
neighbouring town and select her own husband, if she has not already
done so, and the parents will have to make the best bargain they can in
the way of marriage money with their new son-in-law. They would be at an
obvious disadvantage, as their customer would already be in possession
of the “goods.”
If a man in search of a wife sees an unattached young woman whom he
likes he may speak to the girl or to her father first, and if they—the
girl and her parents—are agreeable, he will call his friends as
witnesses and go to the father’s house. The girl will then be called
out, and the man will take his spear, and going into the centre of the
crowd he will stick the spear in the ground, and say: “If the girl loves
me, let her pull up the spear.” Thereupon the girl will step forward,
and pulling up the spear she will carry it to her father, saying,
“_Namojinga_” = I love him.
When the girl has pulled up the spear, the man has to pay the “bespoke”
money—a hoe, an axe, a blanket, a looking-glass, a matchet, and a few
other odds and ends—to the head of the girl’s family. The girl is then
reserved for him until such time as he can pay the whole, or the larger
part of the marriage money—equal to about £10, which is approximately
the cost of two male and two female slaves. In the meantime he can give
the girl small presents, and she may cook and send him an occasional
dish of food, and often there is cohabitation before marriage, for the
young man regards the girl, and speaks of her, as his wife.
A free man marrying a free woman will have to give her father or family
two male and two female slaves, and neither brass rods nor barter goods
will be taken in lieu of them; but as there are so many debts among them
a person will sometimes (and it is not uncommon) pay this “marriage
money” and marry without a single slave actually passing between them;
i.e. B wants to marry A’s daughter, so he will go to C and D, who each
owe him a slave, and will take them to A, who accepts them as his
debtors; then B will go to E and F, who each owe him a female slave, and
these debtors of B will be taken to A, who accepts them as his own
debtors; now C, D, E, and F have no slaves they want to part with, so
they, in their turn, will look up some debtors and take them to A, who
will again accept these new parties as his own debtors. This was called
_bwaka nyungu_ = to pass on or throw over a debt (or credit as the case
may be) from one to another. I have known more than one case in which
the father of the girl has had the debt worked gradually back to
himself, and in giving his daughter in marriage he has received nothing,
but has paid some of his creditors.
When the time arrives for the marriage the parents take some plantain,
cassava, fish, with various other kinds of food, and a calabash or jar
of sugar-cane wine, and together with their daughter they go to the
house of the bridegroom and hand over the girl by putting her hand in
the man’s hand in the presence of witnesses. These latter, after
drinking the wine and sharing in the feast, will dance in honour of the
occasion, and the ceremony is completed. The food and wine, given by the
parents, are a proof that the girl is not sold as a slave, but is given
in marriage as a free woman.
During the time the man is collecting the marriage money he will build a
house, if he does not already possess one, and the girl, under the
supervision of her mother, will prepare a farm. After the ceremony
described above is over, the girl borrows all the finery she can of her
female friends, decorates herself with palm-oil and camwood powder, and
for two or three weeks walks about the town with her husband—a sign to
all that she is now his wife. If the man has already a few wives, they
will help to “dress her” by the loan of their own trinkets, and will
lead her about the town as a proof that she is now a fellow-wife and
belongs to their husband.
Hanging on the wall in my dining-room was a looking-glass 15 inches wide
by 18 inches high; it was probably the largest looking-glass in that
part of Africa, and it was one of the “sights” of the district.
Frequently while sitting in my study I would hear the shuffling of many
feet and much giggling. On going into the dining-room I would see
perhaps eight or ten women all laughing and nudging one another, and
there in the centre right before the glass would be a well-decorated
woman wriggling about in her vain attempt to see both sides of herself
at once. It was a new wife whom the older wives had brought to view
herself in the white man’s looking-glass. In the “trade looking-glass”
she could only see small sections of herself, but in this large one she
had an expansive view of the whole “landscape,” and her remarks of
wonder and surprise were causing the onlookers to giggle and to excite
her to greater efforts to procure broader views of herself. They
exhibited no jealousy, but regarded her as an acquisition—the new wife
being one more to help keep the husband.
