When a girl reaches puberty she informs her mother, who invites the female members of her clan to her house, where an informal feast is enjoyed. The guests congratulate the girl upon having arrived at the state of womanhood, and they say to her, “As yet you are like a child, but you will soon be united with a companion and you will help to increase your people.” The only male present is the girl’s father. The news, however, soon spreads through the village, and it is not long before offers are made to the mother for the privilege of sexual relations with the girl. The first offers are generally refused, the mother holding her virgin daughter for the highest bidder. These are not necessarily offers of marriage, but are more commonly otherwise, and are frequently made by married men. Though the Sia are monogamists, it is common for the married, as well as the unmarried, to live promiscuously with one another; the husband being as fond of his wife’s children as if he were sure of the paternal parentage. That these people, however, have their share of latent jealousy is evident from the secrecy observed on the part of a married man or woman to prevent the anger of the spouse. Parents are quite as fond of their daughters’ illegitimate offspring, and as proud of them as if they had been born in wedlock; and the man who marries a woman having one or more illegitimate children apparently feels the same attachment for these children as for those his wife bears him. Some of the women recount their relations of this character with as much pride as a civilized belle would her honest offers of marriage. One of the most attractive women in Sia, though now a grandmother, once said to the writer: When I was young I was pretty and attractive, and when I reached womanhood many offers were made to my mother for me [she did not refer to marriage, however], but my mother knowing my attractions refused several, and the first man I lived with was the richest man in the pueblo. I only lived with three men before I married, one being the present governor of the village; my eldest child is his daughter, and he thinks a great deal of her. He often makes her presents, and she always addresses him as father when his wife is not by. His wife, whom he married sometime after I ceased my relations with him, does not know that her husband once lived with me. This woman added as an evidence of her great devotion to her husband, that since her marriage she had not lived with any other man. These loose marriage customs doubtless arise from the fact that the Sia are now numerically few and their increase is desired, and that, as many of the clans are now extinct, it is impossible to intermarry in obedience to ancient rule.