The married couple after this make a public declaration of the love and regard they entertain for each other, and still holding the rod between them, dance and sing. When they have finished this part of the ceremony, they break the rod into as many pieces as there are witnesses present, who each take a piece, and preserve it with great care.
The bride is then re-conducted out of the door at which she entered, where her young companions wait to attend her to her father’s house; there the bridegroom is obliged to seek her, and the marriage is consummated. Very often the wife remains at her father’s house till she has a child, when she packs up her apparel, which is all the fortune she is generally possessed of, and accompanies her husband to his habitation.
When from any dislike a separation takes place, for they are seldom known to quarrel, they generally give their friends a few days notice of their intentions, and sometimes offer reasons to justify their conduct. The witnesses who were present at the marriage, meet on the day requested at the house of the couple that are about to separate, and bringing with them the pieces of rod which they had received at their nuptials, throw them into the fire in the presence of all the parties.
This is the whole of the ceremony required, and the separation is carried on without any murmurings or ill-will between the couple or their relations; and after a few months they are at liberty to marry again.
When a marriage is thus dissolved, the children which have been produced from it, are equally divided between them; and as children are esteemed a treasure by the Indians, if the number happens to be odd, the woman is allowed to take the better half.
Though this custom seems to encourage fickleness and frequent separations, yet there are many of the Indians who have but one wife, and enjoy with her a state of connubial happiness not to be exceeded in more refined societies. There are also not a few instances of women preserving an inviolable attachment to their husbands, except in the cases before-mentioned, which are not considered as either a violation of their chastity or fidelity.
Although I have said that the Indian nations differ very little from each other in their marriage ceremonies, there are some exceptions. The Naudowessies have a singular method of celebrating their marriages, which seems to bear no resemblance to those made use of by any other nation I passed through. When one of their young men has fixed on a young woman he approves of, he discovers his passion to her parents, who give him an invitation to come and live with them in their tent.
He accordingly accepts the offer, and by so doing engages to reside in it for a whole year, in the character of a menial servant. During this time he hunts, and brings all the game he kills to the family; by which means the father has an opportunity of seeing whether he is able to provide for the support of his daughter and the children that might be the consequence of their union. This however is only done whilst they are young men, and for their first wife, and not repeated like Jacob’s servitudes.
When this period is expired, the marriage is solemnized after the custom of the country, in the following manner: Three or four of the oldest male relations of the bridegroom, and as many of the bride’s, accompany the young couple from their respective tents to an open part in the centre of the camp.
The chiefs and warriors being here assembled to receive them, a party of the latter are drawn up in two ranks on each side of the bride and bridegroom immediately on their arrival. The principal chief then acquaints the whole assembly with the design of their meeting, and tells them that the couple before them, mentioning at the same time their names, are come to avow publicly their intentions of living together as man and wife. He then asks the two young people alternately, whether they desire that the union might take place. Having declared with an audible voice that they do so, the warriors fix their arrows, and discharge them over the heads of the married pair; this done, the chief pronounces them man and wife.