I cannot close this chapter on marriage and child-birth without putting on record my observations regarding polygamy and its effects on the Congo. Polygamy means monopoly in women, and causes great immorality among the natives practising it; and it is now fast dying out within the sphere of our influence upon the Lower Congo, and in the neighbourhood of our stations upon the Upper. The effect of polygamy was to tie up the women to a comparatively small number of men who were fortunate (?) enough to inherit them, or had procured the wealth with which to pay their marriage money. There was a constant complaint amongst the young and vigorous men of the middle and lower orders that it was almost impossible for them to procure wives. Thus we found a small number of men possessing nearly all the women in a town, having from four or five up to twenty-five and thirty each, and a large number of young men who could not secure wives. Moreover, these wealthy men, besides having all these wives, had bespoken most of the young girls, many almost infants; for it was no uncommon thing for girls of three or four years to be betrothed to men of forty and fifty years of age; and as soon as they reached puberty the marriage money was completed, and they were passed over to their already very much married husbands. Now my observations of polygamy, both on the Lower and Upper Congo, have led me to form a decided opinion that it does not conduce to productivity, but the contrary. Under this system I have never known a large family. One man had eight wives, and he had five children by one and none by the others; another had ten wives and no children; another had twenty-three wives and only one child; another twenty-five wives and three children only; another who had eight wives had three children. Mapwata, chief of Ntenta in French Congo, had forty wives, but only five children. In Mfumu Ngoma’s village there were 87 men, 67 married women, and only 37 children. In the village of Mbela there were about 60 married women, as shown by the number of houses, and only 28 children, and so on _ad lib._