“A further fact,” Dr. Post says, “which speaks for sexual intercourse having originally been unchecked, is the wide-spread custom that the sexes may cohabit perfectly freely previous to marriage.”[302]
The immorality of many savages is certainly very great, but we must not believe that it is characteristic of uncivilized races in general. There are numerous savage and barbarous peoples among whom sexual intercourse out of wedlock is of rare occurrence, unchastity, at least on the part of the woman, being looked upon as a disgrace and even as a crime.
“A Kafir woman,” Barrow says, “is chaste and extremely modest;”[303] and Mr. Cousins writes to me that, between their various feasts, the Kafirs, both men and women, have to live in strict continence, the penalty being banishment from the tribe, if this law is broken. Proyart states that, among the people of Loango, “a youth durst not speak to a girl except in her mother’s presence,” and “the crime of a maid who has not resisted seduction, would be sufficient to draw down a total ruin on the whole country, were it not expiated by a public avowal made to the king.”[304] Among the Equatorial Africans, mentioned by Mr. Winwood Reade, a girl who disgraces her family by wantonness is banished from her clan; and, in cases of seduction, the man is severely flogged.[305] In Dahomey, if a man seduces a girl, the law compels marriage, and the payment of eighty cowries to the parent or master.[306] In Tessaua, according to Dr. Barth, a fine of 100,000 kurdi is imposed on the father of a bastard child—a sum which indicates how seldom such children are born there.[307] Among the Beni-Mzab, a man who seduces a young girl has to pay two hundred francs, and is banished for four years.[308] Among the Beni-Amer, according to Munzinger, the unmarried women are very modest, though the married women believe that they are allowed everything.[309] Among the Arab girls in Upper Egypt, unchastity is made impossible by an operation when they are from three to five years old;[310] and among the Marea, continence is a scarcely less necessary virtue, as a maiden or widow who becomes pregnant is killed together with the seducer and the child.[311] As regards the Kabyles, Messrs. Hanoteau and Letourneux assert, “Les mœurs ne tolèrent même aucune relation sexuelle en dehors du mariage.... L’enfant né en dehors du mariage est tué ainsi que sa mère.”[312]