A TAX ON SUPERFLUOUS WIVES.

Timaru Herald, Volume LXXVI, Issue 11646, 2 January 1902, Page 3

A TAX ON SUPERFLUOUS WIVES.

The; Natal missionaries have been discussing the propriety of. starting a crusade against polygamy. Without in any way defending that institution, it is devoutly to be hoped they will let it aJone (says the Capetown correspondent of the. "Telegraph"). It is doubtiufl if they would succeed; it is quite certain that it would bring a hornet's nest about our ears in the process. It is, unfortunately» the. case that the well-meaaing zeal of the missionary often creates evils worse than those he desires to destroy. It was so in the days of Lord Glenelg; it will be so to-day if they oersevere in this injudicious course. The Bishop of Mashonaland is my authority for the statement that polygamy is dying one _very slowly, perhaps, ' but steadily. In his opinion, "it is largely responsible for the difficulty of procuring native labour. Under the native marriage laws, the daughter is regarded as a merchantable article, to be sold to the suitor for so many herd of oxen. The price ranges, perhaps, from five head to fifty, according to her attractions. The man, therefore, blessed with a quiverfull of daughters grows rich without trouble. Destroy polygamy, and you check aij once both the demand and- the supply. The Bishop's plan for achieving this result is original. Permit polygamy, he says, but regard every wife after the first as a luxury I which should be taxed; and the tax should be a progressive one. If £5 should be the duty on wife No. 2 INo. 1 being free), the duty on wife No. 3 should be £lO, on No. 4 £2O, and so on, on the system of bookkeeping followed by the K«v\ Mr Stiggins. The man, then, • who had only

devoteeof the~fair.sex..wairia..liave.tb work to. eanv the. wherewithal.-to..pay his harem duty. It may not, perhaps, be practicable, but the scheme is -a ss-ery, £reity one as it stands, and the Bishop, who.-hass.-a-lpng and intimate acquaintance with. South Africa, looks upon it as., well within the range of practical politics. •..