Mutual Aid: A Factor of Evolution



Peter Kropotkin

1902



Chapter 3



MUTUAL AID AMONG SAVAGES





Supposed war of each against all. -- Tribal origin of human

society. -- Late appearance of the separate family. -- Bushmen

and Hottentots. -- Australians, Papuas. -- Eskimos, Aleoutes. --

Features of savage life difficult to understand for the European.

-- The Dayak's conception of justice. -- Common law.







    The immense part played by mutual aid and mutual support in



the evolution of the animal world has been briefly analyzed in



the preceding chapters. We have now to cast a glance upon the



part played by the same agencies in the evolution of mankind. We



saw how few are the animal species which live an isolated life,



and how numberless are those which live in societies, either for



mutual defence, or for hunting and storing up food, or for



rearing their offspring, or simply for enjoying life in common.



We also saw that, though a good deal of warfare goes on between



different classes of animals, or different species, or even



different tribes of the same species, peace and mutual support



are the rule within the tribe or the species; and that those



species which best know how to combine, and to avoid competition,



have the best chances of survival and of a further progressive



development. They prosper, while the unsociable species decay.



    It is evident that it would be quite contrary to all that we



know of nature if men were an exception to so general a rule: if



a creature so defenceless as man was at his beginnings should



have found his protection and his way to progress, not in mutual



support, like other animals, but in a reckless competition for



personal advantages, with no regard to the interests of the



species. To a mind accustomed to the idea of unity in nature,



such a proposition appears utterly indefensible. And yet,



improbable and unphilosophical as it is, it has never found a



lack of supporters. There always were writers who took a



pessimistic view of mankind. They knew it, more or less



superficially, through their own limited experience; they knew of



history what the annalists, always watchful of wars, cruelty, and



oppression, told of it, and little more besides; and they



concluded that mankind is nothing but a loose aggregation of



beings, always ready to fight with each other, and only prevented



from so doing by the intervention of some authority.



    Hobbes took that position; and while some of his



eighteenth-century followers endeavoured to prove that at no



epoch of its existence -- not even in its most primitive



condition -- mankind lived in a state of perpetual warfare; that



men have been sociable even in "the state of nature," and that



want of knowledge, rather than the natural bad inclinations of



man, brought humanity to all the horrors of its early historical



life, -- his idea was, on the contrary, that the so-called "state



of nature" was nothing but a permanent fight between individuals,



accidentally huddled together by the mere caprice of their



bestial existence. True, that science has made some progress



since Hobbes's time, and that we have safer ground to stand upon



than the speculations of Hobbes or Rousseau. But the Hobbesian



philosophy has plenty of admirers still; and we have had of late



quite a school of writers who, taking possession of Darwin's



terminology rather than of his leading ideas, made of it an



argument in favour of Hobbes's views upon primitive man, and even



succeeded in giving them a scientific appearance. Huxley, as is



known, took the lead of that school, and in a paper written in



1888 he represented primitive men as a sort of tigers or lions,



deprived of all ethical conceptions, fighting out the struggle



for existence to its bitter end, and living a life of "continual



free fight"; to quote his own words -- "beyond the limited and,



temporary relations of the family, the Hobbesian war of each



against all was the normal state of existence."1



    It has been remarked more than once that the chief error of



Hobbes, and the eighteenth-century philosophers as well, was to



imagine that mankind began its life in the shape of small



straggling families, something like the "limited and temporary"



families of the bigger carnivores, while in reality it is now



positively known that such was not the case. Of course, we have



no direct evidence as to the modes of life of the first man-like



beings. We are not yet settled even as to the time of their first



appearance, geologists being inclined at present to see their



traces in the pliocene, or even the miocene, deposits of the



Tertiary period. But we have the indirect method which permits us



to throw some light even upon that remote antiquity. A most



careful investigation into the social institutions of the lowest



races has been carried on during the last forty years, and it has



revealed among the present institutions of primitive folk some



traces of still older institutions which have long disappeared,



but nevertheless left unmistakable traces of their previous



existence. A whole science devoted to the embryology of human



institutions has thus developed in the hands of Bachofen,



MacLennan, Morgan, Edwin Tylor, Maine, Post, Kovalevsky, Lubbock,



and many others. And that science has established beyond any



doubt that mankind did not begin its life in the shape of small



isolated families.



    Far from being a primitive form of organization, the family



is a very late product of human evolution. As far as we can go



back in the palaeo-ethnology of mankind, we find men living in



societies -- in tribes similar to those of the highest mammals;



and an extremely slow and long evolution was required to bring



these societies to the gentile, or clan organization, which, in



its turn, had to undergo another, also very long evolution,



before the first germs of family, polygamous or monogamous, could



appear. Societies, bands, or tribes -- not families -- were thus



the primitive form of organization of mankind and its earliest



ancestors. That is what ethnology has come to after its



painstaking researches. And in so doing it simply came to what



might have been foreseen by the zoologist. None of the higher



mammals, save a few carnivores and a few undoubtedly-decaying



species of apes (orang-outans and gorillas), live in small



families, isolatedly straggling in the woods. All others live in



societies. And Darwin so well understood that isolately-living



apes never could have developed into man-like beings, that he was



inclined to consider man as descended from some comparatively



weak but social species, like the chimpanzee, rather than from



some stronger but unsociable species, like the gorilla.2



Zoology and palaeo-ethnology are thus agreed in considering that



the band, not the family, was the earliest form of social life.



The first human societies simply were a further development of



those societies which constitute the very essence of life of the



higher animals.3



    If we now go over to positive evidence, we see that the



earliest traces of man, dating from the glacial or the early



post-glacial period, afford unmistakable proofs of man having



lived even then in societies. Isolated finds of stone implements,



even from the old stone age, are very rare; on the contrary,



wherever one flint implement is discovered others are sure to be



found, in most cases in very large quantities. At a time when men



were dwelling in caves, or under occasionally protruding rocks,



in company with mammals now extinct, and hardly succeeded in



making the roughest sorts of flint hatchets, they already knew



the advantages of life in societies. In the valleys of the



tributaries of the Dordogne, the surface of the rocks is in some



places entirely covered with caves which were inhabited by



palaeolithic men.4 Sometimes the cave-dwellings are superposed



in storeys, and they certainly recall much more the nesting



colonies of swallows than the dens of carnivores. As to the flint



implements discovered in those caves, to use Lubbock's words,



"one may say without exaggeration that they are numberless." The



same is true of other palaeolithic stations. It also appears from



Lartet's investigations that the inhabitants of the Aurignac



region in the south of France partook of tribal meals at the



burial of their dead. So that men lived in societies, and had



germs of a tribal worship, even at that extremely remote epoch.



    The same is still better proved as regards the later part of



the stone age. Traces of neolithic man have been found in



numberless quantities, so that we can reconstitute his manner of



life to a great extent. When the ice-cap (which must have spread



from the Polar regions as far south as middle France, middle



Germany, and middle Russia, and covered Canada as well as a good



deal of what is now the United States) began to melt away, the



surfaces freed from ice were covered, first, with swamps and



marshes, and later on with numberless lakes.5 Lakes filled all



depressions of the valleys before their waters dug out those



permanent channels which, during a subsequent epoch, became our



rivers. And wherever we explore, in Europe, Asia, or America, the



shores of the literally numberless lakes of that period, whose



proper name would be the Lacustrine period, we find traces of



neolithic man. They are so numerous that we can only wonder at



the relative density of population at that time. The "stations"



of neolithic man closely follow each other on the terraces which



now mark the shores of the old lakes. And at each of those



stations stone implements appear in such numbers, that no doubt



is possible as to the length of time during which they were



inhabited by rather numerous tribes. Whole workshops of flint



implements, testifying of the numbers of workers who used to come



together, have been discovered by the archaeologists.



