This done, the women fall to eating and drinking. When they have finished they begin singing to the accompaniment of drums. The men are then admitted to the house. In some villages the old men have free access that evening to the room of the girl in whose honour the feast is given, while the other guests amuse themselves with {277} singing outside. After this celebration the girl is entitled to free intercourse with men, even before puberty.[277.1] In East-Central Africa the Azimba maiden is artificially deflowered during a period of retirement and instruction in the forest. When the retirement is over she celebrates her attainment of puberty by a dance in which only women take part. That night a man, hired by her father for the purpose, sleeps with her, and once this is done she is supposed to have no further intercourse with him. Often, however, she is already married before puberty, and consequently no longer a maiden. None the less is she taken from her husband that the puberty customs may be performed. When she is brought back he himself sleeps with her apparently as a ritual act, without the necessity of hiring a man for the purpose.[277.2] Among the Wanyasa, or Mang’anja, at the southern end of Lake Nyasa, ceremonies are performed similar to those of the _Intonjane_ (girls’ puberty ceremonies) of South Africa, and every girl on her return after the initiation must find some man “to be with her,” otherwise she will die.[277.3] The _Intonjane_ among the Kaffirs is well known to be an occasion of sexual indulgence. It may be surmised that the ceremonies of the Suahili on the east coast were originally similar to those just mentioned. But the Suahili have become partially Arabized, though their Mohammedanism is little more than a veneer over their heathen customs and belief. Among them now a girl returns from her seclusion in silence and gives her hand to every man she meets, receiving from him in return a few small coins.[277.4] It is said that the girls of {278} the Wamegi, also a tribe near the coast, are artificially deflowered at puberty by certain old women.[278.1] Artificial defloration at puberty is also practised by the Sawu Islanders. The Sakalava girls in Madagascar perform it on themselves in case their parents have not previously taken the trouble.[278.2] Other examples could be cited, but the subject need not be pursued.