The Fijians Part 18

[Pageheader: CONCUBITANCY JUSTIFIED BY RESULTS]

It is not a little remarkable that the two extremes of vitality should occur in the two cla.s.ses in which in-breeding prevails. The larger cla.s.s of the concubitants (in which cla.s.s also is found the highest fecundity) shows the highest vitality of the four groups. The smaller cla.s.s, the relations other than concubitants, second in point of fecundity, discloses the lowest vitality, and yet the proportion of these marriages which would be regarded as incestuous by our system is small. It is not to be forgotten, however, that in marriages which are regarded by the people as socially right and proper, more care may be bestowed upon the offspring both by the relations of the parents who nurse the mother and child and by the parents themselves. By the same reasoning it is probable that the offspring of marriages regarded as incestuous are neglected by the relations of the parents, and, as a consequence, that less pride is taken in them by the parents themselves.

It has not been found that concubitants marry either earlier or later in life than the members of the other cla.s.ses, and it is to be remembered that concubitants are very often natives of different villages, which may tend to prevent the relations attending upon the mother in her confinement. One of our native witnesses a.s.sured us, moreover, that the union of concubitants was seldom a happy one. Quarrels between husband and wife would certainly outweigh any advantages in favour of child-bearing which the social propriety or fitness might be held to create. But even supposing that the influences at work to make concubitancy so satisfactory a procreative element in the population are of a moral nature, the difference is so marked that there is a balance over to be accounted for by some other explanation. That they rear a larger proportion of their children may be partly or wholly due to the fact that their relationship to each other gives them a higher sense of responsibility, but that they bear more children capable of being reared argues a superior physical fitness for procreation. I am aware that the figures are far too small to allow of any generalization from them, but at the same time it is to be remembered that the inhabitants of these twelve villages represent a fair sample of the population, and also that we found the relative positions of the married cla.s.ses to be generally the same in each village taken individually.

We have here a phenomenon probably unique in the whole range of anthropology--a people who for generations have married their first cousins and still continue to do so, and among whom the offspring of first cousins were not only more numerous but have greater vitality than the children of persons unrelated. Nay more, the children of concubitants--of first cousins whose parents were brother and sister--have immense advantages over the children of first cousins who were the children of two brothers or two sisters respectively. In no other part of the world does there exist so favourable material for investigating the phenomena of in-breeding among human beings. Is it possible that we have stumbled upon an important truth in our physical nature? Throughout Europe there is a widespread prejudice against the union of first cousins, a prejudice that must have arisen from the observation of chance unions. Two French scientists, MM. Lagneau and Gueniot, have lately attempted to combat this prejudice that marriage of first cousins is in itself productive of evil in the offspring. By cla.s.sifying the people of Batz, who, they affirm, are the offspring of generations of consanguineous marriages, they found the population to be comparatively free from the morbid characteristics usually attributed to consanguinity, and they traced the cases of scrofula and similar morbid taints back to its origin in the parents and grandparents. From this they argued, that if scrofulous or rickety children are born of parents nearly related, it is due to the fact that hereditary taint of disease on one or both of them has not been diluted by marriage with a person unrelated to them. It is a pity that in their investigations they did not trace the exact tie of consanguinity between the parents. It might have been seen, whether in Europe as in Fiji, the union of the children respectively of a brother and sister is innocuous, while that of the children of two brothers or two sisters respectively produces evil effects upon the offspring.

[Pageheader: COUSIN MARRIAGE POSSIBLY BENEFICIAL]

The point at issue, therefore, is this. Is the cla.s.sificatory system of relationships after all more logical in an important respect than our own? Is there really a wide physical difference between the relationship of cousins who are offspring of a brother and sister respectively and that of cousins whose parents respectively were two brothers or two sisters? Ought marriage in the one case to be allowed or even encouraged, and in the other case as rigidly forbidden as if it were incestuous? More complete and detailed statistics than it is possible to give within the limits of this chapter are at the service of any one who will attempt to answer these questions by going more deeply into the subject.

Due allowance being made for local variations, the marriage customs of Fijians of the middle cla.s.s in heathen times may be thus summarized.