    Traces of a more advanced period, already characterized by



the use of some pottery, are found in the shell-heaps of Denmark.



They appear, as is well known, in the shape of heaps from five to



ten feet thick, from 100 to 200 feet wide, and 1,000 feet or more



in length, and they are so common along some parts of the



sea-coast that for a long time they were considered as natural



growths. And yet they "contain nothing but what has been in some



way or other subservient to the use of man," and they are so



densely stuffed with products of human industry that, during a



two days' stay at Milgaard, Lubbock dug out no less than 191



pieces of stone-implements and four fragments of pottery.6 The



very size and extension of the shell heaps prove that for



generations and generations the coasts of Denmark were inhabited



by hundreds of small tribes which certainly lived as peacefully



together as the Fuegian tribes, which also accumulate like



shellheaps, are living in our own times.



    As to the lake-dwellings of Switzerland, which represent a



still further advance in civilization, they yield still better



evidence of life and work in societies. It is known that even



during the stone age the shores of the Swiss lakes were dotted



with a succession of villages, each of which consisted of several



huts, and was built upon a platform supported by numberless



pillars in the lake. No less than twenty-four, mostly stone age



villages, were discovered along the shores of Lake Leman,



thirty-two in the Lake of Constance, forty-six in the Lake of



Neuchâtel, and so on; and each of them testifies to the immense



amount of labour which was spent in common by the tribe, not by



the family. It has even been asserted that the life of the



lake-dwellers must have been remarkably free of warfare. And so



it probably was, especially if we refer to the life of those



primitive folk who live until the present time in similar



villages built upon pillars on the sea coasts.



    It is thus seen, even from the above rapid hints, that our



knowledge of primitive man is not so scanty after all, and that,



so far as it goes, it is rather opposed than favourable to the



Hobbesian speculations. Moreover, it may be supplemented, to a



great extent, by the direct observation of such primitive tribes



as now stand on the same level of civilization as the inhabitants



of Europe stood in prehistoric times.



    That these primitive tribes which we find now are not



degenerated specimens of mankind who formerly knew a higher



civilization, as it has occasionally been maintained, has



sufficiently been proved by Edwin Tylor and Lubbock. However, to



the arguments already opposed to the degeneration theory, the



following may be added. Save a few tribes clustering in the



less-accessible highlands, the "savages" represent a girdle which



encircles the more or less civilized nations, and they occupy the



extremities of our continents, most of which have retained still,



or recently were bearing, an early post-glacial character. Such



are the Eskimos and their congeners in Greenland, Arctic America,



and Northern Siberia; and, in the Southern hemisphere, the



Australians, the Papuas, the Fuegians, and, partly, the Bushmen;



while within the civilized area, like primitive folk are only



found in the Himalayas, the highlands of Australasia, and the



plateaus of Brazil. Now it must be borne in mind that the glacial



age did not come to an end at once over the whole surface of the



earth. It still continues in Greenland. Therefore, at a time when



the littoral regions of the Indian Ocean, the Mediterranean, or



the Gulf of Mexico already enjoyed a warmer climate, and became



the seats of higher civilizations, immense territories in middle



Europe, Siberia, and Northern America, as well as in Patagonia,



Southern Africa, and Southern Australasia, remained in early



postglacial conditions which rendered them inaccessible to the



civilized nations of the torrid and sub-torrid zones. They were



at that time what the terrible urmans of North-West Siberia are



now, and their population, inaccessible to and untouched by



civilization, retained the characters of early post-glacial man.



Later on, when desiccation rendered these territories more



suitable for agriculture, they were peopled with more civilized



immigrants; and while part of their previous inhabitants were



assimilated by the new settlers, another part migrated further,



and settled where we find them. The territories they inhabit now



are still, or recently were, sub-glacial, as to their physical



features; their arts and implements are those of the neolithic



age; and, notwithstanding their racial differences, and the



distances which separate them, their modes of life and social



institutions bear a striking likeness. So we cannot but consider



them as fragments of the early post-glacial population of the now



civilized area.



    The first thing which strikes us as soon as we begin studying



primitive folk is the complexity of the organization of marriage



relations under which they are living. With most of them the



family, in the sense we attribute to it, is hardly found in its



germs. But they are by no means loose aggregations of men and



women coming in a disorderly manner together in conformity with



their momentary caprices. All of them are under a certain



organization, which has been described by Morgan in its general



aspects as the "gentile," or clan organization.7



    To tell the matter as briefly as possible, there is little



doubt that mankind has passed at its beginnings through a stage



which may be described as that of "communal marriage"; that is,



the whole tribe had husbands and wives in common with but little



regard to consanguinity. But it is also certain that some



restrictions to that free intercourse were imposed at a very



early period. Inter-marriage was soon prohibited between the sons



of one mother and her sisters, granddaughters, and aunts. Later



on it was prohibited between the sons and daughters of the same



mother, and further limitations did not fail to follow. The idea



of a gens, or clan, which embodied all presumed descendants from



one stock (or rather all those who gathered in one group) was



evolved, and marriage within the clan was entirely prohibited. It



still remained "communal," but the wife or the husband had to be



taken from another clan. And when a gens became too numerous, and



subdivided into several gentes, each of them was divided into



classes (usually four), and marriage was permitted only between



certain well-defined classes. That is the stage which we find now



amOng the Kamilaroi-speaking Australians. As to the family, its



first germs appeared amidst the clan organization. A woman who



was captured in war from some other clan, and who formerly would



have belonged to the whole gens, could be kept at a later period



by the capturer, under certain obligations towards the tribe. She



may be taken by him to a separate hut, after she had paid a



certain tribute to the clan, and thus constitute within the gens



a separate family, the appearance of which evidently was opening



a quite new phase of civilization.8



    Now, if we take into consideration that this complicated



organization developed among men who stood at the lowest known



degree of development, and that it maintained itself in societies



knowing no kind of authority besides the authority of public



opinion, we at once see how deeply inrooted social instincts must



have been in human nature, even at its lowest stages. A savage



who is capable of living under such an organization, and of



freely submitting to rules which continually clash with his



personal desires, certainly is not a beast devoid of ethical



principles and knowing no rein to its passions. But the fact



becomes still more striking if we consider the immense antiquity



of the clan organization. It is now known that the primitive



Semites, the Greeks of Homer, the prehistoric Romans, the Germans



of Tacitus, the early Celts and the early Slavonians, all have



had their own period of clan organization, closely analogous to



that of the Australians, the Red Indians, the Eskimos, and other



inhabitants of the "savage girdle."9 So we must admit that



either the evolution of marriage laws went on on the same lines



among all human races, or the rudiments of the clan rules were



developed among some common ancestors of the Semites, the Aryans,



the Polynesians, etc., before their differentiation into separate



races took place, and that these rules were maintained, until



now, among races long ago separated from the common stock. Both



alternatives imply, however, an equally striking tenacity of the



institution -- such a tenacity that no assaults of the individual



could break it down through the scores of thousands of years that



it was in existence. The very persistence of the clan



organization shows how utterly false it is to represent primitive



mankind as a disorderly agglomeration of individuals, who only



obey their individual passions, and take advantage of their



personal force and cunningness against all other representatives



of the species. Unbridled individualism is a modern growth, but



it is not characteristic of primitive mankind.10







    Going now over to the existing savages, we may begin with the



Bushmen, who stand at a very low level of development -- so low



indeed that they have no dwellings and sleep in holes dug in the



soil, occasionally protected by some screens. It is known that



when Europeans settled in their territory and destroyed deer, the



Bushmen began stealing the settlers' cattle, whereupon a war of



extermination, too horrible to be related here, was waged against



them. Five hundred Bushmen were slaughtered in 1774, three



thousand in 1808 and 1809 by the Farmers' Alliance, and so on.



