T6 NATURAL HISTORY OF AUCTIC AMERICA. 



tirely to female cliildreu, the reason beiug, they tell us, that they are 

 unable to hunt, and consequently of little account. It seems to have 

 b'^en referable to the same cause among the Cumberland Eskimo. Their 

 intercourse with the whites seems to have modified some of the most 

 barbarous of their primitive habits. 



Twins are not common, and triplets very rare. The males outnumber 

 the females. Infanticide may, to some extent, be the cause; but lung 

 diseases, which are alarmingly prevalent, seem more fatal to the women 

 than to the men. 



Children are often mated by the parents while they are still mere in- 

 fants. There is such an extreme laxity of morals that the young women 

 almost invarialy become wives only a short time before they are mothers. 



It is impossible to say at what age the women cease to bear children, 

 as they have no idea of their own age, and few are able to count above 

 ten. Puberty takes place at an early age, possibly at fourteen with the 

 female. They are not a prolific race, and it is seldom a woman has more 

 than tM'o or three children, and often only one, of her own; still many, 

 or almost all, have children ; but inquiry will generally divulge the fact 

 that some of the children have l)ecn bonglit. Almost every young woman 

 has or has had a child, but the identity of the father is in no wise neces- 

 sary in order to insure the respectability of the mother or child. Such 

 cliildren are generally traded or given away to sonic elderly eoui>le as 

 soon as they are old enough to leave the mother. The foster-parents 

 take quite as good care of such adopted children as if they were their 

 own. 



So far as we coiUd learn, thej' do not generally practice any rites or 

 ceremonies of marriage. The best hnnfer. or tlie owner of the largest 

 numl)er of dogs and hunting-gear, will seldom have any difliculty in 

 proenring the woman of his choice i'or a wife, e\en though she has a 

 husband at the lime. It is a common ]iraetiee to trade wives for short 

 periods or for good. They a])]>ear to have maniage rites sometimes, but 

 we coidd induce no on<' to tell us, e.\eei>t one s^iuaw, who agreed to, 

 but only on condition that we l)ecanu' one of tin- intei'csted ]>arti«'s and 

 Bhetheother. This was more than we had liargained I'oi-, and, although 

 generally willing to be a martyr for the <*ause of seit'uee, we allowed this 

 oppoitunity to jtass without imjuoving it. 



Monogamy is at the ])resent time tin- most |»re\ alent. Tolygamy is 

 practiced only in the case of a man being al)Ie to in(»\ id«' for two or more 

 wives. Tliree, and even foui, are known ot'. but lare. Neithei- do two 