The man's parents, having ascertained that their overtures would be acceptable, sent betrothal gifts (_ai ndunguthi_) to the parents of the girl. The token of acceptance was sometimes a miniature _liku_ (ap.r.o.n).

If _vei-ndavolani_ (concubitants), they were often betrothed in early childhood; sometimes, however, a girl child was thus promised to a man old enough to be her grandfather. In either case the girl's parents kept strict watch over her, for any lapse on her part would cover them with shame and dishonour. If the betrothed whom she thus dishonoured was a man of rank her own relations would not scruple to put her to death, as was done by the great chief Ritova in 1852, when his sister thus disgraced him. While the girl is growing up her friends were supposed to "nurse" (_vei-mei_) her, or they might take her to the bridegroom's parents to be cared for till the marriage. When she reached p.u.b.erty the bridegroom's friends prepared a quant.i.ty of property, consisting of mats and bark-cloth, and called the _yau-ni-k.u.mu_, or the _solevu_, and presented it formally to the parents of the girl, and marriages were often delayed for years when the bridegroom's family were too poor to acquire property commensurate with their pride. It was this pecuniary element, and also the custom of _vasu_, which gave every Fijian a lien over the property of his mother's family, that made each clan so jealous in counting the interchange of wives. "_Veka!_" they would exclaim when a fresh proposal was made, "they have had already five women from us, and we but three from them, and now they ask us for a sixth!"

The actual ceremony varied very much with the rank of the parties to the marriage. There was no religious element, and the priests took no part in it. But however humble the couple there were two indispensable ceremonies--the wedding feast, provided by the bridegroom, and the _vei-tasi_, or clipping of the bride's hair. I have failed to discover the author of the fiction, quoted by so many anthropologists, that marriage in Fiji was consummated in the bush. This was never the case.

On the night of the feast the bride was taken to her husband's house, which had been either built specially for her, or was lent by the groom's parents. There the marriage was consummated, without any ceremony except in the case of high chiefs, when the announcement was made by a great shouting. On the morrow was the feast of the clipping, when the long tresses (_tombe_) grown behind each ear as a token of virginity were cut off.[81] In the inland districts the girl's head was shorn, and she entered forthwith upon her labour as a hewer of wood and a drawer of water, ugly enough by this disfigurement to discourage any admirer. The old women of the bridegroom's family had ascertained meanwhile whether the bride had had a right to wear these love-locks, and if the result of their inquiries was unsatisfactory, the feast was made the occasion for putting her friends to shame. By a slash of a knife the carca.s.ses of the pigs, which were presented whole to the visitors in the village square, were so mutilated as to intimate in the grossest imagery that the bride had had a history. The Fijians, however, always preserved a delicacy in these matters which was strangely wanting in the Samoans and Tongans. In Samoa the innocence of the bride was tested in the sight of the whole village by a sort of surgical operation performed by a third person (_digito intruso_); in Tonga the nuptial mat was paraded from house to house.[82]

[Pageheader: FIJIAN LOVE LETTERS]

There was, in some parts of the group, an occasional "marriage by capture" that would have gladdened the heart of Maclennan, but it was ceremonial, and I doubt whether it ever could be described as a custom.

The betrothal gifts having been accepted some time before, the girl was waylaid and carried off. If she was unwilling she ran away to some one who could protect her; if she was content the marriage feast was made on the following morning.

Though as a rule the wishes of the bride were not consulted, there were certainly matches of _vei-ndomoni_ (mutual affection), and young people sometimes eloped with one another to the bush. But the flame of pa.s.sion soon burnt itself out; the couple soon settled down into the comfortable relations of mutual convenience; there was never a trace of idealizing sentiment between lovers.

The _ndunguthi-ni-alewa_ has now given place to the _vola-ni-alewa_, and the former phrase is obsolete. _Vola-ni-alewa_ (writing to a woman) includes both the betrothal gift and the letter which accompanies it.

Very artless and business-like are some of these proposals. "If you love me I love you, but if you love me not, never mind, neither do I love you; only let us have certainty." Sometimes the women write the letter.