They were poisoned like rats, killed by hunters lying in ambush



before the carcass of some animal, killed wherever met with.11



So that our knowledge of the Bushmen, being chiefly borrowed from



those same people who exterminated them, is necessarily limited.



But still we know that when the Europeans came, the Bushmen lived



in small tribes (or clans), sometimes federated together; that



they used to hunt in common, and divided the spoil without



quarrelling; that they never abandoned their wounded, and



displayed strong affection to their comrades. Lichtenstein has a



most touching story about a Bushman, nearly drowned in a river,



who was rescued by his companions. They took off their furs to



cover him, and shivered themselves; they dried him, rubbed him



before the fire, and smeared his body with warm grease till they



brought him back to life. And when the Bushmen found, in Johan



van der Walt, a man who treated them well, they expressed their



thankfulness by a most touching attachment to that man.12



Burchell and Moffat both represent them as goodhearted,



disinterested, true to their promises, and grateful,13 all



qualities which could develop only by being practised within the



tribe. As to their love to children, it is sufficient to say that



when a European wished to secure a Bushman woman as a slave, he



stole her child: the mother was sure to come into slavery to



share the fate of her child.14



    The same social manners characterize the Hottentots, who are



but a little more developed than the Bushmen. Lubbock describes



them as "the filthiest animals," and filthy they really are. A



fur suspended to the neck and worn till it falls to pieces is all



their dress; their huts are a few sticks assembled together and



covered with mats, with no kind of furniture within. And though



they kept oxen and sheep, and seem to have known the use of iron



before they made acquaintance with the Europeans, they still



occupy one of the lowest degrees of the human scale. And yet



those who knew them highly praised their sociability and



readiness to aid each other. If anything is given to a Hottentot,



he at once divides it among all present -- a habit which, as is



known, so much struck Darwin among the Fuegians. He cannot eat



alone, and, however hungry, he calls those who pass by to share



his food. And when Kolben expressed his astonishment thereat, he



received the answer. "That is Hottentot manner." But this is not



Hottentot manner only: it is an all but universal habit among the



"savages." Kolben, who knew the Hottentots well and did not pass



by their defects in silence, could not praise their tribal



morality highly enough.







"Their word is sacred," he wrote. They know "nothing of the



corruptness and faithless arts of Europe." "They live in great



tranquillity and are seldom at war with their neighbours." They



are "all kindness and goodwill to one another.. One of the



greatest pleasures of the Hottentots certainly lies in their



gifts and good offices to one another." "The integrity of the



Hottentots, their strictness and celerity in the exercise of



justice, and their chastity, are things in which they excel all



or most nations in the world."15







    Tachart, Barrow, and Moodie16 fully confirm Kolben's



testimony. Let me only remark that when Kolben wrote that "they



are certainly the most friendly, the most liberal and the most



benevolent people to one another that ever appeared on the earth"



(i. 332), he wrote a sentence which has continually appeared



since in the description of savages. When first meeting with



primitive races, the Europeans usually make a caricature of their



life; but when an intelligent man has stayed among them for a



longer time, he generally describes them as the "kindest" or "the



gentlest" race on the earth. These very same words have been



applied to the Ostyaks, the Samoyedes, the Eskimos, the Dayaks,



the Aleoutes, the Papuas, and so on, by the highest authorities.



I also remember having read them applied to the Tunguses, the



Tchuktchis, the Sioux, and several others. The very frequency of



that high commendation already speaks volumes in itself.



    The natives of Australia do not stand on a higher level of



development than their South African brothers. Their huts are of



the same character. very often simple screens are the only



protection against cold winds. In their food they are most



indifferent: they devour horribly putrefied corpses, and



cannibalism is resorted to in times of scarcity. When first



discovered by Europeans, they had no implements but in stone or



bone, and these were of the roughest description. Some tribes had



even no canoes, and did not know barter-trade. And yet, when



their manners and customs were carefully studied, they proved to



be living under that elaborate clan organization which I have



mentioned on a preceding page.17



    The territory they inhabit is usually allotted between the



different gentes or clans; but the hunting and fishing



territories of each clan are kept in common, and the produce of



fishing and hunting belongs to the whole clan; so also the



fishing and hunting implements.18 The meals are taken in



common. Like many other savages, they respect certain regulations



as to the seasons when certain gums and grasses may be



collected.19 As to their morality altogether, we cannot do



better than transcribe the following answers given to the



questions of the Paris Anthropological Society by Lumholtz, a



missionary who sojourned in North Queensland:20 --







    "The feeling of friendship is known among them; it is strong.



Weak people are usually supported; sick people are very well



attended to; they never are abandoned or killed. These tribes are



cannibals, but they very seldom eat members of their own tribe



(when immolated on religious principles, I suppose); they eat



strangers only. The parents love their children, play with them,



and pet them. Infanticide meets with common approval. Old people



are very well treated, never put to death. No religion, no idols,



only a fear of death. Polygamous marriage. quarrels arising



within the tribe are settled by means of duels fought with wooden



swords and shields. No slaves; no culture of any kind; no



pottery; no dress, save an apron sometimes worn by women. The



clan consists of two hundred individuals, divided into four



classes of men and four of women; marriage being only permitted



within the usual classes, and never within the gens."







    For the Papuas, closely akin to the above, we have the



testimony of G.L. Bink, who stayed in New Guinea, chiefly in



Geelwink Bay, from 1871 to 1883. Here is the essence of his



answers to the same questioner:21  --







"They are sociable and cheerful; they laugh very much. Rather



timid than courageous. Friendship is relatively strong among



persons belonging to different tribes, and still stronger within



the tribe. A friend will often pay the debt of his friend, the



stipulation being that the latter will repay it without interest



to the children of the lender. They take care of the ill and the



old; old people are never abandoned, and in no case are they



killed -- unless it be a slave who was ill for a long time. War



prisoners are sometimes eaten. The children are very much petted



and loved. Old and feeble war prisoners are killed, the others



are sold as slaves. They have no religion, no gods, no idols, no



authority of any description; the oldest man in the family is the



judge. In cases of adultery a fine is paid, and part of it goes



to the negoria (the community). The soil is kept in common, but



the crop belongs to those who have grown it. They have pottery,



and know barter-trade -- the custom being that the merchant gives



them the goods, whereupon they return to their houses and bring



the native goods required by the merchant; if the latter cannot



be obtained, the European goods are returned.22 They are



head-hunters, and in so doing they prosecute blood revenge.



'Sometimes,' Finsch says, 'the affair is referred to the Rajah of



Namototte, who terminates it by imposing a fine.'"







    When well treated, the Papuas are very kind. Miklukho-Maclay



landed on the eastern coast of New Guinea, followed by one single



man, stayed for two years among tribes reported to be cannibals,



and left them with regret; he returned again to stay one year



more among them, and never had he any conflict to complain of.



