A Frenchman's account of Utah.
--A French gentleman, M. Jules Remy, has published in Paris, an account, in two volumes, of a journey from California to Great Salt Lake City, and a residence of some weeks among the Mormons. He appears to have traveled for scientific purposes, and to satisfy his curiosity about a people of whom even we Americans know but little. From an exhaustive English review of his work we gather that he was much pleased with the industry and sobriety of the Mormon population, and needed very little persuasion to join himself to the Society of Latter-day Saints at Desert. On the subjects of Mormon wives, M. Remy gives some curious details:‘ A first wife who should refuse permission to her husband to take a second is condemned by the law, because she has not done as Sarah did when she gave Hagar to Abraham, and as Rachel and Leah did when they gave Bela and Zelpha to Jacob. The husband has a portion of the house to himself, the wives live altogether, just as is practised in the East. The first married enjoys a certain ascendancy over the others Saints who can afford it live in separate houses from their wives. A third system obtains of each wife having a separate house, and the husband boards and lodges in each alternately for twenty-four hours. The wives must look upon one another as sisters, and the children call all, except their own mothers, aunt.--They are distinguished sometimes by their Christian names, as Mrs. Mary Angell, Mrs. Jane Angell, and so on; but the President numbers his, Mrs. Young No. 1, Mrs. Young No. 2, and so on, no doubt to assist his memory. When a wife has conceived, the husband is dispensed from all martial duties towards her. The Mormons have singular reduced the limits of relationship, within which, marriage is forbidden among Christians. Thus one man will wed all the daughters of the same father and mother. Others have married mother and daughter. A certain Watt married a half sister.
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