The Fijians Part 15

[Pageheader: MISSIONARIES PUT DOWN POLYGAMY]

The actual facts were these: The highest chiefs had harems of from ten to fifty women, counting concubines, according to their rank and importance; the chiefs of the inland tribes had five or six wives, who cultivated their plantations for them, and were more agricultural labourers than wives; the chiefs of tributary tribes had seldom more than two wives, and the bulk of the people were monogamists. Young men of the lower orders married rather late in life for a primitive race, rarely, it appears, before the age of twenty-five. Under these conditions it might be expected that there would have been some form of prost.i.tution, but in fact there was nothing of the kind. The nearest approach to it was to be found in the chief's kitchen, where the women in attendance on the chief's wives, especially those nearing middle age, were wont to sit and gossip with their lord's male retainers. In the tributary villages the young men were too well watched in the _mbure_, and the girls in the houses of their parents, for there to have been much philandering. Thus, if it comes to a question of fact--and the terms are to be applied in their most literal sense--the Fijians have a better t.i.tle to be called monogamists than the men of civilized Europe.

The action of the early missionaries in breaking down polygamy did not result in as much hardship as might be supposed. Their policy is set forth in the following instructions from the Society to its ministers: "No man living in a state of polygamy is to be admitted a member, or even on trial, who will not consent to live with one woman as his wife, to whom you shall join him in matrimony, or ascertain that this rite has been performed by some other minister; and the same rule is to be applied in the same manner to a woman proposing to become a member of the Society." The chiefs seem to have made little difficulty about this.

They were married to their princ.i.p.al wife, and the rest went home to their friends, where they had not long to wait for husbands, since there was a certain prestige in marrying a woman who had belonged to a high chief. The discarded wives rarely complained of their dismissal, for their lives in the harem had been unenviable. Exposed to the jealousy and tyranny of the chief wife, they were subjected to daily mortification, and if they had the misfortune to displease the great lady, they were set upon and beaten and ill-treated by her attendants.

At the time of annexation in 1874 the Mission order quoted above had been sufficient to stamp out the custom everywhere but in the hill districts of Vitilevu, where the older chiefs still had from two to four wives apiece. The Government wisely resolved to recognize all these wives as legally married,[68] but not to allow any more polygamous marriages, and in a few years the custom died out of itself. In the polygamous households with which I came into contact the wives were all stricken in years, and they lived harmoniously together, dividing the labour of wood-cutting, water-carrying, and tilling their husband's garden between them.

I do not think that the abandonment of polygamy has had any effect upon the vitality of the race, for the simple reason that its practice was very limited in extent. Then, as now, practically all the women were appropriated. The evils arising from polygamy among the natives in South Africa, cited by the Commission appointed in 1882 by the Governor of Cape Colony to inquire into native customs--namely, idleness of the men, enforced work by the women, immorality of young wives wedded to old men, forced marriages of girls, strife and jealousy among the wives leading to the practice of witchcraft and the sale of young girls--were not prevalent in Fiji; nor had the reasons there adduced in its favour--that polygamy is a provision against old age, since the children of the young wives maintain their parents when the older children have left the home--any application in the Pacific Islands.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 68: Native Regulation 12 of 1877 provided that "all marriages performed and confirmed according to Fijian customs before the pa.s.sing of this Regulation" should be legal and binding.]

CHAPTER IX

FAMILY LIFE

Among the tribes in Fiji, where Melanesian blood predominates, the _mbure-ni-sa_, or unmarried man's house, was a universal inst.i.tution. In the Lau group the strong admixture of Polynesian blood had in some degree broken down the social laws connected with this house, although in most villages the house existed. Among the purer Melanesian tribes of the interior of Vitilevu, after twenty-five years of Christianity and settled government, the _mbure-ni-sa_ exists as a part of the social life of the village, as if obedience could still be enforced.

