At the other extremity of India, in Ceylon, the polyandric _régime_ is still very flourishing, especially in the interior of the island, and among the leisured classes. The number of husbands, generally brothers or relatives, is variable; it varies from three to eight. According to Emerson Tennent, polyandry was formerly general in the island, and it is owing to the efforts of the Dutch and Portuguese that it has disappeared from the coast.[184] It is particularly in lamaic Thibet that the polyandric _régime_ is in full vigour; and in this country religion strengthens it, for the most distinguished men, the ruling classes, the chiefs or officers of the State, _a fortiori_ the lamas, have the same disdain for marriage so loudly professed by the saints of Catholicism. The greater number exempt themselves from it, and leave to the common people the gross care of producing children. Now, the latter, by reason of their poverty, associate together to lighten the burden of the family. It is, again, fraternal polyandry which is the rule in Thibet. It is in this country that sociologists have sought the classic type of this kind of polyandry. In Thibet the right of primogeniture is combined with the right of marriage, and the younger brothers follow the fate of their chief. It is this last who marries for all of them, and chooses the common wife.[185] However, if we may believe other accounts, a certain liberty is allowed to younger brothers. The pressure on them is chiefly economic. When the eldest son marries, the property is transmitted to him in advance of his inheritance, with the charge of maintaining his parents, who, however, can live in a separate house. The youngest brother takes orders, and becomes a lama. The others, if they choose, become inferior husbands of the wife, who with us would be their sister-in-law, and they are almost forced to do this, since their eldest brother is sole inheritor. Once within the polyandric _régime_, the younger brothers have a subordinate position. The eldest, the husband-in-chief, considers them as his servants, and has even the right to send them away without any resource, if he pleases. If the principal husband dies, then his widow, his property, and his authority pass to the younger brother next in age. In the case of the brother not being one of the co-husbands, he cannot inherit the property without the wife, nor the wife without the property. We have here, then, a sort of polyandrian levirate.[186]