Mr. Reade remarks that, among savages generally, it is the seducer who suffers, not the victim.[665] Yet this holds good for certain peoples only,[666] the faithless wife being generally discarded, beaten, or ill-treated in some other way, and very frequently killed. Often, too, she is disfigured by her jealous husband, so that no man may fall in love with her in future. Thus, among several peoples of North America, India, and elsewhere, her nose is cut or bitten off,—a practice which also prevailed in ancient Egypt.[667] As late as the year 1120 the Council of Neapolis in Palestine decreed that an adulterer should be castrated, and the nose of an unfaithful wife cut off;[668] whilst, in the “Uplands-lag,” an old Swedish provincial law, it is prescribed that an adulteress who cannot pay the fine of forty marks, shall lose her hair, ears, and nose.[669] The Creeks and some Chittagong Hill tribes likewise cut off the ears of a woman who has been guilty of infidelity;[670] and many other people are in the habit of shaving her head.[671] Among a large number of peoples, a husband not only requires chastity from his wife, but demands that the woman whom he marries shall be a virgin. There can be little doubt, I think, that this requirement owes its origin to the same powerful feeling that keeps watch over marital faithfulness. Among the Ahts, for example, “a girl who was known to have lost her virtue, lost with it one of her chances of a favourable marriage.”[672] Among the Chippewas, according to Mr. Keating, no woman could expect to be taken as a wife by a warrior unless she had lived in strict chastity.[673] Statements to the same effect are made with reference to other Indian tribes.[674] Again, when one of the Chichimecs of Central Mexico marries, if the girl proves not to be a virgin, she may be returned to her parents.[675] A very similar custom prevailed among the Nicaraguans and Azteks,[676] and exist still among several tribes of the Indian Archipelago and in New Guinea;[677] whilst, in Samoa, valuable presents were given for a girl who had preserved her virtue, the bride’s purity being proved in a way that will not bear the light of description.[678] “In many parts of Africa,” says Mr. Reade, “no marriage can be ratified till a jury of matrons have pronounced a verdict of purity on the bride;[679] it being customary to return a girl who is found not to have been entirely chaste, and to claim back the price paid for her.[680] Dr. Grade states that among the Negroes of Togoland, a much higher price is paid for a bride who is a virgin than for any other.[681] Among the Somals, a fallen girl cannot become a man’s legitimate wife;[682] whilst, in the Soudan and other parts of Africa where girls are subjected to infibulation, that incontinence may be made impossible, no young woman who is not infibulated can get a husband.[683]