The _mbure-ni-sa_ was usually the largest house in the village. It was the men's club in the day-time and the men's sleeping house at night. No woman could enter it without committing a grave breach of propriety.

Young boys below the age of p.u.b.erty went naked and slept with their parents at home; but, from the day that they a.s.sumed the _malo_, or perineal bandage, they removed to the _mbure-ni-sa_ at nightfall, and slept there under the eyes of the elders who either had no home of their own or had adopted the mbure-ni-sa from choice. When the young man reached the age for marriage his mother chose a wife for him from among his concubitant cousins, _i.e._ the daughters of his maternal uncle; and immediately after the marriage he removed from the _mbure-ni-sa_ to a house of his own, or to that of his parents. In parts of Vanualevu, where uterine descent was still recognized, he removed to the village of his wife's parents.

As soon as his wife was confined he was banished again to the _mbure-ni-sa_ for the entire suckling period, which lasted from two to three years. During the whole of this time, unless he had more than one wife, he was obliged to live a life of celibacy.

In the above description I am, of course, speaking of the ordinary middle-cla.s.s Fijian. The higher chiefs, having several wives, provided a separate house for the confinement, and never saw the _mbure-ni-sa_ again after their marriage. Men of the lowest rank had generally no wives at all.

The _mbure-ni-sa_ thus served a double purpose. The girls of the tribe sleeping with their parents, and the young men being practically incarcerated every night under the eyes of their elders, there was little opportunity for immorality before marriage. With the duties of defence, of fighting, of providing food and of fishing, the young men had little time for philandering, and it is a.s.serted by many of the elder natives that it was a rare thing for a girl to have lost her virtue before marriage. Such s.e.xual immorality as took place was between the young men and the older married women.

But the chief value of the _mbure-ni-sa_ undoubtedly lay in the separation of the parents of a child during the suckling period.

Natives, when asked to account for the decrease in their numbers, have for years mentioned the breaking down of this custom of abstinence as the princ.i.p.al cause, a.s.serting that cohabitation injures the quality of the mother's milk. Not understanding the true cause that lay behind this belief, Europeans, medical men as well as missionaries, have treated the opinion with contempt, without, however, shaking the natives' fixed belief. Within the last few years a missionary, the late Rev. J. P.

Chapman, characterized this custom of abstinence as an "absurd and superst.i.tious practice."

[Ill.u.s.tration: The Mbure-ni-sa (Club House).]

The teaching of the missionaries, who believed that the only perfect social system was to be found in the English mode of family life, and the example of the Europeans settled in the group, have broken down the custom of the _mbure-ni-sa_ in all parts of the islands, except the mountain districts of Vitilevu. The example of the native teachers, one of whom is to be found in every village, was in itself enough to discourage a custom which the men had long found irksome, and the natives a.s.sert that a large number of infant deaths might have been prevented if public opinion still sufficed to keep the parents apart.

[Pageheader: PROLONGED PERIOD OF SUCKLING]

The Fijian word _ndambe_ has been loosely applied to the custom of separating the parents while the mother is suckling her child. The word is really an adjective signifying the injury sustained by the child whose parents cohabit too soon after its birth. It becomes _ndambe_, that is to say, it shows symptoms of general debility, accompanied with an enlargement of the abdomen. The infringement of the rule of abstinence is described at Mbau by a slang word, _nkuru vou_. During the long period of suckling--varying from twelve to thirty-six months--the mother abstained from cohabitation from the fear of impoverishing her milk, a superst.i.tion which hid behind it a most important truth; namely, that a second conception taking place during the suckling period must cause the child to be prematurely weaned. While the _mbure-ni-sa_ still existed, secret cohabitation between the parents was made the more difficult by the custom of young mothers leaving their husband's house and living with their relations for a year after the birth of a child; since the adoption of English family life, husband and wife no longer separate, but give their parole to public opinion to preserve the abstinence prescribed by ancient custom. The health of the child is jealously watched for signs that the parents have failed in their duty.

