London Labour and the London Poor, Vol. 4

by Henry Mayhew

Almost everywhere the prostitute class, among Eastern nations, has addicted itself to other pursuits—to music and the dance—to inflame the lust which it designs itself to satisfy. In many countries also the prostitutes have been allied to the priesthood. Thus in India they have formed a sacred class; in the cities of Arabia they are encouraged by the Moolahs to frequent places of worship; elsewhere they have flourished under the auspices of government, which has placed them under the charge of inspectors and derived profit from their degradation. In such countries they carry on their profession more openly, and are more openly encouraged, than in others where their occupation is clandestine.

Some of the nations included in this division of the subject appear to have reached the last stage of their native civilization. Among these is China: her further progress will not be influenced by internal causes, but will be regulated by contact with a superior race. In India the process has already begun, and in the condition of women, and consequently, also, in their national character, the change is becoming apparent. Widow-burning is already a thing of the past; the blot of infanticide will soon be obliterated from the face of society; the prejudice which prevented the second marriage of women, and drove thousands to suicide or prostitution, is gradually yielding before reason; the barriers of caste are being broken down, and more natural relations restored to society. Women in India are the chief degradation to the sacred class of Brahmins, in whom were combined the fanaticism of idolatrous priests and the pride of nobles. Thus the contact of English with Oriental civilization, gentle as it has been, is leading to the subjugation of the latter before the more humane and liberal principles of the former. But it is singular to find that much more difficulty is experienced in modifying the social institutions of half-educated, than in changing those of barbarous races. With the one they are based on habit, with the other on prejudice; and the pride of a little learning induces the one to cling to them, while the simplicity of the savage allows him easily to yield.

The sentiment of chastity is nowhere discovered pure except among very simple and unsophisticated, or very refined and polished nations. It is found in the Bedouin encampments of Arabia, it is found in the pastoral communities of Afghanistan, and it is found among the wandering shepherds of Asia Minor; but amid the barbaric millions of China, with their innumerable maxims of virtue, the true sentiment is very rare. So also is that of love, which belongs also to the infancy and to the maturity of nations, for in the intervening stages it becomes mingled with an alloy of interest, sensuality, or superstition.

Prostitution, however, belongs to all ages and to every nation. But it assumes various forms in the different classes of mankind: it is loose and scattered among the barbarous tribes not yet settled under the forms of regular society; it is systematized and acknowledged among the half-barbarous races; it is adopted as a sacred institution, in regions where the object of the priesthood is, to enslave the souls of men through their senses; it is encouraged in States where the desire of government is to absorb the people in the pursuit of animal gratification, and thus distract their attention from public affairs; it is submitted to a strict, though awkward discipline in countries where the rulers desire to mimic the social code of civilized commonwealths; and as society progresses, though it becomes distinct and conspicuous, it exchanges the highway for the bye-street, the day for the night, withdraws from other classes of the people, and becomes a despised sisterhood, cut off from intercourse with the moral classes of women.

Various stages of this process may have been remarked in the view of the condition and character of women, and the extent and state of the prostitute system in barbarous countries. We now enter on the half-educated communities which occupy the greater part of the world’s surface, and these will lead in the communities of Europe, to which they are linked, on the one hand by Turkey, and on the other by the inhospitable deserts of Siberia.

Of Celebes.

In a region so vast as the Indian Archipelago it would be useless to dwell separately upon every island, especially as many characteristics are common to most of them. We have taken Java and Sumatra as representing the Sunda group, and we shall take Celebes as the head of a family of isles, with Borneo as another. Incidental notices of any peculiarities in the lesser isles will suffice.

Celebes, in its political and social state, is far in advance of the other countries in insular Asia. It enjoys in many of its States a considerable degree of civilization. The idea of freedom, so rare among barbarous races, is recognised in its political system, and representative institutions have actually developed themselves into a republican form of government. Where such progress has been made in the art of civil polity, we may look with confidence for a superior social scheme, and this we actually find. It should be premised that the Indian Archipelago is peopled by two races—the brown, or Malay; and the black, or Ethiopian. The former is the more powerful, intelligent, and polished, and has therefore become the conquering race. It has subdued the Negro hordes of the various islands, and is now paramount in all the great native States. In Java, Sumatra, and Celebes, it has entirely displaced the original possessors of the soil, who dwell only in scattered communities, defended from annihilation by forests and hills, which serve in some degree to balance that native valour which has made the Malays an imperial nation, subdued in their turn by the more powerful race from Europe.

In the States of Celebes women are not excluded from their share in the public business of the commonwealth, though their influence is usually indirect. They rule their own households, give counsel to the men on all important occasions, and even, when the monarchy is elective, are frequently raised to the throne. They eat with their husbands, and from the same dish, only using the left side. They appear mixed with the other sex at public festivals, and, when intrusted with authority, preside over the councils, and are vigorous in the exercise of their prerogative. Nor is peace the only era of their reign. They have sometimes presented themselves in the field, and animated the warriors to battle by applauding the courageous and upbraiding the timid.

In the State of Wajo, which is, perhaps, the most advanced in the island, one check upon civilization exists, and that is the extravagant pride of birth. The spirit, if not the actual institution of caste, exists, and is productive of the usual evils attending an artificial division of classes. A woman of pure descent dare not mingle her blood with that of an inferior, though a man may ally himself with a girl of humbler station. The offspring of such a connection, however, carry with them an appellation denoting their imperfect parentage.