True that his rule was never -- under no pretext whatever -- to



say anything which was not truth, nor make any promise which he



could not keep. These poor creatures, who even do not know how to



obtain fire, and carefully maintain it in their huts, live under



their primitive communism, without any chiefs; and within their



villages they have no quarrels worth speaking of. They work in



common, just enough to get the food of the day; they rear their



children in common; and in the evenings they dress themselves as



coquettishly as they can, and dance. Like all savages, they are



fond of dancing. Each village has its barla, or balai -- the



"long house," "longue maison," or "grande maison" -- for the



unmarried men, for social gatherings, and for the discussion of



common affairs -- again a trait which is common to most



inhabitants of the Pacific Islands, the Eskimos, the Red Indians,



and so on. Whole groups of villages are on friendly terms, and



visit each other en bloc.



    Unhappily, feuds are not uncommon -- not in consequence of



"Overstocking of the area," or "keen competition," and like



inventions of a mercantile century, but chiefly in consequence of



superstition. As soon as any one falls ill, his friends and



relatives come together, and deliberately discuss who might be



the cause of the illness. All possible enemies are considered,



every one confesses of his own petty quarrels, and finally the



real cause is discovered. An enemy from the next village has



called it down, and a raid upon that village is decided upon.



Therefore, feuds are rather frequent, even between the coast



villages, not to say a word of the cannibal mountaineers who are



considered as real witches and enemies, though, on a closer



acquaintance, they prove to be exactly the same sort of people as



their neighbours on the seacoast.23



    Many striking pages could be written about the harmony which



prevails in the villages of the Polynesian inhabitants of the



Pacific Islands. But they belong to a more advanced stage of



civilization. So we shall now take our illustrations from the far



north. I must mention, however, before leaving the Southern



Hemisphere, that even the Fuegians, whose reputation has been so



bad, appear under a much better light since they begin to be



better known. A few French missionaries who stay among them "know



of no act of malevolence to complain of." In their clans,



consisting of from 120 to 150 souls, they practise the same



primitive communism as the Papuas; they share everything in



common, and treat their old people very well. Peace prevails



among these tribes.24 With the Eskimos and their nearest



congeners, the Thlinkets, the Koloshes, and the Aleoutes, we find



one of the nearest illustrations of what man may have been during



the glacial age. Their implements hardly differ from those of



palaeolithic man, and some of their tribes do not yet know



fishing: they simply spear the fish with a kind of harpoon.25



They know the use of iron, but they receive it from the



Europeans, or find it on wrecked ships. Their social organization



is of a very primitive kind, though they already have emerged



from the stage of "communal marriage," even under the gentile



restrictions. They live in families, but the family bonds are



often broken; husbands and wives are often exchanged.26 The



families, however, remain united in clans, and how could it be



otherwise? How could they sustain the hard struggle for life



unless by closely combining their forces? So they do, and the



tribal bonds are closest where the struggle for life is hardest,



namely, in North-East Greenland. The "long house" is their usual



dwelling, and several families lodge in it, separated from each



other by small partitions of ragged furs, with a common passage



in the front. Sometimes the house has the shape of a cross, and



in such case a common fire is kept in the centre. The German



Expedition which spent a winter close by one of those "long



houses" could ascertain that "no quarrel disturbed the peace, no



dispute arose about the use of this narrow space" throughout the



long winter. "Scolding, or even unkind words, are considered as a



misdemeanour, if not produced under the legal form of process,



namely, the nith-song."27 Close cohabitation and close



interdependence are sufficient for maintaining century after



century that deep respect for the interests of the community



which is characteristic of Eskimo life. Even in the larger



communities of Eskimos, "public opinion formed the real



judgment-seat, the general punishment consisting in the offenders



being shamed in the eyes of the people."28



    Eskimo life is based upon communism. What is obtained by



hunting and fishing belongs to the clan. But in several tribes,



especially in the West, under the influence of the Danes, private



property penetrates into their institutions. However, they have



an original means for obviating the inconveniences arising from a



personal accumulation of wealth which would soon destroy their



tribal unity. When a man has grown rich, he convokes the folk of



his clan to a great festival, and, after much eating, distributes



among them all his fortune. On the Yukon river, Dall saw an



Aleonte family distributing in this way ten guns, ten full fur



dresses, 200 strings of beads, numerous blankets, ten wolf furs,



200 beavers, and 500 zibelines. After that they took off their



festival dresses, gave them away, and, putting on old ragged



furs, addressed a few words to their kinsfolk, saying that though



they are now poorer than any one of them, they have won their



friendship.29 Like distributions of wealth appear to be a



regular habit with the Eskimos, and to take place at a certain



season, after an exhibition of all that has been obtained during



the year.30 In my opinion these distributions reveal a very



old institution, contemporaneous with the first apparition of



personal wealth; they must have been a means for re-establishing



equality among the members of the clan, after it had been



disturbed by the enrichment of the few. The periodical



redistribution of land and the periodical abandonment of all



debts which took place in historical times with so many different



races (Semites, Aryans, etc.), must have been a survival of that



old custom. And the habit of either burying with the dead, or



destroying upon his grave, all that belonged to him personally 



-- a habit which we find among all primitive races -- must have



had the same origin. In fact, while everything that belongs



personally to the dead is burnt or broken upon his grave, nothing



is destroyed of what belonged to him in common with the tribe,



such as boats, or the communal implements of fishing. The



destruction bears upon personal property alone. At a later epoch



this habit becomes a religious ceremony. It receives a mystical



interpretation, and is imposed by religion, when public opinion



alone proves incapable of enforcing its general observance. And,



finally, it is substituted by either burning simple models of the



dead man's property (as in China), or by simply carrying his



property to the grave and taking it back to his house after the



burial ceremony is over -- a habit which still prevails with the



Europeans as regards swords, crosses, and other marks of public



distinction.31



    The high standard of the tribal morality of the Eskimos has



often been mentioned in general literature. Nevertheless the



following remarks upon the manners of the Aleoutes -- nearly akin



to the Eskimos  -- will better illustrate savage morality as a



whole. They were written, after a ten years' stay among the



Aleoutes, by a most remarkable man -- the Russian missionary,



Veniaminoff. I sum them up, mostly in his own words: --







    Endurability (he wrote) is their chief feature. It is simply



colossal. Not only do they bathe every morning in the frozen sea,



and stand naked on the beach, inhaling the icy wind, but their



endurability, even when at hard work on insufficient food,



surpasses all that can be imagined. During a protracted scarcity



of food, the Aleoute cares first for his children; he gives them



all he has, and himself fasts. They are not inclined to stealing;



that was remarked even by the first Russian immigrants. Not that



they never steal; every Aleoute would confess having sometime



stolen something, but it is always a trifle; the whole is so



childish. The attachment of the parents to their children is



touching, though it is never expressed in words or pettings. The



Aleoute is with difficulty moved to make a promise, but once he



has made it he will keep it whatever may happen. (An Aleoute made



Veniaminoff a gift of dried fish, but it was forgotten on the



beach in the hurry of the departure. He took it home. The next



occasion to send it to the missionary was in January; and in



November and December there was a great scarcity of food in the



Aleoute encampment. But the fish was never touched by the



starving people, and in January it was sent to its destination.)



