A marriage settlement in money is expected from the bridegroom and paid to the father of the bride. Parents often attempt to avoid cash payments by an exchange of brothers and sisters. A family with a boy and a girl make overtures to an eligible family having a girl and a boy, and the young people are paired off at more advantageous terms all round than would be the case if the families were strangers, that is, if they were out of tribal relations with each other. Sometimes, of course, this matter of exchange causes people of very different ages to be joined, but then the years heal that, and the theory is that if the bride is considerably younger than the groom the husband as he comes to old age will have a comparatively strong and able housekeeper and caretaker in his wife. The usual wedding payment to the father of the bride is about two hundred twenty-five dollars in this village. From this sum the father may make his daughter such presents as he pleases of jewels and head-coins. The wedding costume of the bride is the gift of the groom’s family. Where a widowed woman is remarried, the marriage portion paid her father is less than in the case of a first marriage, and she is apt to receive a larger share of it in presents from her father, since she cannot, in this case, be made to marry except by her own consent. To get the business of marriage settled at the earliest date and in the most advantageous way possible is the aim of guardians and parents. The wife will have done her part well if she bears children, mostly boys,[59] sees that no unnecessary losses of money or food occur in the house and holds her tongue. If she fails in any of these points she may dim the felicities of the married state, that is, of her husband and his father and brothers. ----- ----- [Illustration: BRINGING HOME THE BRIDAL TROUSSEAU] [Illustration: GIRLS AT PLAY. CARRYING HEADLOADS OF GRASS IN IMITATION OF THE WOMEN]