Among the Australian aborigines, quarrels are perhaps for the most part occasioned by “the fair sex.”[939] Speaking of the natives near Herbert Vale, Northern Queensland, Herr Lumholtz says that, “if a woman is good-looking, all the men want her, and the one who is most influential, or who is the strongest, is accordingly generally the victor.”[940] Hence, the majority of the young men must wait a long time before they get wives, as they have not the courage to fight the requisite duel for one with an older man.[941] In the tribes of Western Victoria, described by Mr. Dawson, a young chief who cannot get a wife, and falls in love with one belonging to a chief who has more than two, can, with her consent, challenge the husband to single combat, and, if the husband is defeated, the conqueror makes her his legal wife.[942] Narcisse Peltier, who, during seventeen years, was detained by a tribe of Queensland Australians, states that the men “not unfrequently fight with spears for the possession of a woman.”[943] In New Zealand, if a girl had two suitors with equal pretensions, a kind of “pulling match” was arranged in which the girl’s arms were dragged by each of the suitors in opposite directions, the stronger man being the victor;[944] and, according to the Rev. R. Taylor, there is in the Maori language even a special term for denoting such a struggle.[945] In Samoa, as also in the Fiji Islands, women have always been one of the chief causes of fighting;[946] and of the natives of Makin, of the Kingsmill Group, Mr. Wood assures us that “they have no wars, and very few arms, and seldom quarrel except about their women.”[947] Among the South African Bushmans, the “stronger man will sometimes take away the wife of the weaker.”[948] The people of Wadaï are notorious for their desperate fights for women; and, among the young men of Baghirmi, bloody feuds between rivals are far from being of rare occurrence.[949] In the islands outside Kamchatka there prevailed formerly a very curious custom, as reported by Steller. If a husband found that a rival had been with his wife, he would admit that the rival had at least an equal claim to her. “Let us try, then,” he would say, “which of us has the greater right, and shall have her.” After that they would take off their clothes and begin to beat each other’s backs with sticks; and he who first fell to the ground, unable to bear any more blows, lost his right to the woman.[950] Among the ancient Hindus, says Mr. Samuelson, “it was a custom in royal circles, when a princess became marriageable, for a tournament to be held, and the victor was chosen by the princess as her husband.” This custom was known as the “Swayamvara,” or “Maiden’s Choice,” and it is often mentioned in the ancient legends.[951]