The marriage portion consists either in money, oxen, sheep, goats, or other articles of domestic economy, and is at the same time the property of the woman, although she may be shortly divorced from her husband. Marriages are contracted with very little ceremony, for as soon as the bridegroom has agreed with the father of the bride on the bargain, he takes the woman of his choice home, hews the rahat, or fringed virginal girdle with a knife in innumerable pieces, covers her with a melayeh as a sign that she is now his wife, and the ceremony thus terminates. The nearest neighbours are at the most invited to a dinner; merissa is served up, and the whole affair is concluded with the customary dances. If the bride belong to one of the tribes who practise circumcision, she is certainly forced to subject herself to a fresh operation twenty days before her marriage. When a woman is ill-treated by her husband, or there exists any other cogent reason, she requests to be divorced from him, and the separation is effected without the slightest difficulty. She takes her marriage portion, and if there be children, the girls away with her, whilst the boys remain with the father. A separation is, however, frequently insisted upon without any good cause, for if the husband does not make his wife a sufficient allowance of telka,[33] she may sue for a divorce. Many men separate from their wives when they begin to age, as they generally do after the birth of the second child, and marry a second time with a young girl. To these cast-off wives a tukkoli is then accorded, and a maintenance sufficient to keep them, consisting generally of twenty paras, little more than three halfpence daily. The rich of course are only able to follow this custom, one man, however, scarcely ever has more than two wives in lawful wedlock; but every one keeps a number of female slaves as concubines, especially when his wives begin to grow old. They do not pay much attention to those clauses in matrimony, prescribed by the mahommedan religion, and to which the Moslemins rigidly adhere. The birth of a child is attended with little or no festivity, and the husband pays but slight attention to his wife during this critical period, for every one knows that labours are mostly natural, and terminate quickly and successfully. A midwife and an elderly relation at the utmost are present in the hut with the parturient woman, and when the child is born, a drink, consisting of soda, dried dates, and milk, which is very cooling, or water only, is offered to the mother. On the second, frequently even on the first day, the woman leaves her bed and goes about her ordinary occupations. Parents are very fond of their children, and are never known to beat them for any error they may have committed. The care and education of the young is left entirely to the mother; until they have attained a more mature age, the father troubles himself but little about his children. When