Part 10 (2/2)
Afr_., 158), says of the Landamas and Nalous: ”It is very remarkable that good order and perfect harmony prevail among all these women who are called to share the same conjugal couch.” The same writer says of the polygamous Foulahs (224):
”In general the women appear very happy, and by no means jealous of each other, except when the husbands make a present to one without giving anything to the rest.”
Note the last sentence; it casts a strong light on our problem. It suggests that even where a semblance of jealousy is manifested by such women it may often be an entirely different thing from the jealousy we a.s.sociate with love; envy, greed, or rivalry being more accurate terms for it. Here is another instance in point. Drake, in his work on the Indians of the United States has the following (I., 178):
”Where there is a plurality of wives, if one gets finer goods than the others, there is sure to be some quarrelling among the women; and if one or two of them are not driven off, it is because the others have not strength enough to do so. The man sits and looks on, and lets the women fight it out. If the one he loves most is driven off, he will go and stay with her, and leave the others to s.h.i.+ft for themselves awhile, until they can behave better, as he says.”
The Rev. Peter Jones gives this description (81) of a fight he witnessed between the two wives of an Ojibway chief:
”The quarrel arose from the unequal distribution of a loaf of bread between the children. The husband being absent, the wife who had brought the bread to the wigwam gave a piece of it to each child, but the best and largest portion to her _own_. Such partiality immediately led to a quarrel. The woman who brought the bread threw the remainder in anger to the other; she as quickly cast it back again; in this foolish way they kept on for some time, till their fury rose to such a height that they at length sprang at one another, catching hold of the hair of the head; and when each had uprooted a handful their ire seemed satisfied.”
To make clear the difference between such ebullitions of temper and the pa.s.sion properly called jealousy, let us briefly sum up the contents of this chapter. In its first stage it is a mere masculine rage in presence of a rival. An Australian female in such a case calmly goes off with the victor. A savage looks upon his wife, not as a person having rights and feelings of her own, but as a piece of property which he has stolen or bought, and may therefore do with whatever he pleases. In the second stage, accordingly, women are guarded like other movable property, infringement on which is fiercely resented and avenged, though not from any jealous regard for chast.i.ty, for the same husband who savagely punishes his wife for secret adultery, willingly lends her to guests as a matter of hospitality, or to others for a compensation. In some cases the husband's ”wounded feelings” may be cured by the payment of a fine, or subjecting the culprit's wife to indignities. At a higher stage, where some regard is paid to chast.i.ty--at least in the women reserved for genealogical purposes--masculine jealousy is still of the sensual type, which leads to the life-long imprisonment of women in order to enforce a fidelity which in the absence of true love could not be secured otherwise. As for the wives in primitive households, they often indulge in ”jealous”
squabbles, but their pa.s.sion, though it may lead to manifestations of rage and to fierce and cruel fights, is after all only skin deep, for it is easily overcome with soft words, presents, or the desire for the social position and comfort which can be secured in the house of a man who is wealthy enough to marry several women--especially if the husband is rich and wise enough to keep the women in separate lodges; though even that is often unnecessary.
There is no difficulty in understanding why primitive feminine ”jealousy,” despite seeming exceptions, should have been so shallow and transient a feeling. Everything conspired to make it so. From the earliest times the men made systematic efforts to prevent the growth of that pa.s.sion in women because it interfered with their own selfish desires. Hearne says of the women of the Northern Indians that ”they are kept so much in awe of their husbands, that the liberty of thinking is the greatest privilege they enjoy” (310); and A.H. Keane (_Journ. of Anthrop. Inst_., 1883) remarks that while the Botocudos often indulge in fierce outbreaks of jealousy, ”the women have not yet acquired the right to be jealous, a sentiment implying a certain degree of equality between the s.e.xes.” Everywhere the women were taught to subordinate themselves to the men, and among the Hindoos as among the Greeks, by the ancient Hebrews as well as by the mediaeval Arabs freedom from jealousy was inculcated as a supreme virtue. Rachel actually fancied she was doing a n.o.ble thing in giving her handmaids to Jacob as concubines. Lane (246) quotes the Arab historian El-Jabartee, who said of his first wife:
”Among her acts of conjugal piety and submission was this that she used to buy for her husband beautiful slave girls, with her own wealth, and deck them with ornaments and apparel, and so present them to him confidently looking to the reward and recompense which she should receive [in Paradise] for such conduct.”
