The Travels Of Marco Polo - Volume 2 Of 2 By Marco Polo And Rustichello Of Pisa











































 -  Archipelago.)

[In his second volume of The River of Golden Sand, Captain Gill has two
chapters (viii. and ix.) with - Page 96
The Travels Of Marco Polo - Volume 2 Of 2 By Marco Polo And Rustichello Of Pisa - Page 96 of 701 - First - Home

Enter page number    Previous Next

Number of Words to Display Per Page: 250 500 1000

Archipelago.)

[In his second volume of The River of Golden Sand, Captain Gill has two chapters (viii.

And ix.) with the title: In the footsteps of Marco Polo and of Augustus Margary devoted to The Land of the Gold-Teeth and The Marches of the Kingdom of Mien. - H.C.]

NOTE 3. - This is precisely the account which Lieutenant Garnier gives of the people of Laos: "The Laos people are very indolent, and when they are not rich enough to possess slaves they make over to their women the greatest part of the business of the day; and 'tis these latter who not only do all the work of the house, but who husk the rice, work in the fields, and paddle the canoes. Hunting and fishing are almost the only occupations which pertain exclusively to the stronger sex." (Notice sur le Voyage d'Exploration, etc., p. 34.)

NOTE 4. - This highly eccentric practice has been ably illustrated and explained by Mr. Tylor, under the name of the Couvade, or "Hatching," by which it is known in some of the Bearn districts of the Pyrenees, where it formerly existed, as it does still or did recently, in some Basque districts of Spain. [In a paper on La Couvade chez les Basques, published in the Republique Francaise, of 19th January, 1877, and reprinted in Etudes de Linguistique et a' Ethnographie par A. Hovelacque et Julien Vinson, Paris, 1878, Prof. Vinson quotes the following curious passage from the poem in ten cantos, Luciniade, by Sacombe, of Carcassonne (Paris and Nimes, 1790):

"En Amerique, en Corse, et chez l'Iberien, En France meme encor chez le Venarnien, Au pays Navarrois, lorsqu'une femme accouche, L'epouse sort du lit et le mari se couche; Et, quoiqu'il soit tres sain et d'esprit et de corps, Contre un mal qu'il n'a point l'art unit ses efforts. On le met au regime, et notre faux malade, Soigne par l'accouchee, en son lit fait couvade: On ferme avec grand soin portes, volets, rideaux; Immobile, on l'oblige a rester sur le dos, Pour etouffer son lait, qui gene dans sa course, Pourrait en l'etouffant remonter vers sa source. Un mari, dans sa couche, au medecin soumis, Recoit, en cet etat, parents, voisins, amis, Qui viennent l'exhorter a prendre patience Et font des voeux au ciel pour sa convalescence."

Professor Vinson, who is an authority on the subject, comes to the conclusion that it is not possible to ascribe to the Basques the custom of the couvade.

Mr. Tylor writes to me that he "did not quite begin the use of this good French word in the sense of the 'man-child-bed' as they call it in Germany. It occurs in Rochefort, Iles Antilles, and though Dr. Murray, of the English Dictionary, maintains that it is spurious, if so, it is better than any genuine word I know of." - H.C.] "In certain valleys of Biscay," says Francisque-Michel, "in which the popular usages carry us back to the infancy of society, the woman immediately after her delivery gets up and attends to the cares of the household, whilst the husband takes to bed with the tender fledgeling in his arms, and so receives the compliments of his neighbours."

The nearest people to the Zardandan of whom I find this custom elsewhere recorded, is one called Langszi,[2] a small tribe of aborigines in the department of Wei-ning, in Kweichau, but close to the border of Yun-nan:

Enter page number   Previous Next
Page 96 of 701
Words from 49199 to 49775 of 370046


Previous 96 97 98 99 100 101 102 103 104 105 Next

More links: First 10 20 30 40 50 60 70 80 90 100
 110 120 130 140 150 160 170 180 190 200
 210 220 230 240 250 260 270 280 290 300
 310 320 330 340 350 360 370 380 390 400
 410 420 430 440 450 460 470 480 490 500
 510 520 530 540 550 560 570 580 590 600
 610 620 630 640 650 660 670 680 690 700
 Last

Display Words Per Page: 250 500 1000

 
Africa (29)
Asia (27)
Europe (59)
North America (58)
Oceania (24)
South America (8)
 

List of Travel Books RSS Feeds

Africa Travel Books RSS Feed

Asia Travel Books RSS Feed

Europe Travel Books RSS Feed

North America Travel Books RSS Feed

Oceania Travel Books RSS Feed

South America Travel Books RSS Feed

Copyright © 2005 - 2022 Travel Books Online