Their code of morality is both varied and severe. It is



considered shameful to be afraid of unavoidable death; to ask



pardon from an enemy; to die without ever having killed an enemy;



to be convicted of stealing; to capsize a boat in the harbour; to



be afraid of going to sea in stormy weather. to be the first in a



party on a long journey to become an invalid in case of scarcity



of food; to show greediness when spoil is divided, in which case



every one gives his own part to the greedy man to shame him; to



divulge a public secret to his wife; being two persons on a



hunting expedition, not to offer the best game to the partner; to



boast of his own deeds, especially of invented ones; to scold any



one in scorn. Also to beg; to pet his wife in other people's



presence, and to dance with her to bargain personally: selling



must always be made through a third person, who settles the



price. For a woman it is a shame not to know sewing, dancing and



all kinds of woman's work; to pet her husband and children, or



even to speak to her husband in the presence of a stranger.32







    Such is Aleoute morality, which might also be further



illustrated by their tales and legends. Let me also add that when



Veniaminoff wrote (in 1840) one murder only had been committed



since the last century in a population of 60,000 people, and that



among 1,800 Aleoutes not one single common law offence had been



known for forty years. This will not seem strange if we remark



that scolding, scorning, and the use of rough words are



absolutely unknown in Aleoute life. Even their children never



fight, and never abuse each other in words. All they may say is,



"Your mother does not know sewing," or "Your father is blind of



one eye."33



    Many features of savage life remain, however, a puzzle to



Europeans. The high development of tribal solidarity and the good



feelings with which primitive folk are animated towards each



other, could be illustrated by any amount of reliable testimony.



And yet it is not the less certain that those same savages



practise infanticide; that in some cases they abandon their old



people, and that they blindly obey the rules of blood-revenge. We



must then explain the coexistence of facts which, to the European



mind, seem so contradictory at the first sight. I have just



mentioned how the Aleoute father starves for days and weeks, and



gives everything eatable to his child; and how the Bushman mother



becomes a slave to follow her child; and I might fill pages with



illustrations of the really tender relations existing among the



savages and their children. Travellers continually mention them



incidentally. Here you read about the fond love of a mother;



there you see a father wildly running through the forest and



carrying upon his shoulders his child bitten by a snake; or a



missionary tells you the despair of the parents at the loss of a



child whom he had saved, a few years before, from being immolated



at its birth. you learn that the "savage" mothers usually nurse



their children till the age of four, and that, in the New



Hebrides, on the loss of a specially beloved child, its mother,



or aunt, will kill herself to take care of it in the other



world.34 And so on.



    Like facts are met with by the score; so that, when we see



that these same loving parents practise infanticide, we are bound



to recognize that the habit (whatever its ulterior



transformations may be) took its origin under the sheer pressure



of necessity, as an obligation towards the tribe, and a means for



rearing the already growing children. The savages, as a rule, do



not "multiply without stint," as some English writers put it. On



the contrary, they take all kinds of measures for diminishing the



birth-rate. A whole series of restrictions, which Europeans



certainly would find extravagant, are imposed to that effect, and



they are strictly obeyed. But notwithstanding that, primitive



folk cannot rear all their children. However, it has been



remarked that as soon as they succeed in increasing their regular



means of subsistence, they at once begin to abandon the practice



of infanticide. On the whole, the parents obey that obligation



reluctantly, and as soon as they can afford it they resort to all



kinds of compromises to save the lives of their new-born. As has



been so well pointed out by my friend Elie Reclus,35 they



invent the lucky and unlucky days of births, and spare the



children born on the lucky days; they try to postpone the



sentence for a few hours, and then say that if the baby has lived



one day it must live all its natural life.36 They hear the



cries of the little ones coming from the forest, and maintain



that, if heard, they forbode a misfortune for the tribe; and as



they have no baby-farming nor crèches for getting rid of the



children, every one of them recoils before the necessity of



performing the cruel sentence; they prefer to expose the baby in



the wood rather than to take its life by violence. Ignorance, not



cruelty, maintains infanticide; and, instead of moralizing the



savages with sermons, the missionaries would do better to follow



the example of Veniaminoff, who, every year till his old age,



crossed the sea of Okhotsk in a miserable boat, or travelled on



dogs among his Tchuktchis, supplying them with bread and fishing



implements. He thus had really stopped infanticide.



    The same is true as regards what superficial observers



describe as parricide. We just now saw that the habit of



abandoning old people is not so widely spread as some writers



have maintained it to be. It has been extremely exaggerated, but



it is occasionally met with among nearly all savages; and in such



cases it has the same origin as the exposure of children. When a



"savage" feels that he is a burden to his tribe; when every



morning his share of food is taken from the mouths of the



children -- and the little ones are not so stoical as their



fathers: they cry when they are hungry; when every day he has to



be carried across the stony beach, or the virgin forest, on the



shoulders of younger people there are no invalid carriages, nor



destitutes to wheel them in savage lands -- he begins to repeat



what the old Russian peasants say until now-a-day. "Tchujoi vek



zayedayu, Pora na pokoi!" ("I live other people's life: it is



time to retire!") And he retires. He does what the soldier does



in a similar case. When the salvation of his detachment depends



upon its further advance, and he can move no more, and knows that



he must die if left behind, the soldier implores his best friend



to render him the last service before leaving the encampment. And



the friend, with shivering hands, discharges his gun into the



dying body. So the savages do. The old man asks himself to die;



he himself insists upon this last duty towards the community, and



obtains the consent of the tribe; he digs out his grave; he



invites his kinsfolk to the last parting meal. His father has



done so, it is now his turn; and he parts with his kinsfolk with



marks of affection. The savage so much considers death as part of



his duties towards his community, that he not only refuses to be



rescued (as Moffat has told), but when a woman who had to be



immolated on her husband's grave was rescued by missionaries, and



was taken to an island, she escaped in the night, crossed a broad



sea-arm, swimming and rejoined her tribe, to die on the



grave.37 It has become with them a matter of religion. But the



savages, as a rule, are so reluctant to take any one's life



otherwise than in fight, that none of them will take upon himself



to shed human blood, and they resort to all kinds of stratagems,



which have been so falsely interpreted. In most cases, they



abandon the old man in the wood, after having given him more than



his share of the common food. Arctic expeditions have done the



same when they no more could carry their invalid comrades. "Live



a few days more. may be there will be some unexpected rescue!"



West European men of science, when coming across these facts, are



absolutely unable to stand them; they can not reconcile them with



a high development of tribal morality, and they prefer to cast a



doubt upon the exactitude of absolutely reliable observers,



instead of trying to explain the parallel existence of the two



sets of facts: a high tribal morality together with the



abandonment of the parents and infanticide. But if these same



Europeans were to tell a savage that people, extremely amiable,



fond of their own children, and so impressionable that they cry



when they see a misfortune simulated on the stage, are living in



Europe within a stone's throw from dens in which children die



from sheer want of food, the savage, too, would not understand



them. I remember how vainly I tried to make some of my Tungus



friends understand our civilization of individualism: they could



not, and they resorted to the most fantastical suggestions. The



fact is that a savage, brought up in ideas of a tribal solidarity



in everything for bad and for good, is as incapable of



understanding a "moral" European, who knows nothing of that



solidarity, as the average European is incapable of understanding



the savage. But if our scientist had lived amidst a half-starving



tribe which does not possess among them all one man's food for so



much as a few days to come, he probably might have understood



their motives. So also the savage, if he had stayed among us, and



received our education, may be, would understand our European



indifference towards our neighbours, and our Royal Commissions



for the prevention of "babyfarming." "Stone houses make stony



hearts," the Russian peasants say. But he ought to live in a



stone house first.



