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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d7b82bc --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,4 @@ +*.txt text eol=lf +*.htm text eol=lf +*.html text eol=lf +*.md text eol=lf diff --git a/LICENSE.txt b/LICENSE.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6312041 --- /dev/null +++ b/LICENSE.txt @@ -0,0 +1,11 @@ +This eBook, including all associated images, markup, improvements, +metadata, and any other content or labor, has been confirmed to be +in the PUBLIC DOMAIN IN THE UNITED STATES. + +Procedures for determining public domain status are described in +the "Copyright How-To" at https://www.gutenberg.org. + +No investigation has been made concerning possible copyrights in +jurisdictions other than the United States. Anyone seeking to utilize +this eBook outside of the United States should confirm copyright +status under the laws that apply to them. diff --git a/README.md b/README.md new file mode 100644 index 0000000..9db4240 --- /dev/null +++ b/README.md @@ -0,0 +1,2 @@ +Project Gutenberg (https://www.gutenberg.org) public repository for +eBook #60943 (https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/60943) diff --git a/old/60943-0.txt b/old/60943-0.txt deleted file mode 100644 index 0581384..0000000 --- a/old/60943-0.txt +++ /dev/null @@ -1,8650 +0,0 @@ -Project Gutenberg's Primitive Manners and Customs, by James Anson Farrer - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - -Title: Primitive Manners and Customs - -Author: James Anson Farrer - -Release Date: December 17, 2019 [EBook #60943] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PRIMITIVE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS *** - - - - -Produced by Turgut Dincer and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - - - - - - - - - - -=MORGAN’S ANCIENT SOCIETY=; or, Researches on the Lines of Human Progress -through Savagery and Barbarism to Civilization. By LEWIS H. MORGAN, LL.D. -8vo. $4. - -=SIR HENRY SUMNER MAINE’S WORKS=: - - =Ancient Law=: Its Connection with the Early History of - Society, and its Relation to Modern Ideas. By HENRY SUMNER - MAINE, Member of the Supreme Council of India, and Regius - Professor of the Civil Law in the University of Cambridge. With - an Introduction by Theodore W. Dwight, LL.D. 8vo. $3.50. - - =Lectures on the Early History of Institutions.= A Sequel to - “Ancient Law.” 8vo. $3.50. - - =Village Communities in the East and West.= Six Lectures - delivered at Oxford: to which are added other Lectures, - Addresses, and Essays. 8vo. $3.50. - -=E. B. TYLOR’S WORKS=: - - =Primitive Culture=: Researches into the Development of - Mythology, Philosophy, Religion, Art, and Custom. 2 vols. 8vo. - $7.00. - - =Researches into the Early History of Mankind=, and the - Development of Civilization. 8vo. $3.50. - - - - - PRIMITIVE MANNERS - AND CUSTOMS - - BY - JAMES A. FARRER - - [Illustration] - - NEW YORK - HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY - 1879 - - - - -_INTRODUCTION._ - - -From the myths characteristic of savage tribes, from their beliefs, -their proverbs, their political and social regulations, it is here -sought to gain some general estimate of their powers of intelligence and -imagination, their moral ideas, and their religion; subjects naturally -of much interest and inevitably of some dispute. For the reason that in -savagery as in civilisation there are heights and depths, with more of -light here, more of darkness there, it is quite impossible to bring the -whole of savage life into focus at once, so that every general conclusion -can only be taken as true within limits. The field to be studied is also -so large and diversified, that no two minds can expect to derive from -it the same impressions, nor to attain to more than partial truth about -it. But since the savage can never hope to be heard in court himself, -it is only fair to start with certain considerations which he would -be entitled to urge, and which deserve to weigh in any judgment made -regarding him. - -Statements of very low powers of numeration have been perhaps too hastily -taken as indicative of a low state of intelligence; for not only have -similar assertions concerning American and Tasmanian tribes by the -earliest voyagers proved on subsequent investigation to be erroneous, -but many savages have substitutes for our arithmetic which serve them -perfectly well, the Loangese, for instance, expressing numbers in -narration not by words but by gestures; and the Koossa Kaffirs—very few -of whom are said to be able to count above ten—possessing the peculiar -faculty of detecting almost at a glance any loss in a herd of cattle -which may amount to half a thousand. In the same way the want of a -written language is often supplied by symbolism. Puzzle as it might a -person of education to read a letter, expressed by a bundle containing a -stone, a piece of charcoal, a rag, a pepper-pod, and a grain of parched -corn, this would be the way of saying in Yoruba, that, though the -sender was as strong and firm as a stone, his prospects were as dark as -charcoal; that his clothes were in rags; that he was so feverish with -anxiety that his skin burned like pepper, even enough to cause corn to -wither. The Niam-Niam, again, who declare war by hanging on a tree an -ear of maize, a fowl’s feather, and an arrow, thereby giving contingent -enemies to understand that arrows will avenge any injury done to a single -fowl or a single ear of maize, convey their meaning quite as clearly as -the most politely framed ultimata of any Foreign Office in Europe. - -Many of the beliefs attributed to savages are no fair test of their -general reasoning capabilities; for there are degrees of credulity in -savage as in civilised life, and reason everywhere struggles to exist. -When Pelopidas, on the eve of the battle of Leuctra, received commands -in a dream to sacrifice to certain shades a virgin with chestnut hair, -there were not wanting soldiers, even in that army of Bœotians, who had -the shrewdness to think and the courage to say, that it was absurd to -suppose any divine powers could delight in the slaughter and sacrifice of -human beings, and that, if there were such, they deserved no reverence. -All stages of culture thus have their dissenters, their wicked reasoners. -Among the Ahts only the most superstitious now burn the house of a dead -man, with all its contents, for fear of offending his ghost. The Zulus, -whose sole religion consists in ancestor-worship, exhibited often in -the most ridiculous ceremonies, begin to doubt the power and even the -existence of their Amatongo, or dead ancestors, if, when they are sick, -their prayers and sacrifices fail to effect a cure. - -The Tongan king, Finow, often stated to Mariner his doubts about the -existence of the gods, and expressed the opinion, that men were fools for -believing all they were told by the priests; whilst his saying, that the -gods always favoured that side in war on which there were the greatest -chiefs and warriors, recalls the opinion of a far more famous potentate -than Finow. The disrespect, indeed, that Finow showed to the Tongan -religion was such, that his subjects explained violent thunderstorms as -the dissensions of the gods in Bolotu about his punishment. On the other -hand, savages are also subject to relapses of superstition, such as with -us are dignified by the name of ‘movements;’ an American tribe who traced -their origin to a dog were so firmly impressed by a fanatic with the sin -of attaching their canine relatives to their sledges, that they resolved -to use dogs no more, but women instead, for dragging their possessions. - -Savage ideas of morality and of government seem to agree fundamentally -with those of more advanced populations, the ideas of the latter -differing, indeed, from the barbaric much as a finished photograph -differs from its earlier stage; that is to say, not as essentially -different, but as having become ‘fixed’ after a process of development. -The idea of the wrongfulness of certain acts starts with the fear of -their consequences, that of murder, for instance, from the fear of -revenge; nor are such ideas ever separable from the lowest levels of -savage life. The sense of the sanctity of property begins with what an -individual can make or catch for himself apart from tribal claims; nor -is any state of tribal communism so strong as to recognise no private -rights in the people or things a man takes in war, the game he kills, or -the weapons he fashions. Respect for the aged is one of the best traits -of savage life, for the tribes of whom it is asserted seem to outnumber -those of whom it is denied. In Equatorial Africa young men never appear -before old ones without curtseying nor pass them by without stooping; -should they sit in their presence, it is ‘at a humble distance.’ Nor are -cases of the abandonment of the aged and infirm conclusive proof of a -deficiency of natural affection; one tribe who were accused of so acting -are also known to have carried about with them for years a palsied man -with great tenderness and attention. Truthfulness, again, is recognised -as a virtue outside the pale of the higher religions, for Mungo Park -found it one of the first lessons taught by Mandingo women to their -children, and he mentions the case of one mother, whose only consolation -on the murder of her son ‘was the reflection that the poor boy in the -course of his life had never told an untruth.’ - -Strange contradictions abound in savage life, extremes of barbarity -sometimes co-existing with habits of some refinement. The Ahts, who -occasionally sacrifice one of their number to the gods, and till lately -deserted their sick and aged, without the excuse of scarcity of food, -keep small mats of bark strips for strangers to wipe their feet with, and -after meals offer them water and cedar-bark for washing their hands and -mouths. They have also a strict etiquette regulating their reception of -guests; they observe public ceremonies with extreme formality; their men -of rank vie with one another in politeness. The Niam-Niam are generally -cannibals, but when several of them drink together ‘they may each be -observed to wipe the rim of the drinking-vessel before passing it on.’ -The Bachapins, among whom it is said that a murderer incurs no disgrace, -yet measure a man’s merit by his industry, and despise a man who does -not work, that is, hunt, for his living. The Aztecs, with their constant -and frightful human sacrifices, were so afraid of incurring divine wrath -for the blood they spilled in the chase, that they would always preface -a hunt by burning incense to their idols, and conclude it by smearing -the faces of their divinities with the blood of their game. To turn back -from the procession which accompanied the sacrifice of young children -to the gods of rain and water rendered a man infamous and incapable of -public office; yet death was the penalty for drunkenness in either sex, -and ‘it was considered degrading for a person of quality to touch wine at -all, even in seasons of festival.’ Similar inconsistencies are common in -social regulations, especially in those relating to marriage, stringent -laws of prohibited degrees and the strictest etiquette often affording -no further evidence of purity of manners. The most barbarous marriage -ceremonies are frequently attended with absurd forms of prudery, which -it is perhaps impossible to trace to their origin. The instance of the -Aleutian islanders, who with the grossest vices connect such notions -of propriety as that either a husband or a wife would blush to address -the other in the presence of a stranger, is one among many similar -illustrations of a side of savage life which but for parallels in our -own social usages might present itself as an inexplicable anomaly. - -Better experience has in so many cases dissipated original assertions of -an absolute want of religious ideas among savages, that the strongest -doubts must be felt of all similar negative propositions. Theology in one -of three grades seems rather to be the universal property of mankind, -appearing either harmless, as at the beginning or end of its historical -career, or in its second and middle stage as identical with all that is -abominable and cruel. The classification of mankind on such a basis of -division, though it could never aspire to scientific exactness, would -afford at least a standard of practical discrimination, by which the -relations between Christian and non-Christian communities might to some -extent be adjusted; for, by considering any people under one of these -three aspects, it would be possible to form some estimate of their -aptitude for, or need of, our theology, and of the advisability of our -seeking to force it upon them.[1] Should the principle ever meet with -the acceptance it deserves, that missions, like charities, ought to be -discriminate, it is not difficult to perceive the direction in which such -a truth will be likely some day to receive practical recognition. - -For wherever native theology takes the form of cannibalism, sutteeism, -human sacrifices, or other rites directly destructive of earthly -happiness, there the teaching of missionaries affords the only hope of -a speedy reform, the only acquaintance possible for savage tribes with -a culture higher than their own, save that which is likely to come to -them through the medium of the brandy-bottle or the bayonet. But to send -missions to countries like Russia or China, where there exist established -systems of religion undefiled by cruelty, violates the first principle -of the faith so conveyed, disturbing the peace of families and nations -with the curse of religious animosity. When the Jesuits entreated the -Chinese Emperor, Young-tching, to reconsider his resolution to proscribe -Christianity, there was some reason in the imperial answer: ‘What should -you say if I sent a troop of lamas and bonzes to your country, to preach -their law there?’ The Taeping rebellion, or civil war, which devastated -China for about fifteen years, desolating hundreds of miles of fair -towns and fertile fields, and fought out among massacres, sieges, and -famines, of quite indescribable cruelty and horror, owed its impulse -distinctly to the working of Christian tracts among the more ignorant -classes, followed by a fanatical endeavour to substitute a travesty of -Christianity for the older religions; yet the seeds of all this misery -are still sown in China, in the name and by the ministers of a religion -of Peace, a religion that has for its first and final rule of life the -duty of so dealing with others as we should wish them to deal with -ourselves. - -Cases of the third class, where the state of religious belief is so -rudimentary as to be innocuous, are unhappily few; but where such belief -has not advanced to the detriment of the general welfare, it would seem -the kindest policy not to inspire men, whose lives are spent in the -constant perils of the woods or waves, with fears of more malignant -spirits than those their own fancy has created for them, nor to teach -them the doctrine that, hard and black as this world often proves to -them, there is a yet harder and blacker one beyond. There is also -some charm in that variety of belief and custom against which we wage -unremitting war; and only a tasteless fanaticism can think with pure joy -of the time, when sectarian chapels shall stand on every island of the -seas, and Tartarus be taught wherever the sun shines. Rites and beliefs -lose the interest which cling to them in their native home as soon as -it is sought to transplant them elsewhere, just as flowers lose their -fragrance and beauty when once they have been separated from the plant on -which they grew. For this reason Puritanism has but little charm out of -England; and though it should please our love of uniformity to read (as -we may) of a Tahitian chief carrying his Sabbatarian scruples so far as -to ask whether, if he saw ripe plantains by his garden-path on Sunday, he -might pick and eat them; or of another abstaining from turning a pig out -of his garden on Sunday, preferring to let his sugar-canes be devoured; -such facts are yet no proof that we make Christians of savages; they only -prove that, with some trouble, we may make them imbeciles. - -It would be difficult, indeed, to pay too high a tribute to the unselfish -efforts of missionaries, now and in past times, directly for the benefit -of mankind and indirectly for that of science; yet the question, besides -its speculative interest, derives some justification from the general -results of missions over the world, and from the melancholy disproportion -between their actual and their merited successes: Whether the welfare -and improvement of savage tribes would not be best left to themselves -and to time? That they are not incapable of independent improvement -there is abundant evidence to show. Sometimes it arises in a tribe from -imitation of some neighbouring tribe, more powerful but less barbarous -than itself; sometimes from the initiative of some reforming chief of its -own. Thus the Comanche Indians of Texas, among whom ‘Christianity had -never been introduced,’ abolished, in consequence of their intercourse -with tribes less savage than themselves, the inhuman custom of killing a -favourite wife at her husband’s funeral. Mariner was himself a witness of -the abolition on the Tongan Islands of the custom of strangling the wife -of the great Tooitonga chief at his death. It is said, again, to be an -indisputable fact, that the Monbuttoos of Africa, whose ‘cannibalism is -the most pronounced of all the known nations of Africa,’ have, ‘without -any influence from the Mahometan or Christian world, attained to no -contemptible degree of external culture.’ Finow, the Tongan king, was -a genuine reformer; and there have even been kings of Dahome who have -wished the abolition of human sacrifices. Bianswah, the great Chippewya -chief, put a stop, by a treaty of peace with the Sioux, to the horrible -practice of burning prisoners alive; and, though the peace between -the tribes was often broken, their compact in this respect was never -violated. In other instances the modification of older usages points -to the operation of reformative tendencies. Thus the Nootka Indians, -who used to conclude their hunting festivals with a human sacrifice, -subsequently changed the custom into the more lenient one of sticking a -boy with knives in various parts of his body. The Zulus abolished the -custom of killing slaves with a chief, to prepare food and other things -for him in the next world; so that now it is only a tradition with them -that formerly when a chief died he did not die alone: ‘when the fire was -kindled the chief was put in, and then his servants were chosen and put -in after the chief; the great men followed—they were taken one by one.’ - -It is moreover certain that in some instances savages have arrived -spontaneously at no contemptible notions of morality, and that they have -often lost their native virtues by their very contact with a higher form -of faith. The African Bakwains declared that nothing described by the -missionaries as sin had ever appeared to them otherwise, except polygamy; -and the Tongan chiefs (if Mariner may be trusted), when asked what -motives they had, beyond their fear of misfortunes in this life, for -virtuous conduct, replied, ‘_as if they wondered such a question should -be asked_:’ ‘The agreeable and happy feelings which a man experiences -within himself when he does any good action and conducts himself nobly -and generously, as a man ought to do.’ The natural virtues attributed -to the same people include honour, justice, patriotism, friendship, -meekness, modesty, conjugal fidelity, parental and filial love, patience -in suffering, forbearance of temper, respect for rank and for age. -The Khonds of India, much more savage than the Tongans (their chief -virtues consisting in killing an enemy, dying as a warrior, or living -as a priest), yet account as sinful acts the refusal of hospitality, -the breach of an oath or promise, a lie, or the violation of a pledge -of friendship. The virtues the Maoris now possess they are said to have -possessed before we came among them, namely honesty, self-respect, -truthfulness; and the belief that these virtues are even ‘fading under -their assumed Christianity’ recalls the tradition of certain American -tribes, that their lives and manners were originally less barbarous, -the Odjibwas, for instance, actually tracing the increase of murders, -thefts, falsehood, and disobedience to parents, to the advent of the -Christian whites. - -It is also remarkable that in several instances savages have of -themselves hit upon those very helps to the maintenance of virtue which -all Christian Churches have found so efficacious. For we find existing -among them as religious and moral observances not only Fasting and -Confession, but occasionally even Sermons. In the Tongan Islands _fonos_, -or public assemblies, were held, at which the king would address his -subjects, not only on agriculture but on morals and politics; and the -lower chiefs had _fonos_ also for the similar benefit of their feudal -subordinates. In America, also, some tribes observed feasts at which -the young were addressed on their moral duties, being admonished to be -attentive and respectful to the old, to obey their parents, never to -scoff at the decrepit or deformed, to be charitable and hospitable. Not -only were such precepts dwelt on at great length, but enforced by the -examples of good and bad individuals, just as they might be in London or -Rome. Such considerations, indeed, prove nothing against the additional -good that missionaries may do; but they add some force to the thought -that had a tithe of the energy, the devotion, the suffering, the money, -that has been lavished on coaxing savages to be baptized, been spent on -promoting international peace in Europe, wars might by this time be as -extinct, belong as purely to a past state of things, as judicial combats, -the thumbscrew, or the knout. - -The vexed question, whether savage life represents a primitive or a -decadent condition, whether it represents what man at first everywhere -was, or only what he may become, has throughout the following chapters -been avoided, that controversy being regarded as ‘laid’ by the exhaustive -researches of Mr. Tylor and other writers. But whilst the state of the -lowest modern savages is taken as the nearest approximation we have of -the primitive state from which mankind has risen, it is not pretended -that the state of any particular tribe may not be one to which it has -fallen. As the low position of many Bushmen tribes is quite explicable by -their long border-warfare with the Dutch, and the consequent cruelties -they were exposed to, or as the state of many Brazilian savages may be -traced to similar contact with the Portuguese, so any case of extreme -savagery may be the result of causes, whose operation has no historical -or written proof to attest them. The gigantic stone images on Easter -Island, or the great earthworks in America, are among the proofs, that -but for such material traces of its existence it is possible for a whole -civilisation to vanish, and to leave only the veriest savages on the -soil where it flourished.[2] As we know that Europe was once as purely -savage as parts of Africa are still, and can conceive the cycle of -events restoring it to barbarism, so in the depths of time it may have -happened in places where no suspicion of such a history is possible. As -the surface of the earth seems subjected to processes of elevation and -subsidence, land and sea constantly alternating their dominion, so it may -be with civilisation, destined to no permanent home on the earth, but -subsiding here to reappear there, and varying its level as it varies its -latitude. - -As the practical infinity of past time makes it impossible to calculate -the influence exercised in different parts of the world by migrations, -by conquests, or by commerce, except within a very limited period, so it -precludes any definite belief in ethnological divisions, and relegates -the question of the unity of the human race, like that of its origin, to -the limbo of profitless discussion. No characteristic has yet been found -by which mankind can be classified distinctly into races; and with all -the differences of colour, hair, skull, or language, which now suffice -for purposes of nomenclature, it remains true that there is nothing to -choose between the hypothesis that we constitute only one species and the -hypothesis that we constitute several. The world is so old as to admit of -divergences from a single original type quite as wide as any that exist; -whilst, on the other hand, similarity of customs (such, for instance, as -that Tartars in Asia, Sioux Indians in America, and Kamschadals should -all regard it as a sin to touch a fire with a knife), fail us as a -proof of a unity of origin, in the face of our ignorance of prehistoric -antiquity. - -That the works which have treated before, and better, of the subjects -included in the following chapters should have exercised no deterrent -effect in treating of them again, must find its excuse in the general -interest which those works have produced for the studies in question, -and of which the present work is but a sign and consequence. The reader -has only himself to blame, if, having read the works on the same or -similar subjects by Mr. Tylor, Mr. Spencer, and Sir John Lubbock, or -those in German by Peschel, Wuttke, or Waitz, he troubles himself with -yet another book which seeks rather to illustrate than to exhaust the -many interesting problems connected with savage life; but the present -writer, whilst under the deepest obligations to the labours of his -predecessors—without which his own would have been impossible—has not -studied simply to recapitulate their conclusions, but has sought rather -to arrive at such results as the evidence forced upon him, independently -as far as possible of existing theories or of the authority upon which -they rest. Should he have succeeded in making anyone think better than -before, with more interest and sympathy, of those outcasts of the world -whom we designate as savage, something at least will have been done -to claim for them a kindlier treatment and respect than in popular -estimation they either deserve or obtain. - - - - -_CONTENTS._ - - - CHAPTER I. - - SOME SAVAGE MYTHS AND BELIEFS. - - The universality of religion—Nature and tests of the evidence - relating to the subject—Savage ideas of creation: ideas of a - first man confused with ideas of a first cause—Illustrative - examples of primitive cosmogony—Origin of the myth of the - Two Contending Brothers—Prevalence of the belief in a Golden - Age—Deluge-myths—Their possible origin in recollections of - local floods, in the changes of the land-level, or in fancies - about the skies—Absence in most of them of any connection - with human crime—Vivid belief in futurity among the lower - races—Gradual growth of the idea of the future life as affected - by the present one—Difficulties in the attainment of future - happiness—The great difference between savage and civilised - beliefs regarding the Unknown illustrated by the savage - belief in a future life for animals or things as well as for - men—Compensations in the savage’s creed: no terror of death nor - of the future pages 1-40 - - CHAPTER II. - - SAVAGE MODES OF PRAYER. - - Difficulties in the study of natural religions—Importance of - prayer in savage life—Examples of savage prayers—Are they - limited to temporal interests?