In the Marquesas and Caroline islands, infanticide is a thing unknown. Even in New Zealand, and in other places where this shocking custom prevails and is justified, the children they do rear are cherished with the most indulgent tenderness, and no difference of treatment is observable toward sons or daughters.
Mr. Ellis thus describes the conduct of a chief named Tetoro, whom he saw at the Bay of Islands in 1816: “Before we set out on our short excursion, an incident occurred, which greatly raised my estimation of Tetoro’s character. In the front of the hut sat his wife, with two or three children playing around her. In passing from the hut to the boat, he struck one of the little ones with his foot; the child cried, and though the chief had his mat on, and his gun in his hand, and was in the act of stepping into the boat, where we were waiting for him, he no sooner heard its cries, than he turned back, took the child up in his arms, stroked its little head, dried its tears, and giving it to the mother, hastened to join us.”
The unbounded and almost incredible licentiousness that has prevailed in the Sandwich islands and at Otaheite, has produced the natural effect of diminishing parental and maternal love. When it is inconvenient to take care of children, there is no hesitation about killing them; if strangers wish to buy, they are willing to sell them for a string of beads; they generally pay little attention to their cries or sufferings; and if the poor little creatures are very ill, they lay them down upon the sands to die. The introduction of Christianity into these islands is, however, gradually producing a better state of things.
The birth of a son is hailed with the utmost delight. He generally receives the name of some animal, river, or island; but sometimes slight incidents give rise to a name; thus a little girl of the Sandwich islands was called Lealea-hoku, or The Star Necklace, because she had a necklace made of small steel stars, such as European ladies formerly wore on their shoes.
In New Zealand, fathers take the entire care of boys from the moment they are weaned. The child clasps his little arms about the neck of his parent, and remains suspended on his shoulders, covered with his mat, during the longest journeys and most toilsome occupations. The children are so much accustomed to this position, that they sleep with perfect security.
Infants in this part of the world are nursed a long time. They are often able to run about and talk, before they are weaned. When mothers are busy at their work, they lay them down on a clean mat, and when necessary to carry them about, they fasten them in a sort of satchel at their backs. Little children seldom wear clothing of any kind. In the Marquesas, every child inherits at least one bread-fruit tree from its parents; for if they have no trees in their possession, one is planted as soon as an infant is born, that it may have something for future maintenance. The tree is immediately tabooed, or forbidden, to every one except the individual for whom it is set apart. Even the parents of the child are not allowed to eat of the fruit, or to dispose of it. Both girls and boys, men and women, hold this species of property with perfect security.
The connections formed in the South Sea islands hardly deserve the name of marriage. They take place with very little ceremony, and are dissolved whenever the husband wishes for a change. A woman often has five or six husbands in succession, without the slightest disparagement to her character; but whether she continues to like her companion or not, she is bound to remain with him till he consents to a separation. The first time a daughter is married, her parents present a hog, a fowl, or a plantain tree, to their son-in-law, before it is allowable for them to eat of his provisions; but this is not customary when the woman has previously had a husband. In some places the lover offers the bride’s father a present of fruit, fish, or other articles, the value of which depends upon his rank. Chieftains of the higher classes generally give a feast on the occasion of a daughter’s marriage. The bride is loaded with mats of the finest workmanship, anointed with fragrant oil, and veiled in delicate white gnatoo. The guests wear wreaths of flowers, and floating red ribands, resembling silk, made of the fine membrane of a tree. When the father gives his daughter to the bridegroom, he reminds her that she is now tabooed, or belongs solely and sacredly to her husband. The entertainment concludes with singing, dancing, and wrestling.
If a powerful chief takes a fancy to a girl, he often carries her off by force, and in spite of her resistance; ambitious parents not unfrequently betroth their daughters in infancy to some man of rank, and the contract must afterward be fulfilled; female captives taken in war are always at the disposal of their conquerors; but, generally speaking, mutual inclination constitutes the sole bond of union in all the islands of the Pacific.
At Nukuhiva it is the custom for every woman to have two husbands. Some favorite of a girl’s father becomes her husband, while she is yet very young, and remains under the paternal roof, until she is contracted in marriage to another individual. On this occasion, the wife and her first companion remove to their new residence, and are both supported by the second husband.
In the other islands, polygamy prevails under the more usual form of a plurality of wives. The number varies according to circumstances; the poor seldom have more than one or two; the chiefs sometimes have twelve or fifteen. She who is of the best family is the principal wife; the others are subordinate to her, and her children take precedence of theirs. If the mothers are not noble, the children are never so, whatever may be the rank of their father.