an gradually taught men to respect and adore other
women, and as a matter of course, it was the lover who found it
easiest to get down on his knees before the girl he worshipped.

X. UNSELFISH GALLANTRY.

One day while lunching at an African foudak, half way between Tangier
and Tetuan, I was led to moralize on the conjugal superiority of
Mohammedan roosters to Mohammedan men. Noticing a fine large cock in
the yard, I threw him a handful of bread-crumbs. He was all alone at
the moment and might have easily gobbled them all up. Instead of doing
such a selfish thing, he loudly summoned his harem with that peculiar
clucking sound which is as unmistakable to fowls as is the word dinner
or the boom of a gong to us. In a few seconds the hens had gathered
and disposed of the bread, leaving not a crumb to their gallant lord
and master. I need not add that the Sultan of a human harem in Morocco
would have behaved very differently under analogous circumstances.

THE GALLANT ROOSTER

The dictionary makers derive the word gallant from all sorts of roots
in divers languages, meaning gay, brave, festive, proud, lascivious,
and so on. Why not derive if from the Latin _gallus_, rooster? A
rooster combines in himself all the different meanings of the word
gallant. He is showy in appearance, brave, daring, attentive to
females, and, above all, chivalrous, that is, inclined to show
disinterested courtesy to the weaker sex, as we have just seen. In
this last respect, it is true, the rooster stands not alone. It is a
trait of male animals in general to treat their females unselfishly in
regard to feeding and otherwise.

UNGALLANT LOWER RACES OF MEN

If we now turn to human beings, we have to ascend many strata of
civilization before we come across anything resembling the unselfish
gallantry of the rooster. The Australian savage, when he has speared a
kangaroo, makes his wife cook it, then selects the juiciest cuts for
himself and the other men, leaving the bones to the women and dogs.

Ascending to the much higher Polynesians and American Indians we still
find that the women have to content themselves with what the men
leave. A Hawaiian even considers it a disgrace to eat at the same
place as his wife, or with the same utensils.

What Kowney says (173) of the Nagas of India--"she does everything the
husband will not, and he considers it effeminate to do anything but
fight, hunt, and fish"--is true of the lower races in general