The following passage from Livingstone shows the existence among the
African tribes of his time of a system, which Wood rightly says “has
a singular resemblance to the instruction of pages in the days of
chivalry”:—
“Monina (one of the confederate chiefs of the Banyai) had a great
number of young men about him, from twelve to fifteen years of
age. These were all sons of free men, and bands of young lads
like them in the different districts leave their parents about
the age of puberty and live with such men as Monina for the sake
of instruction. When I asked the nature of the instruction I was
told ‘Bonyái,’ which I suppose may be understood as indicating
manhood, for it sounds as if we should say, ‘to teach an American
Americanism,’ or, ‘an Englishman to be English.’ While here they
are kept in subjection to rather stringent regulations.... They
remain unmarried until a fresh set of youths is ready to occupy
their place under the same instruction.” _Missionary Travels and
Researches in South Africa._ _By David Livingstone_, 1857, p. 618.
M. Foley (Bulln. Soc. d’Anthr. de Paris, 1879) speaks of fraternity in
arms among the natives of New Caledonia as forming a close tie—closer
even than consanguinity.
[Sidenote: _Greek Friendship and Mediæval Chivalry_]
With regard to Greece, J. Addington Symonds has some interesting remarks,
which are well worthy of consideration; he says:—
“Nearly all the historians of Greece have failed to insist upon
the fact that fraternity in arms played for the Greek race the
same part as the idealisation of women for the knighthood of
feudal Europe. Greek mythology and history are full of tales
of friendship, which can only be paralleled by the story of
David and Jonathan in the Bible. The legends of Herakles and
Hylas, of Theseus and Pirithöus, of Apollo and Hyacinth, of
Orestes and Pylades, occur immediately to the mind. Among the
noblest patriots, tyrannicides, lawgivers, and self-devoted
heroes in the early times of Greece, we always find the names of
friends and comrades received with peculiar honour. Harmodius
and Aristogeiton, who slew the despot Hipparchus at Athens;
Diocles and Philolaus, who gave laws to Thebes; Chariton and
Melanippus, who resisted the sway of Phalaris in Sicily; Cratinus
and Aristodemus, who devoted their lives to propitiate offended
deities when a plague had fallen on Athens; these comrades,
staunch to each other in their love, and elevated by friendship
to the pitch of noblest enthusiasm, were among the favourite
saints of Greek legend and history. In a word, the chivalry
of Hellas found its motive force in friendship rather than in
the love of women; and the motive force of all chivalry is a
generous, soul-exalting, unselfish passion. The fruit which
friendship bore among the Greeks was courage in the face of
danger, indifference to life when honour was at stake, patriotic
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