—Baptismal rites equivalent to - prayers—Prayers in the form of toasts—The worship of evil - spirits—Doubtful distinction between good and bad divinities - among savages—Treatment of obdurate gods—Relation of sacrifice - to prayer—Tendency of sacrifices to become more numerous and - severe—Pantomimic dances possibly acted petitions—The African - gorilla-dance, the Mandan buffalo-dance, the Sioux bear-dance, - the Australian kangaroo-dance—A similar idea in prayers for - rain—War-dances—Fetichistic practices perhaps extinct forms of - prayer—Prayers to animals, to the moon, to trees, and their - survival in modern folk-lore 41-77 - - CHAPTER III. - - SOME SAVAGE PROVERBS. - - Differences of national character reflected in - proverbs—Illustrated by Italian and German sayings on the - custom of the Vendetta, by Italian and Persian proverbs - about truth, by Catholic and Protestant sentiments about - priests—Comparison between the proverbs of savage and - civilised communities—Similarities of their feeling as - regards poverty, blame, experience, perseverance, habit, - cause, mendacity—Intelligence displayed in many savage - proverbs—European proverbs of savage coinage, exemplified by a - comparison between African and European proverbs relating to - women—Inferences deducible from known proverbs 78-100 - - CHAPTER IV. - - SAVAGE MORAL PHILOSOPHY. - - Are there any authentic cases of a total absence of moral - distinctions among savages?—Unsatisfactory evidence regarding - their moral notions—The Bushman’s notion of a good and bad - action—The fear of fellow-tribesmen, of spirits and ghosts, - the primary source of distinction in the moral quality of - actions—Moral restraints in secular punishments—Compensation - necessary for homicide—Collective responsibility for crimes—Is - murder ever regarded as indifferent?—Different institutions - for the prevention of wrongs—Greenland singing-combats, - _tabu_, _muru_, confession. Sins or fanciful wrong acts, - illustrated by feelings of proper behaviour with regard to - storms, to ancestors, to names, and to animals—Little evidence - among savages of any idea of moral qualities apart from the - consequences of actions—Their ideas of a future state throw - little light on their moral sentiments—Doubtful evidence - of a belief in a future life as affected by good or bad - conduct—Fundamental agreement between savage and civilised - morality 101-129 - - CHAPTER V. - - SAVAGE POLITICAL LIFE. - - Theory of social evolution—The hunting state not necessarily - one of political inferiority—Do any tribes exist without any - form of social government?—Examples of the loosest social - connections—Connection of agriculture and slavery with more - complex social systems—Freedom and equality little known - in savage life—Natural foundations for distinction between - aristocracy and commonalty—Ordeals previous to admission to - higher ranks—Devices for marking differences of position: - scars, dress, titles, artificial language, funeral ceremonies, - crests—Savage monarchy—Confusion between gods and kings—Old - Japanese and Samoan feelings about monarchy—Limitations on - savage despotism—Orders of society, approaching to a system - of caste—The relation of tabu to monarchy—Primogeniture in - Tahiti—Absurd rights of nephews in Fiji—Taxation a festival - in savage life—The subordination of the priesthood to the - State 130-161 - - CHAPTER VI. - - SAVAGE PENAL LAWS. - - The interest of savage laws—Stage in which the redress of - wrongs is a merely personal matter—Tendency of offences to be - regarded as matters of family or tribal interest—Growth of the - conception of crime as an offence against the tribe, promoted - by the custom of submitting disputes to the judgment of chiefs, - and marked by customs, which, while making such chiefs judges, - leave the punishment of the criminal to the injured party—Such - customs found in America, Africa, Samoa, Afghanistan—Tendency - of penal laws to become more cruel—Primitive punishments - not gratuitously cruel—Savage laws not always arbitrary nor - uncertain—Force of precedents in Caffre law—Regularity in - legal procedure—Curious notions of equity—The ordeal in savage - law, not an appeal to the judgment of God, but an invention - of priestcraft for the detection of guilt—Comparison of some - ordeals—Their utility for the discovery of guilt—Death a - frequent result of concealing real or fancied guilt—Oaths a - later development of the ordeal—The English judicial oath - compared with that in vogue in Samoa—Origin of the supposed - virtue in touching or kissing the thing sworn by—Invisible - connection between the thing touched and the calamity invoked - in touching it 162-187 - - CHAPTER VII. - - EARLY WEDDING CUSTOMS. - - Curious wedding custom of the Garos, in India—Natural - affection among savages, tested by some of the evidence of - eye-witnesses—Love-stories—Treatment of women not uniformly bad - among savages—Married life—Duty of bashfulness, displayed in - curious manners and notions of the Esquimaux, the Hottentots, - the Hos, the Thlinkeets, the Kirghiz, Kamschadals, the - Bushmen, the Zulus, and the Bedouins—Conventional reserve - between husband and wife—Restrictions on intercourse - between near relations—Kicking and screaming the _proper_ - behaviour at weddings—Real disinclination also often a cause - for the employment of real force—The ceremony of capture - affords a bride a real chance of escape from a bridegroom - she dislikes—Mercantile aspect of marriage—Marriages by - capture often voluntary elopements in defeat of parental - contracts, illustrated by customs in India, Afghanistan, - Bokhara—Such marriages legalised by successful elopement and - subsequent settlement with parents—Exogamy and endogamy, how - related—Doubtful origin of exogamy—Its effect in preserving - peace between tribes—Woman-stealing the result of artificial - social customs—Origin of the difference of language between - the sexes among the Caribs—The same phenomenon among the - Zulus—Doubtful evidence of a total absence of marriage - ceremonies 188-238 - - CHAPTER VIII. - - THE FAIRY-LORE OF SAVAGES. - - Primitive philosophy of nature—Astro-mythology of Australian - tribes, of the Tasmanians, the Bushmen, the Esquimaux, Hervey - Islanders, Thlinkeet Indians—Such myths invented to account - for natural phenomena—Not always the result of forgotten - etymologies—The Aht story of the origin of the moon—American - story of the robin—Hervey Islanders’ story of the sole—Stories - also invented to account for curious customs or beliefs—Reason - given by the Irish for their annual persecution of the wren—The - story of the wren and the eagle, very similar in Ireland and - North America—Facility of the dispersion of stories often - accounts for their resemblance—Wide range of the story of - Faithful John—Polynesian stories of Maui stopping the sun’s - motion—the same idea in Wallachia and North America—Many - similar stories arose independently of each other, as the - versions of the idea contained in Jack and the Beanstalk—Some - Aryan myths, explained as fancies about the clouds, found also - in the New World—Hindu myth of Urvasi compared with myths from - Borneo and America—Story-roots to be looked for on earth, not - in the clouds—Celestial and terrestrial phenomena confused—The - influence of dreams in the production of myths—The influence - of flattery—Tendency of chiefs and sorcerers to become gods - and heroes after death—Zeus compared with the culture-heroes - of savage mythology—The Hottentot Utixo, Mannan MacLear, - Manabozho, Viracocha, Quetzalcoatl, Heitsi Eibip, all probably - of human origin—Nicknames a factor in mythology—Tendency to - personify abstractions—Vivid imagination of savages 239-275 - - CHAPTER IX. - - COMPARATIVE FOLK-LORE. - - Interest of folk-lore due to the wide range of similar - superstitions—Three ways of accounting for such - resemblances—Great extent of superstition in civilised - life—Savage incomplete distinction of things—Motion and life - identified—Analogy of bee superstitions with superstitions - about inanimate things—Fear of offending animals by a - light use of their names—Spiritualistic character of - witchcraft—Illustrations—Relics of object-worship—Sacred trees, - animals, birds—Reverence for red things—Chinese analogues - to Aryan folk-lore—Mythology probably founded on folk-lore, - not folk-lore on mythology—Traces of fire-worship—Beltane - fires, formerly perhaps connected with human sacrifices—Scotch - needfires for cattle—Similar customs among the Mayas of America - and the Hottentots—Ideas about the purity of new fire—Recent - examples of the sacrifice of living things to appease - spirits—Moon superstitions like those about the tides—Remnants - of water-worship—Folk-lore a link between civilisation and - barbarism—Influence of Christianity on folk-lore—The history - of mankind that of a rise, not of a fall 276-315 - - - - - -I. - -_SOME SAVAGE MYTHS AND BELIEFS._ - - -The question of the universality of religion, of its presence in some -form or another in every part of the world, seems to be one of those -which lie beyond the bounds of a dogmatic answer. For the accounts -of missionaries and travellers, which furnish the only data for its -solution, have been so largely vitiated, if not by a consciousness of the -interests supposed to be at stake, at least by so strong an intolerance -for the tenets of native savage religions, that it seems impossible to -make sufficient allowance either for the bias of individual writers or -for the extent to which they may have misunderstood, or been purposely -misled by, their informants. - -Although, however, on the subject of native religions we can never -hope for more than approximate truth, the reports of missionaries and -others, written at different periods of time about the same place or -contemporaneously about widely remote places, as they must be free from -all possible suspicion of collusion, so they supply a kind of measure -of probability by which the credibility of any given belief may be -tested. Thus an idea, too inconceivable to be credited, if only reported -of one tribe of the human race, may be safely accepted as seriously -held, if reported of several tribes in different parts of the world. An -Englishman, for instance, however much winds and storms may mentally vex -him, would scarcely think of testifying his repugnance to them by the -physical remonstrance of his fists and lungs, nor would he easily believe -that any people of the earth should seriously treat the wind in this way -as a material agent. If he were told that the Namaquas shot poisoned -arrows at storms to drive them away, he would show no unreasonable -scepticism in disbelieving the fact; but if he learnt on independent -authority that the Payaguan Indians of North America rush with firebrands -and clenched fists against the wind that threatens to blow down their -huts; that in Russia the Esthonians throw stones and knives against -a whirlwind of dust, pursuing it with cries; that the Kalmucks fire -their guns to drive the storm-demons away; that Zulu rain-doctors or -heaven-herds whistle to lightning to leave the skies just as they whistle -to cattle to leave their pens; and that also in the Aleutian Islands a -whole village will unite to shriek and strike against the raging wind, -he would have to acknowledge that the statement about the Namaquas -contained in itself nothing intrinsically improbable. And besides -this test of genuine savage thought, a test which obviously admits of -almost infinite application, there is another one no less serviceable -in ethnological criticism, namely, where the reality of a belief is -supported by customs, widely spread and otherwise unintelligible. -No better illustration can be given of this than the belief, which, -asserted by itself, would be universally disbelieved, in a second life -not only for men but for material things; but which, supported as it is -by the practice, common alike in the old world and the new, of burying -objects with their owner to live again with him in another state, is -certified beyond all possibility of doubt. If to us there seems a no -more self-evident truth than that a man can take nothing with him out of -the world, a vast mass of evidence proves, that the discovery of this -truth is one of comparatively modern date and of still quite partial -distribution over the globe. - -So much, then, being premised as to the nature of the evidence on which -our knowledge of the lower races depends, and as to the limits within -which such evidence may be received and its veracity tested, let us -proceed to examine some of the higher beliefs of savages, which, as they -bear some analogy to the beliefs on similar subjects of more advanced -societies, are in a sense religious, and, so far at least as the -collected information justifies us in judging, seem of indigenous and -independent growth. - -Few results of ethnology are more interesting than the wide-spread belief -among savages, arrived at purely by their own reasoning faculties, in a -creator of things. The recorded instances of such a belief are, indeed, -so numerous as to make it doubtful whether instances to the contrary may -not have been based on too scant information. The difficulty of obtaining -sound evidence on such subjects is well illustrated by the experience of -Dobritzhoffer, the Jesuit missionary, who spent seven years among the -Abipones of South America. For when he asked them whether the wonderful -course of the stars and heavenly bodies had never raised in their minds -the thought of an invisible being who had made and who guided them, he -got for answer that of what happened in heaven, or of the maker or ruler -of the stars, the ancestors of the Abipones had never cared to think, -finding ample occupation for their thoughts in the providing of grass -and water for their horses. Yet the Abipones really believed that they -had been created by an Indian like themselves, whose name they mentioned -with great reverence and whom they spoke of as their ‘grandfather,’ -because he had lived so long ago. He was still, they fancied, to be seen -in the Pleiades; and when that constellation disappeared for some months -from the sky they would bewail the illness of their grandfather, and -congratulate him on his recovery when he returned in May. Still, the -creator of savage reasoning is not necessarily a creator of all things, -but only of some, like Caliban’s Setebos, who made the moon and the sun, -and the isle and all things on it— - - But not the stars; the stars came otherwise. - -So that it is possible the creator of the Abipones was merely their -deified First Ancestor. For on nothing is savage thought more confused -than on the connection between the first man who lived on the world and -the actual Creator of the world, as if in the logical need of a first -cause they had been unable to divest it of human personality, or as -if the natural idea of a first man had led to the idea of his having -created the world. Thus Greenlanders are divided as to whether Kaliak -was really the creator of all things or only the first man who sprang -from the earth. The Minnetarrees of North America believed that at first -everything was water and there was no earth at all, till the First Man, -the never-dying one, the Lord of Life, sent down the great red-eyed bird -to bring up the earth. The Mingo tribes also ‘revere and make offerings -to the First Man, he who was saved at the great deluge, as a powerful -deity under the Master of Life, or _even as identified with him_;’ whilst -among the Dog-ribs the First Man, Chapewee, was also creator of the -sun and moon. The Zulus of Africa likewise merge the ideas of the First -Man and the Creator, the great Unkulunkulu; as also do the Caribs, who -believe that Louquo, the uncreate first Carib, descended from heaven -to make the earth and also to become the father of men.[3] So again in -the Aht belief Quawteaht is not only ‘the first Indian who ever lived,’ -their forefather, but the maker of most things visible, of the earth and -all animals, yet not of the sun and moon.[4] It seems, therefore, not -improbable that savage speculation, being more naturally impelled to -assume a cause for men than a cause for other things, postulated a First -Man as primeval ancestor, and then applying an hypothesis, which served -so well to account for their own existence, to account for that of the -world in general, made the Father of Men the creator of all things; in -other words, that the idea of a First Man preceded and prepared the way -for the idea of a first cause. - -However this may be, and admitting the possible existence of tribes -absolutely devoid of any idea of creation at all, the following savage -fancies about it are not without their interest as typical examples of -primitive cosmogony. - -In one of the Dog-rib Indian sagas an important part in the creation -is played by a great bird, as among several other tribes who loved to -trace their origin to a bird, as some would trace theirs to a toad or a -rattlesnake. Originally, the saga runs, the world was nothing but a wide, -waste sea, without any living thing upon it save a gigantic bird, who -with the glance of its fiery eyes produced the lightning, and with the -flapping of its wings the thunder. This bird, by diving into the sea, -caused the earth to appear above it, and proceeded to call all animals to -its surface (except, indeed, the Chippewya Indians, who were descended -from a dog). When its work was complete it made a great arrow, which it -bade the Indians keep with great care; and when this was lost, owing to -the stupidity of the Chippewyas, it was so angry that it left the earth, -never afterwards to revisit it; and men now live no longer, as they did -in those days, till their throats are worn through with eating and their -feet with walking the earth.[5] - -Many thousands of miles separate the Tongan Islands from North America, -yet there too we find the idea of the earth having come from the waters. -In the beginning nothing was to be seen above the waste of waters but the -Island of Bolotu, which is as everlasting as the gods who dwell there or -as the stars and the sea. One day the god Tangaloa went to fish in the -sea, when, feeling something heavy at the end of his line, he drew it in, -and there perceived the tops of rocks, which continued to increase in -size and number till they formed a large continent, and his line broke, -and only the Tongan Islands remained above the surface. These Tangaloa, -with the help of the other gods, filled with trees and herbs and animals -from Bolotu, only of a smaller size and not immortal. Then he bade his -two sons take their wives and go to dwell in Tonga, dividing the land -and dwelling apart. The younger brother was steady and industrious, and -made many discoveries; but the elder was idle and slept away his time, -and envied the works of his brother, till at last his envy grew so strong -that one day he murdered him. Then came Tangaloa in wrath from Bolotu, to -ask him why he had slain his brother, and he bade him bring his brother’s -family to him. They were told to take their boats and sail eastward till -they came to a great land to dwell in. ‘Your skin’ (to this effect ran -Tangaloa’s blessing) ‘shall be white as your souls, for your souls are -pure; you shall be wise, make axes, have all other riches, and great -boats. I myself will command the wind to blow from your land to Tonga, -but the people of Tonga will not be able with their bad boats to reach -you.’ To the others he said: ‘You shall be black, because your souls are -black, and you shall remain poor. You shall not be able to prepare useful -things, nor to go to the land of your brothers. But your brothers shall -come to Tonga and trade with you as they please.’[6] - -This Tongan creation-myth is especially striking, not only from its -resemblance to the well-known stories of Cain and Abel or of Romulus -and Remus, but from the wonderful extension of a similar story over the -world. It has been found among the Esquimaux, among the Hervey Islanders, -among the Hindoos, among the Iroquois of America. Its origin perhaps lies -in early and rude attempts to account for the more obvious dualisms in -nature, as those, for instance, between the sun and the moon, or between -warm and cold winds. In the Iroquois version the elder brother who -killed the younger is said to have been identical with the sun, though -his mother, not the brother he killed, was the moon.[7] A curious Indian -drawing has been preserved in which the god of the north wind, or of cold -weather, contends with the god of the south, or of warmth. The former -is figured in a snowstorm, the latter in rain; wolves fight on the side -of the one, the crow and plover on that of the other. The conflict is -terrible; the southern god is worsted, cold weather prevails, and the -earth is frozen up. But in spring he sends forth his crow and plover, -who defeat the wolves, and the northern god is drowned in a flood of -spray which arises from the melting of the snow and ice. And in this -contention for cold and warm weather it is believed they will battle as -long as the world shall endure.[8] - -The Kamchadal belief is instructive, as showing that by the creation of -the world the savage only means that small portion of it which he knows, -and that, so far from it being any proof of his intelligence to suppose a -cause for the hills or island which limit his energies, it is rather his -want of logical thought which impels him to the belief. For seeing, as -he does, a spirit in everything, whether it be moving animal, or rushing -wind, or standing stone, and accounting, as he does, for everything by -a spirit which is at once its cause and controlling principle, it is -only natural that he should draw from his unlimited spirit-world one -who made and governs all things. Thus the Kamchadals believe that after -their supreme deity, of whom they predicate nothing but existence, the -greatest god is Kutka. Kutka created the heavens and the earth, making -both eternal, like the men and creatures he placed on the earth. But the -Kamchadals openly avow that they think themselves much cleverer than -Kutka, who in their eyes is so stupid as to be quite undeserving of -prayers or gratitude. Had he been cleverer, they say, he would have made -the world much better, without so many mountains and inaccessible cliffs, -without streams of such rapidity, or such tempests of wind and rain. In -winter, if they are climbing a mountain, or in summer, if their canoes -come to rapids, they will vent loud curses on Kutka for having made the -streams too strong for their canoes, or the mountains so wearisome for -their feet. - -The Tamanaks of the Orinoco manifested a not much higher conception of a -creator than the Kamchadals. For they ascribed the creation of the world -to Amalivacca, who in the course of his work discussed long with his -brother about the Orinoco, having the kind wish so to make it that ships -might as easily go up its stream as down, but being compelled to abandon -a task which so far transcended his powers. The Tamanaks recently showed -a cave where Amalivacca dwelt when he lived among them, before he took a -boat and sailed to the other side of the sea.[9] - -Not only, however, is the idea of a creation of things quite common -among untutored savages, but there is often a belief closely connected -therewith that in the beginning death and sickness were unknown in the -world, but came into it in consequence of some fault committed by its -hitherto immortal occupants. Such a belief, reported as it is from places -so widely sundered as Ceylon, North America, and the Tongan Islands, -seems effectually to discountenance the suspicion which might otherwise -attach to it of collusion or mistake on the part of our informants. -It is the fancy of the Cingalese cosmogony that, in the fifth period -of creative energy, the immortal beings who then inhabited the earth -ate of certain plants, and thereby involved themselves in darkness and -mortality. ‘It was then that they were formed male and female, and lost -the power of returning to the heavenly mansions.’ Liable as they had -theretofore been to mental passions, such as envy, covetousness, and -ambition, they were thenceforward subjected to corporeal passions as -well, and the race now inhabiting the earth became subject to all the -evils that afflict them.