    Similar remarks must be made as regards cannibalism. Taking



into account all the facts which were brought to light during a



recent controversy on this subject at the Paris Anthropological



Society, and many incidental remarks scattered throughout the



"savage" literature, we are bound to recognize that that practice



was brought into existence by sheer necessity. but that it was



further developed by superstition and religion into the



proportions it attained in Fiji or in Mexico. It is a fact that



until this day many savages are compelled to devour corpses in



the most advanced state of putrefaction, and that in cases of



absolute scarcity some of them have had to disinter and to feed



upon human corpses, even during an epidemic. These are



ascertained facts. But if we now transport ourselves to the



conditions which man had to face during the glacial period, in a



damp and cold climate, with but little vegetable food at his



disposal; if we take into account the terrible ravages which



scurvy still makes among underfed natives, and remember that meat



and fresh blood are the only restoratives which they know, we



must admit that man, who formerly was a granivorous animal,



became a flesh-eater during the glacial period. He found plenty



of deer at that time, but deer often migrate in the Arctic



regions, and sometimes they entirely abandon a territory for a



number of years. In such cases his last resources disappeared.



During like hard trials, cannibalism has been resorted to even by



Europeans, and it was resorted to by the savages. Until the



present time, they occasionally devour the corpses of their own



dead: they must have devoured then the corpses of those who had



to die. Old people died, convinced that by their death they were



rendering a last service to the tribe. This is why cannibalism is



represented by some savages as of divine origin, as something



that has been ordered by a messenger from the sky. But later on



it lost its character of necessity, and survived as a



superstition. Enemies had to be eaten in order to inherit their



courage; and, at a still later epoch, the enemy's eye or heart



was eaten for the same purpose; while among other tribes, already



having a numerous priesthood and a developed mythology, evil



gods, thirsty for human blood, were invented, and human



sacrifices required by the priests to appease the gods. In this



religious phase of its existence, cannibalism attained its most



revolting characters. Mexico is a well-known example; and in



Fiji, where the king could eat any one of his subjects, we also



find a mighty cast of priests, a complicated theology,38 and a



full development of autocracy. Originated by necessity,



cannibalism became, at a later period, a religious institution,



and in this form it survived long after it had disappeared from



among tribes which certainly practised it in former times, but



did not attain the theocratical stage of evolution. The same



remark must be made as regards infanticide and the abandonment of



parents. In some cases they also have been maintained as a



survival of olden times, as a religiously-kept tradition of the



past.







    I will terminate my remarks by mentioning another custom



which also is a source of most erroneous conclusions. I mean the



practice of blood-revenge. All savages are under the impression



that blood shed must be revenged by blood. If any one has been



killed, the murderer must die; if any one has been wounded, the



aggressor's blood must be shed. There is no exception to the



rule, not even for animals; so the hunter's blood is shed on his



return to the village when he has shed the blood of an animal.



That is the savages' conception of justice -- a conception which



yet prevails in Western Europe as regards murder. Now, when both



the offender and the offended belong to the same tribe, the tribe



and the offended person settle the affair.39 But when the



offender belongs to another tribe, and that tribe, for one reason



or another, refuses a compensation, then the offended tribe



decides to take the revenge itself. Primitive folk so much



consider every one's acts as a tribal affair, dependent upon



tribal approval, that they easily think the clan responsible for



every one's acts. Therefore, the due revenge may be taken upon



any member of the offender's clan or relatives.40 It may often



happen, however, that the retaliation goes further than the



offence. In trying to inflict a wound, they may kill the



offender, or wound him more than they intended to do, and this



becomes a cause for a new feud, so that the primitive legislators



were careful in requiring the retaliation to be limited to an eye



for an eye, a tooth for a tooth, and blood for blood.41



    It is remarkable, however, that with most primitive folk like



feuds are infinitely rarer than might be expected; though with



some of them they may attain abnormal proportions, especially



with mountaineers who have been driven to the highlands by



foreign invaders, such as the mountaineers of Caucasia, and



especially those of Borneo -- the Dayaks. With the Dayaks -- we



were told lately -- the feuds had gone so far that a young man



could neither marry nor be proclaimed of age before he had



secured the head of an enemy. This horrid practice was fully



described in a modern English work.42 It appears, however,



that this affirmation was a gross exaggeration. Moreover, Dayak



"head-hunting" takes quite another aspect when we learn that the



supposed "headhunter" is not actuated at all by personal passion.



He acts under what he considers as a moral obligation towards his



tribe, just as the European judge who, in obedience to the same,



evidently wrong, principle of "blood for blood," hands over the



condemned murderer to the hangman. Both the Dayak and the judge



would even feel remorse if sympathy moved them to spare the



murderer. That is why the Dayaks, apart from the murders they



commit when actuated by their conception of justice, are



depicted, by all those who know them, as a most sympathetic



people. Thus Carl Bock, the same author who has given such a



terrible picture of head-hunting, writes:







 "As regards morality, I am bound to assign to the Dayaks a high



place in the scale of civilization.... Robberies and theft are



entirely unknown among them. They also are very truthful.... If I



did not always get the ' whole truth,' I always got, at least,



nothing but the truth from them. I wish I could say the same of



the Malays" (pp. 209 and 210).







    Bock's testimony is fully corroborated by that of Ida



Pfeiffer. "I fully recognized," she wrote, "that I should be



pleased longer to travel among them. I usually found them honest,



good, and reserved... much more so than any other nation I



know."43 Stoltze used almost the same language when speaking



of them. The Dayaks usually have but one wife, and treat her



well. They are very sociable, and every morning the whole clan



goes out for fishing, hunting, or gardening, in large parties.



Their villages consist of big huts, each of which is inhabited by



a dozen families, and sometimes by several hundred persons,



peacefully living together. They show great respect for their



wives, and are fond of their children; and when one of them falls



ill, the women nurse him in turn. As a rule they are very



moderate in eating and drinking. Such is the Dayak in his real



daily life.



    It would be a tedious repetition if more illustrations from



savage life were given. Wherever we go we find the same sociable



manners, the same spirit of solidarity. And when we endeavour to



penetrate into the darkness of past ages, we find the same tribal



life, the same associations of men, however primitive, for mutual



support. Therefore, Darwin was quite right when he saw in man's



social qualities the chief factor for his further evolution, and



Darwin's vulgarizers are entirely wrong when they maintain the



contrary.







    The small strength and speed of man (he wrote), his want of



natural weapons, etc., are more than counterbalanced, firstly, by



his intellectual faculties (which, he remarked on another page,



have been chiefly or even exclusively gained for the benefit of



the community). and secondly, by his social qualities, which led



him to give and receive aid from his fellow men.44







    In the last century the "savage" and his "life in the state



of nature" were idealized. But now men of science have gone to



the opposite extreme, especially since some of them, anxious to



prove the animal origin of man, but not conversant with the



social aspects of animal life, began to charge the savage with



all imaginable "bestial" features. It is evident, however, that



this exaggeration is even more unscientific than Rousseau's



idealization. The savage is not an ideal of virtue, nor is he an



ideal of "savagery." But the primitive man has one quality,



elaborated and maintained by the very necessities of his hard



struggle for life -- he identifies his own existence with that of



his tribe; and without that quality mankind never would have



attained the level it has attained now.



