Among some of the Polynesian Islanders, and particularly the Samoans, woman is more esteemed than with others, but usually she is treated in the same manner as with most uncultured peoples. As shown by many of their customs, she is looked upon as an inferior creature. Captain King remarked that at the Sandwich Islands, when these were first discovered, less respect was shown to women than at any of the other Pacific Islands which Captain Cook’s expedition had visited. All the best kinds of food were forbidden them. In domestic life they lived almost entirely by themselves, and although no instance of positive ill-treatment was actually observed, yet it was evident that “they had little regard or attention paid them.” The facts stated sufficiently establish that, among primitive peoples, woman is regarded as “property.” Usually female children are thought little of by their parents, and they are cared for only as having a certain exchange value. In the more advanced stage represented by the pastoral peoples they are more highly prized, because, although a man may prefer his cattle to his daughters, these, if successfully reared, will bring a certain addition to his stock. A curious relic of this primitive idea of the exchange value of woman is yet extant in Afghanistan, where crimes are atoned for by fines estimated, partly in young women, and partly in money. It is not surprising that the man who has purchased his wife should look upon her in the same light as any other chattel which he has acquired, and this _property_ notion is at the foundation of most of the social habits of savage life. It must not be thought that women, even among the most uncultured peoples, are altogether without influence, if not over their own condition, yet over the minds of other. The wars, if such they can be called, waged by the Australian aborigines, are generally due to the old women, who incite the men with the most passionate language to revenge any injury to the tribe, and they perform the same office among other uncivilised peoples. It is well-known what influence over the conduct of such peoples is exercised by the sorcerers or wizard doctors, and in many parts of both Africa and America women as well as men exercise that calling;. It is not often that among the more warlike races women attain to the position of chief, but such a state of things is not unknown to the African tribes; and in Madagascar and the Polynesian Islands woman is as competent as man to occupy the throne. With the American tribes who trace descent through females, women have great influence in the election of the chiefs.