[10] According to the saga of the Dog-rib Indians -the first man who lived upon the earth, when food and other good things -abounded, was Chapewee, who afterwards, giving his children two kinds of -food, black and white, forbade them to eat of the former. When he went -away for a long journey to bring the sun into the world, his children -were obedient and ate only of the white fruit, but ate it all. But when -he went away a second time to bring the moon into the world, in their -hunger his children forgot his prohibition and ate of the black fruit. So -when Chapewee returned he was very wroth, and declared that thenceforth -the earth should only produce bad fruit and that men should be subject -to sickness and death. Afterwards, indeed, when his family lamented that -men should have been made mortal for eating the black fruit, Chapewee -granted that those who dreamt certain dreams should have the power of -curing sickness and so of prolonging human life; but that was the extent -to which Chapewee relented.[11] The Caribs, Waraues, and Arawaks are -said to believe in two distinct creators of men and women; the creator -of the former being superior and doing neither good nor harm. After he -had created men he came on the earth to see what they were doing; but -finding them so bad that they even attempted his own life, he took from -them their immortality and gave it to skin-casting creatures instead. -The Aleutian Islanders believe that the god who made their islands -completed his work by making men to inhabit them; but these men were -immortal beings, for when age came over them they had but to climb a -lofty mountain and plunge from thence into a lake, in order to come forth -young again and vigorous. Then it happened that a mortal woman, who had -the misfortune to draw upon herself celestial love, remonstrated one day -with her lover for having, in his creation of the Aleutian Islands, made -so many mountains and forgotten to supply the land with forests. This -imprudent criticism caused her brother to be slain by the angry god, and -all men after him to be subject to death. A similar idea is contained in -one of the Tongan traditions of creation; for when the islands were made, -but before they were inhabited by reasonable beings, some two hundred of -the lower gods, male and female alike, took a great boat to go to see -the new land fished up by Tangaloa. So delighted were they with it that -they immediately broke up their big boat, intending to make some smaller -ones out of it. But after a few days some of them died; and one of -them, inspired by God, told them that since they had come to Tonga, and -breathed its air and eaten its fruits, they should be mortal and fill the -world with mortals. Then were they sorry that they had broken their big -boat, and they set to work to make another, and went to sea, hoping again -to reach Bolotu, the heaven they had left; but being unable to find it, -they returned regretfully to Tonga. - -Thus it would seem that wherever men have so far advanced in power of -thought as to realise the conception of antiquity, the troubles of their -actual lot have always tempted them to idealise the past, and the glories -of the age of gold have been sung by the poets of no particular land -nor literature. The Shawnee Indians believed there was a time when they -could walk on the ocean or restore life to the dead, till they lost -these privileges when the nation by its carelessness became divided into -two.[12] The Ashantees trace all their calamities to the folly of their -ancestors, for when the first created black men were given their choice -between a large box and a piece of sealed-up paper they elected to take -the box, but found therein only some gold, iron, and other metals, whilst -the white men on opening the paper found all that was needful to make -them wise, and have ever since treated the blacks as their slaves.[13] -It is remarkable that a similar fancy is ascribed to the Navajoes of -New Mexico. For their ancestors, after creating the sun and moon, made -two water-jars, both covered at the top, but one gorgeously painted, -containing only rubbish, the other of plain earthenware, unpainted, but -containing flocks and herds and other valuables. The Navajoes, allowed -to choose before the Pueblos, took the beautiful but worthless jar; -whereupon the old men said: ‘Thus it will always be with the two nations. -You, Navajoes, will be a poor and wandering race; destitute of the -comforts of life and ever greedy for things on account of their outward -show rather than their intrinsic value; while the Pueblos will enjoy an -abundance of the good things of life, will occupy houses, and have plenty -of flocks and herds.’[14] According to the legend in the Zend-Avesta, -when Ormuzd created Meschia and Meschiana, the first man and woman, he -appointed heaven as their dwelling, under the sole condition of humility -and obedience to the law of pure thought, pure speech, and pure action. -For some time they were a blessing to one another and lived happily, -saying that it was from Ormuzd that all things came—the water and earth, -trees and animals, sun, moon, and stars, and all good roots and fruits -on the earth. But at last Ahriman became master over their thoughts, -and they ascribed the creation of all things to him. So they lost their -happiness and their virtue, and their souls were condemned to remain -in Duzakh until the resurrection of their bodies, when Sosiosch should -restore life to the dead.[15] - -Among the myths, however, most widely spread over the world and common -to races in all stages of culture, from the most barbarous to the most -civilized, a prominent place is due to the legend of an all-destructive -deluge, a legend which, arising as it probably did in many different -places from exaggerated memories of purely local floods, must, in spite -of its seeming universality, remain a merely local myth, entirely -destitute of all bearing on the question of the unity of the human race, -or of any connection with the story told in Genesis. A local flood like -that which on the occasion of an earthquake in 1819 was caused by the -sea flowing in at the eastern mouth of the Indus and converting in the -space of a few hours a district of 2,000 square miles into a vast lagoon, -would naturally be an event which would remain for ever in the oral -traditions of the district and tend to become magnified when the event -itself was forgotten. In Australia, which is subject at certain epochs -and in certain localities to great inundations, and which bears evidence -of former floods in what are now waterless deserts, flood stories are -said to be ‘exceedingly common’ among all the tribes, one tribe having -a tradition that when they returned to their old hunting-grounds on -the banks of a river, after a great flood, they found the sea flowing -where had stood the other bank, nor any trace left of its former -inhabitants.[16] - -Or, again, it is possible that alterations in the level of the sea and -land or the subsidence of a large continent, such as that of which on -geological as well as ethnological grounds it has been supposed that the -Polynesian islands are the remains, may have originated the tradition. -Thus, the Abbé Brasseur de Bourbourg imagined the submersion of a -large country in the Atlantic to account for the deluge-myths of the -Central American nations.[17] Dr. Brinton, indeed, suggests, that not -physics, but metaphysics is the exciting cause of beliefs in periodical -convulsions of the globe, maintaining that ‘by nothing short of a -miracle’ could savages preserve the remembrance of even the most terrible -catastrophe beyond a few generations. But it is at least as likely -that such remembrance should be possible as that savages, starting, as -he supposes, with an idea of creation as a reconstruction of existing -elements, should have added thereto the myth of a universal catastrophe, -‘to avoid the dilemma of a creation from nothing on the one hand and the -eternity of matter on the other.’[18] Perhaps, however, all such legends -are best regarded as pure nature-myths, to which we may possibly find -the key in the belief of the Esquimaux, that the souls of the dead are -encamped round a large lake in the sky, which when it overflows causes -rain upon earth and would cause a universal deluge if at any time its -floodgates were burst. The belief in a contingency is never far from the -assertion of its actuality, nor are the steps of thought always visible -which separate the possible from the real. - -Although many of the deluge-myths of the world have doubtless owed their -origin to the zeal with which they have been sought for in the cause -of orthodox theories, it is improbable that all of them have been -produced in this way. Dr. Brinton, who has examined the evidence with -care, asserts that there are twenty-eight American nations among whom a -distinct and well-authenticated myth of the deluge was found.[19] - -It would be tedious to allude to more than a few illustrations of the -belief as it exists in the world, or to try to distinguish the elements -in them of purely native growth from the influences of Christian -teaching. The Kamchadals believe that the earth was once flooded and many -persons drowned, though they tried to save themselves in boats, those -only succeeding who made great rafts of trees and let down stones for -anchors, to prevent themselves from drifting out to sea; when the waters -subsided their rafts rested on the mountain-tops. The Esquimaux appealed -to the bones of whales found on their mountains in support of their -assertion that the world had once been tilted over and all men drowned -but one. The Mandan Indians, according to Catlin, celebrated every year -in pantomime the subsidence of the great waters.[20] - -It is noticeable that in most savage legends of a flood (and it may, -perhaps, be taken as some test of their authenticity) there is an entire -absence of the idea, so familiar to ourselves, of the flood having -resulted from any fault committed by the then inhabitants of the earth. -At most such an idea appears in germ, as in the tradition of the Society -Islanders, that a fisherman, catching his hook in the hair of the great -sea-god as he lay asleep in his coral grove, so angered that divinity -that he caused the waters to arise till they flooded the very tops of the -mountains and drowned the inhabitants, the fisherman and his family alone -being suffered to escape, and thereby serving to attest the genuineness -of the tradition. So in Fiji the deluge was caused by two grandsons of a -god killing his favourite bird, and instead of being apologetic acting -with insolence and fortifying the town they lived in for the purpose -of defying their grandfather. The connection of the catastrophe with -human wickedness belongs apparently to a more advanced state of thought, -of which the recently deciphered Chaldæan version may be taken as a -sample. In it Hasisadra, the sage, who with his wife escaped the general -destruction, tells Izdubar, the giant, how he built a vessel according to -the directions of Hea, to save himself and his family from the universal -deluge which the gods sent upon the earth to punish the wickedness of -men; how the deluge lasted six days, and on the seventh, when the storm -ceased, the vessel was stranded for seven days on the mountains of -Nizir; and how on the seventh day, he Hasisadra, sent out first a dove -and then a swallow, both of whom, finding no resting-place, returned to -the vessel, till a raven was sent forth and did not return; and Hasisadra -sent out the animals to the four winds, and poured out a libation in -thanksgiving, and built an altar on the summit of the mountain. - -The belief in a future life—a belief perhaps first suggested in that -rude state of culture where the dreaming and waking life are not clearly -distinct but are both equally real—appears to prevail so generally among -the lower races, that it is more difficult to find instances where it is -_not_ found than instances where it is. The dead who visit the living in -their sleep are not thought of as dead, but as simply invisible; and for -this reason all over the globe it is so common to bury material things in -the graves of the departed, to serve them in that other world which is so -vividly conceived as but a continuation of this one. The Red Indian takes -his horses, the Greenlander his reindeer, and both the common requisites -of earthly economy; just as many tribes still take their slaves and -their wives to accompany them on that journey which, as it is imagined -so distinctly, is undertaken without mystery to a fresh existence. Till -lately, in parts of Sweden, a man’s pipe and tobacco-pouch, some money -and lights, were interred with him; and at Reichenbach, in Germany, a -man’s umbrella and goloshes are still placed in his grave.[21] In Russia -formerly a new pair of shoes was put on the feet of the dead for the long -journey before him, a custom also found among the natives of California, -and the Christian priest used to place on a man’s breast, as he lay in -his coffin, a pass, which, besides being inscribed with his Christian -name and the dates of his birth and death, was also a certificate of his -baptism, of the piety of his life, and of his having partaken of the -communion before his death.[22] These are but survivals of savage ideas, -which picture the continuation of consciousness far more vividly than -more advanced religions. The Ahts bury blankets with their dead, that -they may not shiver in the cold ones provided in the land of Chayher. The -Delawar Indian used to make an opening at the head-end of the coffin, -that the soul of the deceased might go in and out till it had thoroughly -settled on its future place of residence. When the Chippewyas killed -their aged relatives who could hunt no more, the medicine-song used -proves the simple faith which made the cruel deed an act of mercy: ‘The -Lord of life gives courage. It is true all Indians know that he loves us, -and we give over to him our father, that he may feel himself young in -another land and able to hunt.’ - -It is possible, indeed, that in many cases the attention shown by savages -to their dead, by the burial of property which would have been of use to -the survivors, or by the placing of food on their graves at periodical -feasts, arose rather from fear than from any kinder motive, dictated by -the dread always felt by the living of the dead and the wish to satisfy -them, if possible, by some peace-offering. The Samoyed sorcerer, after -a funeral, goes through the ceremony of soothing the departed, that he -may not trouble the survivors nor take their best game; a feeling still -further illustrated by their habit of not taking the dead out to be -buried by the regular hut door, but by a side-opening, that if possible -they may not find their way back—a habit found also in Greenland and in -many other parts of the world. For the fear of the dead is a universal -sentiment, common no less to the Abipones, who thought that sorcerers -could bring the dead from their graves to visit the living, or to the -Kaffirs, who think that bad men alone live a second time and try to kill -the living by night, than it is to the ignorant who still believe in -the blood-sucking vampire, a belief which little more than a century -ago amounted to a kind of epidemic in Hungary, resulting in a general -disinterment and the burning or staking of the suspected bodies. In the -sepulture, therefore, of men with their possessions, it was probably -the original thought that the dead would be less likely to haunt the -dwellings of the living, if they were not compelled to re-seek upon earth -those articles of daily use which they knew were to be found there. - -But the savage belief in a future is very variable; nor could we expect -to find it much affected by ideas of earthly morality, when such ideas -themselves hardly appear to exist. At most it is men of rank and courage -who live again, while cowards and the commonalty perish utterly; -generally there is no qualification of any kind. The Bedouins have no -fixed belief at all, some thinking that after death they are changed -into screech-owls, and others that if a camel is slain on their graves -they will return to life riding on it, but otherwise on foot. All North -American Indians are said to believe in the continual life of the soul, -and, because they think themselves the highest beings on earth, postulate -a hereafter where all their earthly longings will be satisfied.[23] But -they trouble themselves little about it, thinking that the god they -recognise as supreme is too good to punish them. Thus the Indians of -Arauco look forward to an eternal life in a beautiful land which lies -to the west, far over the sea, whither souls are taken by the sailor -Tempulazy and where no punishment is expected: for Pillican, their god, -the Lord of the world, would not inflict pain.[24] The Tunguz Lapps look -on the next life as simply a continuation of this one; in it there will -be no punishment, for here everyone is as good as he can be, and the gods -kill men reluctantly, but are thereby satisfied. In the Polynesian future -there is a similar absence of any idea of retribution. There is, for -instance, no moral qualification, but only one of rank, for Bolotu, that -happy land of the dead which lies far away to the north-west of Tonga, -beyond the reach of Tongan boats and greater than all the Tongan islands -put together, wherein abound beautiful and useful trees, whose plucked -fruit instantly grows again; where a delicious fragrance fills the air, -and birds of the loveliest colours sit upon the trees; where the woods -swarm with pigs, which are immortal so long as they are not eaten by the -gods. Nothing, indeed, shows better how independent is imagination of -race than the great similarity of those idealised earths which constitute -the heavens of the most distant savage tribes. The American Indian, who -visits in a dream the unseen world, reports of it, in language recalling -that of Homer, that it is a land where there is neither day nor night, -where the sun never rises nor sets; where rain and tomahawks and arrows -are never seen; where pipes abound everywhere, lying ready to be smoked; -where the earth is ever green, the trees ever in leaf; where there is no -need of bearskin nor of hut; where, if you would travel, the rivers will -take your boat whithersoever you will, without the need of rudder or of -paddle. And just as in the Tongan Bolotu the plucked fruit is replaced, -so there the goat voluntarily offers its shoulder to the hungry man, in -full confidence that it will grow again, and the beaver for the same -reason makes a ready sacrifice of its beautiful tail.[25] - -So far there is no idea of a future life as in any way affected by this -one. But such ideas do exist among savages, and are extremely interesting -as indications of the growth of their moral ideas. The quality most -necessary for a savage is pre-eminently courage, and courage, therefore, -appearing as the first recognised virtue, lays first claim, as such, to -consideration hereafter. The Brazilians believed that the souls of the -dead became beautiful birds, whilst cowards were turned into reptiles. -The Minnetarrees held that there were two villages which received the -dead; but that the cowardly and bad went to the small one, whilst the -brave and good occupied the larger. Among the Caribs, who entertain the -strange fancy that they have as many souls as they feel nerves in their -body, but that the chief of these resides in the heart and goes to -heaven at death, whilst the others go to the sea or the woods, we meet -again with the reservation of happiness to the souls of the brave. They -alone will live merrily, dancing, feasting, and talking; they alone will -swim in the great streams, feeling no fatigue; the Arawaks will either -serve them as slaves or wander about in desert mountains. Somewhat -similar was the faith of the old Mexicans, who divided the future world -into three parts: the first, the House of the Sun, where the days were -spent in joyful attendance on that luminary, with songs and games and -dances, by such brave soldiers as had died in battle or as prisoners -had been sacrificed to the gods, and by women who had died in giving -children to the community; the second, the kingdom of Tlalocan, hidden -among the Mexican mountains, not so bright as the former, but cool and -pleasant, and filled with unfailing pumpkins and tomatoes, reserved for -priests and for children sacrificed to Tlaloc and for all persons killed -by lightning, by drowning, or by sickness; the third, the kingdom of -Mictlauteuctli, reserved for all other persons, but with nothing said -of any punishment there awaiting them. One of the beliefs in Greenland -is, that heaven is situate in the sky or the moon, and that the journey -thither is so easy that a soul may reach it the same evening that it -quits the body, and play at ball and dance with those other departed -souls who are encamped round the great lake and shine in heaven as the -northern lights. But others say that it is only witches and bad people -who join the heavenly lights, where they not only enjoy no rest, owing -to the rapid revolutions of the sky, but are so plagued with ravens -that they cannot keep them from settling in their hair. They believe -that heaven lies under the earth or sea, where dwells Torngarsuk, the -Creator, with his mother, in perpetual summer and beautiful sunshine. -There the water is good and there is no night, and there are plenty of -birds, and fish, and seals, and reindeer, all to be caught at pleasure, -or ready cooking in a great kettle; but these delights are reserved for -persons who have done great deeds and worked steadfastly, who have caught -many whales or seals, who have been drowned at sea, or have died in -childbirth. These persons alone may hope to join the great company and -feast on inconsumable seals. Even then they must slide for five days down -the blood-stained precipice; and unhappy they to whom the journey falls -in stormy weather or in winter, for then they may suffer that other death -of total extinction, especially if their survivors disturb them by their -noise or affect them injuriously by the food they eat. The Kamchadal -belief is very curious, as showing how the idea of compensation in the -next world for the evils of this—an idea already apparent in the Mexican -and Greenland beliefs—may have served to bridge over the conception of a -mere continuance of life for the soul, and the conception of an actual -retribution awaiting it. They imagine that the dead come to a place under -the earth, where Haetsch dwells, son of Kutka the Creator, and the first -man who died on earth, now Lord of the under-world and general receiver -of souls. To those who come dressed in fine furs and drive fat dogs -before their sledges, he gives instead old ragged furs and lean dogs; but -to those who have known poverty on earth he gives new furs and beautiful -dogs and also a better place to live in than the others. The dead live -again as on earth; their wives are restored to them, they build ostrogs -again, and catch fish, and dance and sing; there is less storm and snow -than above ground, and more people; indeed, abundance of everything. - -It is easy to conceive how, when once the idea had been reached that the -brave deserved compensation in the next world for their earthly courage, -the poor for their earthly wretchedness, or the sick for their earthly -sufferings, and all men for the misfortune of premature death, it should -also be inferred, as soon as any criterion between goodness and badness -more refined than the mere difference between courage and cowardice had -been attained, that the good should have some advantage over the bad, and -from such an inference to a complete theory of retribution and punishment -of the bad the logical steps seem fairly obvious. Few things, indeed, are -more remarkable among the lower races than the general absence of the -ideas we associate with hell.[26] At most the idea of future punishment -is negative, the lives of slaves and cowards terminating in a total -cessation of consciousness, as opposed to its continuance for warriors -and chiefs. Still, the idea of difficulty in attaining the blessed -abodes, such as that above noticed as prevalent in Greenland—an idea, -as Mr. Tylor suggests, probably connected with the sun’s passage across -the sky to the west, where the happy land is so generally figured to -lie—is very common, and from such an idea it is natural to connect the -difficulty of the journey to Paradise with the destruction of those whose -presence in it would mar its blessedness. - -The trial of merit, varying with experiences of physical geography, -generally lies either in the passage of a river or gulf by a narrow -bridge, or in the climbing of a steep mountain. The Choctaws, for -instance, believe that the dead have to pass a long and slippery -pine-log, across a deep and rapid river, on the other side of which stand -six persons, who pelt new-comers with stones and cause the bad ones to -fall in.[27] In Khond theology the judge of the dead resides beyond -the sea, on the smooth and slippery Leaping Rock, below which flows a -black unfathomable river; and the souls of men take bold leaps to reach -the rock, those that fail contracting a deformity which is transferred -to the next soul animated on earth. The Blackfoot Indians, on the other -hand, believe that departed souls have to climb a steep mountain, from -the summit of which is seen a great plain, with new tents and swarms of -game; that the dwellers in that happy plain advance to them and welcome -those who have led a good life, but reject the bad—those who have soiled -their hands in the blood of their countrymen—and throw them headlong from -the mountain; whilst women who have been guilty of infanticide never -reach the mountain at all, but hover round the seat of their crimes with -branches of trees tied to their legs. The Fijians think that even the -brave have some difficulty in reaching the judgment-seat of Ndengei, and -they provide the dead with war-clubs to resist Sama and his host, who -will dispute their passage. But celibacy is in their eyes apparently -the only offence which calls for peremptory and hopeless punishment. -Unmarried Fijians are dashed to pieces by Nangananga as in vain attempts -to steal round to a certain reef they are driven ashore by the rising -tide.