In the second place, it should be mentioned that the civilisation of the
Masai, as well as of the other tribes in alliance with us, made rapid
progress. The _el-moran_, when once they had become accustomed to light
work, and had given up their inactive camp-life, allowed themselves to be
induced by us to enter early upon the married state. Our women succeeded in
uprooting the Ditto abuse. Several of the ladies, with Mrs. Ney at their
head, undertook a tour through Masailand, and offered to every Masai girl
who made a solemn promise of chastity until marriage, admission into a
Freeland family for a year, and instruction in our manners, customs, and
various forms of skilled labour. So great was the number who accepted this
offer, that they could not all be received into Freeland at once, but had
to be divided into three yearly groups. Yet even those who could not be
immediately received were decorated with the insignia of their new
honour--a complete dress after the Freeland pattern, their barbarian wire
neck-bands, leg-chains, and ear-stretchers, as well as their coating of
grease, being discarded--and they were solemnly pronounced to be 'friends
of the white women.' So permanent was the influence of this distinction
upon the Masai girls, who had not given up their ambition along with their
licentious habits, that not one of them proved to be unworthy of the
friendship of the virtuous white ladies. The Masai youth were so zealous in
their efforts to win the favour of the girls who were thus distinguished,
that the latter were all very soon married. That at the end of the year
there was an eager competition for the girls who were returning home is as
much a matter of course as that those who in the meantime had married, even
if they had had children, had not forfeited their right to a residence in
Freeland--a circumstance that led to not a few embarrassments. The ultimate
result was that in a very short time the once so licentious Masailand was
changed into a model country of good morals. The hitherto prevalent
polygamy died out, and several hundred good schools arose in different
parts of the country, which in that way made gigantic strides towards
complete civilisation.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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