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_ The lowest depth of aboriginal degradation remains to be sounded. Like most of the Africans, Australians are lower than animals inasmuch as they often do not wait till girls have reached the age of puberty. Meyer (190) says of the Narrinyeri: "They are given in marriage at a very early age (ten or twelve years)." Lindsay Cranford[157] testifies regarding five South Australian tribes that "at puberty no girl, without exception, is a virgin." With the Paroo River tribes "the girls became wives whilst mere children, and mothers at fourteen" (Curr, II., 182). Of other tribes Curr's correspondents write:
"Girls become wives at from eight to fourteen years."
"One often sees a child of eight the wife of a man
of fifty." "Girls are promised to men in infancy,
become wives at about ten years of age, and mothers
at fourteen or fifteen".
[FOOTNOTE 157: _Journal Anthrop. Inst_., XXIV., 169. See also Waitz, VI., 774; Macgillivray, II., 8; Hasskarl, 82. They have a peculiar rattle with mystic sculpturing, and Eyre says that its sound libertatem coeundi juventuti esse tum concessam omnibus indicat. Maclennan cites G.S. Lang, who cites the fact that the old men get most of the young women. Connubium profecto valde est liberum. Conjuges, puellae, _puellulae_ cum adolescentibus venantur. Pretium corporis poene nullius est. Vendunt se vel columbae vel canis vel piscis pretio. Inter Anglos et aborigines nihil distat.]
The Birria tribe waits a few years longer, but atones for this by a resort to another crime: "Males and females are married at from fourteen to sixteen, but are not allowed to rear children until they get to be about thirty years of age; hence infanticide is general." The missionary O.W. Schuermann says of the Port Lincoln tribe: "Notwithstanding the early marriage of females, I have not observed that they have children at an earlier age than is common among Europeans." Of York district tribes we are told (I., 343) that "girls are betrothed shortly after birth, and brutalities are practised on them while mere children." Of the Kojonub tribe: "Girls are promised in marriage soon after birth, and given over to their husbands at about nine years of age." Of the Natingero tribe: "The girls go to live with their husbands at from seven to ten years, and suffer dreadfully from intercourse." Of the Yircla Meening tribe:
"Females become wives at ten and mothers at twelve
years of age." "Mr. J.M. Davis and others of repute
declare, as a result of long acquaintance with
Australian savages, that the girls were made use of for
promiscuous intercourse when they were only nine or ten
years old." (Sutherland, I., 113.)
It is needless to continue this painful catalogue. _
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