Should it be replied that female infanticide is, on the average of cases, not carried so far as to make the namber of wiyes insufficient to maintain the aggregate population — should it be said that only exceptional tribes rear so few women as not to haye mothers enough to produce the next generation; then we are met by a still greater difficulty. If in each of the exogamous tribes forming the supposed cluster, the men are forbidden to marry women of their own tribe, and must steal women from other tribes; the implication is that each tribe knowingly rears wiyes for neighbouring tribes, but not for itself. Though each tribe kills many of its female infants that it may not be at the cost of rearing them for its own benefit, yet it deliberately rears the re- mainder for the benefit of its enemies. Surely this is an inadmissible supposition. In proportion as the interdict against marrying women within the tribe is peremptory, the preservation of girls will be useless — ^worse than useless, indeed, since adjacent hostile tribes, to whom they must go as wiyes, will be thereby strengthened. And as all the tribes, liying under like interdicts, will have like motives, they will all of them cease to rear female infants.
Manifestly, then, exogamy in its original form, can never have been anything like absolute among the tribes forming a cluster; but can have been the law among some of them only.
§ 287. In his concluding chapter, Mr. McLennan says that " on the whole, the account which we have given of the origin of exogamy, appears the only one which will bear examination.'' (p. 289.) It seems to me, however, that setting out with the postulate laid down by him, that primi- tiv^e groups of men are habitually hostile, we may, on asking what are the concomitants of war, be led to a different theory, open to none of the objections above raised.
In all times and places, among savage and civilized, vio« 650 THS DOMESTIC BlIATIONS.
tory is followed by pillage. Whateyer portable tilings of worth the conquerors find^ thej take. The enemies of the Faegians plunder them of their dogs and arms; pastond tribes in Africa have their cattle driven away by oonqoering marauders; and peoples more advanced are robbed of their money^ ornaments^ and all valuable things that are not too heavy. The taking of women is manifestly bat a part of this process of spoiling the vanquished. Women are prised as wives^ as concubines^ as drudges; and^ the men having been killed^ the women are carried off along with the other moveables. Everywhere among the uncivilized we find this. Turner tells us that ^* in Samoa^ in dividing the spoil of a conquered people^ the women were not killed, but taken as wives." We learn from Mitchell that in Australia, '*^on some whites telling a native that they had shot a man of another tribe, his only remark was: — ' Stupid whitef ellows! why did you not bring away the gins?' " And P. Martyr says that among the cannibal Caribs in his day, " to eat women was considered unlawful. * * * Those who were captured young were kept for breeding, as we keep fowl, etc'* Early legends of the semi -civilized show us the same thing; as when in the Iliad we read that the Greeks plundered ''the sacred city of Eetion," and that part of the spoils " they divided among themselves *' were the women. And there need no examples to recall the fact that in later and more civilized times, successes in battle have been followed by transactions allied in character, if not the same in form. Hence it is obvious that from the beginning down to compa- ratively late stages, women-stealing has been an incident of successful war.
Observe, next, that the spoils of conquest, some of them prized for themselves, are some of them prized as trophies Proofs of prowess are above all things treasured by the savage. He brings back his enemy's scalp, like the North American Indian. He dries and preserves his enemy's head, like the New Zealander. He fringes his robe with EZOOAMT AND ENDOOAUT. 6ol locks of hair cut from his slain foe. Among other signs of success in battle is return with a woman of the yan- quished tribe. Beyond her intrinsic value she has an ex- trinsic value. Like a native wife, she serves as a slave; but unlike a native wife^ she serves also as a trophy. As^ then^ among savages, warriors are the honoured members of the tribe — as, among warriors, the most honoured are those whose bravery is best shown by achievements; the possession of a wife taken in war becomes a badge of social distinction. Hence members of the tribe thus married to foreign women, are held to be more honourably married than those married to native women. What must result?
In a tribe not habitually at war, or not habitually suc- cessful in war, no decided effect is likely to be produced on the marriage customs. If the great majority of the men have native wives, the presence of a few whose superiority is shown by having foreign wives, will fail to change the practice of taking native wives: the majority will keep one another in countenance. But if the tribe, becoming more successful in war, robs adjacent tribes of their women more frequently, there will grow up the idea that the now- considerable class having foreign wives form the honourable class, and that those who have not proved their bravery by bringing back these living trophies are dishonourable: non- possession of a foreign wife will come to be regarded as a proof of cowardice. An increasing ambition to get foreign wives will therefore arise; and as the number of those who are without them decreases, the brand of disgrace attaching to them will grow more decided; until, in the most warlike tribes, it becomes an imperative requirement that a wife shall be obtained from another tribe — ^if not in open war, then by private abduction.
