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_ Mariner, who lived among the Tongans four years, and whose adventures and observations were afterward recorded by Martin, gives information which indicates that Cook was wrong when he said that a more civilized people does not exist under the sun. "Theft, revenge, rape and murder," Mariner attests (II., 140), "under many circumstances are not held to be crimes." It is considered the duty of married women to remain true to their husbands and this, Mariner thinks, is generally done. Unmarried women "may bestow their favors upon whomsoever they please, without any opprobrium" (165). Divorced women, like the unmarried, may admit temporary lovers without the least reproach or secresy.
"When a woman is taken prisoner (in war) she generally
has to submit; but this is a thing of course, and
considered neither an outrage nor dishonor; the only
dishonor being to be a prisoner and consequently a
sort of servant to the conqueror. Rape, though always
considered an outrage, is not looked upon as a crime
unless the woman be of such rank as to claim respect
from the perpetrator".
Many of their expressions, when angry, are
"too indelicate to mention." "Conversation is often
intermingled with allusions, even when women are present,
which could not be allowed in any decent society in
England."
Two-thirds of the women
"are married and are soon divorced, and are married
again perhaps three, four, or five times in their
lives." "No man is understood to be bound to conjugal
fidelity; it is no reproach to him to intermix his
amours." "Neither have they any word expressive of
chastity except _nofo mow_, remaining fixed or
faithful, and which in this sense is only applied
to a married woman to signify her fidelity to her
husband."
Even the married women of the lower classes had to yield to the wishes of the chiefs, who did not hesitate to shoot a resisting husband. (Waitz-Gerland, VI., 184.)
While these details show that Captain Cook overrated the civilization of the Tongans, there are other facts indicating that they were in some respects superior to other Polynesians, at any rate. The women are capable of blushing, and they are reproached if they change their lovers too often. They seem to have a dawning sense of the value of chastity and of woman's claims to consideration. In Mariner's description (I., 130) of a chief's wedding occurs this sentence:
"The dancing being over, one of the old matabooles
(nobles) addressed the company, making a moral
discourse on the subject of chastity--advising the
young men to respect, in all cases, the wives of
their neighbors, and never to take liberties even
with an unmarried woman against her free consent."
The wives of chiefs must not go about without attendants. Mariner says, somewhat naively, that when a man has an amour, he keeps it secret from his wife,
"not out of any fear or apprehension, but because
it is unnecessary to excite her jealousy, and
make her perhaps unhappy; for it must be said,
to the honor of the men, that they consult in
no small degree, and in no few respects, the
happiness and comfort of their wives."
If Mariner tells the truth, it must be said in this respect that the Tongans are superior to all other peoples we have so far considered in this book. Though the husband's authority at home is absolute, and though one girl in every three is betrothed in her infancy, men do not, he says, make slaves or drudges of their wives, or sell their daughters, two out of every three girls being allowed to choose their own husbands--"early and often." The men do most of the hard work, even to the cooking. "In Tonga," says Seemann, "the women have been treated from time immemorial with all the consideration demanded by their weaker and more delicate constitution, not being allowed to perform any hard work." Cook also found (II., 149) that the province allotted to the men was "far more laborious and extensive than that of the women," whose employments were chiefly such as may be executed in the house. _
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