During this period the man buys all the food, but when the “honeymoon”
is over the girl takes up her farm-work and settles down to ordinary
life. From that time she brings home each afternoon some of her farm
produce to prepare for her own and her husband’s evening meal. The
husband, however, must find her the fish for such meals as he partakes
with her, and should he have a quantity of meat he must be willing to
share it with his wives.
For the poor slave woman there are no preliminary gifts, no “bespoke”
money, no wedding feast and dance, and no “honeymoon.” The sum agreed
upon is paid, and the slave woman is taken to her new owner’s house, or
given as a farm help to his favourite wife. The children of such a
marriage are called _mbotela_ = semi-slave, indicating that one of the
parents is a slave. If a man cannot afford to pay the marriage money for
a free wife, or even to buy a slave, he can hire a slave as his wife,
and any children born to them belong to the owner of the slave woman and
not to the father and mother. Or a man will sometimes borrow a wife of
another man for three or six months, and will pay a fixed sum according
to the length of time he has her; but any children born of such an
arrangement belong to the real husband of the woman.
A man can marry as many women as he can find the marriage money for, but
to each he must give a house, and all his free wives have equal rights.
His slave wives are simply slaves, and he can sell or kill them just as
he pleases. Polygamy is very general, and monogamy is the result of
poverty. Free men, as a rule, do not marry slaves; but the slave woman
is given in marriage to the slave man, and she thus helps to make him
contented with his lot in the town and tribe; she keeps him in food and
increases the wealth of her master by bearing children, who are slaves
and the property of her owner.
When a free woman does not want to marry the man who is trying to
arrange for her, she will tell him frankly that if he persists in
marrying her, she will run away from him. But if, in spite of this
threat, he completes the arrangements, then a few days after the
marriage she will escape to a neighbouring town and put herself under
the protection of the chief by tearing his cloth. The chief then gives
the husband notice of what has happened, and before he can claim his
wife he has to pay the chief 600 brass rods = 39s. as compensation for
his torn cloth. If the husband does not then permit her to marry the man
she wants, she runs away again and again, and every time she runs it
will cost her husband 600 brass rods. A sensible man will take warning
by the first threat, and will not complete the marriage.
If a free woman is badly treated by her husband, she will resort to the
above method of making him pay for his ill-treatment of her, and will
thus force him to use her more kindly. There is also a more drastic way
of punishing a husband for outrageous conduct towards his wife. After
repeated complaints of his ill-usage she will run to the witch-doctor
and smash his _eboko_, or saucepan of “medicine,” and in so doing she
will commit a great offence. The witch-doctor will hold her until the
husband redeems her by the gift of a slave, and the payment of a large
sum to replace the _eboko_ and make fresh “medicine.” Having paid the
money—for she is worth more than the total value of the slave and the
brass rods—he will treat his wife better in future, or she will again
break the _eboko_. A slave woman who runs away to a chief will be
brought back, and her master will beat, kill her, or sell her right out
of the district, so it is wiser for her to run right beyond his reach in
the first instance. I have known women who successfully carried out
these various modes of punishing their abusive, bad-tempered husbands;
and undoubtedly the fact that the women can and will make their husbands
pay in this way renders life more tolerable for them. Without some such
system the wife’s lot would be terrible and impossible.
Breaking the _eboko_, or “medicine” saucepan, answers another purpose: a
man’s wife has been stolen from him, and all other means having failed
to regain her, he goes to the witch-doctor, tears his cloth and breaks
the _eboko_. This action calls attention to the case and arouses
widespread interest. The witch-doctor must now take up the case, or he
will lose his dignity as a witch-doctor, and folk will lose their
respect and fear for his _eboko_. So he places himself at the head of a
movement to punish the wife-stealer, and the men who would not help the
husband volunteer to fight under the witch-doctor; and when the woman is
captured the husband has to pay heavy damages for tearing the cloth,
breaking the _eboko_, and for the help of the witch-doctor in the fight.