A few facts showing that by savages proofs of courage are often required as qualifications for marriage, will carry home this conclusion. Hemdon tells us that among the Mahu6s, a man cannot take a wife until he has sub- 652 THS DOM ssnc ulatiohs; nutted to severe torture. Bates, speaking of the Paas^ on the Upper Amasons, says that formerly " the yoang men earned their brides by valiant deeds in war." Before he ia allowed to marry, a yonng Dyak must prove his bravery by bringing back the head of an enemy. Bancroft quotes Colonel Cremony as saying that when the Apaches warriors return unsuccessful, '' the women turn away from them with assured indifference and contempt. They are upbraided as cowards, or for want of skill and tact, and are told that such men should not have wives." That among other re- sults of sentiments thus exemplified, abduction of women will be one, is obvious; for a man who, denied a wife till he has proved his courage, steals one, satisfies his want and achieves reputation at the same time. If, as we see, the test of deserving a wife is in some cases obtainment of a trophy, what more natural than that the trophy should often be the stolen wife herself? What more natural than that where many warriors of the tribe are distinguished by stolen wives, the stealing of a wife should become the required proof of fitness to have one? Hence would follow a peremptory law of exogamy.
In so far as it implies that usage grows into law, this interpretation agrees with that of Mr. McLennan. It does not, however, like his, assume either that this usage origrin- ated in a primordial instinct, or that it resulted from scarcity of women caused by infanticide. Moreover, un- like Mr. M^ennan's, the explanation so reached is con- sistent with the fact that exogamy and endogamy in many cases co-exist; and with the &ct that exogamy often co- exists with polygyny. Further, it does not involve us in the difficulty raised by supposing a peremptory law of exogamy to be obeyed throughout a cluster of tribes.
§ 288. But can the great prevalence of the form of cap- ture in marriage ceremonies be thus accounted forf Mr* M'l^unan believes that wherever this form is now found.
I EXCMUMT AND ENDOQAMT. 653 complete exogamy once prevailed. Examination will^ I thinks show that the implication is not necessary. There are several ways in which the form of captnre naturally arises; or rather, let as say, it has several conspiring caoses.
If, as we have seen, there still exist rude tribes in which men fight for possession of women, the taking posses- sion of a woman naturally comes as a sequence to an act of capture. That monopoly which constitutes her a wife in the only sense known by the primitive man, is a result of successful violence. Thus the form may originate from actual capture within the tribe, instead of originating from actual capture without it.
Beyond that resistance to a man's seizure of a woman apt to be made by other men within the tribe, there is the resistance of the woman herself. Sir John Lubbock ex- presses the opinion that female coyness is not an adequate cause for the establishment of the form of capture; and it may be that, taken alone, it does not suffice to account for everything. But there are reasons for thinking it an important factor. Here are some of them. Crantz tells us concerning the Esquimaux, that when a damsel is asked in marriage, she— <* direcUy falls into the greatest apparent consternation, and nins out of doors tearing her bunch of hair; for single women always affect the utmost bashfulness and aversion to any proposal of marriage, lest they should lose their reputation for modesty."
Like behaviour is shown by Bushmen girls. When — " a girl has grown up to womanhood without having previously been betrothed, her lover must gain her own approbation, as well as that of the parents; and on this occasion his attentions are received with an affectation of great alarm and disinclination on her part, and with some squabbling on the part of her Mends."
Again, among the Sinai Arabs, says Burckhardt, a bride— '* defends herself with stones, and often inflicts wounds on the young men, even though she does not dislike the lover; for, according to custom, the more she struggles, bites, kicks, cries, and strikes, the more she is applauded ever after by her own companions.'* During the pro- 654 THE DOMESTIC RELATIONS.
cession to the Losband's camp, " decency obliges her to ciy and sob most bitterly."
Of the Muzos^ Piedrahita narrates that after agreement with the parents was made— " the bridegroom came to see the bride, and stayed three days caress- ing her, while she replied by beating him with her fists and with sticks. After these three days she got tamer, and cooked his meals." In these cases^ then, coyness, either real or affected for repu- tation's sake, causes resistance of the woman herself. In other cases there is joined with this the resistance of her female friends. We read of the Sumatran women that ^^ both the bride and her female relatives make it a point of honour to prevent (or appear to prevent) the bridegroom from obtaining his bride.'' On the occasion of a marriage among the Araucanians, Smith tells us that ''the women spring up en masse, and arming themselves with clubs, stones, and missiles of all kinds, rush to the defence of the distressed maiden. * * * It is a point of honour with the bride to resist and struggle, however willing she may be." And once more we learn from Grieve that when a Elamts- chadale '^ bridegroom obtains the liberty of seizing his bride, he seeks every opportunity of finding her alone, or in company of a few people, for during this time all the women in the village are obliged to protect her."