If it fall off in condition it is declared to be _ndambe_, and the mother is compelled to wean it immediately, with an effect upon the child which varies with its age. If it suffers it is said to be _kali ndole_--prematurely weaned. The Fijians have no artificial food for their infants. There is nothing between the mother's milk and solid vegetable food, and until the digestive organs are fit to a.s.similate such foods the child must be kept at the breast. Among European women menstruation is rarely re-established during the period of suckling, and there is therefore no particular danger to the child in cohabitation during this period. At the worst, if conception takes place, the child can be brought up upon artificial diet. With Fijian women, however, menstruation often recommences at the third or fourth month after parturition, and cohabitation, even at this early stage, often results in a second pregnancy. The mother is physiologically incapable of nourishing at the same time the foetus within her and the child at her breast, and the symptoms of defective nutrition become evident in the latter very soon after the new conception has taken place. The child must be weaned at once, since it soon becomes too weak to undergo the strain of a change of diet; it becomes _ndambe_. An old Fijian midwife told me that the children of elderly men are less often _ndambe_ than those of young men, because the older father, being less ardent, is more likely to observe the rule of abstinence.

Nearly half the Fijian children born die within the first year. In many cases, no doubt, death is caused by premature weaning owing to a second conception, but there is no doubt that a number of weakly children are brought into the world through the physical incapacity of the Fijian mother for bearing healthy children in quick succession. This incapacity may proceed from some inherent racial defect, or from improper or insufficient food. Under the old wise system of abstinence, the forces of the mother had time to recuperate before she was again called upon to bear the strain of maternity, but with the early death of her child she is at once pregnant. The birth-rate is increased by the production of a weak offspring that will go in its turn to swell the death-rate; in other words, a lower birth-rate would tend to increase the population.

In Tonga and in the Gilbert Islands the separation is rigidly enforced.

In the latter group _ndambe_ is called _ngori_. The relations of the mother exercise extreme vigilance to prevent the couple from cohabiting, and the husband who infringes the rule is scolded by his wife's relations and sent for the future to sleep with the young men.

Lieutenant Matthews, who visited the Sierra Leone River between 1785 and 1791, says of the Mandingoes: "Mothers never wean their children until they are able to walk and carry a calabash of water, which they are instructed to do as soon as possible, as cohabitation is denied to them while they have children at the breast." Even in j.a.pan, where there is artificial food for infants, prolonged suckling is still the rule. Sir Edwin Arnold[69] says: "j.a.pan is of all countries, except England, that where fewest children die between birth and the age of five years; albeit a point in favour of j.a.panese babies is that they are nursed at the breast until they are two or even three years old."

The Pitcairn Islanders, who possess goats, but are otherwise as ill provided with artificial food for infants as the Fijians, were found by Beechey in 1831 to be suckling their children for three and even four years."[70]

It is proper here to notice traces of the couvade, not perhaps indicating that the couvade itself was ever practised as a custom, but showing rather how widely spread are the ideas underlying that custom.

In the province of Namosi, where children were suckled for three years, there is a belief that if the father, when separated from his wife, has an intrigue with another woman his child will fall off, showing the symptoms of _ndambe_. The sickness is called there by the suggestive name of _veisangani tani_ (_lit._, "alien thigh-locking"). Dr. R. H.

Codrington[71] says of Mota (Banks Islands): "When a child is born, neither father nor mother eats things, such as fish or meat, which might make the children ill. The father does not go into sacred places which the child could not visit without risk. After the birth of the first child the father does no heavy work for a month lest the child should be injured." Mr. Walter Carew says of the district north of Namosi: "I have frequently observed a father abstain from certain articles of food from fear of affecting the child, born or unborn; and I have often joked the people about it. Once I persuaded a man to break the tabu and eat some fowl. Unfortunately, the child died some time afterwards, and the father more than half believed me to have been the cause of its death." In discussing this belief as a trace of the couvade, Starke quotes Dobizhoffer's remarks upon the Abipones: "They comply with this custom with the greater readiness because they believe that the father's rest and abstinence have an extraordinary effect on the well-being of unborn infants, and is indeed absolutely necessary for them.... For they are quite convinced that any unseemly act on the father's part would injuriously affect the child on account of the sympathetic tie which naturally subsists between them, so that in the event of the child's death the women all blame the self-indulgence of the father, and find fault with this or that act."