The husband will then try to recover all the damages from the stealer of
his wife. It is interesting to note that, both to the husband and to the
wife, there is such a force available in their utter need. Here and
there a man treats his wife with kindness and consideration, and he
sometimes displays an affection for her that is pleasing to the onlooker
and an encouragement to those who are working for the uplifting of the
race, for it shows of what the men are capable; but to the majority of
the men the wife is a passing fancy, a brief passion which is quickly
extinguished, and all that remains to warm their hearts, and keep them
faithful to each other, are the cold, charred embers of a bare
toleration for one another.
Above the age of five years it is impossible to find a girl who is a
virgin, and it has been difficult to find a word for virgin in the Congo
languages. The only thing a man can do is to see that his wife does not
commit adultery after he has married her, without his consent and
receiving due compensation for it. Should she do so, then the adulterer
is punished, but the woman goes free. If she were punished she would not
confess, and without her confession the husband is not able to enforce
the fine on the lover. A woman’s word is always taken against the man’s
most solemn oath. I have a very strong suspicion that this power is
often abused, (_a_) by the woman to pay off a grudge against someone who
has slighted her, and also to be regarded by the other women of the town
as one after whom the men run; (_b_) by the husband as a means of
replenishing an empty purse—the fine being shared by the husband and
wife. There are undoubtedly women who remain faithful to their husbands;
and there are men who treat their wives with kindness and consideration,
but from what I observed they are very few indeed. Sometimes in anger
two men will exchange their wives, especially if one man’s wife is
continually running after the other man.
If a woman does not know, or will not perform, her duties properly as a
wife, i.e. will not farm, cook, etc., the man can take her back to her
family and receive in return the marriage money he gave for her to her
family; but not the “bespoke” money. Should she die within a few years
of her marriage the husband can claim another woman, or the return of
the marriage money, for his view is that a faulty article has been
supplied to him.
When a free woman wants to leave her husband, or have a divorce from
him, she sends a “token” to the man of her choice, who, if desirous of
possessing her, goes to the husband and tries to arrange the matter. If
the husband acts unreasonably in his demands—wants too much marriage
money, or desires the whole sum down at once—then she resorts to the
expedient of escaping to a neighbouring chief (as mentioned above), and
the husband is quickly brought to his senses. Should the “token” sent be
returned, she knows that the man does not want her, and if her family
are unwilling, or unable through poverty, to return the marriage money,
or think she is unreasonable in seeking a divorce, she has to remain
with her husband. To run away, without just cause, to another town, is
to make her name a byword among her acquaintances, and the native is
very sensitive to public opinion, as we tried to show in the chapter on
Social Life.
We have not found the same desire for children, on the part of the
women, as we observed on the Lower Congo. This may be accounted for by
the fact that on the Lower Congo the law of mother-right is in full
force, and consequently all the children belong to the mother and her
family; while on the Upper Congo father-right is the general custom, and
the children belonging to the father, the mother has no particular
interest in them.
The beliefs of a tribe considerably affect their point of view, and this
is seen in nothing more emphatically than in their beliefs about
child-bearing. On the Lower Congo a non-child-bearing woman is the butt
of the town’s ridicule, she is sneered at, pointed at by all the other
women, and is the object of their scorn. She feels degraded in the eyes
of all, and however much she may blame her husband, or may try to prove
that she is bewitched, yet her shame is bitterly felt and resented. She
has failed ignominiously in her one paramount duty to her family. Her
sterility is the constant theme of her husband’s bickerings; and when
everything else fails to quicken her or stop her nagging tongue, he has
only to hint at this abnormal disability and she is choked with chagrin
and almost ready to commit suicide.
Now on the Upper Congo among the Boloki it appears that every family
has what is called a _liboma_, it may be a pool in the bush, or in the
forest, or on an island; it may be a creek, or it may be a Bombax
cotton tree; but wherever the _liboma_ may be it is regarded as the
preserve of the unborn children of the family. The disembodied spirits
(_mingoli_) of the deceased members of the family performed the duty
of supplying these preserves with spirit-children to keep their
families strong and numerous. They have very misty ideas as to how
these _liboma_ are supplied with the spirit-children (or
_bingbongbo_), but I have a suspicion that underlying the _liboma_ is
some idea of reincarnation—some thought there was a rebirth of certain
deceased members of the family, and others thought that the
disembodied spirits had spirit-children, and these were sent to the
_liboma_ to be endowed in due time with bodies.