One that came into my hands soared to a poetic height. "Be gentle like the dove, and patient like the chicken," but concluded somewhat lamely with, "When you have read this my letter, throw it down the drain."

In September 1875, a few months after the cession of the group, the Council of Chiefs recommended the prohibition of betrothal gifts on the ground that they tended to infant betrothals, and consequently to the compulsory marriage of ill-a.s.sorted couples, who separated immediately without consummating it; that girls should be free to marry whom they chose on attaining the age of sixteen; that the licence should be granted by native magistrates after due inquiry; and that the ceremony should be performed either by a European magistrate or by a minister of religion. These recommendations, liberal enough when one considers how recently those who framed them had been freed from the bonds of custom, were embodied in a native regulation, to which was added three years later the sensible provision that the bridegroom should first be provided with a house of his own. But as the betrothal gifts, which were of no great value, seemed on consideration to be less objectionable than was at first supposed, a Regulation was afterwards pa.s.sed to make them legal.

The real obstacle to marriage proved to be the _yau-ni-k.u.mu_. While it consisted only of native manufactures there were few men who could not provide it with the help of their relations, but as soon as it became fashionable to give knives, print, etc., for which money was required, there were difficulties. The unhappy bridegroom, knowing how lightly a Fijian girl may change her mind, had the ceremony performed on the understanding that the marriage should not be consummated until he was able to pay for his bride. While he was acc.u.mulating the property to redeem her, the bride lived with her parents. Months pa.s.sed, and in many cases a prosecution for adultery took the place of the promised festivities, though the marriage had never been consummated. This state of things appeared to be more common on the north-east coast of Vitilevu than elsewhere.

[Pageheader: OBSTACLES TO MARRIAGE]

In 1892, therefore, a Regulation was pa.s.sed again prohibiting betrothal gifts, and making it illegal to keep married people apart because the _yau-ni-k.u.mu_ had not been presented, and provided a penalty for enticing married women from their husbands. There still remained the magistrate's power to refuse a licence if the relations advanced "reasonable objections," for by the law of custom objections to intermarriage with a tribe of traditional enemies were reasonable. The native chiefs, mindful of their own feelings if their daughters were to make a _mesalliance_, clung to this power of veto, and without their co-operation it was useless to attempt more legislation. And, since there is probably no community in which poverty, or cla.s.s distinctions, are not obstacles to marriages of inclination, the Fijians have little to complain of.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 74: The information in this chapter was collected by the Commission on the Native Decrease (1891), of which the author was a member.]

[Footnote 75: Thus, John X. marries Mary O. They have two children, male O. and female O. (belonging to the mother's group). These marry female X. and male X. (father's group). Their children would be X.'s and O.'s respectively, following their mothers, and, if of opposite s.e.x, could intermarry, although public opinion regards the union as improper in consequence of the near relationship of the parents.]

[Footnote 76: Du Chaillu, _Trans. Ethn. Soc._, N.S., Vol. I, p. 321.]

[Footnote 77: _Smithsonian Report_, 1866, p. 315.]

[Footnote 78: De Mor., Germ., XX., quoted by Sir John Lubbock.]

[Footnote 79: We find it stated by Dr. Codrington that there is a remarkable tendency throughout the islands of Melanesia towards the subst.i.tution of a man's own children for his sister's children and others of his kin in succession to his property; and this appears to begin where the property is the produce of the man's own industry.]

[Footnote 80: Quoted by Sir John Lubbock, _Origin of Civilization_.]

[Footnote 81: In these degenerate days the _tombe_ are worn by many unmarried girls who have no right to them.]

[Footnote 82: I remember a high chief in Fiji, who had married a Tongan girl, complaining bitterly of the invasion of his privacy by the bride's aunt, who insisted upon officiating as a witness, and relating with glee how, in the small hours, he had forcibly bundled the old lady out into the night.]

CHAPTER XI

CUSTOMS AT BIRTH

It has already been shown that the decay of the Fijian race is due, not to a low birth-rate, but to an excessive mortality among infants. The mean annual birth-rate for the ten years 1881-1891 was 38.48. This compares very favourably with the mean annual rates of European countries, which vary from 42.8 in Hungry to 25.9 in France. In England the rate is 35.3.

