19.
Whatever sums of money the husbands have received in the name of dowry from their
wives, making an estimate of it, they add the same amount out of their own
estates. An account is kept of all this money conjointly, and the profits are
laid by: whichever of them shall have survived [the other], to that one the
portion of both reverts together with the profits of the previous time. Husbands
have power of life and death over their wives as well as over their children:
and when the father of a family, born in a more than commonly distinguished
rank, has died, his relations assemble, and, if the circumstances of his death
are suspicious, hold an investigation upon the wives in the manner adopted
toward slaves; and, if proof be obtained, put them to severe torture, and kill
them. Their funerals, considering the state of civilization among the Gauls, are magnificent and costly; and they cast into
the fire all things, including living creatures, which they suppose to have been
dear to them when alive; and, a little before this period, slaves and
dependents, who were ascertained to have been beloved by them, were, after the
regular funeral rites were completed, burnt together with them.
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