Now if a man does not have a child by his wife, then she is simply
barren (they always think it is the fault of the woman), but there are
no sneers, and no shame. The woman takes her sister to her husband, that
he may have a child by her. But if a man has one child by a wife, and no
more, he thinks someone has bewitched his _liboma_ by taking the
family’s stock of children from it and hiding them; or, it may be that
the other members of the family have bewitched her so that she may not
be able to procure another child from the _liboma_, that there might be
more for themselves; if, however, none of the family have more than one
child by their wives, then some other family, through hatred or
jealousy, has taken by witchcraft the children from their _liboma_ and
concealed them, for only the family to which the _liboma_ belongs can
give birth to the unborn infant spirits there.
Twins are not frequent, but when they do arrive they demand proper
treatment and entail more than ordinary care in the observance of
certain duties. Three days after the birth of twins (_masa_) the mother
takes them in her arms and dances in front of her house before her
neighbours, who join in a chorus in which they sing over and over again:
“_Masa e maolela_” = the twins cry for you. The mother is decorated with
leaves, sprays, and twigs, the same as for an ordinary birth. These are
made into garlands for her head, stuck into her waist-belt, and fixed on
her wherever it is possible. At this ceremony the names are given, which
are the same for every pair of twins, and these names are retained
through life. Other folk may change their names according to fancy, but
twins never. The first-born is always known as _Nkumu_, and the second
as _Mpeya_, and whenever you hear either of these names you know at once
that the bearer is one of twins.
The first-born of twins is always carried on the right arm, and the
second on the left arm. Whenever the mother replies to a salutation she
must give two answers, one for each child; and should she greet anyone
she must duplicate her greeting, that each child may be recognized. She
carries the dual idea further than that, for she must eat, not with one
hand, but with both, that each child may be properly nourished. Presents
are given in duplicate, or the child not receiving a present will fret,
become ill, and die; and the sickness or death of either child is
supposed to arise from carelessness in the observance of these rules.
The twins are expected to cry together, rejoice together, and should
they lack unanimity in either of these functions of rejoicing or
sorrowing together, it is because one is sulky on account of one or
other of the above rules having been broken. When one of the twins dies
the mother borrows a baby of the same age, and puts it with the living
twin that it may not fret.
When a man finds a snake (called _Mwaladi_, a snake with red marks on
it) lying by his side when he awakes, he regards it as a sign that he
will have a child by his wife; and if a woman lying or sitting observes
the same snake approaching her, she remains quietly in her position, and
if it passes near her she sprinkles a little camwood powder over it, and
regards it as an omen that she will soon become a mother. The child born
after such an augury is not treated with any special respect or
interest, and no special name is given to it as on the Lower Congo.
I found that when a woman married she brought her totem with her, and
then not only observed her own totem but her husband’s also; and the
child born to them took the totems of both parents until there was a
council of both families—the paternal and maternal branches—and then it
was generally arranged that the child should observe the father’s totem.
One day I was interested in watching the following ceremony: The women
of the village had rubbed themselves well with camwood powder, they had
also decorated their bodies with leaves, and tied on sashes of a creeper
with small leaves (_nkokolemba_), and danced for a considerable time to
the sound of drums, then the lobe of the right ear of the child was
pierced. It was a boy, for if it had been a girl the left lobe would
have been pierced (the left is always a token of inferiority). This
ceremony took place during the morning, and was a sign to the _boweya_
spirit that that child belonged to a family in whose totem the spirit
was specially interested. The pierced ear indicated to the spirit that
the owner had a claim on its help and protection. These rites were only
observed when the family possessed a totem that had a _boweya_ spirit to
preside over its interests and health, and always took place on the
fifth day after the birth of the child.