    Primitive folk, as has been already said, so much identify



their lives with that of the tribe, that each of their acts,



however insignificant, is considered as a tribal affair. Their



whole behaviour is regulated by an infinite series of unwritten



rules of propriety which are the fruit of their common experience



as to what is good or bad -- that is, beneficial or harmful for



their own tribe. Of course, the reasonings upon which their rules



of propriety are based sometimes are absurd in the extreme. Many



of them originate in superstition; and altogether, in whatever



the savage does, he sees but the immediate consequences of his



acts; he cannot foresee their indirect and ulterior consequences



-- thus simply exaggerating a defect with which Bentham



reproached civilized legislators. But, absurd or not, the savage



obeys the prescriptions of the common law, however inconvenient



they may be. He obeys them even more blindly than the civilized



man obeys the prescriptions of the written law. His common law is



his religion; it is his very habit of living. The idea of the



clan is always present to his mind, and self-restriction and



self-sacrifice in the interest of the clan are of daily



occurrence. If the savage has infringed one of the smaller tribal



rules, he is prosecuted by the mockeries of the women. If the



infringement is grave, he is tortured day and night by the fear



of having called a calamity upon his tribe. If he has wounded by



accident any one of his own clan, and thus has committed the



greatest of all crimes, he grows quite miserable: he runs away in



the woods, and is ready to commit suicide, unless the tribe



absolves him by inflicting upon him a physical pain and sheds



some of his own blood.45 Within the tribe everything is shared



in common; every morsel of food is divided among all present; and



if the savage is alone in the woods, he does not begin eating



before he has loudly shouted thrice an invitation to any one who



may hear his voice to share his meal.46



    In short, within the tribe the rule of "each for all" is



supreme, so long as the separate family has not yet broken up the



tribal unity. But that rule is not extended to the neighbouring



clans, or tribes, even when they are federated for mutual



protection. Each tribe, or clan, is a separate unity. Just as



among mammals and birds, the territory is roughly allotted among



separate tribes, and, except in times of war, the boundaries are



respected. On entering the territory of his neighbours one must



show that he has no bad intentions. The louder one heralds his



coming, the more confidence he wins; and if he enters a house, he



must deposit his hatchet at the entrance. But no tribe is bound



to share its food with the others: it may do so or it may not.



Therefore the life of the savage is divided into two sets of



actions, and appears under two different ethical aspects: the



relations within the tribe, and the relations with the outsiders;



and (like our international law) the "inter-tribal" law widely



differs from the common law. Therefore, when it comes to a war



the most revolting cruelties may be considered as so many claims



upon the admiration of the tribe. This double conception of



morality passes through the whole evolution of mankind, and



maintains itself until now. We Europeans have realized some



progress -- not immense, at any rate -- in eradicating that



double conception of ethics; but it also must be said that while



we have in some measure extended our ideas of solidarity -- in



theory, at least -- over the nation, and partly over other



nations as well, we have lessened the bonds of solidarity within



our own nations, and even within our own families.



    The appearance of a separate family amidst the clan



necessarily disturbs the established unity. A separate family



means separate property and accumulation of wealth. We saw how



the Eskimos obviate its inconveniences; and it is one of the most



interesting studies to follow in the course of ages the different



institutions (village communities, guilds, and so on) by means of



which the masses endeavoured to maintain the tribal unity,



notwithstanding the agencies which were at work to break it down.



On the other hand, the first rudiments of knowledge which



appeared at an extremely remote epoch, when they confounded



themselves with witchcraft, also became a power in the hands of



the individual which could be used against the tribe. They were



carefully kept in secrecy, and transmitted to the initiated only,



in the secret societies of witches, shamans, and priests, which



we find among all savages. By the same time, wars and invasions



created military authority, as also castes of warriors, whose



associations or clubs acquired great powers. However, at no



period of man's life were wars the normal state of existence.



While warriors exterminated each other, and the priests



celebrated their massacres, the masses continued to live their



daily life, they prosecuted their daily toil. And it is one of



the most interesting studies to follow that life of the masses;



to study the means by which they maintained their own social



organization, which was based upon their own conceptions of



equity, mutual aid, and mutual support -- of common law, in a



word, even when they were submitted to the most ferocious



theocracy or autocracy in the State.











Notes
1 Nineteenth Century., February 1888, p. 165



2 The Descent of Man, end of ch. ii. pp. 63 and 64 of the 2nd

edition.



3 Anthropologists who fully endorse the above views as regards

man nevertheless intimate, sometimes, that the apes live in

polygamous families, under the leadership of "a strong and

jealous male." I do not know how far that assertion is based upon

conclusive observation. But the passage from Brehm's Life of

Animals, which is sometimes referred to, can hardly be taken as

very conclusive. It occurs in his general description of monkeys;

but his more detailed descriptions of separate species either

contradict it or do not confirm it. Even as regards the

cercopithèques, Brehm is affirmative in saying that they "nearly

always live in bands, and very seldom in families" (French

edition, p. 59). As to other species, the very numbers of their

bands, always containing many males, render the "polygamous

family" more than doubtful further observation is evidently

wanted.



4 Lubbock, Prehistoric Times, fifth edition, 1890.



5 That extension of the ice-cap is admitted by most of the

geologists who have specially studied the glacial age. The

Russian Geological Survey already has taken this view as regards

Russia, and most German specialists maintain it as regards

Germany. The glaciation of most of the central plateau of France

will not fail to be recognized by the French geologists, when

they pay more attention to the glacial deposits altogether.



6 Prehistoric Times, pp. 232 and 242.



7 Bachofen, Das Mutterrecht, Stuttgart, 1861; Lewis H. Morgan,

Ancient Society, or Researches in the Lines of Human Progress

from Savagery through Barbarism to Civilization, New York, 1877;

J.F. MacLennan, Studies in Ancient History, 1st series, new

edition, 1886; 2nd series, 1896; L. Fison and A.W. Howitt,

Kamilaroi and Kurnai, Melbourne. These four writers -- as has

been very truly remarked by Giraud Teulon, -- starting from

different facts and different general ideas, and following

different methods, have come to the same conclusion. To Bachofen

we owe the notion of the maternal family and the maternal

succession; to Morgan -- the system of kinship, Malayan and

Turanian, and a highly gifted sketch of the main phases of human

evolution; to MacLennan -- the law of exogeny; and to Fison and

Howitt -- the cuadro, or scheme, of the conjugal societies in

Australia. All four end in establishing the same fact of the

tribal origin of the family. When Bachofen first drew attention

to the maternal family, in his epoch.making work, and Morgan

described the clan-organization, -- both concurring to the almost

general extension of these forms and maintaining that the

marriage laws lie at the very basis of the consecutive steps of

human evolution, they were accused of exaggeration. However, the

most careful researches prosecuted since, by a phalanx of

students of ancient law, have proved that all races of mankind

bear traces of having passed through similar stages of

development of marriage laws, such as we now see in force among

certain savages. See the works of Post, Dargun, Kovalevsky,

Lubbock, and their numerous followers: Lippert, Mucke, etc.



8 See Appendix VII.



9 For the Semites and the Aryans, see especially Prof. Maxim

Kovalevsky's Primitive Law (in Russian), Moscow, 1886 and 1887.

Also his Lectures delivered at Stockholm (Tableau des origines et

de l'évolution de la famille et de la propriété, Stockholm,

1890), which represents an admirable review of the whole

question. Cf. also A. Post, Die Geschlechtsgenossenschaft der

Urzeit, Oldenburg 1875.



10 It would be impossible to enter here into a discussion of the

origin of the marriage restrictions. Let me only remark that a

division into groups, similar to Morgan's Hawaian, exists among

birds; the young broods live together separately from their

parents. A like division might probably be traced among some

mammals as well. As to the prohibition of relations between

brothers and sisters, it is more likely to have arisen, not from

speculations about the bad effects of consanguinity, which

speculations really do not seem probable, but to avoid the

too-easy precocity of like marriages. Under close cohabitation it

must have become of imperious necessity. I must also remark that

in discussing the origin of new customs altogether, we must keep

in mind that the savages, like us, have their "thinkers" and

savants-wizards, doctors, prophets, etc. -- whose knowledge and

ideas are in advance upon those of the masses. United as they are

in their secret unions (another almost universal feature) they

are certainly capable of exercising a powerful influence, and of

enforcing customs the utility of which may not yet be recognized

by the majority of the tribe.



