e la trouve chez les Iberiens ou les premiers
Peuples d'Espagne ... elle est aujourd'hui dans quelques unes de nos
Provinces d'Espagne."

The word _couvade_, forgotten in the sense of lying-in bed, recalled by
Sacombe, has been renovated in a happy manner by Dr. Tylor.

As to the custom itself, there can be no doubt of its existence, in spite
of some denials. Dr. Tylor, in the third edition of his valuable _Early
History of Mankind_, published in 1878 (Murray), since the last edition of
_The Book of Ser Marco Polo_, has added (pp. 291 seqq.) many more proofs
to support what he had already said on the subject.

There may be some strong doubts as to the _couvade_ in the south of
France, and the authors who speak of it in Bearn and the Basque Countries
seem to have copied one another, but there is not the slightest doubt of
its having been and of its being actually practised in South America.
There is a very curious account of it in the _Voyage dans le Nord du
Bresil_ made by Father Yves d'Evreux in 1613 and 1614 (see pp. 88-89 of
the reprint, Paris, 1864, and the note of the learned Ferdinand Denis, pp.
411-412). Compare with _Durch Central-Brasilien ... im Jahre_ 1884 _von
K.v. den Steinen_. But the following extract from _Among the Indians of
Guiana_.... _By Everard im Thurn_ (1883), will settle, I think, the
question:

"Turning from the story of the day to the story of the life, we may begin
at the beginning, that is, at the birth of the children. And here, at
once, we meet with, perhaps, the most curious point in the habits of the
Indians; the _couvade_ or male child-bed. This custom, which is common to
the uncivilized people of many parts of the world, is probably among the
strangest ever invented by the human brain. Even before the child is born,
the father abstains for a time from certain kinds of animal food. The
woman works as usual up to a few hours before the birth of the child. At
last she retires alone, or accompanied only by some other women, to the
forest, where she ties up her hammock; and then the child is born. Then in
a few hours--often less than a day--the woman, who, like all women living
in a very unartificial condition, suffers but little, gets up and resumes
her ordinary work. According to Schomburgk, the mother, at any rate among
the Macusis, remains in her hammock for some time, and the father hangs
his hammock, and lies in it, by her side; but in all cases where the
matter came under my notic