The father during the pregnancy of his wife is prohibited certain foods,
and he is neither to hunt nor fish during the pregnancy and confinement
of his wife, unless she goes to a medicine man and is marked with
different coloured pigments on the breast, abdomen, shoulders, temple,
and forehead, and wears two or three charms; these ensure for her a good
delivery and a healthy child, and also allow her husband to go hunting
and fishing. The food prohibitions vary considerably, and while the man
is observing these taboos he is said to be in a state of _liboi_, a noun
derived from the verb _bwa_ = to be confined, to deliver of a child. It
is very probably a remnant of _la couvade_. They have, however, no
tradition of the man ever having taken the place of the woman by lying
in bed during confinement.
There is no adoption into a family, but there is milk-brotherhood, and
the milk-brother often receives a portion of the estate; and there is
also milk-sisterhood, and when a woman is a milk-sister it is
permissible, but is regarded as very irregular, for her milk-brother to
marry her.
There are two names given to illegitimate children—_mwana wa ngangi_ =
child of a mistress, i.e. a woman who has been hired from her husband or
family for a fixed period at a certain price; and _mpampoka_ = a child
whose father is not known. In the former case the child will eventually
be owned by the proper husband or guardian of the woman, unless the
lover made other arrangements, that is, paid a larger fee, at the time
of hiring his mistress; in the latter case the child will belong to the
woman, and hence to her family, and in both cases the child will remain
with its mother until it is ten or twelve years of age.
Abortion is produced by the drinking of a decoction made by boiling
_kungubololo_ leaves, which is said to be very bitter, like quinine.
Abortion is practised to avoid the trouble incurred by having children,
or from hatred towards the husband, whom the woman may desire to
divorce; for if she has any children by him, her relationship to her
husband is so complicated thereby that she cannot easily leave him for
another man.
When a man divorces a wife who has a child of tender years, the child is
allowed to remain with her until he or she is about ten or twelve years
of age, and then is given up to the father, but is permitted to visit
the mother should she be living in a neighbouring town or district. The
father has the right to kill his own child, and although the act may be
strongly condemned by his neighbours and his family, yet they have no
power to punish him, though it may be a clear case of murder. I may say
that I never heard of a father killing his child while I lived amongst
them; but the natives assured me that there had been such cases. A
father, however, would not hesitate to pawn his children, or even to
sell them into slavery, if he were in dire straits. As a rule they are
fairly kind to their children, even to over-indulgence, for it is rarely
that they punish them.
Perhaps this will be the best place in which to make a few remarks on
the mother-in-law. She and her son-in-law may never look on each other’s
face. I have often heard a man say, “So-and-so, your mother-in-law is
coming,” and the person addressed would run into my house and hide
himself until his wife’s mother had gone by. They can sit at a little
distance from each other, with their backs to one another, and talk over
affairs when necessary. _Bokilo_ means mother-in-law, daughter-in-law,
brother-in-law, father-in-law, sister of mother-in-law, brother of
father-in-law, wife of wife’s brother, and in fact any relation-in-law.
_Bokilo_, the noun, is derived from _kila_ = to forbid, prohibit, taboo,
and indicates that all bearing the relationship of _bokilo_ can have no
intimate relationship with one another, for it is regarded as
incestuous; and it is according to native ideas just as wrong for a
daughter-in-law to speak or look at her husband’s father, as for the
son-in-law to speak or look at his wife’s mother. Some have told me that
this was to guard against all possibility of cohabitation, “For a person
you never look at you never desire.” Others have said, “Well, don’t you
see, my wife came from her womb.” I am strongly inclined to the opinion
that the former is the real reason.
I knew a case in which a man married his mother-in-law by marriage. The
woman was not his wife’s mother, but his wife’s father’s wife, and as
such was his mother-in-law. I had seen him avoid her many times, and it
was thus evident that all the wives of the wife’s father are regarded as
joint-mothers of the children, and hence mothers-in-law. His wife’s
father died, and the man wanted to have one of the wives (i.e. one of
his mothers-in-law) as his own wife, so he arranged with a friend to pay
the marriage money and take her as his wife, then she, by that marriage,
being no longer his mother-in-law, he was able to take her as his own
wife. He thereupon paid the money for her and took her to his house.
