508 SOCIAL POSITION OF WOMEN. 



amonfj savages themselves, we must admit that female virtue 



o o 



is, in many cases, but slightly regarded; as, indeed, is but 

 natural when women themselves are looked upon as little 

 better than domestic animals. Among many tribes, for in- 

 stance the South Sea Islanders and the Esquimaux, indecent 

 dances are not only common, but are countenanced by women 

 of the highest rank, to whom it does not appear to occur that 

 there is any harm or impropriety in them. Judged by our 

 standards, these facts are very dreadful ; but we must remem- 

 ber they did not entail on savages the same fatal consequences 

 as with us ; and before we condemn them too severely, let us 

 remember our own literature and our own morality, even in 

 the last century. 



The harsh, not to say cruel treatment of women, which is 

 almost universal among savages, is one of the deepest stains 

 upon their character. They regard the weaker sex as beings 

 of an inferior order, as mere domestic drudges. Nor are the 

 labours and sufferings of the women sweetened by any great 

 affection on the part of those for whom they toil. We have 

 already seen that the Algonquins had no word for "love" in 

 their language, and that the Tinne Indians had no equivalent 

 for "dear" or "beloved/' Captain Lefroy* says: "I endea- 

 voured to put this intelligibly to Nannette, by supposing such 

 an expression as ' ma chere femme ; ma chere fille.' When at 

 length she understood it, her reply was (with great emphasis), 

 ' I' disent jamais c,a ; i' disent ma femme, ma fille." Spix and 

 Martius-f- tell us that among the Brazilian tribes the father 

 has scarcely any, the mother only an instinctive, affection for. 

 the child. There can be no doubt that, as an almost universal 

 rule, savages are cruel ; but we must remember that they are 

 less sensitive to pain than those who spend much of their 

 time in-doors, and that in many cases they inflict upon them- 

 selves also the most horrible tortures. 



* Richardson's Arctic Expetli- t Rcise, vol. i. p. 381. 



tion 3 vol. ii. p. 24. 



