of the family tie, is confined to those few chiefs who are still heathens.
Usually the young men and girls marry very young. English travellers state they have seen a mother only 11 years of age! Usually the first wife of a young chief is much older than himself, but, on the other hand, instances were frequent of old men marrying young girls. The daughters of men of very high rank frequently remained unmarried.
The mortality among infants under a year old is very great. At present not more than three children are reckoned to each family, and the number of barren marriages is much greater than those that prove fruitful.
Infanticide is at present as rare as in Europe. In former times, especially during the wars of the interior, it was by no means unusual for a mother to put her children to death, especially if females, in order to spare herself the trouble of nursing and bringing up. Male offspring, on the contrary, were taken more care of, because they would increase the aggressive power of the tribe, and were looked upon as the avengers of injuries sustained and not yet compensated. Illegitimate children they almost always put to death, either by strangling them or compressing the mouth and nostrils. The practice of infanticide among the weaker sex took its rise chiefly in the life of slavery which was the normal state of the women during their heathen condition. Such was the reasoning once avowed by a murderess of her
child:—"Why should my child live? to be brought up as the slave of the wives of my husband, to be beaten and kicked by them!"
There seems to be some mistake in the assertion of several writers upon the customs prevalent in New Zealand, to the effect that on the death of a Maori it is customary to sacrifice his nearest relatives. Only when a great chief dies, are some of his slaves occasionally put to death at the same time, that their spirits may accompany him who has preceded them to the shadowy land, to serve him there, and execute his commands as they did while on earth.
So too it occasionally happened that, on the death of a much-esteemed chief, a hostile incursion was made by a number of warriors, in order to provide a victim from another tribe, and thus make it feel the same pang as that which they were suffering in the loss of their chief. Suicide, on the death of a near relative, is even at present far from uncommon as a token of inconsolable grief. A low estimate of the value of life seems to be a leading feature in the character of the New Zealander; it needs but a slight cause to make him take his own life or plunge into some abyss.
Slavery, to the extent that existed among the aborigines in former times, is no longer to be found, though many prisoners taken in war are still held as slaves by their captors. In many cases the slaves prefer to stay with their present masters, if they have been well treated, rather than return among their own race, from whom they feel themselves
estranged, and by whom it is probable they have long been forgotten.
The introduction of Christianity was immediately followed by the manumission of all slaves throughout the islands. Under the old laws, the owner of a slave was undisputed master of his person and property, and might put him to death, or sell him,—in short, do with him as he pleased. Everything that the slave possessed belonged to his master. Slaves were usually made in battle, either during the storming of a fortified village, or páh, or during flight before a victorious enemy. Each warrior might take as many prisoners as he could, who thereupon became his incontestable property. Chiefs, however, and youths of rank were usually put to death on the spot.