Among the Lake Nya.s.sa tribes the husband ceases cohabitation as soon as his wife announces her pregnancy, and does not resume it until the child is weaned. If he has no other wife "he will strive to remain chaste in the fear lest, if he commit adultery, his unborn child will die."[72]

Among the Atonga, in the same region, the husband has no relations with his wife for five or six months after the child's birth. If he has access to any other woman during this period, the popular belief is that she will certainly die.[73]

This widely extended custom of prolonged suckling among non-pastoral peoples seems to show that Nature intended the human mother to suckle her offspring until it had developed the teeth necessary for masticating solid food. Civilization, ever driving Nature at high pressure, has found artificial food for infants, leaving the mother free to bear the stress of a second maternity. To meet this increased strain the civilized mother is nourished and tended with a care that is never bestowed upon her savage sister. Barbarism followed the law of Nature and supported it by a customary law of mutual abstinence, but the customary law of the Fijians has been mutilated and has left them between two stools, not yet adopting the conveniences of civilization and obliged, nevertheless, to do the high pressure work of the civilized state without help. The reproductive powers of the Fijian woman of to-day are forced, though her body is no better prepared by a generous course of food to meet the strain than when she was allowed to follow the less exacting course of Nature for which only her body is fitted.

And to make matters worse, the Fijians, recognizing the evils of too frequent conceptions, drink nostrums to prevent them, probably injuring thereby the child at the breast.

[Pageheader: THE MISSIONARIES' MISTAKE]

If the missionaries, as is said, are responsible for breaking down these customs of abstinence, and still regard it as "absurd and superst.i.tious," it is a pity that they did not recognize another important difference between European and Fijian society--the irregular and insufficient nourishment for the women and the lack of artificial food for infants--and devote their efforts to reforming this before they discouraged a custom so admirably adapted to meet the evils of a lack of cereals and milk-yielding animals. It is too late now to go back. The Fijian husband will never again consent to enforced separation from his wife. Rapid conceptions and a high birth-rate must be reckoned with, and the only feasible remedy is to improve the diet of the nursing mother, and induce the people generally to keep milk-yielding animals for their children. Cattle thrive in Fiji, but the efforts of the Government to convert the Fijian agriculturist to pastoral pursuits cannot be said to have been successful.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 69: _Some Pictures from j.a.pan_, by Sir Edwin Arnold.]

[Footnote 70: _Beechey's Voyage_, p. 128.]

[Footnote 71: _Notes on the Customs of Mota (Banks Islands)_, by the Rev. R. H. Codrington, M.A.]

[Footnote 72: _British Central Africa_, by Sir H. H. Johnston.]

[Footnote 73: _Ibid._, p. 415.]

CHAPTER X

THE MARRIAGE SYSTEM[74]

There are two systems of kinship nomenclature current among Fijians, one indicating consanguinity, and the other kinship in relation to marriage.

This latter system radiates from the central idea of Concubitancy, and it is this system that is now to be discussed. The word "Concubitant" is adopted because, besides being a fair translation of the Fijian word _vei-ndavolani_ (_vei_ = reciprocal affix, _ndavo_ = to lie down), it expresses the Fijian idea that persons so related ought to cohabit.

In order to understand the system it is necessary to free the mind from the ideas a.s.sociated with the English terms of relationship, and to adopt the native terms, which are as follows:--

(1) _Tama_--Father, or paternal uncle.

_Tina_--Mother, or maternal aunt.