The opinion prevails that everywhere and always the first advances were made by the men, the women being passive, and coyly reserved. This opinion—like many other notions regarding the relations of the sexes—rests on ignorance, pure ignorance. In collecting the scattered facts bearing on this subject I have been more and more surprised at the number of exceptions to the rule, if, indeed, rule it be. Not only are there tribes among whom women must propose—as in the Torres Straits Islands, north of Australia, and with the Garos of India, concerning whom interesting details will be given in later chapters; but among many other savages and barbarians the women, instead of repelling advances, make them.
"In all Polynesia," says Gerland (VI., 127), "it was a common occurrence that the women wooed the men." "A proposal of marriage," writes Gill (Savage Life in Polynesia, II.), "may emanate with propriety from a woman of rank to an equal or an inferior." In an article on Fijian poetry (731-53), Sir Arthur Gordon cites the following native poem:
The girls of Vunivanua all had lovers,
But I, poor I, had not even one.
Yet I fell desperately in love one day,
My eye was filled with the beauty of Vasunilawedua.
She ran along the beach, she called the canoe-men.
She is conveyed to the town where her beloved dwells.
Na Ulumatua sits in his canoe unfastening its gear.
He asks her, "Why have you come here, Sovanalasikula?"
"They have been falling in love at Vunivanua," she answers;
"I, too, have fallen in love. I love your lovely son,
Vasunilawedua."
Na Ulumatua rose to his feet. He loosened a tambua whale's
tooth from the canoe.
"This," he said, presenting it to her, "is my offering to
you for your return. My son cannot wed you, lady."
Tears stream from her eyes, they stream down on her breast.
"Let me only live outside his house," she says;
"I will sleep upon the wood-pile. If I may only light his
seluka [cigarrette] for him, I shall rejoice.
If I may only hear his voice from a distance, it will
suffice. Life will be pleasant to me."
Na Ulumatua replied, "Be magnanimous, lady, and return.
We have many girls of our own. Return to your own land.
Vasunilawedua cannot wed a stranger."
Sovanalasikula went away crying.
She returned to her own town, forlorn.
Her life was sadness.
Ia nam bosulu.
Tregear (102) describes the "wooing house" in which New Zealand girls used to stand up in the dark and say: "I love so-and-so, I want him for a husband;" whereupon the chosen lover, if willing, would say yes, or cough to signify his assent. Among the Pueblo Indians
"the usual order of courtship is reversed; when a girl is disposed to marry, she does not wait for a young man to propose to her, but selects one to her own liking and consults her father, who visits the parents of the youth and acquaints them with his daughter's wishes. It seldom happens that any objections to the match are made" (Bancroft, I., 547);
and concerning the Spokane Indians the same writer says (276) that a girl "may herself propose if she wishes." Among the Moquis, "instead of the swain asking the hand of the fair one, she selects the young man who is to her fancy, and then her father proposes the match to the sire of the lucky youth" (Schoolcraft, IV., 86). Among the Dariens, says Heriot (325), "it is considered no mark of forwardness" in a woman "openly to avow her inclination," and in Paraguay, too, women were allowed to propose (Moore, 261). Indian girls of the Hudson River region
"were not debarred signifying their desire to enter matrimonial life. When one of them wished to be married, she covered her face with a veil and sat covered as an indication of her desire. If she attracted a suitor, negotiations were opened with parents or friends, presents given, and the bride taken" (Ruttenber).
A comic mode of catching a husband is described in an episode from the tale "Owasso and Wayoond" (Schoolcraft, A.R. II., 210-11):
"Manjikuawis was forward in her advances toward him. He, however, paid no attention to it, and shunned her. She continued to be very assiduous in attending to his wants, such as cooking and mending his mocassins. She felt hurt and displeased at his indifference, and resolved to play him a trick. Opportunity soon offered. The lodge was spacious, and she dug a hole in the ground, where the young man usually sat, covering it very carefully. When the brothers returned from the chase the young man threw himself down carelessly at the usual place, and fell into the cavity, his head and feet remaining out, so that he was unable to extricate himself. 'Ha! ha!' cried Manjikuawis, as she helped him out, 'you are mine, I have caught you at last, and I did it on purpose.' A smile came over the young man's face, and he said, 'So be it, I will be yours;' and from that moment they lived happily as man and wife."
It was a common thing among various Indian tribes for the women to court distinguished warriors; and though they might have no choice in the matter, they could at any rate place themselves temptingly in the way of these braves, who, on their part, had no occasion to be coy, since they could marry all the squaws they pleased. The squaws, too, did not hesitate to indulge, if not in two husbands, in more than one lover. Commenting on the Mandans, for instance, Maximilian Prinz zu Wied declares (II., 127) that "coyness is not a virtue of the Indian women; they often have two or three lovers at a time." Among the Pennsylvania Indians it was a common thing for a girl to make suit to a young man.