was immediately made known. If not, she put off making a direct answer by a reference to her brother or eldest son. Consent being obtained of the mother, the bridegroom without much further conference with the bride, was then told where she lay, and thenceforward admitted to her bed.
From some cause or other, it appears, that the women of the Cherokees frequently made use of means to promote abortion, which at length became so alarming, as to occasion a resort to punishment by whipping.
In all stages of society regulations have existed, either as controling customs, or written laws, whereby the conduct of men with each other was limited and restrained. A system of equity was established, more or less strictly according with justice, as influenced by exterior circumstances; thus life was claimed for {134} life, and objects wrested from the weak or unsuspecting, restored by the interference of moral power vested in superiors and rulers. Among the Cherokees and other Indians of North America, the conviction of natural justice went so far as frequently to draw no distinction of punishment betwixt manslaughter and murder. Governed also by the idea of a general fraternity existing throughout a tribe of people, the brother of a murderer, or even his nearest relative was not secure from the fatal avenger, in the absence of the principal. In consequence of this, it sometimes happened that the brother became the executioner of his brother or nearest relative, who had committed a murder, in order to save himself from vengeance. He who had taken away the life of another, either by malice or accident, was also occasionally suffered to redeem it, by obtaining and presenting to the injured party, a scalp or a prisoner of the enemy, as they were satisfied in any way to obtain life for life.