[28] The Norwegian Lapps consider that abstinence from stealing, -lying, and quarrelling entitles a man to compensation hereafter. Such -receive after death a new body, and live with the higher gods in Saiwo, -and indulge in hunting and magic, brandy-drinking and smoking, to a far -higher degree than was possible on earth. Wicked men, perjurers, and -thieves go to the place of the bad spirits, to Gerre-Mubben-Aimo.[29] -The idea of compensation of the good leads naturally to the idea of -retribution for the bad; and even among the Guinea Coast negroes we -find future inducements to the practice of such moral duties as they -recognise. For they are wont to make for themselves idols, called Sumanes -whose favour they endeavour to secure by abstinence from certain kinds -of foods, believing that after death those who have been constant in -their vows of abstinence and in offerings to the Sumanes will come to a -large inland river, where a god inquires of everyone how he has lived -his days on earth, and those who have not kept their vows are drowned -and destroyed for ever. The inland-dwelling negroes declare that at -this river dwells a powerful god in a beautiful house, which, though -always exposed, is never touched by rain. He knows all past and present -things; he can send any kind of weather, he can heal sicknesses and work -miracles. Before him must all the dead appear; the good to receive a -happy and peaceful life, the bad to be killed for ever by the large -wooden club which hangs before his door. Lastly, it may be noticed -that negro tribes believe that death will take them to the land of the -European and give them the white man’s skin; but, as they generally paint -their devil white, we cannot be sure that such a change is not rather -dreaded as a punishment for the bad than regarded as a change for the -better. - -So far it appears that savages have developed from the promptings and -imaginings of their own minds some idea of a Creator and of a soul, as -well as of a future to some extent dependent on earthly antecedents. It -is of course difficult to judge how far the missionaries or travellers, -who have mainly supplied the only evidence we have, may have clearly -understood, or how much they may have unintentionally imported into, -beliefs they represent as purely indigenous. In many cases a remarkable -similarity may lead us to suspect that the belief is not native, but -implanted at some time by Christian or other influence, though traces -of such influence may be absolutely wanting or at least not proved. -There can, for instance, be little doubt whence Sissa, the devil of the -Guinea Coast negroes, derived the pair of horns and long tail with which -he is usually depicted. But, on the other hand, we cannot lay down any -rigid canon for the imaginations of men, nor say that if one belief is -identical with another a thousand miles off it must therefore have been -borrowed and cannot be of independent growth. Indeed, when we reflect on -the limited nature of the mental faculties of savages, on the limited -range of objects for their minds to work upon, on their childlike fear -of the dark and the unseen, and their still more childlike delight in -the indulgence of their fancy, so far from there being anything strange -in the analogies of thought between distant tribes, the strangeness -would rather be if such analogies did not exist. It is probable that -children tell one another much the same stories in London as they do at -the Antipodes, and there is no more reason to be surprised at finding -much the same theologies current in Africa as in Australia or Ceylon. The -same sun, which shines on men’s bodies alike, shines on their minds alike -too; and myths, like dreams, with all the apparent field for variety in -their formation, are really subject to the closest laws of uniformity and -sameness. - -We have, however, to be careful, in applying terms of our own religious -phraseology to savage thoughts and fancies, to discriminate between the -higher and lower meaning they bear, and always to employ them in the -lower. The belief, already noticed, of the Kamchadals in Kutka well -illustrates how different is the meaning involved in the Kamchadal theory -of creation from that involved in Genesis or the Zend-Avesta. The same -is true of the belief in a soul and its future life; for the savage, -intensely vivid as is his future beyond the grave, seldom doubts for an -instant but that he will share it with all the rest, not only of the -animate, but of the inanimate world. For that reason he buries axes, and -clothes, and food with the dead, to be of service in the next world. The -Fijians used to show ‘the souls of men and women, beasts and plants, of -stocks and stones, canoes and houses, and of all the utensils of this -frail world, swimming, or rather tumbling one over the other,’ as they -were borne by a swift stream at the bottom of a deep hole to the regions -of immortality.[30] So of the animate world. The Kamchadal believes that -the smallest fly that breathes will rise after death to live again in -the under-world.[31] If the Laplander expects that all honest people -will re-meet in Aimo, he as fully expects that bears and wolves will -meet there too. The Greenlander believes that all the heavenly bodies -were once Greenlanders, _or animals_, and that they shine with a pale -or red light according to the food they ate on earth. He also believes -that when all things now living on the earth are dead, and the earth -cleansed from their blood by a great water-flood; when the purified dust -is consolidated again by a great wind, and a fairer earth, all plain and -no cliffs, is substituted for the present one; when Priksoma, he who is -above, breathes on men that they may live again—then animals will also -rise again and be in great abundance. The old inhabitants of Anahuac -and Egypt believed equally that animals would share the next world -with them; and, if the universality of an opinion were any reason for -its credibility, few opinions could claim a better title to acceptance -than this one. So confident were the Swedish Lapps of the future life -of animals, that whenever they killed one in sacrifice they buried the -bones in a box, that the gods might more easily restore it to life.[32] -There is really nothing very unnatural in this idea, when we remember -that in the lower stages of culture man not only admits the equality of -brutes with himself, but even acknowledges their superiority by actual -worship of them. It is not difficult to understand how it is that savages -who see deities in everything, in the motionless mountain or stone no -less than in the rushing river or wind, should see in animals deities of -extraordinary power, whose capacities infinitely transcend their own. -Recognising as they do in the tiger a strength, in the deer a speed, in -the monkey a cunning, all superior to their own, they naturally conceive -of them as deities whom above all others it is expedient to humour by -adoration and sacrifice. Some negro tribes, holding that all animals -enshrine a spirit, which may injure or benefit themselves, will refrain -from eating certain animals, otherwise perfectly edible, and endeavour -to propitiate them by lifelong attention. Thus some regularly offer food -at the earth-houses of termites, or fatten sheep and goats, for a purely -temporary and perfectly spiritual advantage. It is on account of their -divine and immortal nature that the well-known custom of apologising to -animals killed in the chase is so general among savages. It is generally -a deprecation of any post-mortem vindictiveness on the part of the -animal’s ghost. The natives of Greenland refrain from breaking seals’ -heads or throwing them into the sea; but they pile them in a heap before -their hut door, that the souls of the seals may not be angry and in their -spite frighten living seals away. The Yuracares of Bolivia were careful -to put small fish-bones carefully aside, lest fish should disappear; and -other Indian tribes would keep the bones of beavers and sables from their -dogs for a year and then bury them, lest the spirits of those animals -should take offence and no more of them be killed or trapped.[33] The -Lapps are so afraid that the soul of the animal whose flesh they have -killed may take its revenge as a disembodied spirit, that before eating -it they not only entreat pardon for its death, but perform the ceremony -of treating it first with nuts or other delicacies, that it may be led -to believe it is present as a guest—not to be eaten, but to eat. Another -Kamchadal fancy indicates how savages, whose theory of cause and effect -appears to be that it is quite sufficient for two things to be connected -contemporaneously for one to be cause and the other effect, are led more -especially to see deities in birds, from the observation that changes -in weather are associated with their arrival and departure. Since to be -associated with a thing is to be caused by it, migratory birds take away -or bring the summer with them. For the reason that the spring and the -wagtails return together the Kamchadal thanks the wagtail for bringing -back the spring, and it is probably from a similar confusion of thought -that he thanks the ravens and crows for fine weather. - -Whether, in conclusion, it be true or not that the more civilised nations -of the earth have gone through stages of growth in which their religious -conceptions resembled those of contemporary savage tribes, one result -at least is clear, that the actual standpoint of the savage with regard -to the great mysteries of existence is removed _toto cœlo_ from that of -Christian, or Mahometan, or Parsee. The Creator he believes in is not -so much the cause of all things as the maker of some things, because -seemingly the first father of men needed the wherewithal to exercise his -energies. The savage’s soul is simply his breath or ghost, which indeed -will survive his body, but which may lose its identity in the body of -an animal or thing, destined like himself to live again. He conceives -of himself generally as not mortal, but not therefore as immortal. His -future is but a repetition of his present, with the same base wants -and pursuits, only with a greater possibility of indulgence, and not -necessarily indefinite in duration. It is, perhaps, some compensation -for this, that, if it does not hold out great hopes, its prospect serves -to deprive death of its terror, and brightens the sufferings of the -passing day. To the native American death is said to be rather an event -of gladness than of terror, bringing him rest or enjoyment after his -period of toil; nor does he fear to go to a land ‘which all his life long -he has heard abounds in rewards without punishments.’[34] No thought of -possibly flying from present evils to find immeasurably greater ones -awaiting him after death would ever occur to a savage, and he will even -kill himself or cheerfully submit to be killed by his friends, in order -to realise the sooner the difference imagined between earth and heaven. -The powers of evil which vex him here will be absent hereafter, and the -Spirit he recognises as supreme in his hierarchy of invisible powers is -either conceived as too beneficent to punish, or, if he punishes at all, -as likely to punish at once and for ever. - - - - -II. - -_SAVAGE MODES OF PRAYER._ - - -In the same way as a child is insensibly educated by the very efforts of -an adult to place himself on its level, so any tribe of savages is to -some extent modified by the time that a stranger has fitted himself, by -long residence among them and the acquisition of their language, to tell -us anything about them. This primary difficulty, amounting theoretically -to insuperability, might alone suffice to invalidate most of the received -evidence which asserts or denies concerning savages anything whatsoever -in broad general terms. But when the evidence concerns religious ideas -another difficulty is superadded, and one which appertains to the subject -of religion alone—the reserve, that is, (attested by too many travellers -to need specific references,) with which savages guard their stock of -fundamental beliefs. The delicacy manifested by the most skilled of the -Iowa Indian tribe as to communicating fully or freely on religious -subjects, lest they should bring on themselves or their nation some -great calamity,[35] indicates the feeling that probably underlies such -religious reticence. If a savage dare not pronounce his own name, much -less the names of his dead, it is a fair matter of wonder that he should -ever have become so free with the names and attributes of his divinities -as to have rendered it possible for such systematic representations of -his theology as are current to appear before the world. - -The evidence afforded by ethnology as to the nature of prayer among -savages is slighter than on most subjects relating to them, partly -from the natural disregard paid to such matters by most Christian -missionaries, partly from the secret and hidden character of prayer, -which alone would make its study impossible; but there is abundant -evidence to show that religious supplication of a certain kind enters -more deeply than might be supposed into the daily lives of the lower -races of mankind. Says Ellis of the Society Islanders: ‘Religious rites -were connected with almost every act of their lives. An _ubu_ or prayer -was offered before they ate their food, planted their gardens, built -their houses, launched their canoes, cast their nets, and commenced or -concluded a journey.’[36] In the Fijian Islands business transactions -were commonly terminated by a short wish or prayer; and in the Sandwich -Islands the priest would pray before a battle that the gods he addressed -would prove themselves stronger than the gods of his foes, promising -them hecatombs of victims in the event of victory. But the mere fact of -such prayers is of less interest than the actual formulas used; these, -however, have more rarely been thought worth recording. - -According to a recent African traveller it is a daily prayer in some -parts of Guinea: ‘O God, I know thee not, but thou knowest me: thy aid is -necessary to me.’ Or again: ‘O God, help us; we do not know whether we -shall live to-morrow: we are in thy hand.’[37] A Bushman, being asked how -he prayed to Cagn (recognised by his tribe as the first being and creator -of all things), answered, in a low, imploring tone: ‘O Cagn, O Cagn, are -we not your children? do you not see our hunger? Give us food;’ ‘and,’ -he added, ‘he gives us both hands full.’[38] It further appears that the -Bushmen address petitions to the sun, to the moon, and to the stars;[39] -and the Kamchadals, who have been made to dispute with them the lowest -rank of humanity, had a rude form of prayer to the Storm-god, which was -uttered by a small child, sent naked round the ostrog with a shell in -its uplifted hand: ‘Gsanlga, sit down and cease to storm; the mussel is -accustomed to salt, not to sweet water; you make me too wet, and from the -wet I must freeze. I have no clothes; see how I freeze.’[40] In a certain -African tribe it is said to be usual for the men to go every morning to a -river, and there, after splashing water in their faces, or throwing sand -over their heads, after clasping and loosing their hands and whispering -softly the words _Eksuvais_, to pray: ‘Give me to-day rice and yams, -gold and aggry-beads, slaves, riches, and health; make me active and -strong.’[41] - -The Zulus of Africa and the Khonds of India supply good illustrations -of savage prayer. The head man of a Zulu village, at the sacrifice of -a bullock to the spirits of the dead, thus addresses them in prayer: -‘I pray for cattle that they may fill this pen. I pray for corn that -many people may come to this village of yours and make a noise and -glorify you. I also ask for children, that this village may have a large -population and that your name may never come to an end.’[42] The Khonds, -also, at the sacrifice of a bullock express their wishes with rather more -emphasis: ‘Let our herds be so numerous that they cannot be housed; let -children so abound that care of them shall overcome their parents, as -shall be seen by their burnt hands.’ Or, again, they will ask that their -swine may so abound that their fields shall require no other ploughs than -their ‘rooting snouts;’ that their poultry may be so numerous as to hide -the thatch of their houses; that neither fish, frog, nor worm shall be -able to live in their drinking ponds beneath the trampling feet of their -multitude of cattle.[43] - -These may be taken as fair samples of primitive prayer; but it is only -just, as against the inference that a savage’s prayers have reference -solely to the good and evil things of this world, to notice indications -of higher sentiments. The Yebus of Africa, with faces bowed to the earth, -are said commonly to pray, not only for preservation from sickness and -death, but for the gifts of happiness and _wisdom_.[44] The Tahitian -priest, praying to the god by whom it was supposed that a dead man’s -spirit had been required, that the sins of the latter, especially that -one for which he had lost his life, might be buried in a hole then dug -in the ground and not attach to the survivors, points to the occasional -presence of a moral motive in prayer; though even here the deprecation -of further anger on the part of the gods appears the principal object -of concern.[45] So little indeed do thoughts of morality or of a future -state enter as factors into savage prayer, and so little does any -ethical distinction appear in the savage conception of supernatural -powers, that not unfrequently supplication is directed to the attainment -of ends morally the reverse of desirable. Like the Roman tradesman -praying to Mercury to aid him in cheating, the Nootka warrior would -entreat his god that he might find his foes asleep, and so kill a great -many of them.[46] But perhaps the best illustration of the perverted use -of prayer is one employed by a clan of the Hervey Islanders when engaged -on a thieving and murdering expedition, and uttered as near as possible -to the dwelling of the person about to be robbed. It is apparently -addressed to Rongo, or Oro, the great Polynesian god of war, and is thus -translated in Mr. Gill’s ‘Myths and Songs of the South Pacific’:—[47] - - We are on a thieving expedition; - Be close to our left side to give aid. - Let all be wrapped in sleep; - Be as a lofty cocoa-nut tree to support us. - -The god is then entreated to cause all things to sleep; the owner of the -house is entreated to sleep on, likewise the threshold of the house, the -insects, beetles, earwigs, and ants that inhabit it, the central post, -the several rafters and beams that support it; and after the thatch of -the house has been asked to sleep on, the prayer thus concludes:— - - The first of its inmates unluckily awaking - Put soundly to sleep again. - If the Divinity so please, man’s spirit must yield. - O Rongo, grant thou complete success. - -If, however, we may hope to find anywhere indications of a higher purpose -in prayer than the attainment of merely temporary or personal needs, we -must seek it (nor is the search entirely vain) in those rites of religion -which, from the highest to the lowest levels of culture, are customary -upon the entrance of a fresh life on the stage of this world’s trials and -sorrows. The popular saying, that the cries of a child at its christening -are the cries of the devil going out of it, expresses identically the -same belief which still prompts our savage contemporaries to drive -evil spirits from a new-born child by rites of mysterious spiritual -efficacy; and it is probably to the indigenous prevalence of baptism -among many savage tribes that some Catholic missionaries, complacently -identifying conversion with immersion, have owed the success of their -efforts. It would at least be interesting to know whether baptism was -a native African rite at the time that the Capuchin Merolla baptized -with his own hands 13,000 negroes, and Padre Jerom da Montefarchio his -100,000 in the space of twenty years.[48] Mungo Park gives an account of -a purely heathen festival held about a week after the birth of a child, -at which a priest, taking the latter in his arms, would pray, soliciting -repeatedly the blessing of God on the child and all the company. And -Bosman tells of a priest binding ropes, corals, and other things round -the limbs of a new-born child, and exorcising the spirits of sickness and -evil.[49] - -It cannot, however, be proved with certainty that such rites are of -native growth wherever they have been found, though similar feelings of -natural impurity, of natural anxiety, may well have contributed to make -them common all the world over. With this reservation, let it suffice -to recall some illustrations drawn from the most distant parts of the -world. The most touching form of the custom is told of a tribe in the -Fiji Islands, where the priest, presented by the relations with food -with which to notify the event to the gods before the birth-festival, -would thus petition the latter: ‘This is the food of the little child: -take knowledge of it, ye gods. Be kind to him. Do not pelt him or spit -upon him, or seize him, but let him live to plant sugar-canes.’[50] -In New Zealand, the tohunga, or priest, dipping a green branch into a -calabash of water, sprinkled the child therewith and made incantations -according to its sex;[51] whilst in the Hervey Islands, where the -child was immersed in a taro leaf filled with water, the ceremony was -intimately connected with their system of tribes and dedication for -future sacrifice.[52] Crossing over to America, we find among the Indian -tribes of Guiana the native priest dancing about an infant and dashing -water over it, finishing the ceremony by passing his hands over its -limbs, muttering all the while incantations and charms.[53] In some North -American tribes, water having been boiled with a certain sweet-scented -root, and some of it having been first thrown into the fire and the rest -distributed to the company by the oldest woman present, the latter would -then offer a short prayer to the Master of Life, on behalf of the child, -that its life might be spared and that it might grow; and if, at the -festival held to commemorate the child’s first slain animal, one of the -chief persons present would entreat the Great Spirit to be kind to the -lad and let him grow to be a great hunter, in war to take many scalps and -not to behave like an old woman, it cannot be said that such a prayer was -purely selfish in its aim or confined solely to present necessities.[54] - -Although, however, it is impossible to dissociate baptismal rites so rude -as these from a belief in magic, the idea of water as conferring moral as -well as physical purity appears to have been attained by some of the more -advanced heathen tribes. The rite of baptism, says Dr. Brinton, was of -immemorial antiquity among the Cherokees, Aztecs, Mayas, and Peruvians: -the use of water as symbolical of spiritual cleansing clearly appearing, -for instance, in the prayer of the Peruvian Indian, who after confessing -his guilt would bathe in the river and say: ‘O river, receive the sins -I have this day confessed unto the sun, carry them down to the sea, and -let them never more appear.’[55] It has often been told, on the original -authority of Sahagun, how the Mexican nurse, after bathing the new-born -child, would bid it approach its mother, the goddess of water; praying at -the same time to her that she would receive it and wash it, would take -away its inherited impurity, make it good and clean, and instil into it -good habits and manners.[56] - -The mere enunciation of a wish often amounts among savages to a complete -prayer, it being conceived that the expression of desire is of more -moment than the manner of such expression; such a conception still -surviving among ourselves at certain wishing towers, wishing gates, or -on the occurrence of certain natural phenomena. In Fiji it was common -to shout aloud, after drinking a toast, the name of some object of -desire, and this was equivalent to a prayer for whatever it might be—for -food, wealth, a fair wind, or even for the gratification of cannibal -gluttony. Franklin tells how some Indians, disappointed in the chase, set -themselves to beat a large tambourine and sing an address to the Great -Spirit, praying for relief, their prayer consisting solely of three words -constantly repeated;[57] the tambourine probably being employed for the -same purpose that the Sioux Indians kept a whistle in the mouth of one of -their gods, namely, to make their invocation audible. The Ahts, praying -to the moon, sometimes say no more than _teech, teech_, that is, Health -or Life; and it is curious that the rude savages of Brazil exclaim _teh, -teh_, to the same luminary.[58] The Sioux would often say, ‘Spirits of -the dead, have mercy!’ adding thereto a notification of their wishes, -whether for good health, good luck in hunting, or anything else.[59] The -Zulus, however, sometimes carry this principle of brevity furthest, for -sometimes in their prayers to the spirits of their dead they simply say, -‘Ye people of our house,’ ‘the suppliant taking it for granted that the -Amatongo will know what he wants;’ though generally their addresses to -their ancestors are of a much more orthodox length than this.[60] When we -consider how large a place the spirits of the dead fill in the savage’s -spirit-world it appears possible that many of the prayers and sacrifices, -said to be offered to the Great Spirit or unknown divinities, are really -addressed to the all-controlling, ever-present spirits of the departed. - -If we may believe the testimony of a great many travellers in all -parts of the world, the case of the Yezidis, who to the recognition -of a supreme being are said to join actual worship of the chief power -of evil, represents no exceptional phase of human thought. Yet even -the Yezidis, according to Dr. Latham, are said to be improperly called -Devil-worshippers, since they only try to conciliate Satan, speak of him -with respect or not at all, avoid his name in all their oaths, and are -pained if they hear people make a light use of it.