Here we have, I think, proof that one origin of the form of capture is feminine opposition — ^primarily of the woman herself, and secondarily of female friends who naturally sym- pathize with her. Though the manners of the inferior races do not imply much coyness, yet we cannot suppose coyness to be wholly absent. Hence that amount of it which really exists, joined with that further amount simulated for reputation's sake, will make resistance, and consequently capture, natural phenomena. Moreover, since a savage makes his wife a slave, and usually treats her brutally, she has an additional motive for resistance.
Nor does forcible opposition proceed only from the girl and her female friends: the male members of her BXOQAMY AND ENDOGAMT^ 656 femily also are likely to be opponents. A woman is of yalue not only as a wife^ but also as a daughter; and all throagh^ from the lowest to the highest stages of social progress, we find a tacit or avowed claim to her services by her father. It is so even with the degraded Fuegians: an equivalent in the shape of service rendered has to be given for her by the youth, '^ such as helping to make a canoe.'^ It is so with numerous more advanced savages all over the world: there is either the like giving of stipulated work, or the giving of a price. And we have evidence that it was originally so among ourselves: in an action for seduction the deprivation of a daughter's services is the injury alleged. Hence it is inferable that in the rudest states, where claims, parental or other, are but little regarded, the taking away of a daughter is Ukely to become the occasion of a fight. Facts support this conclusion. Of the Araucanians Smith tells us that when there is opposition of the parents, " the neighbours are immediately summoned by blowing the horn, and chase is given." " Among the Ganders, a tribe on the southern shores of the Caspian Sea, the bridegroom must run away with his bride, although he thereby exposes himself to the vengeance of her parents, who, if they find him within three days, can lawfully put him to death." And we read concerning the Gonds that " a suitor usually carries off the girl that is refused to him by the parents." Thus we find a further natural cause for the practice of capture — a cause which must have been common before social usages were well established. Indeed, on reading that among the Mapuch^s the man sometimes '^ lays violent hands upon the damsel, and carries her off," and that *' in all such cases the usual equivalent is afterwards paid to the girl's father," we may suspect that abduction, spite of parents, was the primary form; that there came next the making of com- pensation to escape vengeance; that this grew into the making of presents beforehand; and that so resulted even- tually the system of purchase.
656 THE D0ME8TI0 RELATIONS.
If^ then, within a tribe there are three soarces of oppo- sition to the appropriation of a woman by a man, it doea not seem that the form of capture is inexplicable unless we assume the abduction of women from other tribes.
Bui eren supposing it to haye originated in the capture of foreign women, its survival as a marriage-ceremony would not prove exogamy to have been the law. In a tribe whose warriors had many of them wives taken from enemies, and who, as having captured their wives, were regarded as more honourably married than the rest, there would result an ambition, if not to capture a wife, still to seem to capture a wife. In every society the inferior ape the superior; and customs thus spread among classes the ancestors of which did not observe them. The antique-looking portraits that decorate many a modern large house, by no means demon- strate the distinguished ancestry of the owner; but may merely simulate a distinguished ancestry. The coat of arms a wealthy man bears, does not necessarily imply descent from men who once had their shields and flags covered by such marks of identity. The plumes borne on a hearse, do not prove that the dead occupant had forefathers who wore knightly decorations. And similarly, it does not follow that all the members of tribes who go through the form of capturing their wives at marriage, are descendants of men who in earlier days actually captured their wives. Mr. McLennan himself points out that, among sundry ancient peoples, captured wives were permitted to the military class though not to other classes. It we suppose a society formed of a dominant militaiy class, originally the con- querors, who practised wife-capture, and a subject class who could not practise it; and if we ask what would happen when such a society fell into more peaceful relations with adjacent like societies, and obtained wives from them no longer by force, but by purchase or other friendly arrange- ment; we may see that, in the first place, the form of cap- ture would replace the actuality of capture in the marriages I I I I I SXOQAMT AND EKDOOAMT. 667 of this dominant class; for^ as Mr. McLennan contenils^ conformity to ancestral usage would necessitate the simula- tion of capture after actual capture has ceased. And when^ in the dominant class^ wife-capture had thus passed into a form, it would be imitated by the subject class as being the most honourable form. Such among the inferior as had risen to superior social positions would first adopt it; and they would gradually be followed by those below them. So that, e7en were there none of the other probable origins named above, a surviving form of capture in any society would not necessarily show that society to have been exogamous; but would merely show that wife-capture was in early times practised by its leading men.
