270 CHOCTAW LEGISLATION. 
captain of more than ordinary temerity arose, 
and offered a resolution that each and every 
individual who should thenceforward dare to 
introduce any of the liquid curses into their 
country, should be punished with a hundred 
lashes on his. bare back, and the liquor be 
poured out. This was passed, afier some 
slight changes, by acclamation: but, with a 
due sense of the injustice of ezx-post-facto re- 
strictions, all those who had liquors on hand 
were permitted to sell them. The council 
adjourned ; but the members soon began to 
canvass among each other the pernicious 
consequences which might result from the 
protracted use of the whiskey already in the 
shops, and therefore concluded the quicker it 
was drank up, the more promptly would the 
evil be over: so, falling to, in less than two 
hours Bacchus never mustered a drunker 
troop than were these same temperance 
legislators. The consequences of their de- 
termination were of lasting importance to 
them. The law, with some slight improve- 
ments, has ever since been rigorously en- 
forced. 
Among most of the Indian tribes the daugh- 
ter has very little to do with the selection of 
her husband. The parents usually require to 
be satisfied first, and their permission being 
secured the daughter never presumes to offer 
any-important resistance. There is a post- 
nuptial custom peculiar to the full-blood In- 
dians of the Choctaws, which deserves particu- 
lar notice. For years, and perhaps for life, 
