RoTH] MARRIAGE, POLYGAMY, DIVORCE, WORK 669 
next door to her’s for some two or three nights before. It may be 
after a paiwarri feast, when he will stay on for a day or two if he 
happens to have an eye on the daughter of the house. As soon as 
the dorakuara sings of a morning, which is in the very early dawn, 
he will go over to the father’s hammock, wake him, and say he wishes 
to have a talk. The old man immediately picks up a cigarette, leans 
out of his hammock to fan up the fire underneath, lights his smoke, 
and is all attention. “What is it?” he will say. The young man 
then tells him that he likes his daughter and wants to know if he 
can have her; he also inquires whether he would like him for son-in- 
law, and ends by saying that, although he may not be able to keep 
his daughter and future wife exactly as the old man would like, he 
will try his best to please him in every respect. At last the father of 
the girl talks somewhat as follows: “I can not give you an answer 
until I hear from the girl and her mother; if the girl likes you, you 
will know for yourself, and I can not refuse you. But you can come 
again in a day or two,” the time depending upon the distance of the 
proposed son-in-law’s house. At the end of the time appointed the 
young man returns, but leaves his hammock at the water side or on 
the pathway. If the girl goes to fetch and bring this in he knows 
that his prospects are favorable, any doubt being clinched by the 
father telling her to give the young man cassava, pepper-pot, beltiri, 
or anything else that may be going. The young woman joins him in 
his hammock that very same night. After a few days the bride- 
groom may take his new wife on a visit to his mother’s, but he soon 
returns to his father-in-law’s place, where he takes up his permanent 
abode. 
“ Among the Makusi, as with the Warrau and Waika [ Akawai],” 
says Schomburgk, “aman may ask a father for his daughter, and if 
he is well known as a warrior, hunter, or fisherman, he is certain of 
being accepted. This being the case, he removes all his property to 
his father-in-law’s hut and devotes all his attention to him—hunts, 
fishes, and clears a field for him. If he complains of the exertion or 
does not appear energetic enough for his father-in-law, the latter 
will get rid of him with a word or two of thanks, ete.” (SR, m, 316). 
$70. Among the nations of the Orinoco, and to the westward of it, 
the practice of making a temporary exchange of wives for a limited 
time was in vogue. At the expiration of the period agreed upon they 
are received back without the smallest objection being raised on 
either side (FD, 55). So, also, there is Gumilla’s evidence. By 
mutual contract they will exchange their wives for a definite number 
of months; and the day of settlement over, each woman returns to 
her husband’s house (G, 1, 133). 
