According to the generalization of Post, who has given the most careful groupings,[725] "the laws of divorce found among the different peoples of the earth vary within the widest limits conceivable." So confusing, indeed, is the mass of custom relating to the subject that in the very outset a word of warning must be given. For in the present state of inquiry, often dependent upon superficial observation and conflicting reports, any analysis or classification, however careful, must perforce be accepted as really tentative and only in broad outline approaching the truth. Nevertheless, with regard to the liberty of divorce, following the suggestion of Post, five classes of peoples may be differentiated: 1. Very often among rude races, particularly where the "genealogical organization is little developed or in process of decay," the marriage bond is lax, and it is readily dissolved at the pleasure of either party.[726] Such is the case with many African, Asiatic, American, and Oceanic peoples. Among the African Damaras, for instance, the wife may change her husband every week if she likes.[727] Similarly among the Shekiani, another negro tribe, the woman may abandon her spouse for mistreatment or for any other cause, returning to her native village, where her friends make it a point of honor not to give her back; and in this way wars sometimes arise.[728] Like freedom exists on the Gold Coast and among the Felups of Fogni; and very commonly in Africa the wife may leave the husband if the purchase price is returned.[729] Among the Makassars and Buginese, without assigning any cause whatever, either party may divorce the other, dividing the children between them.[730] The same is true of the endogamic Alfurese of Minahasa, with whom the cognatic system of relationship prevails.[731] Even in Burma divorce appears to be a one-sided matter, though the person dissolving the marriage suffers severe disadvantages with respect to property rights.[732] In ancient Arabia marriages were formed without ceremony, and they were ended by either spouse with equal ease.[733] But the law of the Amaxosa, constituting with the Amazulu the division of the Bantu stock commonly called "Kafirs," affords a particularly interesting example of early custom with regard to divorce and its legal consequences. Both parties enjoy the greatest freedom in dissolving the marriage; and this is all the more striking because of the prevalence of wife-purchase, which usually restricts the privileges of the woman in this regard. If the marriage is childless, however long it may have endured, the husband who proves the alleged ground of divorce is entitled to receive back the purchase price; and this is true also, in case of such a marriage, when the separation takes place on the part of the wife, unless she establishes very grave cause for her action. The divorced woman is permitted to marry again, provided the purchase price is