152 Of the Checks to Population in Bk. i. 



orders arising from debauchery; but, above all, 

 they would escape in great measure the ravages 

 of war. In a state of society in which hostilities 

 never cease, the drains of men, from this cause 

 alone, must occasion a great disproportion of the 

 sexes, particularly where it is the custom, as re- 

 lated of the Galla in Abyssinia,* to massacre 

 indiscriminately all the males, and save only the 

 marriageable women from the general destruction. 

 The actual disproportion of the sexes arising from 

 these causes probably first gave rise to the per- 

 mission of polygamy, and has perhaps contributed 

 to make us more easily believe, that the propor- 

 tion of male and female children in hot climates 

 is very different from what we have experienced 

 it to be in the temperate zone. 



Bruce, with his usual prejudices on this subject, 

 seems to think that the celibacy of a part of the 

 women is fatal to the population of a country. 

 He observes of Jidda that, on account of the great 

 scarcity of provisions, which is the result of an 

 extraordinary concourse of people to a place 

 almost destitute of the necessaries of life, few of 

 the inhabitants can avail themselves of the privi- 

 lege granted by Mahomet. They cannot there- 

 fore marry more than one wife; and from this 

 cause arises, he says, the want of people and the 

 large number of unmarried women.f But it is 



* Bruce's Travels to discover the Source of the Nile, vol. iv. p. 

 411. 



t Id. vol. i. c. xi. p. 280. 



