mother-in-law face to face.[79.5] Here then we {80} see that a man avoids his son-in-law as well as his mother-in-law, though not so strictly. [Sidenote: The custom of avoiding mother-in-law and wife of wife’s brother among the Thonga of Delagoa Bay.] Among the Thonga, a Bantu tribe about Delagoa Bay, when a man meets his mother-in-law or her sister on the road, he steps out of the road into the forest on the right hand side and sits down. She does the same. Then they salute each other in the usual way by clapping their hands. After that they may talk to each other. When a man is in a hut, his mother-in-law dare not enter it, but must sit down outside without seeing him. So seated she may salute him, “Good morning, son of So-and-so.” But she would not dare to pronounce his name. However, when a man has been married many years, his mother-in-law has less fear of him, and will even enter the hut where he is and speak to him. But among the Thonga the woman whom a man is bound by custom to avoid most rigidly is not his wife’s mother, but the wife of his wife’s brother. If the two meet on a path, they carefully avoid each other; he will step out of the way and she will hurry on, while her companions, if she has any, will stop and chat with him. She will not enter the same boat with him, if she can help it, to cross a river. She will not eat out of the same dish. If he speaks to her, it is with constraint and embarrassment. He will not enter her hut, but will crouch at the door and address her in a voice trembling with emotion. Should there be no one else to bring him food, she will do it reluctantly, watching his hut and putting the food inside the door when he is absent. It is not that they dislike each other, but that they feel a mutual, a mysterious fear.[80.1] However, among the Thonga, the rules of avoidance between connexions by marriage decrease in severity as time passes. The strained relations between a man and his wife’s mother in particular become easier. He begins to call her “Mother” and she calls him “Son.” This change even goes so far that in some cases the man may go and dwell in the village of his wife’s parents, especially if he has children and the children are grown up.[80.2] Again, among the Ovambo, a Bantu {81} people of German South-West Africa, a man may not look at his future mother-in-law while he talks with her, but is bound to keep his eyes steadily fixed on the ground. In some cases the avoidance is even more stringent; if the two meet unexpectedly, they separate at once. But after the marriage has been celebrated, the social intercourse between mother-in-law and son-in-law becomes easier on both sides.[81.1]