HISTORY OF MADAGASCAR. 
163 
patronized by the government, placed under instruction, 
and when approaching what is deemed among the people 
the age of maturity, viz. from fourteen to eighteen years, 
great numbers were taken into the army. Where this is 
not the case, as soon as a youth is able to serve the 
purposes of the government, he is expected to form his 
own domestic establishment, to perform his share of all 
public services, and bear his portion of the taxes, and other 
public burdens of the people. When this takes place, if 
the lands of the father are sufficient, a section is given to 
the son as his portion ; but when the possessions of the 
father will not admit of this, land is purchased for the son, 
usually at a low rate, the price seldom exceeding six or 
seven dollars per acre. 
The practice of betrothing children at a very early age 
prevails to a great extent in Madagascar; the parents fre¬ 
quently make an arrangement for their children with a 
view to their marriage, before the latter are capable of 
thinking for themselves on the subject. These are consi¬ 
dered as voa-fofo, “betrothed” or “pledged.” In other 
cases, young persons think and judge for themselves. 
Domestic manners in Madagascar do not impose the 
restraints usual in most Oriental countries; very frequent 
opportunities therefore occur in the social intercourse of 
families, for young persons of both sexes to see each 
other, and, as elsewdiere, love and courtship precede 
matrimony. Usually, however, such alliances are formed 
on the arrangements of the parents, and not unfrequently 
through their influence. Many of both sexes are married 
at the age of twelve or fourteen. These sometimes con¬ 
tinue to live with their parents, though they more frequently 
form separate establishments for themselves. Shortly after 
the ages above specified, they frequently become parents. 
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