115 



CHAP. IX. 



J\Iatrimony and Domestic Employments. 



By the admapu polj^gamy is allowed among the 

 Araucanians, whence they marry as many wives 

 as they can furnish with a dower^ or more pro- 

 perly purchase, as to obtain them they must give 

 to their fathers a certain amoimt of property, as 

 has been and still is the practice in most countries 

 of both continents. But in their marriages they 

 scrupulously avoid the more immediate degrees 

 of relationship. Celibacy is considered as igno- 

 minious. Old batchelors are called, by way of 

 contempt, ruchiapra, and old maids cndcpra^ that 

 is, old, idle, good for nothing. 



Their marriajre ceremonies have little for- 

 mality, or, to speak more accurately, consist in 

 nothing more than in carrying off the bride by 

 pretended violence, which is considered by them, 

 as by the negroes of Africa, an essential pre- 

 requisite to the nuptials. The husband, in con- 

 cert with the father, conceals himself with some 

 friends near the place where they know the bride 

 is to pass. As soon as she arrives she is seized 

 and put on horseback behind the bridegroom, 

 notwithstanding her pretended resistance and her 



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