ost him. When a man
died his widow became independent, except where there were surviving
sons by another wife, who in such case could claim their father's widow
as a concubine to be held in common. This singular custom doubtless
arose from the theory of the woman being a chattel of the estate and
reverting by right to the heirs. Adultery was punished on the woman by
death, while if the outraged husband took the guilty paramour in
_flagrante delicto_ he could slay him without incurring any penalty; if,
however, the man escaped, he could not afterward be killed with
impunity, but could be made to pay to the injured husband the original
cost of the wife. It seems highly probable, however, that among the
early Araucanians female virtue was of a high standard, though among
their descendants it is not quite so highly esteemed.

A somewhat curious custom, still in force among the Araucanians, was
that of borrowing children. A sterile woman was an object of reproach,
as has been the case among all primitive peoples, and she was likely to
forfeit the consideration of her husband and to be supplanted by a new
wife who might bear him children. It was to guard against this as far as
possible--as well as for protection, since sterility was cause for
divorce--that the barren Araucanian wife would often borrow from some
complacent and prolific kinswoman one or more of her children, whom the
sterile wife would rear as her own. The exact status of these children
in the household is not clear; they would seem to have been attributed
by courtesy, as it were, to the wife, but not to have stood as heirs to
the husband unless in default of heirs of his body, nor even then except
by express testamentary act, or that which bore the value of such act,
on his part. Yet the fact that the custom existed and still exists is
sufficient to show that it must in some way have assured the position of
the barren wife. The Araucanians, by the way, notwithstanding a
statement to the contrary by Molinos, swathe their children as do most
Indian tribes, and they even tie their infants to a bamboo frame so
tightly that the little unfortunates have no control over any portion of
their bodies save their eyes, and in this state they are hung upon the
walls when it is desirable to get them out of the way an occurrence so
frequent that the infants pass nearly their whole existence hung upon
pegs like unhappy _lares_.

One curious Araucanian custom, surviving to th