”In case of failure of an heir,” says Griffis, in his famous work on j.a.pan (557), ”the husband is fully justified, often strongly advised even by his wife, to take a handmaid to raise up seed to preserve their ancestral line.” A Persian instance is given by Ida Pfeiffer (261), who was introduced at Tabreez to the wives of Behmen-Mirza, concerning whom she writes:
”They presented to me the latest addition to the harem--a plump brown little beauty of sixteen; and they seemed to treat their new rival with great good nature and told me how much trouble they had been taking to teach her Persian.”
JEALOUSY PURGED OF HATE
Casting back a glance over the ground traversed, we see that women as well as men--primitive, ancient, oriental--were either strangers to jealousy of any kind, or else knew it only as a species of anger, hatred, cruelty, and selfish sensuality; never as an ingredient of love. Australian women, Lumholtz tells us (203), ”often have bitter quarrels about men whom they love[19] and are anxious to marry. If the husband is unfaithful, the wife frequently becomes greatly enraged.”
As chast.i.ty is not by Australians regarded as a duty or a virtue, such conduct can only be explained by referring to what Roth, for instance, says (141) in regard to the Kalkadoon. Among these, where a man may have as many as four or five wives,
”the discarded ones will often, through jealousy, fight with her whom they consider more favored; on such occasions they may often resort to stone-throwing, or even use fire-sticks and stone-knives with which to mutilate the genitals.”
Similarly, various cruel disfigurements of wives by husbands or other wives, previously referred to as customary among savages, have their motive in the desire to mar the charms of a rival or a disobedient conjugal slave. The Indian chief who bites off an intriguing wife's nose or lower lip takes, moreover, a cruel delight at sight of the pain he inflicts--a delight of which he would be incapable were he capable of love. To such an Indian, Shakspere's lines
But O, what d.a.m.ned minutes tells he o'er Who dotes yet doubts, suspects, yet strongly loves,
would be as incomprehensible as a Beethoven symphony. With his usual genius for condensation, Shakspere has in those two lines given the essentials of true jealousy--suspicion causing agony rather than anger, and proceeding from love, not from hate. The fear, distress, humiliation, anguish of modern jealousy are in the mind of the injured husband. He suffers torments, but has no wish to torment either of the guilty ones. There are, indeed, even in civilized countries, husbands who slay erring wives; but they are not civilized husbands: like Oth.e.l.lo, they still have the taint of the savage in them. Civilized husbands resort to separation, not to mutilation or murder; and in dismissing the guilty wife, they punish themselves more than her--for she has shown by her actions that she does not love him and therefore cannot feel the deepest pang of the separation. There is no anger, no desire for revenge.
How comes this gentle concord in the world, That hatred is so far from jealousy?
It comes in the world through love--through the fact that a man--or a woman--who truly loves, cannot tolerate even the thought of punis.h.i.+ng one who has held first place in his or her affections. Modern law emphasizes the essential point when it punishes adultery because of ”alienation of the affections.”
A VIRTUOUS SIN
Thus, whereas the ”jealousy” of the savage who is transported by his sense of proprietors.h.i.+p to b.l.o.o.d.y deeds and to revenge is a most ign.o.ble pa.s.sion, incompatible with love, the jealousy of modern civilization has become a n.o.ble pa.s.sion, justified by moral ideals and affection--”a kind of G.o.dly jealousy which I beseech you call a virtuous sin.”
Where Love reigns, disturbing Jealousy Doth call himself Affection's sentinel.
And let no one suppose that by purging itself of b.l.o.o.d.y violence, hatred, and revenge, and becoming the sentinel of _affection_, jealousy has lost any of its intensity. On the contrary, its depth is quintupled. The bl.u.s.ter and fury of savage violence is only a momentary ebullition of sensual pa.s.sion, whereas the anguish of jealousy as we feel it is
Agony unmix'd, _incessant_ gall, Corroding every thought, and blasting all Love's paradise.
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