[61] In Equatorial -Africa it is said that whilst Mburri, the spirit of evil, is worshipped -piously as a tyrant to be appeased, it is not considered necessary to -pray to Njambi, the good spirit.[62] Harmon says distinctly of all the -different Indian tribes east of the Rocky Mountains that they pray and -make frequent and costly sacrifices to the bad spirit for delivery from -evils they feel or fear, but that they seldom pray to the supreme good -spirit, to whom they ascribe every perfection, and whom they consider -too benevolent ever to inflict evil on his creatures.[63] There is, -indeed, little doubt that, if a certain amount of evidence suffices -the requirements of proof, we must yield consent to the fact, in -itself neither incredible nor unintelligible, that many savage tribes, -recognising and believing in a good and powerful spirit, make that very -goodness a reason for their neglect of him, and address their petitions -instead to the mercy of that other spirit to whose power for evil they -conceive the world to lie subject.[64] There is, however, much to be -said in favour of the view, that the mind in its primitive state is -unconscious of this moral dualism in the spirit-world, attributing -rather (in perfect accordance with the analogy of human relationships) -good and bad things alike to the agency of the same beings, according as -transitory impulses affect them. - -Thus, according to Castren, an antagonism between absolute good and -absolute evil finds no place among the Samoyeds. They have no extreme -divinities corresponding in their attributes to Ahriman and Ormuzd. ‘The -human temper is the divine temper also, good and bad mixed.’[65] Mburri, -who, according to one writer, is the evil spirit in Equatorial Africa, -is, according to another, the good spirit, or at least the less wicked -of the two, both the good and bad receiving worship, and being endowed -with much the same powers.[66] The Beetjuans, venerating Morimo as the -source of all good and evil that happened to them, were not agreed as to -whether he was entirely a beneficent or a malevolent being; and, if they -thanked him for benefits, they never hesitated to curse him for ills or -for wishes unfulfilled.[67] ‘To the very same image,’ says Bosman of the -negroes, ‘they at one time make offerings to God and at another to the -devil, so that one image serves them in the capacity of god and devil.’ -It was untrue, he declares, that the negroes prayed and made offerings to -the devil, though some of them would try to appease a devil by leaving -thousands of pots of victuals standing ever ready for his gratification; -on the contrary, the devil was annually banished from their towns with -great ceremony, being hunted away with dismal cries, and his spirit -pelted with wood and stones.[68] - -The evidence, again, in this respect concerning the aborigines of -America is important. The Winnebagoes are said to have had a tradition -that soon after the creation a bad spirit appeared on the scene, whose -attempts to vie with the products of the Good Spirit resulted in making -a negro in failure of an Indian, a grizzly bear in failure of a black -one, and snakes which were endowed with venom; he also it was who made -all the worthless trees, thistles, and weeds, who tempted Indians to -lie, murder, and steal, and who receives bad Indians when they die. The -suspicion, however, of Christian influence among this tribe makes the -tradition of little value to the argument. Turning to other evidence, -amid Schoolcraft’s reiterated statements of the original dualism of -Indian theology, whereby the Indian was careful ‘to guard his good and -merciful God from all evil acts and intentions, by attributing the whole -catalogue of evil deeds among the sons of men to the Great Bad Spirit -of his theology,’ we yet find this admission, that ‘it is impossible to -witness closely the rites and ceremonies which the tribes practise in -their sacred and ceremonial societies without perceiving that _there is -no very accurate or uniform discrimination between the powers of the -two antagonistical deities_.’[69] Mr. Pond, who resided with the Sioux -Indians for eighteen years and had every opportunity to become acquainted -with such matters, declares that it was ‘next to impossible to penetrate’ -into the subject of their divinities; but he was never able to discover -‘the least degree of evidence that they divide the gods into classes of -good and evil,’ nor did he believe that they ever distinguished the Great -Spirit from other divinities ‘till they learnt to do so from intercourse -with the whites;’ for they had no chants, feasts, dances, nor sacrificial -rites which had any reference to such a being, or which, if they had, -were not of recent origin.[70] Of the same people says Mr. Prescott, a -man related to and resident among them many years: ‘As to their belief in -evil spirits, they do not understand the difference between a great good -spirit and a great evil spirit, as we do. _The idea the Indians have is -that a spirit can be good if necessary, and do evil if it thinks fit._’ -They ‘know very little about whether the Great Spirit has anything to do -with their affairs, present or future.’ Their idea of the Great Spirit -is of the vaguest possible kind, since they lack entirely any conception -of his power, or of the mode of, or of a reason for, man’s creation. -The Great Spirit they believe made everything but the wild rice and the -thunder; and they have been known to accuse their deity of badness in -sending storms to cause them misery.[71] In the same way the Comanches -of Texas neither worship the evil spirit nor are aware of his existence, -‘_attributing everything to arise from the Great Spirit, whether of good -or evil_.’[72] Had the ancient Jews been described by Greek travellers -instead of by themselves, we may fairly suspect that they would have -been introduced to posterity as a people, consciously theistic indeed, -but at the same time as addicted, in most of their rites, to demonolatry -and the propitiation of imaginary evil beings. The true view would -seem to be that the theology of the lower races does not admit of that -preciseness of terminology, of that clear distinction of qualities, of -that systematic marshalling of powers, which has been so often predicated -of it, but that in its growth it undergoes a period of flux and change -similar to that which may be seen to occur in the evolution of the lowest -forms of physical life into more determinate types of being. - -The Sioux Indians, abusing their Great Spirit for sending them storms, -or the Kamschadals cursing Kutka for having created their mountains so -high and their streams so rapid, expose a state of thought relating to -the gods which is most difficult to reconcile with the savage’s habitual -dread of them, still more with a high conception of them, but which is -too well authenticated to admit of doubt. Franklin saw a Cree hunter -tie offerings (a cotton handkerchief, looking-glass, tin pin, some -ribbon and tobacco) to the value of twenty skins round an image of the -god Kepoochikan, at the same time praying to him in a rapid monotonous -tone to be propitious, explaining to him the value of his presents, and -strongly cautioning him against ingratitude.[73] If all the prayers and -presents made to their god by the Tahitians to save their chiefs from -dying proved in vain, his image was inexorably banished from the temple -and destroyed.[74] The Ostiaks of Siberia, if things went badly with -them, would pull down from their place of honour in the hut and in every -way maltreat the idols they generally honoured so exceedingly; the idols -whose mouths were always so diligently smeared with fish-fat, and within -whose reach a supply of snuff ever lay ready.[75] The Chinese are said -to do the same by their household gods, if for a long time they are deaf -to their prayers, and so do the Cinghalese;[76] so that the practice -is more than an impulsive manifestation of merely local feeling. That -such feelings occasionally crop out in civilised Catholic countries is -matter of more surprise; but it is an authentic historical fact that the -good people of Castelbranco, in Portugal, were once so angry with St. -Anthony for letting the Spaniards plunder their town, contrary to his -agreement, that they broke many of his statues in pieces, and, taking the -head off one they specially revered, substituted for it the head of St. -Francis.[77] Neapolitan fishermen are said to this day to throw their -saints overboard if they do not help them in a storm; and the images of -the Virgin or of St. Januarius, worn in Neapolitan caps, are in danger -of being trodden under foot and destroyed, if adverse contingencies -arise. The latter saint, indeed, once received during a famine very clear -intimation, that, unless corn came by a certain time, he would forfeit -his saintship.[78] - -It is perhaps a refinement of thought when a present becomes an advisable -accompaniment to a simple petition; but the principle of exchange once -entered into, the relations between man and the supernatural lead -logically from the offering of fruits and flowers to the sacrifice of -animals and of men. Some Algonkin Indians, mistaking once a missionary -for a god, and petitioning his mercy, begged him to let the earth yield -them corn, the rivers fish, and to prevent sickness from slaying or -hunger from tormenting them. Their request they backed with the offer of -a pipe;[79] and in this ridiculous incident the whole of the savage’s -philosophy of sacrifice is contained. Prescott, coming with some Indians -to a lake they were to cross, saw his companions light their pipes -and smoke by way of invoking the winds to be calm.[80] And the Hurons -offered a similar prayer with tobacco to a local god, saying: ‘Oki, -thou who livest on this spot, we offer thee tobacco. Help us, save us -from shipwreck. Defend us from our enemies. Give us good trade, and -bring us safe back to our villages.’[81] In the island of Tanna, the -village priest, addressing the spirits of departed chiefs (thought to -preside over the growth of yams and fruits), after the firstfruits of -vegetation had been deposited on a stone, on the branch of a tree, or -on a rude altar of sticks, would pray: ‘Compassionate father, here is -some food; eat it, be kind to us on account of it;’ and in Samoa, too, -a libation of ava at the evening meal was the offering, in return for -which the father of a family would beg of the gods health and prosperity, -productiveness for his plantations, and for his tribe generally a strong -and large population for war.[82] In Fiji, again, when the chief priests -and leading men assembled to discuss public affairs in the yaquona or -kava circle, the chief herald, as the water was poured into the kava, -after naming the gods for whom the libation was prepared, would say: -‘Be gracious, ye lords, the gods, that the rain may cease, and the sun -shine forth;’ and again when the potion was ready: ‘Let the gods be of a -gracious mind, and send a wind from the east.’[83] - -It is a somewhat obvious inference, if presents like these fail to obtain -corresponding results, that the spirit addressed is not satisfied, -and that he requires a greater value in exchange for the blessings at -his disposal. The crowning petition, therefore, of disappointed and -despairing humanity is, by an irrefragable chain of reasoning, the -sacrifice of a human life, or, if this fails, of many lives. Long and -frequent were the prayers of the Tahitians to the gods when their chiefs -were ill, for, under the idea that ‘the gods were always influenced by -the same motives as themselves, they imagined that the efficacy of their -prayers would be in exact proportion to the value of the offerings with -which they were accompanied.’ Hence, if the disease grew violent, the -fruits of whole plantain fields or more than a hundred pigs would be -hurried to the marae; nay, not unfrequently a number of men with ropes -round their necks would be led to the altar and presented to the idol, -with prayers that the mere sight of them might satisfy his wrath.[84] -It does not appear that on such occasions they were actually slain, but -we seem here rather to see the first step towards human sacrifice than -merely a survival of it, for the obtaining of this particular wish. The -process is naturally from the sacrifice of the least possible to the -sacrifice of the greatest possible, though after that point has been -reached there may well be a tendency, varying with the character of a -tribe, to fall back upon make-believe, curtailed losses. The Mandan -Indians, Catlin repeats, always sacrificed the best of its kind to the -Great Spirit, the favourite horse, the best arrow, or the best piece of -buffalo;[85] so that the sacrifice of their fingers was more probably -a form of incipient human sacrifice than, as it sometimes is, a relic -of a more complete self-surrender. Both the Aztecs and the Mayas, with -all the cruel forms of sacrifice that disgraced their civilization, -retained traditions of a time when the gods were contented with the -milder offerings of fruits and flowers; and in Yucatan, where hundreds of -young girls were sacrificed in the dark but sacred pit of Chichen, there -were recollections of a time when one victim sufficed the demands of -the spirit-world. And in this instance may be seen how human sacrifice, -besides being the highest gift man could offer to his god or gods, was in -yet another sense a mode of prayer; for whilst the victims stood round -the pit, whilst the incense burnt on the altar and in the braziers, the -officiating priest explained to the messengers from earth ‘the things -for which they were to implore the gods into whose presence they were -about to be introduced.’[86] So also the priests of Mexico would exhort -the deputation of eighteen souls they sent to the sun to remember the -mission for which they were sent, the people’s wants they were to make -known, the favours they were to ask for their countrymen.[87] - -Less obviously connected with prayer than sacrifice is dancing, a custom -which the civilized world has long since ceased to regard as in any -sense connected with religion, but which among savages, besides being a -natural expression of joy in life, of thankfulness for sun or shower, is -not unfrequently a mode of prayer, a means employed for the attainment -of desire. This at least seems the case with those imitative dances or -pantomimes in which with marvellous exactitude the savage all the world -over acts the part of the animals he pursues in the chase. The national -dance of the Kamschadals consists in the imitation of the manners and -motions of seals and bears, varying from the gentlest movement of -their bodies to the most violent agitation of their thighs and knees, -accompanied with singing and stamping in time;[88] and it is remarkable -that in Vancouver’s Island also there is a seal dance, for which the -natives, stripping themselves naked, enter the water, regardless of the -cold of the night, and emerge ‘dragging their bodies along the sand like -seals,’ then enter the houses and crawl about the fires, and finally -jump up and dance about.[89] - -But although it is intelligible that such facility and perfection of -beast-acting as, for instance, enabled the Dog-rib Indians to approach -and kill the reindeer, acquired originally by the necessities of the -chase, should be perpetuated as a religious ceremony to keep up a -habit of actual importance to existence, there are cases to which this -explanation would hardly apply, as, for example, to the African gorilla -dance, which has been so vividly described by a recent eye-witness, -and which, he says, ‘was a religious festival held on the eve of an -enterprise,’ the eve, namely, of a gorilla hunt. An African dancing to -a drum and harp imitated closely all the attitudes and movements of the -gorilla, being joined in the chorus by all the rest present. ‘Now he -would be seated on the ground, his legs apart, his hands resting on his -knees, his head drooping, and in his face the vacant expression of the -brute. Sometimes he folded his arms on his forehead. Suddenly he would -raise his head with prone ears and flaming eyes,’ till in the last act -he represented the gorilla attacked and killed.[90] But, unless gorillas -are ever killed by so clever an imitation of themselves that they really -mistake their African neighbours for their own brothers, the gorilla -dance must, by a phenomenon of thought not without analogy, be a mode -of prayer for obtaining a desired result; the same fetishistic law of -thought prevailing that is traceable in the idea that by pouring water -on a stone you can bring rain on the earth, or that you can injure your -enemy by an injury to his effigy. - -It may be, however, that pantomimic dances were employed originally as a -clearer expression than mere words of the suppliant’s wishes, the acting -of a hunt or battle being equivalent to a petition for favour and success -in the same, and the unseen deities addressed being not unnaturally -conceived as more likely to see the bodily movements than to hear the -feeble voice of the petitioner. The analogy of the various tongues, -prevalent among birds, beasts, and men, might well suggest to a savage -the possibility of the spiritual world being unavoidably deaf to his -utterances from mere inability to comprehend them; whilst dealings with -the nearest tribe might make it natural for him to resort to the use of -signs and symbols as the least mistakable vehicle for his meaning. The -Ahts, retiring to the solitude of the woods, and there standing naked -with outstretched arms before the moon, employ set words and gestures -according to the nature of the object they desire. Thus in praying for -salmon the suppliant rubs the back of his hands, and, looking upwards, -says, ‘Many salmon, many salmon;’ in asking for deer he carefully rubs -both his eyes, for geese the back of his shoulders, for bears his sides -and legs, uttering in a sing-song way the usual formula. The meaning of -all these rubbings is obscure; but it has been suggested that the rubbing -of the hands indicates a wish that the hand may have the requisite -steadiness for throwing the salmon spear; the rubbing of the eyes, a -prayer, that they may be opened to discern deer in the forest.[91] -Among a Californian tribe it was usual, preparatory to the chase, to -resort to a certain stake-inclosure and there to pray to the god’s image -for success, by mimicry of the actions of the hunt, as by leaping and -twanging of the bow.[92] In the Society Islands, if the land had been in -any way defiled by an enemy, a mode of religious purification consisted -in offering pieces of coral, collected expressly, on the altar to the -gods, to induce them ‘to cleanse the land from pollution, that it might -be pure as the coral fresh from the sea.’[93] - -The Voguls, whose most frequent prayers are for success in hunting, are -said to promote their fulfilment by ‘_images in the shape of the beast -more especially sought for, rudely shaped out of wood or stone_.’[94] -But to dance like the animal would naturally serve the purpose as well; -and so the interpretation of some dances as symbolised prayers explains -several American customs which are strikingly analogous to the African -gorilla dance already described. Every Mandan Indian was compelled by -social law to keep his buffalo’s mask, consisting of the skin and horns -of a buffalo’s head, in his lodge, ready to put on and wear in the -buffalo dance, whenever the protracted absence of that animal from the -prairie rendered it expedient to resort to this means for the purpose -of inducing the herds to change the direction of their wanderings and -bend their course towards the Mandan villages. And a principal part in -the annual celebration of the subsidence of the great waters consisted -in the buffalo dance, wherein eight men dressed in entire buffalo skins, -so as to imitate closely the appearance and motions of buffaloes, were -the chief actors, and four old men chanted prayers to the Great Spirit -for the continuation of his favours in sending them good supplies of -buffaloes for the coming year.[95] In this instance the close relation -between dance and prayer, the dance being either supplementary or -explicative, clearly appears; as it also does in a very similar buffalo -dance performed by a neighbouring tribe of the Mandans, the Minnatarees. -In their ceremony six elderly men acted the animals, imitating with -great perfection even the peculiar sound of their voice.[96] Behind them -came a man, who represented the driving of the beasts forward, and who, -at a certain point, placing his hands before his face, sang, and made a -long speech in the nature of a prayer, containing good wishes for the -buffalo hunt and for war, as also an appeal to the heavenly powers to be -propitious to the huntsmen and their arms. So again the Sioux Indians -for several days before starting on a bear hunt would hold a bear dance, -which was regarded as ‘a most important and indispensable form,’ and in -which the whole tribe joined in a song to the Bear Spirit, to conciliate -as well as to consult him. ‘All with the motions of their hands closely -imitated the movements of that animal; some representing its motion in -running, and others the peculiar attitude and hanging of the paws when -it is sitting up on its hind feet and looking out for the approach of an -enemy.’[97] And the same tribe, whenever they had bad luck in hunting, -would institute a dance to invoke the aid of one of their gods.[98] - -To the African gorilla dance, the Mandan buffalo dance, the Sioux -bear dance, may be added the custom of the Koossa Kafirs, who, before -they start on a hunt, perform a wonderful game, which is considered -absolutely necessary to the success of the undertaking.[99] One of them, -representing some kind of game, takes a handful of grass in his mouth -and runs about on all fours; whilst the rest make-believe to transfix -him with their spears, till at last he throws himself on the ground as -if he were killed.[100] On the occasion of a Sioux Indian dreaming of -the fish-eating cormorant, a fish dance was instituted, to ward off any -danger portended, in which the most elaborate imitation of the cormorant -was observed. The medicine-men, dancing up to a fish, affixed to a pole, -began quacking, flapping their arms like wings, biting at the fish, and -pretending to hide a piece in their nests away from the wolves.[101] The -Ahts, again, Sproat observed, spent the eve of a deer hunt ‘in dancing -and singing and in various ceremonies intended to secure good luck on the -morrow.’[102] And in South Australia it is remarkable that, when boys of -a certain age undergo the ceremony of losing their front teeth, power is -conferred on them of killing the kangaroo by a kind of kangaroo dance. -First of all, a kangaroo of grass is deposited at their feet; and then -the actors, the adults of the tribe, having fitted themselves with long -tails of grass, set off ‘as a herd of kangaroos, now jumping along, then -lying down and scratching themselves, as those animals do when basking in -the sun,’ two armed men following them meanwhile, as it were to steal on -them unmolested and spear them.[103] - -The same thought occurs in prayers for rain. Modern Servian peasants, -pouring water over a girl covered with grass and flowers, employ a mode -of petition for rain very similar to that in vogue near Lake Nyanza. -There, after a wild dance, a jar of water is placed before the village -chief: the woman who acts as priestess of the ceremonies washes her -hands, arms, and face with the water; then a large quantity of it is -poured over her, and finally all the women present rush to dip their -calabashes in the jar and to toss the water in the air with loud cries -and wild gesticulations.[104] - -Again, the common savage war dance may be taken to have a religious -significance in addition to its secular motive of sustaining martial -feelings and habits. In the war dance of the Navajoes of New Mexico the -most important part of the war dance was the arrow dance, when a young -virgin, beautifully dressed, represented in gesture ‘the war path.’ An -eye-witness has described it as a really beautiful performance. Slowly -and steadily she would pursue her imaginary foe; suddenly her step would -quicken as she came in sight of the enemy; she would dance faster -and faster, and, seizing an arrow, demonstrate by the rapidity of her -movements that the fight had begun; she would point with the arrow, show -how it wings its course, how the scalp is taken, how the victory is -won.[105] Among the Winnebagoe Indians also it was part of the war dance -for a warrior to go through the pantomime of the discovery of the enemy, -of the ambuscade, the attack, the slaughter, and the scalping.[106] And -in this reference may be noted the curious proceeding of the women of -Accra, on the Guinea Coast, who, whilst the male population were engaged -in war with a neighbouring people, endeavoured every day to bring it to -a happy issue by dancing fetish; that is, by fighting sham battles with -wooden swords, flying to the boats on the beach and pretending to row, -throwing some one into the sea, taking a trowel and making believe to -build a wall—all actions literally symbolical of corresponding ones to -be performed by the men in the course of defeating their enemy.