The excessive mortality among Fijian infants makes it necessary to examine very closely the practices of the native midwives at the risk of wearying the reader with somewhat technical details.

Native midwives are generally the ordinary medical pract.i.tioners, and are termed _Vu-ni-kalou_ (skilled in spirit-lore), or _Yalewa vuku_ (wise woman), though that term belongs more properly to the wives of the hereditary _matai sau_ (canoe-wrights and carpenters). These women keep their craft secret, and as a consequence it often becomes family property, being handed down from mother to daughter. The natives a.s.sert, however, that so far from the craft being regarded as hereditary, any person who thinks she has discovered a new remedy is at liberty to follow the business when so inclined. This opens a wide field to quackery, of which any woman with more cunning or self-a.s.sertion than her neighbours can avail herself for the sake of credit or of gain.

[Pageheader: MIDWIVES]

None but a few of the female relations of a lying-in woman are admitted to the house when she is in labour, the mixed attendance customary in Tonga on such occasions not being tolerated. When the labour pains begin the woman a.s.sumes a squatting posture, but during the throes of childbirth she lies back in the arms of two friends sitting behind her, who support her shoulders while the midwife stations herself in front.

From a physiological point of view this is a disadvantageous position, but it appears to be adopted by chance rather than design, it being a natural posture for a people who both sleep and sit on a matted floor.

The midwife makes a digital examination for the purpose of ascertaining the presentation, which is generally normal. The membranes are not tampered with, and nothing else is done until after the natural birth of the child. Then the midwife clears its mouth of mucus with her fingers or with her lips. Midwives differ on the point of the moment at which the umbilical cord should be severed. Some of them seem to know that the cord pulsates, but they do not understand the reason, for the Fijians know nothing of the circulation of the blood. They generally wait until the child breathes or cries out. If it emits no cry the general practice is to compress the cord between the finger and thumb, and to squeeze the blood onward towards the child. Sometimes they rattle a bunch of _kitu_ (gourds) near its ear in the hope of awakening it. Neither artificial respiration nor a dash of cold water is ever resorted to, though cold water is used in Tonga in extreme cases, and the natives mention cases in which children must have perished through the neglect of this precaution. The cord is then measured from the navel to the knee, and cut square across with a mussel-sh.e.l.l, or a bamboo knife. Now-a-days scissors are sometimes used. It is never severed by biting as is done by some natural races, nor is it ever tied or knotted. Native opinions vary as to whether bleeding occurs in consequence of the cord not being tied.

The midwives deny that it does, but some women declare that it is a good thing for the "bad blood" to drain out of the cord. Severance of the umbilical cord without ligature is not so unsafe as might appear, for the experience of obstetricians goes to show that there is less risk of haemorrhage when the cord is left long, though, of course, bleeding is more likely to occur from a clean transverse cut than from an oblique cut, or a laceration. After division the foetal end is wrapped in a shred of bark-cloth, and coiled down on the abdomen. The blood that oozes from it is absorbed by the cloth, which is changed occasionally.

As soon as the child cries and the cord has been severed an attendant washes it in cold water. A drink of cold water is given to the mother with the view of stimulating the uterus to contract and expel the afterbirth. Retention of the placenta is the one contingency dreaded by native women, but the midwives say that it is as rare as it is dangerous. Among the inland tribes the midwives often introduce the hand to extract the placenta, but among the coast people they believe it to be an experiment which is better left alone. In cases where the drink of cold water fails in its intended effect, herbal infusions are administered, and poultices are sometimes applied externally, but the safe expedient of compressing the uterus by placing the hand on the abdomen is unknown to Fijian midwives--a surprising fact in a nation of ma.s.seuses. It seems clear that Fijian mothers sometimes die from retained placenta, and that the blame is laid at the door of the midwife if she has ventured upon any manual interference. One woman stated that some of her friends went through life in dread of pregnancy through the popular fear of retained placenta.