I cannot close this chapter on marriage and child-birth without putting
on record my observations regarding polygamy and its effects on the
Congo. Polygamy means monopoly in women, and causes great immorality
among the natives practising it; and it is now fast dying out within the
sphere of our influence upon the Lower Congo, and in the neighbourhood
of our stations upon the Upper. The effect of polygamy was to tie up the
women to a comparatively small number of men who were fortunate (?)
enough to inherit them, or had procured the wealth with which to pay
their marriage money. There was a constant complaint amongst the young
and vigorous men of the middle and lower orders that it was almost
impossible for them to procure wives. Thus we found a small number of
men possessing nearly all the women in a town, having from four or five
up to twenty-five and thirty each, and a large number of young men who
could not secure wives. Moreover, these wealthy men, besides having all
these wives, had bespoken most of the young girls, many almost infants;
for it was no uncommon thing for girls of three or four years to be
betrothed to men of forty and fifty years of age; and as soon as they
reached puberty the marriage money was completed, and they were passed
over to their already very much married husbands.
Now my observations of polygamy, both on the Lower and Upper Congo, have
led me to form a decided opinion that it does not conduce to
productivity, but the contrary. Under this system I have never known a
large family. One man had eight wives, and he had five children by one
and none by the others; another had ten wives and no children; another
had twenty-three wives and only one child; another twenty-five wives and
three children only; another who had eight wives had three children.
Mapwata, chief of Ntenta in French Congo, had forty wives, but only five
children. In Mfumu Ngoma’s village there were 87 men, 67 married women,
and only 37 children. In the village of Mbela there were about 60
married women, as shown by the number of houses, and only 28 children,
and so on _ad lib._
If you ask a native chief, husband of many wives, how many children he
has, he will state an absurd number, not because he desires to deceive
you, but for the following reasons: All the children, of his brothers
and sisters, and all their children’s children, are spoken of as the
chief’s children, as he is the head of the family, i.e. all the nephews
and nieces, the grand-nephews and grand-nieces are regarded as a man’s
own off-spring, besides his own children and grandchildren; many of us
could make up large families in this way. And again, the native has a
very strong superstition and prejudice against counting his children,
for he believes that if he does so, or if he states the proper number,
the evil spirits will hear it and some of his children will die; hence
when you ask him such a simple question as, “How many children have
you?” you stir up his superstitious fears, and he will answer: “I don’t
know.” If you press him, he will tell you sixty, or one hundred
children, or any other number that jumps to his tongue; and even then he
is thinking of those who, from the native view of kinship, are regarded
as his children, and desiring to deceive, not you, but those ubiquitous
and prowling evil spirits, he states a large number that leaves a wide
margin. I have been introduced by young men to men, much older than
themselves, as “my children,” and there was a twinkle in their eyes,
showing that they appreciated the humorous absurdity of the situation.
Among the Congo languages there is no proper word for virgin, for there
was not in the old days a pure girl above the age of five. I would,
therefore, most emphatically dissent from the oft-repeated fallacious
statement that polygamy promotes morality among native tribes; that it
has caused widespread immorality on the Congo is truer to the facts.
After carefully reviewing all the data I am forced to the conclusion
that polygamy is not necessitated by the climate, but is the natural
outcome of their customs, mode of thought, and view of life. A Congo man
will fight, trade, carry heavy loads for long distances, and work, but
he will not hoe the ground, that is _infra dig._ to him. He will dig the
white man’s farm, but he will not work land in his own village, so, to
use his own words, he “hires” or “borrows” a woman to do this for him,
and the more women he has the less likely is he to go hungry. Again, the
more women he has the more important he is, the greater his influence
and social standing; when a native wants to impress you with the
greatness of his chief or the importance of the head of his family, he
tells you the number of his wives, and he does not mind adding a dozen
to the sum total.