11 Col. Collins, in Philips' Researches in South Africa, London,

1828. Quoted by Waitz, ii. 334.



12 Lichtenstein's Reisen im südlichen Afrika, ii. Pp. 92, 97.

Berlin, 1811.



13 Waitz, Anthropologie der Naturvolker, ii. pp. 335 seq. See

also Fritsch's Die Eingeboren Afrika's, Breslau, 1872, pp. 386

seq.; and Drei Jahre in Süd Afrika. Also W. Bleck, A Brief

Account of Bushmen Folklore, Capetown, 1875.



14 Elisée Reclus, Géographie Universelle, xiii. 475.



15 P. Kolben, The Present State of the Cape of Good Hope,

translated from the German by Mr. Medley, London, 1731, vol. i.

pp. 59, 71, 333, 336, etc.



16 Quoted in Waitz's Anthropologie, ii. 335 seq.



17 The natives living in the north of Sidney, and speaking the

Kamilaroi language, are best known under this aspect, through the

capital work of Lorimer Fison and A.W. Howitt, Kamilaroi and

Kurnaii, Melbourne, 1880. See also A.W. Howitt's "Further Note on

the Australian Class Systems," in Journal of the Anthropological

Institute, 1889, vol. xviii. p. 31, showing the wide extension of

the same organization in Australia.



18 The Folklore, Manners, etc., of Australian Aborigines,

Adelaide, 1879, p. 11.



19 Grey's Journals of Two Expeditions of Discovery in North-West

and Western Australia, London, 1841, vol. ii. pp. 237, 298.



20 Bulletin de la Société d'Anthropologie, 1888, vol. xi. p.

652. I abridge the answers.



21 Bulletin de la Société d'Anthropologie, 1888, vol. xi. p.

386.



22 The same is the practice with the Papuas of Kaimani Bay, who

have a high reputation of honesty. "It never happens that the

Papua be untrue to his promise," Finsch says in Neuguinea und

seine Bewohner, Bremen, 1865, p. 829.



23 Izvestia of the Russian Geographical Society, 1880, pp. 161

seq. Few books of travel give a better insight into the petty

details of the daily life of savages than these scraps from

Maklay's notebooks.



24 L.F. Martial, in Mission Scientifique au Cap Horn, Paris,

1883, vol. i. pp. 183-201.





25 Captain Holm's Expedition to East Greenland.



26 In Australia whole clans have been seen exchanging all their

wives, in order to conjure a calamity (Post, Studien zur

Entwicklungsgeschichte des Familienrechts, 1890, p. 342). More

brotherhood is their specific against calamities.



27 Dr. H. Rink, The Eskimo Tribes, p. 26 (Meddelelser om

Grönland, vol. xi. 1887).



28 Dr. Rink, loc. cit. p. 24. Europeans, grown in the respect of

Roman law, are seldom capable of understanding that force of

tribal authority. "In fact," Dr. Rink writes, "it is not the

exception, but the rule, that white men who have stayed for ten

or twenty years among the Eskimo, return without any real

addition to their knowledge of the traditional ideas upon which

their social state is based. The white man, whether a missionary

or a trader, is firm in his dogmatic opinion that the most vulgar

European is better than the most distinguished native."  -- The

Eskimo Tribes, p. 31.



29 Dall, Alaska and its Resources, Cambridge, U.S., 1870.



30 Dall saw it in Alaska, Jacobsen at Ignitok in the vicinity of

the Bering Strait. Gilbert Sproat mentions it among the Vancouver

indians; and Dr. Rink, who describes the periodical exhibitions

just mentioned, adds: "The principal use of the accumulation of

personal wealth is for periodically distributing it." He also

mentions (loc. cit. p. 31) "the destruction of property for the

same purpose,' (of maintaining equality).



31 See Appendix VIII.



32 Veniaminoff, Memoirs relative to the District of Unalashka

(Russian), 3 vols. St. Petersburg, 1840. Extracts, in English,

from the above are given in Dall's Alaska. A like description of

the Australians' morality is given in Nature, xlii. p. 639.



33 It is most remarkable that several writers (Middendorff,

Schrenk, O. Finsch) described the Ostyaks and Samoyedes in almost

the same words. Even when drunken, their quarrels are

insignificant. "For a hundred years one single murder has been

committed in the tundra;" "their children never fight;" "anything

may be left for years in the tundra, even food and gin, and

nobody will touch it;" and so on. Gilbert Sproat "never witnessed

a fight between two sober natives" of the Aht Indians of

Vancouver Island. "Quarrelling is also rare among their

children." (Rink, loc. cit.) And so on.



34 Gill, quoted in Gerland and Waitz's Anthropologie, v. 641.

See also pp. 636-640, where many facts of parental and filial

love are quoted.



35 Primitive Folk, London, 1891.



36 Gerland, loc. cit. v. 636.



37 Erskine, quoted in Gerland and Waitz's Anthropologie, v. 640.



38 W.T. Pritchard, Polynesian Reminiscences, London, 1866, p.

363.



39 It is remarkable, however, that in case of a sentence of

death, nobody will take upon himself to be the executioner. Every

one throws his stone, or gives his blow with the hatchet,

carefully avoiding to give a mortal blow. At a later epoch, the

priest will stab the victim with a sacred knife. Still later, it

will be the king, until civilization invents the hired hangman.

See Bastian's deep remarks upon this subject in Der Mensch in der

Geschichte, iii. Die Blutrache, pp. 1-36. A remainder of this

tribal habit, I am told by Professor E. Nys, has survived in

military executions till our own times. In the middle portion of

the nineteenth century it was the habit to load the rifles of the

twelve soldiers called out for shooting the condemned victim,

with eleven ball-cartridges and one blank cartridge. As the

soldiers never knew who of them had the latter, each one could

console his disturbed conscience by thinking that he was not one

of the murderers.



40 In Africa, and elsewhere too, it is a widely-spread habit,

that if a theft has been committed, the next clan has to restore

the equivalent of the stolen thing, and then look itself for the

thief. A. H. Post, Afrikanische Jurisprudenz, Leipzig, 1887, vol.

i. p. 77.



41 See Prof. M. Kovalevsky's Modern Customs and Ancient Law

(Russian), Moscow, 1886, vol. ii., which contains many important

considerations upon this subject.



42 See Carl Bock, The Head Hunters of Borneo, London, 1881. I am

told, however, by Sir Hugh Law, who was for a long time Governor

of Borneo, that the "head-hunting" described in this book is

grossly exaggerated. Altogether, my informant speaks of the

Dayaks in exactly the same sympathetic terms as Ida Pfeiffer. Let

me add that Mary Kingsley speaks in her book on West Africa in

the same sympathetic terms of the Fans, who had been represented

formerly as the most "terrible cannibals."



43 Ida Pfeiffer, Meine zweite Weltrieze, Wien, 1856, vol. i. pp.

116 seq. See also Müller and Temminch's Dutch Possessions in

Archipelagic India, quoted by Elisée Reclus, in Géographie

Universelle, xiii.



44 Descent of Man, second ed., pp. 63, 64.



45 See Bastian's Mensch in der Geschichte, iii. p. 7. Also Grey,

loc. cit. ii. p. 238.



46 Miklukho-Maclay, loc. cit. Same habit with the Hottentots.







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