MARRIAGE. 
321 
But little real affection consequently exists between 
husbands and wives, and young men value a wife 
principally for her services as a slave ; in fact when 
asked why they are anxious to obtain wives, their 
usual reply is, that they may get wood, water, and 
food for them, and carry whatever property they 
possess. In 1842 the wife of a native in Ade- 
laide, a girl about eighteen, was confined, and re- 
covered slowly ; before she was well the tribe removed 
from the locality, and the husband preferred accom- 
panying them, and left his wife to die, instead of 
remaining to attend upon her and administer to her 
wants. When the natives were gone, the girl was re- 
moved to the mission station, to receive medical attend- 
ance, but eventually died. In the same year an old 
woman who broke her thigh was left to die, as the 
tribe did not like the trouble of carrying her about. 
Parents are treated in the same manner when help- 
less and infirm.* In 1839 I found an aged man left 
to die, without fire or food, upon a high bare hill 
beyond the Broughton. In 1843 I found two old 
women, who had been abandoned in the same way, 
at the Murray, and although they were taken every 
amorem inter nuptos vix posse esse grandem, quum omnia quse ad 
foeminas attinent, hominum arbitrio ordinentnr et tanta sexuum 
societati laxitas, et adolescentes quibus ita multae ardoris ex- 
plendi dantur occasiones, haud magnopere uxores, nisi ut servas 
desideraturos. 
* “Practised by the American Indians.” — Catlin, vol. i. 
p. 216 . 
VOL. II. 
Y 