Again, chiefs in receiving visits from other chiefs and their retinues
had to give free hospitality for long periods. This required a large
amount of food and several women to prepare it daily. Then again, for
generations the women have believed that if they allowed their husbands
to have intercourse with them between the time of pregnancy and the
weaning of their children, those children would die. This superstitious
belief has been a potent factor in keeping polygamy alive, if it did not
originate it. Remember how they procure their wives, and that the
woman’s family must replace her in the event of death, consequently the
family has been careful to see that she has not been weakened by
frequent child-bearing, lest they should have to give another woman in
her place. Among some tribes the man had to wait until his wife’s family
took him a calabash of palm-wine, and renewed their permission to him.
Some writers think, judging by the tone of their articles, that we
missionaries rush pell-mell into a country, and delight in upsetting the
institutions and customs of a place whether they are good, bad, or
indifferent. This, however, is not true to the facts as I know them.
Our Mission on the Congo commenced its operations in 1878, and it was
well on in the eighties before churches were formed, with rules and
regulations for the guidance of converts. In the meantime a language had
been reduced to writing, much translation work had been done, and a mass
of information collected about the habits, customs, and view of life
taken by the native. “Many men, many minds” is an old saying, and we
found it a true one when the time came to deal with native marriage
customs and polygamy in relation to church membership. There was not a
single aspect of this great question but had its exponents; and it was
not until after mature consideration, and a careful study of all the
pros and cons, that we came to the conclusion that monogamy was the only
wise rule to adopt, and we therefore laid it down as a condition of
church membership that one man should have one wife only.
It is also a rule of the church that no Christian shall receive marriage
money for his daughter, niece, or ward; and no Christian is permitted to
give marriage money for his wife, except to a heathen if he asks for it.
The reasons for this exception are obvious. We also insist that all
Christians shall marry either by civil law or “holy matrimony.” We are
interested in the natives and, rightly or wrongly, we devote our lives
to them; and if we had desired numbers on the church roll to quote in
reports rather than the moral and physical well-being of our
parishioners, we should have made these restrictions less rigorous, and
entrance to church membership more easy and pleasant for them. Our
Society gives us a free hand in dealing with these great problems.
Now we find that Christian teaching and monogamy have conduced to
stricter morality among the people, and also to an increase in the
birth-rate. In the old days there was in every village on the Lower
Congo a house called _Mbongi_, or _Nzo-a-matoko_ (house for young men),
where the lads and unmarried men slept. Girls from an early age had free
ingress to these houses, and their mothers encouraged them to go. These
houses have been cleared out of all the villages where there is any
Christian influence at work, and even from heathen villages also, for
they have been greatly influenced by the purer public opinion of recent
years. Now that monogamy is practised by so many, the young men know
that in due time they will be able to secure a wife, and they desire to
receive her as pure as possible, hence the closing of these village
bachelor houses even in the heathen towns. Christian parents also use
their best endeavour to preserve their daughters in innocency.
We have within a stone’s-throw of Wathen Station a Christian village
where monogamy is the rule without exception. There are twenty-four
married women living there with their husbands, and they have between
them fifty-seven children now living (noted in 1908), and five have
died, making in all sixty-two births. Some of these have only been
married eighteen months or two years, and there is no doubt that as the
years go by there will be many more children born to these twenty-four
wives. Now the same number of women tied to one man would not have had a
tenth of the children. Again, we have throughout our districts a large
number of teachers, many of whom are married, and most of them have
children—one, two, or three, according to the length of time they have
been married. There is another noticeable thing, that in the Christian
villages, i.e. the monogamous villages, there are plenty of children,
while the same cannot be said of the heathen in polygamous villages.
Some seem to think that polygamy spells large families and a fair state
of morality; but on the Congo, and I speak of what I know, polygamy
means a very low birth-rate and an absolute lack of morality and common
decency. Polygamy is giving place to monogamy, and that means a higher
morality, a purer and more self-respecting womanhood, and the
introduction of a truer affection between the husband and the wife which
will result in a better and more healthy home-life for the children, and
will lead to the coming of a brighter day on dark, oppressed Africa.
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