§ 289. And now, pursuing the argument, let us see whether exogamy and endogamy are not simultaneously accounted for as correlative results of the same differentiat- ing process. Setting out with a state in which the rela- tions of the sexes were indefinite, variable, and determined by the passions and circumstances of the occasion, we have to explain how exogamy and endogamy became established, the one here, the other there, as consequences of surround- ing conditions. The efficient conditions were the relations to other tribes, now peaceful but usually hostile, some of them strong and some of them weak.
Necessarily, a primitive group not commonly at war with neighbouring groups, must be endogamous; for the taking of women from other tribes is either a sequence of open war, or is an act of private war which brings on open war. Pure endogamy, however, resulting in this manner, is pro- bably rare; since the hostility of tribes is almost universal. But endogamy is likely to characterize not peaceful groups alone, but also groups habitually worsted in war. An occasional abducted woman taken in reprisal, will not suffice to establish in a weak tribe any precedent for wife-capture; but, contrariwise, a member of such a tribe who carries off TJ u TJ u a woman, and so proyokea ihe Toogeanoe of a stronger faribe robbed^ is likely to meet with geneial reprobation.^ Hence marrying within the tribe will not only be habiioalj bat there will arise a prqndioe, and erraitoally a law, against taking wires from other tribes: the needs of sdf-preserva- tion will make the tribe endogamoos. This interpr^ation harmonizes with the fsct, admitted by Mr. Mliennan, that the endogamons tribes are as nnmeroos as the ezogamons; and also with the &ct he admits, that in snndry cases clusters of tribes allied by blood Mid language are some of them exogamons and some endogamons.
It is to be inferred that among tribes not differing mnch from one another in strengrth, there will be continnal ag- gressions and reprisals^ accompanied by mntoal robberies of women. No one of them will be able to snpply itself with wives entirely at the expense of adjacent tribes; and benoe^ in each of them, there will be both native wives and wives taken from other tribes: there will be both exogamy and endogamy. Stealing of wives will not be reprobated, be- canse the tribes robbed are not too strong to be defied; and it will not be insisted on^ because the men who have stolen wives will not be nnmeroos enough to determine the average opinion.
If > however, in a clnster of tribes one gains predominance by freqaent successes in war — if the men in it who have stolen wives come to form the larger number — if the pos- session of a stolen wife becomes a mark of that bravery without which a man is not worthy of a wife; then the dis- creditableness of marrying within the tribe, growing into * Since the Above sentence was written, I have^ by a bappj coincideDoeh come npon a verifying fact^ in the joBt-pablished Life in ike Somtkem Islet, bj tbe Rev. Mr. Gill (p. 47). A man belonging to one of the tribes in ICangua •tole food from an ac^acent tribe. This adjacent tribe avenged itself by de- stroying the houses, etc.» of the thief's tribe. Therenpon the thieTs tribe, sn^TT because of the mischief thns brought npon them, killed the thief. If this hap- pened with a stealer of food, still more would it be likely to happen with a stealer of women, when the tribe robbed was the more poweriuL aer SZOaAHT AND EKDOGAMT. 659 disgracefulness, will end in a peremptory reqairement to get a wife from another tribe — ^if not in open war, then by pri- vate thef fc: the tribe will become exogamons. A se- quence may be traced. The exogamons tribe thns arising, and growing while it causes adjacent tribes to dwindle by robbing them, will presently divide; and its sections, usurping the habitats of adjacent tribes, will carry with them the estab- lished exogamons habit. When, presently becoming hostile, these diverging sub-tribes begin to rob one another of women, there will arise conditions conducive to that internal exogamy which Mr. McLennan supposes, rightly I think, to replace external exogamy. For unless we assume that in a cluster of tribes, each will undertake to rear women for adjacent tribes to steal, we must conclude that the exoga- mons requirement will be met in a qualified manner. Wives bom within the tribe but foreign by blood, will, under pressure of the difficulty, be considered allowable, instead of actually stolen wives. And thus, indeed, that kinship in the female line which primitive irregularity in the relations of the sexes originates, will become established, even though male parenthood is known; since this interpretation of kin- ship will make possible conformity to a law of eonnubiv/m that could not otherwise be obeyed.
§ 290. Nothing of much importance is to be said respect- ing exogamy and endogamy in their general bearings on social life.
