The trial marriage is an ineradicable custom among the Eskimos. If a young man and woman are not suited with each other, they try again, and sometimes several times; but when they find mates to whom they are adapted, the arrangement is generally permanent. If two men want to marry the same woman, they settle the question by a trial of strength, and the better man has his way. These struggles are not fights, as the disputants are amiable; they are simply tests of wrestling, or sometimes of pounding each other on the arm to see which man can stand the pounding the longer.
Their fundamental acceptance of the proposition that might is right in such matters sometimes extends to a man saying to the husband of a woman: "I am the better man." In such case the husband has either to prove his superiority in strength, or yield the woman to the other. If a man grows tired of his wife, he simply tells her there is not room for her in his igloo. She may return to her parents, if they are living; she may go to a brother or a sister; or she may send word to some man in the tribe that she is now at liberty and is willing to start life again. In these cases of primitive divorce, the husband keeps one or all of the children if he wants them; if not, the woman takes them with her.
The Eskimos do not have many children, two or three being the usual number. The woman does not take her husband's name in any case. Akatingwah, for instance, will remain Akatingwah, whether she has had one husband or several. Children do not address their parents as father and mother, but call them by their names, though sometimes very small children use a diminutive which corresponds to our "mamma."
Among the Eskimos the woman is as much a part of the man's property as his dog or sledge—except in some rare cases. The cause of the suffragettes has as yet made little headway in this region. I remember one instance in which an Eskimo woman had a difference of opinion with her husband, and proved her right to independence by blackening the old man's eye; but I am afraid that the more conservative members of the tribe attributed this unfeminine behavior to the corrupting influence of contact with civilization.
As there are more men than women among the Eskimos, the girls marry very young, often about the age of twelve. In many cases the marriages are arranged between the parents when the children are quite young; but the boy and girl are not bound, and when they are old enough they are permitted to decide for themselves. In fact, they can make several such decisions without losing caste. On the last expedition, as on those of former years, I found that a number of matrimonial changes had taken place among my Northern friends since I was last among them.
It would be worse than useless to attempt to engraft our marriage customs upon these naive children of Nature. Should an arctic explorer consider it his duty to tell a young Eskimo that it was not right for him to exchange wives with his friend, it would be well for the explorer to have his supporting argument well prepared beforehand, for the censured one would probably open wide his eyes and inquire, "Why not?"