Now as to the origin of the word; we have seen above that Rochefort was the first to use the expression _faire la couvade_. This author, or at least the author (see _Barbier, Ouvrages anonymes_) of the _Histoire naturelle ... des Iles Antilles_, which was published for the first time at Rotterdam, in 1658, 4to., writes: “C’est qu’au méme tems que la femme est delivrée le mary se met au lit, pour s’y plaindre et y faire l’acouchée: coutume, qui bien que Sauvage et ridicule, se trouve neantmoins à ce que l’on dit, parmy les paysans d’vne certaine Province de France. Et ils appellent cela _faire la couvade_. Mais ce qui est de fâcheus pour le pauvre Caraïbe, qui s’est mis au lit au lieu de l’acouchée, c’est qu’on luy fait faire diéte dix ou douze jours de suite, ne luy donnant rien par jour qu’vn petit morceau de Cassave, et vn peu d’eau dans la quelle on a aussi fait boüillir un peu de ce pain de racine.... Mais ils ne font ce grand jeusne qu’à la naissance de leur premier enfant....” (II. pp. 607–608). Lafitau (_Mœurs des Sauvages Ameriquains_, I. pp. 49–50) says on the authority of Rochefort: “Je la trouve chez les Ibériens ou les premiers Peuples d’Espagne ... elle est aujourd’hui dans quelques unes de nos Provinces d’Espagne.” The word _couvade_, forgotten in the sense of lying-in-bed, recalled by Sacombe, has been renovated in a happy manner by Dr. Tylor. As to the custom itself, there can be no doubt of its existence, in spite of some denials. Dr. Tylor, in the third edition of his valuable _Early History of Mankind_, published in 1878 (Murray), since the last edition of _The Book of Ser Marco Polo_, has added (pp. 291 _seqq._) many more proofs to support what he had already said on the subject. There may be some strong doubts as to the _couvade_ in the south of France, and the authors who speak of it in Béarn and the Basque Countries seem to have copied one another, but there is not the slightest doubt of its having been and of its being actually practised in South America. There is a very curious account of it in the _Voyage dans le Nord du Brésil_ made by Father Yves d’Evreux in 1613 and 1614 (see pp. 88–89 of the reprint, Paris, 1864, and the note of the learned Ferdinand Denis, pp. 411–412). Compare with _Durch Central-Brasilien ... im Jahre_ 1884 _von K.v. den Steinen_. But the following extract from _Among the Indians of Guiana_.... _By Everard im Thurn_ (1883), will settle, I think, the question: