a legal
marriage. It is an unsettled question, both in England and this
country, whether a marriage solemnized by customary formalities alone
is legal, or if one characterized by the mere consent of the parties
is illegal. The latter has been held as legal in some instances in
both countries. Kent, in his "Commentaries," lays down the law that a
contract made so that either party recognizes it from the moment of
contract, and even not followed by cohabitation, amounts to a valid
marriage, and also that a contract to be recognized at some future
period, and followed by consummation, is equally valid. It is
unfortunate that the law is so undecided in this respect. The
decisions arrived at, for or against, were not dependent upon any
recognized law, but seem to be influenced by the character of the
cases, either for favor or discountenance. As long as the law
recognizes cohabitation legal only in marriage, it seems to me that if
consummated under consent of the parties to bear marital relations
with each other, or promise of marriage, the act should be
unhesitatingly pronounced as the equivalent of a valid marriage in all
instances. If cohabitation is only a marital prerogative, the law
should not stultify itself by recognizing it as possible to occur in
any other relation. If either of the parties is married, the law
defines it as adultery, and very properly defines the punishment. It
is necessary to the progress of the age that some such principle
should be recognized in common law so as not to subject the decision
of the question to the individual opinion of any judge. It would at
once obviate the confusion of sentiment now held in regard to it and
besides arrest the decision in test cases from mere caprice of the
tribunal. It is certainly as correct a principle as any in common law,
and would, in its operations as a statute law, be free from injustice,
and capable of doing much good.

POLYGAMY--WHAT IT IS.

Polygamy is a state in which a man has at the same time more than one
wife. It has existed from time immemorial, especially among the
nations of the East. The custom was tolerated by the laws of Moses,
and, in fact, no positive injunction against it is found in the whole
of the Old Testament. It is questionable whether more than one was
recognized as the _bona fide_ wife, the others simply being wives by
right of concubinage. But if polygamy was in its strictest sense the
legal custom,