The occasional retention of portions of the membranes appears to puzzle Fijian midwives. They lay particular stress upon the impropriety of removing such fragments--_ai k.u.mbek.u.mbe_ (cleavings), they call them--even when they have been extruded spontaneously, but, on the contrary, are careful to tie them down _in loco_ under a bandage of bark-cloth, trusting the rest to nature. They admit, however, that women to whom this happens are usually feverish for some time, and they evidently think the situation dangerous.

[Pageheader: FORt.i.tUDE OF FIJIAN MOTHERS]

After the conclusion of the third stage of labour some midwives of the inland tribes introduce the hand as far as the _bai ni yate_ (_lit._, fence of the liver) or the _tuvu ni ngone_ (foetal source, _i.e.

Fornix v.a.g.i.n.ae_), and, bending the fingers, clear out all the clots they can find. Others adopt the better practice of raising the mother to a sitting posture to facilitate their discharge by gravitation.

An infusion called _wai-ni-lutu-vata_ (medicine for simultaneous birth) is sometimes taken during the later months of pregnancy, to induce an easy labour and the descent of the placenta at the proper moment.

Among the hill tribes of Vitilevu labour seems to be more easy and expeditious than on the coast, and yet, notwithstanding their less varied experience, the midwives of those tribes enjoy a higher reputation for skill, and also follow more orthodox methods than their sisters among the more enlightened tribes. Both, however, display the same ignorance of the rudiments of physiology, and are as empirical in their midwifery as in their treatment of ordinary sickness.

The infant mortality is attributed by many Europeans to the hard work done by the women during pregnancy, and immediately after childbirth.

The native belief is that a woman should do no heavy work up to the time of quickening, but that thenceforward the more she works the easier will her confinement be. Though this maxim is universal, the practice during pregnancy varies with the individual and the locality. Among the hill tribes women leave their house as early as the day after their confinement; they generally do so about the fifth day. Cases are recorded in which a woman has gone out in the morning in an advanced stage of pregnancy, and has returned in the evening with a load of firewood on her back and a new-born child in her arms. But at Mbau, and among the higher cla.s.ses generally, women are kept to the house for a full month, and among the high chiefs the _bongi ndrau_ (hundred days) are observed, the mother abstaining from all but purely domestic occupations for that period.

Accidents of childbirth seem to be rare with Fijian women. All the midwives that have been questioned agree that mal-presentations are uncommon, and that only one case of an arm-presentation had occurred within their experience. When abnormal presentations do occur they are regarded as being the fruit of an adulterous connection, and when the child dies, as it invariably does, the death is put down to this cause instead of to want of skill on the part of the midwife. The Vital Statistics put the still births at 6 per cent., and in a few provinces at 10 per cent., but it has been ascertained that many of these represent cases of foetal death before delivery.

In western Vitilevu, the centre of belief in witchcraft, confinements used to take place out of doors. A temporary hut is run up near the yam-garden, often at a considerable distance from the village, and the pregnant woman takes up her quarters there for the event. No preparation is made beyond taking a rough creel, padded with dried gra.s.s, for the reception of the new-born infant. The people use neither mat nor bark-cloth for the purpose, being loath to destroy it afterwards, and saying, "How will you get rid of the blood with which it will be stained?" The hut, too, is floored only with gra.s.s. As a rule there is no midwife, and the woman does all that is necessary for herself. The key to these primitive customs is the belief in witchcraft. The most effective tools of the wizard are the excretae of the intended victim. If the woman was attended during her confinement a gra.s.s-blade, stained with blood, might be secreted by a malicious person, and used to compa.s.s her death. She uses no mats because mats are too precious to be wantonly burned, and every mat she had used would be a weapon in the hands of her enemies. So she brings her child into the world unaided, and burns the hut and all it contains before she sets out for the village. Now, mark how superst.i.tion works for sanitation. Whereas the child of the coast is brought into the world in a stuffy hut, and swaddled in dirty bark-cloth, reeking with impurities, the inland baby and its mother are guarded against infection by a law of cleanliness more rigid than any that the Mosaic code enjoined.