“When the parents of the man and the woman meet to settle the price of the woman, the price depends on how many days in the week the marriage tie is to be strictly observed. The woman’s mother first of all proposes that, taking everything into consideration, with due regard to the feelings of the family, she could not think of binding her daughter to a due observance of that chastity which matrimony is expected to command for more than two days in the week. After a great deal of apparently angry discussion, and the promise on the part of the relations of the man to pay more, it is arranged that the marriage shall hold good, as is customary among the first families of the tribe, for four days in the week, viz. Monday, Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday, and in compliance with old established custom, the marriage rites during the three remaining days shall not be insisted on, during which days the bride shall be perfectly free to act as she may think proper, either by adhering to her husband and home, or by enjoying her freedom and independence from all observance of matrimonial obligations.”[117] [117] Spencer, _Descriptive Sociology_, Vol. V, p. 8, citing Petherick, _Egypt, the Soudan, and Central Africa_, pp. 140-141. A further striking example of mother-right is furnished by the Mariana Islands, where the position of women was distinctly superior. “Even when the man had contributed an equal share of property on marriage, the wife dictated everything, and the man could undertake nothing without her approval; but if the woman committed an offence, the man was held responsible and suffered the punishment. The women could speak in the assembly; they held property, and if a woman asked anything of a man, he gave it up without a murmur. If a wife was unfaithful, the husband could send her home, keep her property, and kill the adulterer; but if the man was guilty or even suspected of the same offence, the women of the neighbourhood destroyed his house and all his visible property, and the owner was fortunate if he escaped with a whole skin; and if the wife was not pleased with her husband, she withdrew, and a similar attack followed. On this account many men were not married, preferring to live with paid women.”[118] [118] Thomas, _Sex and Society_, pp. 73-74, quoting Waitz-Gerland. A similar case of the rebellion of men against their position is recorded in Guinea, where religious symbolism was used by the husband as a way of obtaining control and possession of his wife. The maternal system held with respect only to the chief wife.