The dwellings of the Indians are huts made of the interwoven boughs of trees, or tents covered with the skins of animals, without division of apartments. Whole villages of women and children are often left for weeks, while the men are absent on hunting expeditions. The South American tribes were more docile, indolent, and soft-hearted than those of the north. They married at an earlier period; twelve or thirteen being the common age for a bride. It is said that the tribes about the isthmus of Darien considered it no impropriety for women to make the first declaration of love. When they preferred a young man, they told him so, and promised to be very faithful, good-tempered, and obedient, if he would take them to wife. The women of Greenland and other countries about the arctic regions are inured to the utmost rigor of a northern climate, and the extremity of toil. During the long winters, many of these tribes live in snow huts with ice windows. They consider train-oil one of the greatest of luxuries, and would eagerly devour a tallow candle in preference to the most delicious sweetmeats. They dress in garments of reindeer’s skin, lined with moss, and changed so seldom, that they become filthy in the extreme. The men hunt bears and catch seals; but when they have towed their booty to land, they would consider it a disgrace to help the women drag it home, or skin and dress it. They often stand and look idly on, while their wives are staggering beneath a load that almost bends them to the earth. The women are cooks, butchers, masons, curriers, shoemakers, and tailors. They will manage a boat in the roughest seas, and will often push off from the shore in the midst of a storm, that would make the hardiest European sailor tremble. In most countries, women enter into matrimony more readily than men, even where their affections are not concerned. The reasons are obvious. Women are more restrained by the laws and usages of society than men, and the scope of their ambition is much more limited. Though marriage subjects them to many cares and privations, it gives them in some respects a greater degree of freedom and consideration; it likewise generally insures protection and support, and is almost the only way in which a woman can rise above her natural condition, with regard to wealth and rank.