Exogamy in its primitive form is clearly an accompani- ment of the lowest barbarism; and it decreases as the hos- tility of societies becomes less constant, and the usages of war mitigated. That the implied crossing of tribal stocks, where these tribal stocks are very small, may be advan- tageous, physiologically, is true; and exogamy may so secure a benefit which at a later stage is secured by the mingling of conquering and conquered tribes; though none who bear in mind the thoughtlessness of savages will sup- 660 THE DOMESTIC RBIATIONS.
pose sncli a benefit to liave been contemplated. Bat the exogamotis oostom as at first established^ implies an ex- tremely abject condition of women; a brutal treatment of tbem; an entire absence of the higher sentiments that ac- company the relations of the sexea Associated with the lowest type of political life, it is also associated with the lowest type of domestic life.
Evidently endogamy, which at the outset must have cha- racterized the more peaceful groups, and which has pre- vailed as societies have become less hostile, is a concomitant of the higher forms of the family.
[The above chapter, written before the middle of Sep- tember, I have kept standing in type for several weeks: being deterred from printing by the announcement that a second edition of Mr. M'Lennan's work was coming out, and by the thought that perhaps amendments contained in it might entail some modifications of my criticisms. Cir- cumstances, however, have prevented Mr. M'Lennan from changing his exposition. In the preface to this new edition he says: — '* Thongh I am again firee to resimie the studies necessaiy for its revision, it is uncertain whether I coold soon reyise it in a eatialaetaiy manner — bo that I am without an answer to representationB made to me, that it is better it should be made acceaaible to students with its imperfections than that it should remain inaccessible to them. I have done this the more readily that, on the whole, I still adhere to the con- elusions I had arrived at more than eleven years ago, on the various matters which are discussed in ' Primitive Marriage.* " I now, therefore, send the foregoing pages to the press unaltered. The quotations are, of course, from the first edition, the paging of which does not correspond with that of the second. I have not, however, thought it need- ful, or indeed, desirable, to change the references; since the first edition is at present, and probably wiU for some time be, more widely diffused than the second.]
CHAPTER V.
PROMISCUITY.
§ 291. Alrbaby^ in the chapter on " The Frimitire Rela- tions of the Sexes,'' illustrations have been given of the in- definiteness and inconstancy of the connexions between men and women in low societies. The wills of the stronger, onchecked by political restraints, nnguided by moral sentiments, determine all behavionr. Forcibly taking women from one another, men recognize no tie between the sexes save that which might establishes and liking nmintains. To the instances there given, others may be added, showing that at first, marriage, as we understand it, hardly exists.
Bancroft quotes Poole as saying of the Haidahs that the women ''cohabit almost promiscuously with their own tribe, though rarely with other tribes." According to Captain Taylor, the Hill-tribes of the Piney HUls, Madura dis- trict, have very few restrictions upon promiscuous inter- course. Describing a people inhabiting the Keilgherry Hills, Captain Harkness says — '' They [two Brulars] informed us that the Einilars have no marriage contract, the sexes cohabiting almost indiscriminately; the option of remaining in union or of separating resting principally with the female.'' Of another Indian people, the Teehurs, it is said that they ''live together almost indiscriminately in large communities, and eyen when two people are regarded 662 THK OOMXSTIC RKIiATIONS.
as married the tie is but nominal/' And according to a Bralimin sepoj who lired more than a year with the AndamaneBOj promiscuity is so far sanctioned among them by public opinion, that a man who is refused by an un- married woman "considers himself insulted," and some- times takes summary yengeance.
As shown by instances before giren, this state of things is in many low tribes rery little qualified by such form of union as stands for marriage; which sometimes has not eren a name. Temporary fancies determine the con- nexions and mere whims dissolve them. What is said of the Mantras, who marry without acquaintance and dirorce for trifles, and among whom some men marry ''forty or fifty" times, may be taken as typical, § 292. Facts of this kind are thought by several writers to imply that the primitive condition was one of unqualified hetairism. Complete promiscuity is held to have been not simply the practice but in some sort the law. Indeed, the name ''communal marriage'' has been proposed by Sir John Lubbock for this earliest phase of the sexual rela- tions, as implying recogniaed rights and bonds. I do not think the evidence warrants us in concluding that pro- miscuity ever existed in an unqualified form; and it appears to me that even had it so existed, the name " com- munal marriage " would not convey a true conception of it.
As before contended, the initial social state must have been one in which there were no social laws. Social laws presuppose continued social existence; and continued so- cial existence presupposes reproduction through successive generations. Hence there could, at first, have been no such social law as that of "communal marriage, where every man and woman in a small community were regarded as equally married to one another" — ^there could have been no conception of "communal marriage rights." The words " marriage " and " rights " as applied to such a state have.
FB0MI3GUITT. 663