670 ARTS AND CRAFTS OF GUIANA INDIANS [ETH. ANN. 38 
871. Marriage by purchase, either in the shape of presents, work 
done, etc., was of common usage. Thus, in one thing there is more 
or less agreement among all the (Orinoco) nations, and that is their 
daughters are salable, that the bridegroom must pay the parents for 
the trouble taken in rearing them, and also for the solicitude and care 
with which they will henceforth work for their husbands (G, 1, 284). 
By way of business it is distinctly agreed how much the bridegroom 
has to pay for the bride. This settled, the bargain is complete. It 
she is old enough he takes her away. Otherwise from that time forth 
the obligation rests on him of getting food for her. When he who 
asks for the marriageable girl is a man already possessing another or 
other wives, the consent of the girl’s parents is rendered very difficult 
to obtain and is only overcome by an increase in the payment 
(G, u, 286). By whatever means the Warrau may have secured his 
first wife, his second, third, and fourth ones are obtained by presents 
(i. e., purchase). If the wife is old, an event which usually already 
takes place at 20 years of age, the man looks out for another from 
the little girls of 7 and 8 years of age. He hands the child over to 
the eldest wife for instruction, who teaches her the household duties 
until such time as she enters upon all the rights and cares of a mar- 
ried woman (SR, 1, 164). Aiyukanti, the Makusi, had bought Baru 
of Pirara as a child in order that upon her entrance into woman- 
hood he might have her as his second wife (SR, m, 141). So also 
among the Carib the male relations of the women would sometimes 
demand payment before they would consent to give them in marriage, 
even when the woman was a widow, and no longer very young... . 
Brett tells the story of an old Carib father coming to claim compen- 
sation from his son-in-law for the loss of his daughter’s services and 
of his subsequent claim for the child. The unwritten law of Carib 
usage was decidedly in the old man’s favor and he received com- 
pensation for that child. For each succeeding birth he could, if he 
chose, reappear like an unquiet spirit, make a similar demand, and 
be supported therein by the custom of his nation (Br, 353-354). 
872. With the Island Carib, when there happened to be among the 
female prisoners of war any that they liked, they made them their 
wives, but though the children born of them were free, yet were the 
mothers, for their part, still accounted slaves (RO, 545). Among 
the Uaupes River Indians there is no particular ceremony at mar- 
riage, except that of always carrying away the girl by force or mak- 
ing a show of doing so, even when she and her parents are quite 
willing (ARW, 346). 
873. Girls may be offered to a man by their father, mother, or by 
themselves. Among the Arawak of the Moruca, if a father wants 
some celebrated person as husband for his daughter, he lets her place 