[107] In -Madagascar, too, when the men are absent in war, the custom of the women -to dance, in order to inspire their husbands with courage, has been -thought not to be destitute of a religious meaning. - -That a dance may be in reality a form of prayer, a petition acted -instead of spoken, as more likely so to be understood, makes it possible -that prayers may be hidden under customs which are generally only cited -to illustrate the absurdity of primitive metaphysics. May it not be that -the Indian, when he thinks to ensure a successful chase by drawing a -figure of his game with a line leading to its heart from its mouth, and -by so subjecting its movements to himself, or when he thinks to cure a -man of sickness by shooting the bark-effigy of the animal supposed to -possess him—may it not be that he thereby hopes to influence known or -unknown natural forces in his favour by a clear representation of his -wants? The control of natural phenomena by witchcraft may thus have -been in its origin a direction to natural phenomena, or rather to the -spirits ruling them; an address perhaps to those spirits of the dead -which to a savage are his earliest and for long his only gods; and thus -the absurdities of fetishism might become intelligible as lifeless -prayers, with more or less of their primal meaning, descended from such -a philosophy of nature. The Kamschadal child sent out naked to make the -rain stop, clear as the meaning of the custom is with the prayer joined -to it, would without it appear in the light of ordinary fetishism. So -the Khond, carrying a branch cut from hostile soil to his god of war, -and there, after he has dressed it like one of the enemy, throwing it -down, with certain incantations, on the shrine of the divinity, urges -his petition in a way which even the god of war can scarcely fail to -understand. And the Basuto woman, who in her wish for children, prays -to her tutelary divinity for the accomplishment of her desires by -making dolls of clay and treating them as infants, affords yet another -illustration of the operation of the same law of thought.[108] - -It remains to show how, in primitive theology, prayer attaches itself as -well to the material as the spiritual world, for it is here especially -that it finds its counterpart in the folk-lore of our own day. As, -however, there is scarcely an object in nature which in a state of -ignorance may not with reason be worshipped, a few illustrations must be -taken for thousands on a subject it were less easy to exhaust than the -patience of the reader. - -‘As for animals having reasoning powers,’ says an exceptionally credible -witness, ‘I have heard Indians talk and reason with a horse the same -as with a person.’[109] Our fairy tales of talking animals would be -commonplace facts to a savage. Hence it can be no matter of surprise to -find that it is a common Indian custom to converse with rattlesnakes, -and to endeavour to propitiate them with presents of tobacco. On one -occasion, the Iowas having begun to build a village, the presence of -a rattlesnake on a neighbouring hill was suddenly announced, when -forthwith started the great snake doctor with tobacco and other presents: -when he had offered these, and had had a long talk with the snake, he -returned to his village, with the satisfactory news that his tribesmen -might now travel in safety, as peace had been made between them and the -snakes.[110] - -But perhaps of all natural objects that have attracted human worship, -and been regarded as a supreme source of human woe or welfare, none can -compare with the moon. For the moon’s changes of aspect being far more -remarkable than any of the sun’s, and more calculated to inspire dread -by the nocturnal darkness they contend with, are held in popular fancy -nearly everywhere to cause, portend, or accord with changes in the lot of -mortals and all things terrestrial. In the Hervey Islands cocoa-nuts are -invariably planted at the full of the moon, the size of the latter being -held symbolical of the future fulness of the fruit;[111] and in South -Africa it is unlucky to begin a journey or any work of importance in the -last quarter of the moon.[112] The moon’s wane makes things on earth wane -too; when it is new or full, it is everywhere the proper season for new -crops to be sown, new households to be formed, new weather to begin. - -The feeling of the Congo Africans, who at the sight of the new moon fall -on their knees or stand and clap their hands, praying that their lives -may be renewed like that of the moon, corresponds exactly with the idea -of English folk-lore that crops are more likely to be plentiful if sown -when the moon is young, or with the idea of German folk-lore that the new -moon is the season for counting money which it is desired may increase. -‘On the first appearance of the new moon, which,’ says Mungo Park, -‘the Kafirs look upon as newly created, the pagan natives, as well as -Mahomedans, say a short prayer,’ seemingly the only adoration they offer -to the Supreme Being;[113] so that the sentiment of the Congo prayer may -be guessed to underlie, consciously or not, the salutations by which the -new moon is greeted generally throughout Africa, from the salutations of -the Hottentots to the prayers of the Makololos, for the success of their -journeys or the destruction of their enemies.[114] - -More difficult to understand than the worship of either animals or the -heavenly bodies is that of such inanimate things as stones, trees, or -rivers. Yet the state of thought is not so far remote from our own but -that we can still listen with pleasure, in stories like ‘Undine,’ to -the voices of the forest or the river. To a savage, however, it is not -only the motion or the sound of natural objects which suggests their -divinity, but the danger that is ever latent in them; and it is rather -to prevent the river from drowning him or the tree from falling on him -than from any perception of their beauty that he makes offerings to -them and pays them homage. Such feelings as that of the Cree Indians, -who believed that a deer, found dead within a few yards of a willow -bush which they worshipped and of which it had eaten, had fallen a -victim to the sin of its sacrilege, are not confined to savage lands nor -times.[115] As savages have been known to apologize to a slain elephant -or bear, assuring it that its death was accidental, so it is said that -in parts of Germany a woodcutter will still (or would recently) beg -the pardon of a fine healthy tree before cutting it down.[116] In our -own midland counties there is a feeling to this day against binding up -elder-wood with other faggots; and in Suffolk it is believed misfortune -will ensue if ever it is burnt. In Germany formerly an elder-tree might -not be cut down entirely; and Grimm was himself an eye-witness of a -peasant praying with bare head and folded hands before venturing to cut -its branches. That trees are still popularly endowed with a conscious -personality is further proved by the custom, not yet extinct, of trying -to secure the future favours of fruit trees by presents and prayers. The -placing of money in a hole dug at the foot of them, the presenting them -with money on New Year’s Day, the shaking under them of the remainder of -the Christmas dinner, the beating of them with rods on Holy Innocents’ -Day—all German methods to incite fruit trees to further fertility—answer -closely to the English custom of apple-howling or wassailing, when at -Christmas or Epiphany the inhabitants of a parish, walking in procession -to the principal orchards, and there singling out the principal tree, -sprinkle it with cider, or place cider-soaked cakes of toast and sugar -in its branches, saluting it at the same time with set words in the form -of a prayer to the trees to be fruitful for the ensuing year, as the -doggerel verses following show plainly enough:— - - Here’s to thee, old apple tree, - Whence thou mayst bud and whence thou mayst blow, - And whence thou mayst bear apples enow, - Hats full, caps full, - Bushel, bushel, sacks full, - And my pocket full too.[117] - -And similar prayers, as lifeless now as the fossil shells on the shore of -some ancient coral sea, lie scattered abundantly in many an English rhyme -and ballad, serving to show how the philosophy of one age passes into the -nonsense of a later one, and how ideas which constituted a religion for -one time may only survive as an amusement for another. - - - - -III. - -_SOME SAVAGE PROVERBS._ - - -The German proverb, ‘Speak, that I may see thee,’ may be applied as -truly to a whole community as to an individual. For proverbs—or, roughly -defining, popular sayings—reflect conspicuously the general character of -a nation, constituting its actual code of social, political, and moral -philosophy. Besides the beauty and wisdom, from which alone many of -them derive an imperishable charm, they serve as a kind of literature -in miniature, in which the inner life of a nation is more clearly -legible than in its more voluminous writings. And in spite of the -general resemblance which seems to pervade the proverbial lore of the -world, arising partly from the direct interchange of thought inseparable -from international commerce of any kind, partly from a uniformity -of experience—such, for example, as has impressed on all people the -wisdom of caution and truth—there are yet well-marked differences in -the proverbs of nations, which as clearly retain the records of their -several histories as do their different laws and customs. Remarkable, -therefore, as is the substantial similarity of proverbial codes, of -which the general characteristic is a high sense of right coupled with -a mournful consciousness of human infirmity, they betray often in the -very expression of the same idea the individuality of their national -birthplace. It is obvious, for instance, that, largely as all modern -nations are indebted to a writer like Æsop for the thoughts they -share in common, each nation severally will owe more of its wisdom to -writers of its own, who, like Shakespeare or Cervantes, have, from -greater familiarity with the manners, been more competent to express -the feelings, of their different countries. But the way in which good -proverbs, like good gold, find acceptance everywhere, and pass readily -into the current coinage of different realms, may be illustrated by the -fact of the existence, in countries so widely remote as Spain, Arabia, -Persia, Afghanistan, and India, of a saying, second to none in all the -essentials of a good proverb, to the effect that ‘when God wills the -destruction of an ant, he supplies it with wings.’[118] - -An instructive instance of the light thrown on national character by -proverbs may be supplied from a comparison of Italian, German, and -Persian teaching on the subject of vindictiveness. In communities -destitute of social organisation, the ‘vendetta,’ or duty of -blood-revenge, probably preceded and led the way to the practice of -legal punishment. Originally it was a kind of lynch-law, supplying -the default of any legal protection of life; and all nations bear -traces in their history of having passed through a stage of growth in -which the sacred duty of vengeance was the germ of any idea of a more -judicial retribution. Confucius made it a duty for a son to slay his -father’s murderer, just as Moses insisted on a strictly retaliatory -penalty for bloodshed. The duty of revenge, which if it is yet extinct -in Corsica survives with so much interest in the play of ‘The Corsican -Brothers,’ to this day, in places like Fiji, still passes from father -to son, and from the son to the nearest relation. The longer survival -of such feelings in Italy, consequent on the different circumstances of -her history, is clearly impressed on the proverbial philosophy of her -people, constituting a remarkable contrast to the sentiments of other -countries. For the Italian, extolling the sweetness of revenge, declares -it a morsel fit for God; and, expressing pity or contempt for the man -who either cannot or will not carry out his revenge, counsels patience -and the waiting of time and place for its successful execution. In a -proverb so terribly expressive that you seem to hear in it the assassin’s -gnashing teeth, he will tell you that ‘revenge, though a hundred years -old, still has its milk teeth,’ a maxim which stands on no higher a level -than the pagan African saying, ‘Hate hath no medicine,’ or than that of -Afghanistan, ‘Speak good words to an enemy very softly, gradually destroy -him root and branch;’ and which may be fitly compared with the Fijian -expression of malice: ‘Let the shell of the oyster perish by reason of -years, and to these add a thousand more, still my hatred shall be hot.’ -How much purer than the Italian is the German teaching, which declares -revenge to be fresh wrong, the conversion of a little right into a great -injustice, and sure in its turn to draw revenge after it; or how far -nobler still is the more positive sentiment of Persia, that to take -revenge for an injury is the sign of a mean spirit; that it is easy to -return evil for evil, but that the manly thing is to return good for it! - -The contrast conveyed in these proverbs is the more striking, in that -Italy might pre-eminently call herself the Catholic, as against Germany -the heretical, or Persia the infidel, land. It has been said that -every tenth proverb in an Italian collection contains a selfish or -cynical maxim; and though the beauty and purity of many Italian sayings -counterbalance the baseness of others—those, for instance, on love being -as refined as those on revenge are barbarous—it may not be uninteresting -to compare generally the proverbs of Italy with those of a land like -Persia where the religious history has been so different. - -The noblest Italian proverb is to the effect that a hundred years cannot -repair a moment’s loss of honour; the basest, perhaps, that bad as it -is to be a knave, it is worse to be known as one. To love a friend with -all his faults; to associate with the good in order to be good; to -work in order to rest; to do right in spite of consequences, and good -irrespectively of persons; to do evil never, whatever the benefit—these -are among the highest lessons of Italian proverb-lore. That among men of -honour a word is a bond, and that conscience is as good as a thousand -witnesses; that the best sermon is a good life, and that the gains of -begging are dearly bought, are maxims of the same upright tendency. -Yet, over against these, are proverbs pervaded by the saddest spirit -of universal mistrust, instilling utter disbelief of any sincerity in -friendship, and even counselling to selfish or downright wicked conduct. -What more melancholy evidence of this than is afforded by the following -common sayings?— - - He who suspects is seldom to blame. - - Trust was a good man, Trust-not a better. - - From those I trust God guard me; from those I mistrust I will - guard myself. - - Who would have many friends let him test but few. - - Tell your secret to your friend, and he will set his foot on - your neck. - -Or, again, what can be thought of such maxims as, that it is expedient -to peel a fig for your friend but a peach for your enemy; that the man -who esteems none but himself is happy as a king; that public money, like -holy water, is the property of all men; or that with art and knavery men -may live through half the year, and with knavery and art through the -other? - -The Persian proverbs seem to breathe a different moral atmosphere from -these, being as generous in character as the Italian are cynical, and -displaying a free spirit of liberality, trust, independence, above all, -of truthfulness, which is unsurpassed in any country of Europe. If in -Italy it is common to say that a man who cannot flatter knows not how -to talk, in Persia the sentiment prevails that to flatter is worse than -to abuse. The Persian, true to the character given of him by Herodotus, -holds boldly, that the man who speaks truth is always at ease; that men -never suffer from speaking the truth; that it behoves them to speak their -minds unreservedly, for that there is no hill in front of the tongue. -Add to this the popular sayings, that the accounts of friends are in the -heart, and that it is better to be in chains with friends than in the -garden with strangers. That it should have become proverbial in Persia, -that a man lowers himself by vexing the poor, and loses all claim to -greatness by finding fault with his inferiors, proves the purity of a -religion which has instilled such thoughts into the ethics of a nation; -nor could any language in Europe produce proverbs characterised by a -higher spirit of morality than is revealed in the following selection:— - - A high name is better than a high house. - - The cure for anger is silence. - - A man must cut out his own garments of reputation. - - Heaven is at the feet of mothers (_i.e._ lies in dutiful - obedience). - - It is better to die of want than to beg. - - The liberal man is the friend of God. - - Practise liberality, but lay no stress on the obligation. - -As another illustration of the way in which a few proverbs may condense -centuries of history, may be instanced the recorded experiences of -mankind touching priests and priestcraft. With no other evidence than -that of proverbs before him, a future historian of Europe might easily -detect a marked difference of feeling on this matter between Protestant -Germany and the Catholic countries of Europe. Not that the latter are -wanting in sayings to the prejudice of the priestly class, but they are -not so numerous as in Germany. The French have two proverbs, marked with -all the wit and boldness of their genius, one charging anyone who values -a clean house not to let into it either a priest or a pigeon; the other -declaring that it is human ignorance alone which causes the pot to boil -for priests. The Spanish experience also is, that it is best neither to -have a good friar for a friend nor a bad one for an enemy, and that -it is well to keep awake in a land thickly tenanted by monks. But the -Germans go much farther than this. In German estimation the priest is a -being who, in company with a woman, may be found at the bottom of all the -mischief that goes on in the world, and is as little likely as a woman -to forgive you an injury. Like the bites of wolves, those of priests are -hard to heal, so that it is best, if you fight with them at all, to beat -them to death. If they are ever hot, it is from eating, not from work; -for they always take care to bless themselves first, nor do they ever pay -any tithes to one another. - -The above comparisons suffice to show how differences of national -character, and even how the operation of different forms of faith, may -reveal themselves in proverbs. Yet such estimates must be formed with -caution, in consideration of the wide possibilities of error which -are inseparable from so inexhaustible a subject. For not only may -the proverb-collector easily attribute to one country alone a saying -which belongs equally to, or may even have originated in, another, -but his canon of selection is somewhat arbitrary and dependent on his -preconceptions of what a proverb really is. ‘To take the ball on the -hop,’ for instance, is as genuine an English proverb as ‘to make hay -whilst the sun shines,’ which contains the same idea; yet whilst the one -might be heard every day, the other might not be heard once a year, so -that it might easily escape notice altogether, or if found be rejected -as obsolete. We can consequently, as in other branches of human study, -only make use, _on trust_, of such data as lie at hand, and, whilst -fully acknowledging the imperfection of the evidence, strive after an -approximation to truth, without hope for its actual attainment. - -If now we extend the limits of our comparison, to take in some proverbs -of the lower races as well as of the higher, we shall find therein a -strong corroboration of the lesson already learnt in any comparison -of the superstitions, myths, and manners of different societies; -namely, that differences of race, colour, and even structure, sink into -insignificance when compared with the intellectual affinities which unite -the families of mankind, and that there is, perhaps, no phase of thought -nor shade of feeling belonging to the higher culture of the world to -which we may not find an antitype or even an equivalent in the lower. If -we take some of the proverbs collected from tribes confessedly low in -civilisation—those, for instance, of West Africa—and compare them with -proverbs still prevalent in Europe, we cannot fail to be struck with the -strong likeness between them, as well as impressed with the idea, that -many actually existent common sayings may have had their birth in days -of the most remote and savage antiquity. The immense number of modern -proverbs, drawn from the observation of the natural, and especially -of the animal, world (a number which must be nearly one out of five), -coupled with the coincidence that the same fact is perhaps the most -striking one in the proverbs collected from West Africa, seems to lend -some support to such a theory. - -As an introductory instance let us take savage and civilised sentiments -about poverty, a belief in the misfortune of which is written clearly in -every language of Europe. Italian experience says that poverty has no -kin, and that poor men do penance for rich men’s sins; in Germany the -poor have to dance as the rich pipe; whilst in Spain and Denmark the evil -is expressed more graphically still, it being a matter of observation -in the one country that the poor man’s crop is destroyed by hail every -year; in the other, that the poor man’s corn always grows thin. And, in -the Oji dialect, spoken by about two millions of people, including the -Ashantees, Fantees, and others, it is also proverbial that the poor man -has no friend, that poverty makes a man a slave, and that hard words are -fit for the poor. And as the Dutch have learnt, that ‘poor folks’ wisdom -goes for little,’ or the Italians, that ‘the words of the poor go many to -the sackful,’ so in Oji exactly the same idea is conveyed in the saying, -that ‘when a poor man makes a proverb it does not spread’; in Yoruba, in -the saying, that ‘poverty destroys a man’s reputation;’ and in Accra in -the still cleverer proverb, that ‘a poor man’s pipe does not sound.’[119] - -The proverbs of savages are moral and immoral, elevated and base, -precisely as are those of more civilised nations. The proverbs of the -Yorubas, justly observes the missionary, Mr. Bowen,[120] ‘are among the -most remarkable of the world;’ and indeed the intellectual powers and -moral ideas displayed in West African proverbs generally ought largely -to modify our conceptions of their originators, and make us sceptical -of that extreme dearth of mental wealth which has so frequently been -declared to attend a low standard of material advancement. Their wit, -terseness, vividness of illustration, and insight into life, are all -alike surprising; and acquaintance with them must suggest caution in -any estimate of the mental capacities of savages whose languages may -have been less investigated and consequently remain less known. ‘It has -always been passing travellers who have drawn the most doleful pictures -of so-called savages, and especially have asserted the poverty of their -language.’[121] It may well prove that better acquaintance with the -languages of tribes, classed at present for various reasons almost -outside the human family, may show them to combine, as Humboldt found -was the case with the once depreciated Carib language, ‘wealth, grace, -strength, and gentleness.’ It was said of the Veddahs once that they were -utterly destitute of either religion or _language_; and the Samojeds were -reported to shriek and chatter like apes. - -The Basutos of South Africa are savages, yet the following proverbs are -current among them:— - - A good name makes one sleep well. - - Stolen goods do not make one grow. - - Famine dwells in the house of the quarrelsome. - - The thief catches himself. - - A lent knife does not come back alone. (_i.e._ a good deed is - never thrown away.)[122] - -Compare, for elevation of mind, these Yoruban proverbs with those already -noticed as current in Italy:— - - He that forgives gains the victory. - - He who injures another injures himself. - - Anger benefits no one. - - We should not treat others with contempt.[123] - -On the other hand, ‘If a great man should wrong you, smile on him,’ -may be compared with the Arabic advice about dangerous friends, ‘If a -serpent love thee, wear him as a necklace;’ or with the Pashto proverb -of the same intention, ‘Though your enemy be a rope of reeds, call him a -serpent.’ - -Here are some more proverbs with whose European equivalents everyone will -be familiar:— - -ON FAULTFINDING. - - If you can pull out, pull out your own grey hairs. (Oji.) - - Before healing others, heal yourself. (Wolof.) - -With which we may compare the Chinese:— - - Sweep the snow from your own doors without troubling about the - frost on your neighbour’s tiles. - -ON THE VALUE OF EXPERIENCE. - - Nobody is twice a fool. (Accra.) - - Nobody is twice ashamed. (Accra.) - - He is a fool whose sheep run away twice. (Oji.) - - He dreads a slowworm who has been bitten by a serpent. (Oji.) - -With which we may compare our own— - - It’s a silly fish that’s caught twice with the same bait. - -Or the German— - - An old fox is not caught twice in the same trap. - -To which both Italy and Holland have exactly similar proverbs. - -ON PERSEVERANCE. - - Perseverance always triumphs. (Basuto.) - - The moon does not grow full in a day. (Oji.) - - Perseverance is everything. - - Who has patience has all things. (Yoruba.) - - By going and coming a bird builds its nest. (Oji.) - -Which latter may be compared with the Dutch proverb— - - By slow degrees a bird builds its nest. - -And all of them with the Chinese— - - A mulberry-leaf becomes satin with time. - -ON THE FORCE OF HABIT. - - The thread follows the needle. - - Its shell follows the snail wherever it goes. (Yoruba.) - - As is the sword so is the scabbard. (Oji.) - -To which again China supplies a good parallel in - - The growth of the mulberry tree follows its early bent. - -ON CAUSATION. - - If nothing touches the palm-leaves they do not rustle. (Oji.) - - Nobody hates another without a cause. (Accra.) - - A feather does not stick without gum. (A Pashto proverb.) - -Again, the Turkish proverb, that curses, like chickens, come home to -roost, or the Italian one that, like processions, they come back to -their starting-point, is well matched by the Yoruba proverb that ‘ashes -fly back in the face of their thrower.’ Or the tendency of travellers -to exaggerate or tell lies, impressed as it has been on all human -experience, is also confirmed by the Oji proverb, that ‘he who travels -alone tells lies.’ And the universal belief in the ultimate exposure -of falsehood conveyed in such proverbs as the Arabian, ‘The liar is -short-lived;’ the Persian, ‘Liars have bad memories;’ or the still -more expressive Italian saying, that ‘the liar is sooner caught than a -cripple,’ finds itself corroborated by the Wolof proverb, that ‘lies, -though many, will be caught by Truth as soon as she rises up.’ Even in -Afghanistan, where it is said that no disgrace attaches to lying _per -se_, and where lying is called an honest man’s wings, while truth can -only be spoken by a strong man or a fool, there is also a proverb with -the moral, that the career of falsehood is short.[124] - -That ‘hope is the pillar of the world,’ that ‘it is the heart which -carries one to hell or heaven,’ or that ‘preparation is better than -after-thought’—all experiences of the Kanuri, a Moslem tribe, who -think it a personal adornment to cut each side of their face in twenty -places—shows that there is no necessary connection between general -savagery and an absence of moral culture. The natives of New Zealand, -with all their barbarity, had in common use a saying which were a -desirable maxim for European diplomacy: ‘When you are on friendly terms, -settle your disputes in a friendly way; when you are at war, redress -your injuries by violence.’[125] Even the Fijians would say that an -unimproved day was not to be counted, and that no food was ever cooked by -gay clothes and frivolity.[126] A good Ashantee proverb warns people not -to speak ill of their benefactors, by forbidding them to call a forest a -shrubbery that has once given them shelter. The proverbs already quoted -from Yoruba teach the same lesson, nor would it be difficult to add many -more, all proving the existence among savages of a morality identical -in its main features with that of the higher group of nations to which -we ourselves belong, interpenetrated as it has been for ages with the -philosophies and religions of the civilised East. - -A similar testimony to the intellectual powers of savages is afforded by -their proverbs, though of course the argument is only a suggestive one -from tribes whose language has been well studied to others not so well -known. That the Soudan negroes are on a higher level of general culture -than many savages of other islands or continents is proved by the fact -that all known Africans are acquainted with the art of smelting iron and -converting it into weapons and utensils; so that they may be said to be -living in the iron age, and thus, materially at least, are more advanced -than the Botocudos of Brazil, who are still in the age of polished stone -implements. From the fact alone that the Yorubas express their contempt -for a stupid man by saying that he cannot count nine times nine, we are -enabled at once to place them above tribes whose powers of numeration -fall short of such readiness. Hence we should not be justified in -expecting to find among Australian or American aborigines proverbs of so -high an intellectual order as abound in Africa, of which the following -may be selected as samples:— - - Were no elephant in the jungle the buffalo would be large; - -or— - - The dust of the buffalo is lost in that of the elephant. - - A crab does not bring forth a bird. - - Two small antelopes beat a big one. - - Two crocodiles do not live in one hole. - - A child can crush a snail, but not a tortoise. - - A razor cannot shave itself. - - You cannot stop the sun by standing before it. - - If you like honey, do not fear the bees. - - When a fish is killed its tail is inserted in its own mouth. - (Said of people who reap the reward of their deeds.) - -The Zulus, speaking of the uncertainty of a result, say, ‘It is not -known what calf the cow will have;’[127] and when the Fantees tell you -to ‘cross the river before you abuse the crocodile,’[128] there is no -difficulty in translating their meaning into English. In all these -proverbs it is obvious how the facts of every-day life have readily -served everywhere as the basis of intellectual advancement, and how -similar lessons have everywhere been drawn from the observation of -similar occurrences. - -Leaving now the analogy between African and European proverb-lore, -which the uniformity of moral experiences and the observation of similar -laws of nature sufficiently account for, let us endeavour to find among -civilised nations any proverbs which, by the figures involved in them -or their likeness to savage maxims, seem to bear a distinct impression -of a barbaric coinage. One French proverb may almost certainly be so -explained. It is, for instance, well known that the lower races very -generally account for eclipses of either sun or moon by supposing them -to be the victims of the fury or voracity of some ill-disposed animal, -whom they try to divert by every horrible noise they can produce, or by -any weapon they have learnt to fashion. A typical instance of this was -the belief of the Chiquitos of South America that the moon was hunted -across the sky by dogs, who tore her in pieces when they caught her, till -driven off by the Indian arrows. It has been suggested that the French -proverb, ‘Dieu garde la lune des loups,’ said in deprecation of a dread -of remote danger, is a survival of a similar rude philosophy of nature -which is still prevalent in the capital of Turkey, and in the days of St. -Augustine was current over Europe.[129] - -Another instructive set of proverbs may be adduced to show how the social -philosophy current in the savage state may survive in contemporary -expressions of modern Europe. In Africa, where, speaking generally, a -man’s wife has no better status in society than that which attaches to -his slave or his ox, and a son has been known to wager his own mother -against a cow, we cannot be astonished at finding in vogue proverbs -strongly depreciatory of the worth of the female sex. Thus a wise Kanuri -is cautioned, that if a woman shall speak to him two words, he shall take -one and leave the other; nor should he give his heart to a woman, if he -would live, for a woman never brings a man into the right way. So, too, -Pashto proverbs say contemptuously, that a woman’s wisdom is under her -heel, and that she is well only in the house or in the grave. The same -feeling is endorsed by the Persians, who declare that both women and -dragons are best out of the world, classing the former with horses and -swords among their by-words of unfaithfulness. - -The literatures of all countries are strongly tinged with sentiments -of the same unjust nature. Even the French say that a man of straw is -worth a woman of gold, though their proverb, ‘Ce que femme veut, Dieu le -veut,’ is as true as it is a witty variation of the well-known democratic -formula. The Italians have made the shrewd observation, that, whilst with -men every mortal sin is venial, with women every venial sin is mortal; -but no language has anything worse than this, that as both a good horse -and a bad horse need the spur, so both a good woman and a bad woman need -the stick. - -It is, however, in Germany that the character of women has suffered most -from the shafts of that other half of the community, which (it might be -complained) has as unfair a monopoly of making proverbs as it has of -making laws. The humorous saying, that there are only two good women in -the world, one of whom is dead and the other not to be found, contains -the key to the common national sentiment. A woman is compared to good -fortune in her partiality for fools, and to wine in her power to make -them. Like a glass, she is in hourly danger; and, like a priest, she -never forgets. Her vengeance is boundless, and her mutability finds its -only parallel in nature in the uncertain skies of April. Her affections -change every moment, like luck at cards, the favour of princes, or the -leaves of a rose; and though you will never find her wanting in words, -there is not a needle-point’s difference betwixt her yea and her nay. -She only keeps silence where she is ignorant, and it is as fruitless to -try to hold a woman at her word as an eel by its tail. Her advice, like -corn sown in summer, may perhaps turn out well once in seven years; but -wherever there is mischief brewing in the world, rest assured that there -is a woman and a priest at the bottom of it. Every daughter of Eve would -rather be beautiful than good, and may be caught as surely by gold as a -hare by dogs or a gentleman by flattery. Even in the house she should -be allowed no power, for where a woman rules the devil is chief servant; -whilst two women in the same house will agree together like two cats over -a mouse or two dogs over a bone. - -Spanish experience on this subject coincides with the Teutonic, but -without the expenditure of nearly so much spleen, and with several -glimpses of a happier experience. What can be worse than this: ‘Beware of -a bad woman, nor put any trust in a good one;’ or sadder than this: ‘What -is marriage, mother? Spinning, childbirth, and crying, daughter’? Yet the -Spanish woman, as hard to know as a melon, as little to be trusted as a -magpie, as fickle as the wind or as fortune, as ready to cry as a dog to -limp, in labour as patient as a mule, is not so destitute as the German -of any redeeming qualities for her failings. The Spaniard is taught to -believe that with a good wife he may bear any adversity, and that he -should believe nothing against her unless absolutely proved. It is also -in remarkable contrast to the experiences of other countries, that in -Spain it should have passed into a proverb, that whilst an unmarried man -advocates a daily beating for a wife, as soon as he marries he takes care -of his own. - -Female talkativeness appears also to be a subject of lament all over the -world, from our own island, where a woman’s tongue proverbially wags like -a lamb’s tail, to the Celestial Empire, where it is likened to a sword, -never suffered by its owner to rust. Regard not a woman’s words, says the -Hindoo; and the African also is warned against trusting his secrets even -to his wife. The Spaniard believes that he has only to tell a woman what -he would wish to have published in the market-place; and all languages -have sayings to the same effect. The Scotch divine who, before the -Session, defended his heresy that women would find no place in heaven, -by the text, ‘There was silence in heaven for about the space of half an -hour,’ only expressed a sentiment of universal currency over the world. - -The proverbs collected from the lower races are still very few, when -compared with the immense mass of those from nations with whose -literature we are more familiar. It is in the nature of things that -missionaries and travellers should have been first struck by, and first -given us information about, matters more directly challenging their -notice than phrases in common use, for a real knowledge of which the most -favourable conditions of a prolonged intimacy are obviously requisite. -The large collection of such proverbs from West Africa alone, revealing -as they do an elevation of feeling and a clearness of intelligence which -other facts of their social life would never have led us to suspect, -point at the possibility of such collections elsewhere largely modifying -our present views concerning other savage tribes. They at least should -teach us caution against accepting the conclusions which some writers -have drawn from their study of savage languages, when, from the absence -or loss in a dialect of such words as ‘love’ or ‘gratitude,’ they -proceed to explain, on the hypothesis of degradation, that rude state -of existence which is denoted by the word ‘savage,’ and which there -are abundant reasons for supposing was really the primitive germ, out -of which all subsequent civilisation has been unfolded. ‘Were,’ says -Archbishop Trench, ‘the savage the primitive man, we should then find -savage tribes furnished, scantily enough it might be, with the elements -of speech, yet, at the same time, with its fruitful beginnings, its -vigorous and healthful germs. But what does their language on close -inspection prove? In every case what they are themselves, the remnant -and ruin of a better and a nobler past. Fearful indeed is the impress of -degradation which is stamped on the language of the savage—more fearful, -perhaps, even than that which is stamped upon his form.’[130] Yet, -whatever may be the case with some tribes, who may be shown historically -to have fallen from a higher state (and such are the exceptions), at -least the languages spoken in Africa bear no such ‘fearful impress of -degradation’ as are declared to be traceable _in every case_, if we may -judge of a language by the thoughts which it expresses rather than by the -words which it contains. - - - - -IV. - -_SAVAGE MORAL PHILOSOPHY._ - - -Lucretius, in his retrospect of prehistoric times, imagines primeval man -as unpossessed of any moral law, and is at pains to explain how, as men -were once ignorant of the property of either fire to warm or of skins to -cover them, so once there was a time when no moral restraints affected -the relations between man and man.[131] Across the Atlantic we find the -same strain of thought in the myths, common in many different stages of -progress, of those culture heroes who had come long ago to teach men the -arts and virtues of life, and had left their names to be worshipped by a -grateful posterity. The Peruvian legend, that moral law was unknown until -the Sun sent two of his children to raise humanity from their animal -condition, coincides with the modern hypothesis that the morality of the -cave-men resembled very much that of the cave-bear; so that it becomes a -subject worthy of inquiry whether any human communities ever have lived, -or are actually living, with no more idea of moral right and wrong than -is necessary for the social harmony of a wolf-pack or a wasp’s nest; -whether, in short, what to the Roman was a matter of speculation, or to -the American of legend, can fairly become for us one of science. - -The Shoshones of North America, some of whom are said to have built -absolutely no dwellings, but to have lived in caves and among the rocks, -or burrowed like reptiles in the ground; or the Cochinis, who resorted -at night for shelter to caverns and holes in the ground, may be taken as -the best representatives of the ancient cave-dwellers, and the nearest -known approach to communities living in the state presupposed by the -legends of most latitudes.[132] Californians generally are said to have -had ‘no morals, nor any religion worth calling such;’ yet even the -Shoshones knew, like so many other American tribes, how to ratify either -a treaty or a bargain by the ceremony of smoking, and used shell-money -as an instrument of barter. But some moral notions must enter into the -rudest kind of barter, and barter was known to the ancient cave-dwellers -of Périgord, just as it is to the lowest contemporary savage tribes. -Rock crystal and Atlantic shells, found among the remains of men, tigers, -and bears, in the caves of Périgord, could, it is argued, only have got -thither by barter; so that the earliest human beings we have record -of must have possessed at least so much morality as is necessary for -commerce.[133] - -As regards existing savages, evidence as to their moral ideas can only be -sought in incidental allusion to their customs, penalties, beliefs, or -myths, never in chapters expressly devoted to the delineation of their -moral character. Not only do such delineations by different writers -conflict hopelessly with one another, but inconsistencies abound in the -accounts of the same writer, as, for instance, where Cranz describes -Greenlanders as mild and peaceable, and a few pages further on as -‘naturally of a murderous disposition.’ The value of Cranz’ evidence is -marred by the fact that he writes expressly to rebut the Deistic idea of -a natural morality existing by the light of reason and independent of -Revelation; and the evidence of other writers, whenever a long residence -among savages entitles them to speak with any authority at all, is spoilt -by their several temptations to bias. Whether the temptation be to -enliven a book of travel, to inculcate the need and enhance the merit of -missionary labours, or to illustrate the uniformity of moral perceptions -and the universality of certain moral laws, in any case we are exposed -to the error of mistaking for habitual what is really peculiar, and of -misunderstanding the indications of facts which are as often anomalous as -they are illustrative. - -The way, also, in which the love of theory may give rise to unjustifiable -credulity or even to absolute misstatement may be exemplified from the -common story of the Bushman who spoke with absolute unconcern of having -murdered his brother, or of the other Bushman who gave as an instance of -his idea of a good action, stealing some one else’s wife, and of a bad -one, losing in the same way his own. According to the original authority, -the Bushmen who were questioned, to test their intelligence, on a few -moral points, and especially on what they considered good actions and -what bad, belonged to a kraal of extremely poor, half-starved Bushmen, -seemingly ‘the outcasts of the Bushmen race;’ the interpreter, through -whom Burchell made his inquiries, said he could not make them understand -what he said, and to the specific question about good and bad actions -_they made no reply_, the missionary himself adding, as comment, that -‘their not understanding it must have been either pretended stupidity or -a wilful misrepresentation by the interpreter.’ This same interpreter is -suspected by Burchell, in the very same page, of such misrepresentation, -or of actual invention in respect of the story of the murder—a story -which, if true, adds the missionary, would have justified him in saying, -Here are men who know not right from wrong. Yet both these stories have -been quoted to exemplify the state of the moral destitution of the lower -races.[134] - -The fear of incurring the ill-will of his fellow-beings or of those -invisible spirits disposed more or less hostilely towards him and -everywhere surrounding him, must have sufficed, even for prehistoric -man, to have marked out certain acts as less advisable than others, and -so far as wrong. The instinct to repel or revenge personal injuries, and -the instinct to appease the unknown forces of nature, neither of which, -be it assumed, acted less energetically in the past than the present, -must have always contributed to rank certain sets of actions as better to -be avoided. Personal or tribal well-being has probably always supplied -a sufficiently defined moral standard, sufficiently defended by real or -fanciful sanctions. So suggests theory; and in point of fact a savage -tribe is as difficult to find as it is to imagine, without a sense of a -difference in the quality of actions, arising from a difference in their -likely consequences to themselves. - -The fear of revenge from a man’s survivors or from his ghost would at -any time tend to make homicide a prominent act of guilt. The vendetta, -sometimes carried out as much against a homicidal tiger or tree as -against a man, would scarcely ever be not dreaded by a human murderer; -and the associations are obvious and few between homicide as merely an -act to be avenged and a crime to be avoided. Even in instances where -bloodshed seems to have left but an external stain, affecting the hands -not the heart of the murderer, and calling simply for purification -by washing, the presence of a feeling of difference may be detected -between the killing of a man and the killing of a bear. But the dread of -vengeance from a murdered man’s ghost, which is said to have acted as a -check on murder among the Sioux Indians, or the dread of such vengeance -from the tutelary gods of the deceased, which is said to have acted as -a check on cannibalism in Samoa, points to the existence of prudential -restraints which are likely not to have been limited in their operation -to a tribe in America nor to an island in the Pacific. - -But, besides spiritual terrors, secular punishment has a well-defined -place among savages, to check the extreme indulgence of hatred or -passion. It is doubtful whether any savage tribe is so indifferent to -the criminality of murder as to be destitute of customary penal laws to -prevent or punish it. These customs vary from the payment of a slight -compensation, payable either to the dead man’s family or to the tribal -chief, down to actual capital punishment. Among the Northern Californians -a few strings of shell-money compounded for the murder of a man, and -half a man’s price was paid for a woman; banishment from the tribe being -sometimes the penalty, death never.[135] Among the Kutchin tribes human -life was valued at forty beaver skins.[136] Even the Veddahs insist upon -compensation to survivors. The Tunguse Lapps, with whom homicide was a -brave rather than a shameful act, punished nevertheless a murderer with -blows, and compelled him to support the dead man’s relations.[137] In -some cases a slight penance was the only law against homicide. A Yuma -Indian, for instance, who killed a tribesman had perforce to starve for a -month on vegetables and water, bathing frequently during the day; whilst -a Pima who killed an Apache had to fast for sixteen days, living in the -woods, careful meanwhile to keep his eyes from the sight of a blazing -fire and his tongue from conversation.[138] - -The custom, moreover, of extending to a whole family the guilt of an -individual is an additional protection to human life among savages. In -the same way as, till lately, English law avenged itself on the suicide -who had escaped its jurisdiction, by punishing the criminal’s relations, -savage custom satisfies indignation by taking any member of a family as a -substitute for a fugitive criminal. The Thlinkeet Indians, if they cannot -kill the actual murderer, kill one of his tribe or family instead.[139] -‘An Indian,’ says Kane, ‘in taking revenge for the death of a relative, -does not, in all cases, seek the actual offender; as, should the party -be one of his own tribe, any relative will do, however distant.’[140] -Catlin tells the story how, when a great Sioux warrior, the Little Bear, -had been shot by the Dog, the avengers of the former, failing to overtake -the Dog, caught and slew his brother instead, notwithstanding that he was -a man much esteemed by the tribe.[141] If a Californian criminal escaped -to a sacred refuge he was regarded as a coward, in that he diverted to -a relation a punishment he deserved himself.[142] In Samoa not only the -murderer but all his belongings would fly to another village as a city -of refuge, for in Samoan law a plaintiff might seek redress from ‘the -brother, son, or other relative of the guilty party.’[143] In Australia -wide-spread consternation followed the commission of a crime, especially -if the culprit escaped, for the brothers of the criminal held themselves -quite as guilty as he was, and only persons unconnected with the family -believed themselves safe.[144] In the Fiji Islands a warrior once left -his musket in such a position that it went off and killed two persons. -The owner of the musket was condemned to death; but, as he fled away, the -strangulation of his father instead of him perfectly satisfied the ends -of justice.[145] - -The Samoans, as far back as it was possible to trace, had had customary -laws for the prevention of theft, adultery, assault, and murder, and -the penalties for such crimes appeared rather to have grown milder than -severer with time. Not only this, but they had penal customs for such -wrong acts as rude conduct to strangers, pulling down of fences, spoiling -fruit trees, or calling chiefs by opprobrious epithets. It is open to -doubt whether other savage tribes had not equally good safeguards for -preventing at least those greater social offences, whose immorality -furnishes the first principle of even the ethics of civilised communities. - -In Fiji the criminality of actions is said to have varied with the social -rank of the offender, murder by a chief being accounted less heinous -than a petty larceny by a man of low rank. Theft, adultery, witchcraft, -violation of a _tabu_, arson, treason, and disrespect to a chief were -among the few crimes regarded as serious. With regard to murder, we are -told (and the passage is a favourite one for illustrating the extreme -variability of moral sentiment), that to a Fijian shedding of blood was -‘no crime, but a glory,’ and that to be an acknowledged murderer was -‘the object of his restless ambition.’ In a similar strain it has been -said, that in New Zealand intentional murder was either very meritorious -or of no consequence; the latter if the victim were a slave, the former -if he belonged to another tribe. The malicious destruction of a man of -the same tribe was, however, rare, the _lex talionis_ alone applying -to or checking it;[146] and it is probable that this reservation in -favour of native New Zealand should be made for all cases where murder -is spoken of as a trivial matter. Whenever murder is spoken of as no -crime, reference seems generally made to murder outside the tribe, so -that from the circumstances of savage life it resolves itself into an -act of ordinary hostility; or if the reference is to murder within the -tribe, it is to murder sanctioned by necessity, custom, or superstition. -The Carrier Indians, who did not think murders worth confessing when they -confessed other crimes of their lives, yet regarded the _murder of a -fellow-tribesman as something quite senseless_, and the man who committed -such a deed had to absent himself till he could pay the relatives, -since at home he was only safe if a chief lent him the refuge of his -tent or of one of his garments.[147] ‘A murder,’ says Sproat, ‘_if -not perpetrated on one of his own tribe_, or on a particular friend, -is no more to an Indian than the killing of a dog.’ The sutteeism and -parenticide, which missionaries describe as murders, are, from the -savage point of view, rather acts of mercy, being intimately connected -with their ideas of future existence, to which it is neither fair nor -scientific to apply the phraseology and associations of Christian -morality.[148] - -Different tribes have evolved different institutions for the prevention -of wrongs, which supplement to a large extent the absence of fixed legal -remedies. - -In Greenland there was the singing combat, in which anyone aggrieved, -dancing to the beat of a drum and accompanied by his partisans, recited -at a public meeting a satirical poem, telling ludicrous stories of his -adversary, and obliged to listen afterwards to similar abuse of himself, -till, after a long succession of charges and retorts, the assembled -spectators gave the victory to one of the combatants. These combats, -says Cranz, served to remind debtors of the duty of repayment, to brand -falsehood and detraction with infamy, to punish fraud and injustice, -and above all to overwhelm adultery with contempt. The fear of incurring -public disgrace at these combats was, with the fear of retaliation for -injury, the only motive to virtue which the writer allows to the natives -of Greenland. - -In Samoa thieves could be scared from plantations by cocoa-nut leaflets -so plaited as to convey an imprecation; and a man who saw an artificial -sea-pike suspended from a tree would fear, that, if he accomplished his -theft, the next time he went fishing a real sea-pike would dart up and -wound him mortally. Images of a similar nature, conveying imprecations -of disease, death, lightning, or a plague of rats, seem also to have -been effective restraints upon thievish propensities;[149] and in the -Tonga Islands fruits and flowers were tabooed, that is, preserved, -by plaited representations of a lizard or a shark.[150] It is likely -that a similar meaning attached in Africa to certain branches of trees -which, stuck into the ground in a particular manner, with bits of broken -pottery, were enough to prevent the most determined robber from crossing -a threshold.[151] Similar _tabu_ marks were seen on some rocks at Tahiti, -placed there to prevent people fishing or getting shells from the Queen’s -preserves;[152] and it is possible that the origin of all _tabu_ customs -may have lain in the supposed efficacy of symbolical imprecation. - -In New Zealand the institution of _muru_, or the legalized enforcement of -damages by plunder, extended the idea of sinfulness even to involuntary -wrongs or accidental sufferings. Involuntary homicide is said to have -involved more serious consequences than murder of malice prepense; and -if a man’s child fell into the fire, or his canoe was upset and himself -nearly drowned, he was not only cudgelled and robbed, but he would have -deemed it a personal slight not to have been so treated.[153] To escape -from drowning was indeed a common sin in savage life, for was it not to -escape the just wrath of the Water Spirit, and perhaps to turn it upon -some one else? In Kamschatka so heinous was the sin of cheating the Water -Spirit of his prey, by escape from drowning, that no one would receive -such a sinner into his house, speak to him, nor give him food: he became, -in short, socially dead. Fijians who escape shipwreck are supposed to -be saved in order to be eaten, and Williams tells, how on one occasion -fourteen of them who lost their canoe at sea only escaped becoming food -for sharks to become food for their friends on shore. If the Koossa -Kafirs see a person drowning, or indeed in any danger of his life, they -either run away from the spot or pelt the victim with stones as he -dies.[154] So also with death by fire: if an Indian falls into the fire -or is partially burnt, it is believed that the spirits of his ancestors -pushed him into the flames owing to his negligence in supplying them with -food.[155] The custom of an African tribe to expel from their community -anyone bitten by a zebra or an alligator, or even so much as splashed by -the tail of the latter, is evidently related to the same idea.[156] - -Again, however much Catlin’s assertion that self-denial, torture, -and immolation were constant modes among North American Indians for -appealing to the Great Spirit for countenance and forgiveness, may -overstate the truth, it is remarkable that not only penance by fasting -and self-torture, but the practice of confession, should occur in the -lower culture as a mode of moral purification. Confession was common not -only in Mexico and Peru, but among widely remote savage tribes, being -closely connected with the belief in the power of sin to cause, and of -priestcraft to cure, dangerous sickness. The Carrier Indians of North -America thought, that the only chance of recovery from sickness lay in a -disclosure before a priest of every secret crime committed in life, and -that the concealment of a single fact would meet with the punishment of -instantaneous death.[157] The Samoan Islanders believing that all disease -was due to the wrath of some deity, would inquire of the village priest -the cause of sickness, who would sometimes in such cases command the -family to assemble and confess. At this confessional ceremony each member -of the family would confess his crimes, and any judgments he might have -invoked in anger on the family or the invalid himself; long-concealed -crimes being often thus disclosed.[158] In Yucatan, confession, -introduced by Cukulcan, the mythical author of their culture, was much -resorted to, ‘as death and disease were thought to be direct punishments -for sins committed.’ The natives of Cerquin, in Honduras, confessed, not -only in sickness, but in immediate danger of any kind, or to procure -divine blessings on any important occasion. So far did they carry it, -that, if a travelling party met a jaguar or puma, each would commend -himself to the gods, confessing loudly his sins, and imploring pardon; if -the beast still advanced they would cry out, ‘We have committed as many -more sins; do not kill us.’[159] - -But over and above the wrong acts from which restraints lie in the -revenge of individuals, in punishment by the community, or in artificial -restrictions, there is a large class of acts, defended rather by -spiritual than secular sanctions, deriving their sinfulness from pure -misconceptions of things, and constituting for savages by far the larger -part of their field for right and wrong. The consciousness of having -trodden in the footstep of a bear would be as painful to a Kamschadal -as the consciousness of having stolen, the possible consequences of the -former being infinitely more dreadful. Such acts as the experience of -primitive times has thus generalized into acts provocative of unpleasant -expressions of dissatisfaction from the spiritual world, and so far -as sinful, become in the folk-lore of later date acts merely unlucky -or ominous. The feeling to this day prevalent in parts of England and -Germany, that if you transplant parsley you may cause its guardian spirit -to punish you or your relations with death, fairly illustrates how the -wrongful acts of bygone times may even in civilised countries continue to -be guarded by the very same sanction that gave them potency in the days -of savagery. - -Of such regulations in restraint of the natural liberty of savage tribes -let it suffice to give some instances of sinful acts which derive all -their associations of wrong from rude notions concerning the nature of -storms, of ancestors, of names, and of animals. It will be seen that in -some cases such superstitions act as real checks to real wickedness; -though the connection between them seems purely accidental, rather than -the result of any intuitive discrimination of the qualities of actions. - -As English sailors will refrain from whistling at sea, lest they should -provoke a storm, so the Kamschadals account many actions sinful on -account of their storm-breeding qualities. For this reason they will -never cut snow from off their shoes with a knife out of doors, nor go -barefooted outside their huts in winter, nor sharpen an axe or a knife -on a journey. The Fuejian natives brought away by Captain Fitzroy felt -sure that anything wrong said or done caused bad weather, especially the -sin of shooting young ducks. They declared their belief in an omniscient -Big Black Man, who had his living among the woods and mountains, and -influenced the weather according to men’s conduct; in illustration of -which they told a story of a murderer, who ascribed to the anger of -this being a storm of wind and snow which followed his crime.[160] In -Vancouver’s Island there is a mountain, the sin of mentioning which in -passing may cause a storm to overturn the offender’s canoe.[161] - -Prominent among the moral checks of savage life is the fear of the -anger of the dead. Among savages the supposed wishes of their departed -friends, or deified forefathers, operate as real commands, girt with -all the sanction of superstitious terror, and clothing the most fanciful -customs with all the obligatory feelings of morality. A New Zealand -chief, for instance, would expect his dead ancestors to visit him with -disease or other calamity if he let food touch any part of his body, -or if he entered a dwelling where food hung from the ceiling.[162] The -wide prevalence of the feeling that disease and death are due to the -displeasure of the dead, who may return to earth, to reside in some part -of a living person’s body, may be illustrated by the Samoan custom of -taking valuable presents as a last expression of regard to the dying, -or by way of bribing them to forego their incorporeal privilege of -post-mortem revenge.[163] On the Gold Coast also friends make presents -to the dead of gold, brandy, or cloth, to be buried with them; just as -in ancient Mexico all classes of the population would beg of their dead -king to accept their offerings of food, robes, or slaves, which they vied -in giving him, or as the Mayas would place precious gifts or ornaments -near or upon the corpse of a deceased lord of a province. So the Bodos, -presenting food at the graves of their relations, would pray, saying, -‘Take and eat ... we come no more to you, come no more to us.’ - -Proper behaviour with regard to names is one of the most important points -of savage decorum. The confusion, amounting almost to identification, -between a person and his name is one of the most signal proofs of the -power of language over thought. As Catlin’s or Kane’s Indian pictures -were thought to detract from the originals something of their existence, -giving the painter such power over them that whilst living their bodies -would sympathise with every injury done to their pictures, and when dead -would not rest in their graves, so the feeling among savages is strong -that the knowledge of a person’s name gives to another a fatal control -over his destiny. An Indian once asked Kane ‘whether his wish to know -his name proceeded from a desire to steal it;’[164] whilst with the -Abipones it was positively sinful for anyone to pronounce his own name. -Kane could only discover Indians’ names through third parties; and it -is curious that the natives of one of the Fiji Islands will never tell -their names to an inquirer, if there should be anyone else to answer the -question.[165] Hence it is that the highest compliment a savage can pay a -person is to exchange names with him, a custom which Cook found prevalent -at Tahiti and in the Society Islands, and which was also common in North -America.[166] Warriors sometimes take the name of a slain enemy, from -the same motive apparently which, in some instances, is an inducement to -eat their flesh, namely, to appropriate their courage. The Lapps change a -child’s baptismal name, if it falls ill, rebaptizing it at every illness, -as if they thought to deceive the spirit that vexed it by the simple -stratagem of an _alias_;[167] and the Californian Shoshones, in changing -their names after such feats as scalping an enemy, stealing his horses, -or killing a grizzly bear, had, perhaps, some similar idea of avoiding -retaliation. Among the Chinook Indians near relations often changed their -names, lest the spirits of the dead should be drawn back to earth by -often hearing familiar names used. - -With these ideas about names it is easy to understand how especial -reverence would become attached to the names of kings or dead persons -whose power to punish a light use of their appellations might well be -deemed exceptional. On accessions to royalty in the Society Islands all -words resembling the king’s name were changed, and any person bold enough -to continue the use of the superseded terms was put to death, with all -his relations.[168] From a similar state of thought the Abipones invented -new words for all things whose previous names recalled a dead person’s -memory, whilst to mention his name was ‘a nefarious proceeding.’[169] In -Dahome the king’s name must be pronounced with bated breath, and it is -death to utter it in his presence.[170] The degrees of guilt, attached -to the mention of a dead person, arising from a belief in the power of -spoken names to call back their owners, vary in sinfulness from its being -a positive crime, punishable by fine, to a mere rudeness, to be checked -in the young. Among the Northern Californians it was one of the most -strenuous laws that whoever mentioned a dead person’s name should be -liable to a heavy fine, payable to the relatives.[171] The tribe of Ainos -held it a great rudeness to speak of the dead by their names; whilst -young Ahts are instantly checked, if they make an unthinking use of the -name of a chief that has been relinquished in memory of some event of -importance.[172] - -Several causes may have led to animal worship. The tendency to call men -by qualities or peculiarities in them fancifully recalling those of -some animal, and the tendency to apotheosize distinguished ancestors, -thus named after the tiger or the bear, may have led to a confusion of -thought between the animal and the man, till the divine attributes, once -attached to the individual, became transferred to the species of animal -that survived him in constant existence. Or the same fancy, which sees -inspiration in an idiot from his very lack of common reason, may have -attributed peculiar wisdom and looked with peculiar awe on the animal -world, by very reason of its speechlessness. Then, again, the idea that -the bodies of animals may be the depositories of departed human souls may -have led to the worship of certain animals: some Californians for this -reason refraining from the flesh of large game, because it is animated -by the souls of past generations, so that the term ‘eater of venison’ -is one of reproach among them. Or the prohibitions of shamans may have -produced the result in some cases: the Thlinkeet Indians being found, -for this reason, abstinent from whale’s flesh or blubber, whilst both -are commonly eaten by surrounding tribes. But, whatever the original -causes may have been, tribes are found all over the world beset with a -feeling of sinfulness with regard to the injuring, eating, or in any way -offending different species of animals; of which, as no extreme instance, -may be mentioned the Fijian custom of presenting a string of new nuts, -gathered expressly, to a land crab, ‘to prevent the deity leaving with -an impression that he was neglected, and visiting his remiss worshippers -with drought, dearth, or death.’ - -Beyond, however, customs or ideas in prevention of acts prejudicial to -their real or supposed welfare, savage communities appear to have little -idea of any quality in actions rendering them good or bad independently -of consequences. Their prayers, their beliefs, and their mythology, -alike go to prove this. That they will pray for such temporal blessings -as health, food, rain, or victory, but not for such moral gains as the -conquest of passion or a truthful disposition, to some extent justifies -the inference that moral advancement forms no part of their code of -things desirable. Their good and evil spirit or spirits are simply -distinguished, where they are distinguished at all, as the causes -respectively of things agreeable or disagreeable, as taking sides for or -against struggling humanity, so that tribes which pay and sacrifice to -the source of evil, to the neglect of that of good, cannot be said not to -conform to reason. Their mythology, again, owes its very monotony mainly -to the lack of moral interest to relieve and sustain it. As Mr. Grote, -arguing from the mythology to the moral feeling of legendary Greece, -observes, that such a sentiment as a feeling of moral obligation between -man and man was ‘neither operative in the real world nor present to the -imaginations of the poets,’ so it may be said not less emphatically of -extant savage mythology. The Polynesian idea of a god, it has been well -said, is mere _power_ without any reference to goodness. The divine -denizens of Avaiki (the Hades of the Hervey Islands), as they marry, -quarrel, build, and live just like mortals, so they murder, drink, -thieve, and lie quite in accordance with terrestrial precedents.[173] The -unethical nature, however, of savage prayer or mythology is obviously -not incompatible with the practical recognition of certain moral -distinctions; in the same Hervey Islands, for instance, the greatest -possible sin was to kill a fellow-countryman by stealth, instead of in -battle.[174] - -Ideas, again, relating to a future state and the dependence of future -welfare on the mode of life spent on earth, though they would seem to -afford some insight into the moral sentiments of those holding them, in -default of definition of the good or bad conduct so rewarded or punished, -do not really prove much. In the following instances, which offer several -shades of variety, there is scarcely any attempt at moral definition, and -the native belief has, perhaps, been adulterated by Christian influence. -The Good Spirit of the Mandans dwelt in a purgatory of cold and frost, -where he punished those who had offended him, before he would admit them -to that warmer and happier place, where the Bad Spirit dwelt and sought -to seduce the happy occupants.[175] For the Charocs of California were -two roads, one strewn with flowers, and leading the good to the bright -Western land, the other bristling with thorns and briers, and leading -the wicked to a place full of serpents. The souls of Chippewyans drifted -in a stone canoe to an enchanted island in a large lake; if the good -actions of their life predominated they were wafted safely ashore; but -if the bad, the canoe sank beneath their weight, leaving the wretches to -float for ever, in sight of their lost and nearly won felicity. Wicked -Okanagans, again, a Columbian tribe (and by the wicked are here specified -murderers and thieves), went to a place where an evil spirit, in human -form, with equine ears and tail, belaboured them with a stick.[176] The -Fijian belief appears truer to savage thought; for whilst such of their -dead as succeeded in reaching Mbula were happy or not, according as -they had lived so as to please the gods, mortals subjected to special -punishment were persons who had not their ears bored, women who were not -tattooed, and men who had not slain an enemy.[177] - -Taking, however, these instances at their best, there is nothing to show -that the good or bad, rewarded or punished as above described, were -really anything more than those who on earth had fought and hunted with -courage or cowardice. Writers citing such beliefs do not always make -allowance for the difference between the savage and the civilised moral -standard. The code to be observed, says Schoolcraft, in order for the -soul to pass safely the stream which leads to the land of bliss, ‘appears -to be, as drawn from their funeral addresses, fidelity and success as a -hunter in providing for his family, and bravery as a warrior in defending -the rights and honour of his tribe. There is no moral code regulating the -duties and reciprocal intercourse between man and man.’[178] And if the -good American Indians above mentioned were distinguished by any higher -moral attributes than those of mere bravery and activity, it is difficult -to account for the fact that, while Mexican civilisation consigned all -who died natural deaths, good and bad alike, to the dull repose of -Mictlan, reserving for the higher pleasures of futurity those who met -their deaths in war or water, or from lightning, disease, or childbirth, -tribes whose culture stood to that of Mexico as far removed as that of -Polynesia from that of Europe, should have attained to the moral belief -of the influence of earthly conduct reaching beyond the grave.[179] - -The foregoing brief review of some of the real evidence on the subject -would seem to indicate the conclusion that, in matters of morals, savages -are neither so low as they have been painted by most writers nor so -blameless as they have been portrayed by some. Their faults, such as -their vindictiveness, their ingratitude, or their mendacity, might be -predicated as easily of communities the most advanced in the world; -nor, in the face of the great neglect of precision of language in all -narratives of travel, can any evidence of the utter ignorance of right -and wrong among any tribe lay claim to the smallest scientific value. Of -the African Yorubas, whilst one writer asserts that they are not only -covetous and cruel, but ‘wholly deficient in what the civilised man calls -conscience,’ of the same people another says that they have several -words in their language to express honour, and ‘more proverbs against -ingratitude than perhaps any other people.’[180] - -Perhaps no description of savage character is fairer than Mariner’s -of the Tongan Islanders. ‘Their notions,’ he says, ‘in respect to -honour and justice are tolerably well-defined, steady, and universal; -but in point of practice both the chiefs and the people, taking them -generally, are irregular and fickle, being in some respects extremely -honourable and just, and in others the contrary, as a variety of -causes may operate.’[181] But the justice of such remarks is lost in -their vagueness, and their impartial generality would render them of -world-wide rather than of merely local or insular application. - -If, therefore, in consideration of the unsatisfactory nature of the -direct evidence, we resort to the indirect for the materials of our -judgment, we shall perhaps not err widely from the truth if we say that -average savage morality coincides very much with that of any contemporary -remote village of the civilised world, where the fear of retaliation and -disgrace is the chief preventive of great wickedness, and the natural -play of the social affections the main safeguard of good order. The -statement calls for but few limitations, that wherever travellers have -explored, or missionaries taught, they have been able to detect customary -laws regulating the relations of civil life, the orderly transference of -property by exchange or inheritance, no less than the fixed succession -to titles and dignities. They have found not only punishments for the -prevention, but judicial ordeals for the detection, of crimes; nor is -it possible to believe that such penal laws can exist without ideas of -wrongness attaching to the deeds they prohibit. But, besides the secular -absolution involved in legal penalties, they have found not unfrequently -a kind of spiritual purification by means of confession, penances, and -fasting; the practice of such confession alone proving that feelings of -remorse are not foreign to savage races, difficult as it must always be -to discriminate between actual remorse for wickedness and the mere dread -of contingent punishment. The greater social crimes, murder, theft, and -adultery, though not recognized as morally worse than many acts of purely -fanciful badness, are sufficiently prevented by the fear of revenge or -of tribal punishment; and statements concerning indifference to the -immorality of such actions either do not rest on good evidence or apply -to extra-tribal, that is, to hostile relations. It seems, therefore, that -fundamentally the two extremities of civilisation are ethically united; -each having for its standard of morality the idea of its own welfare, -and deriving a sense of moral obligation from a more or less vague dread -of consequences. The fundamental identity of human emotions, of the -operations of the feelings of love, fear, hope, and shame, appear to have -produced, in different stages of culture, very similar moral feelings; -nor is it conceivable that such feelings, howsoever much weaker, were -ever radically different in the most remote antiquity. - - - - -V. - -_SAVAGE POLITICAL LIFE._ - - -From the accounts of travellers respecting the nature of government among -uncivilised tribes it would not be a purely baseless theory to construct -a scale of successive developments, ranging from people entirely -destitute of political cohesion to people characterised by a quite -despotic form of government, and agreeing in the main with the fishing or -hunting and the agricultural stages of human advancement respectively. -The savage idea of monarchy is represented by all the possible gradations -between the most limited and the most absolute kind of government, and -we should naturally look for the best types of the latter among tribes -where geographical limitations or other causes have necessitated a -stationary and agricultural life. We should expect to find the first -germs of recognised leadership among people taught by war and the chase -to appreciate superior strength or skill; and to see such temporary -leaders pass into definite political chiefs, when a more settled mode -of life has given fixedness to ideas of property and made its defence -more desirable. We might infer _à priori_ that as men lived by hunting -or fishing before they drove flocks, and drove flocks before they tilled -the ground, so they lived in families before they lived in hordes, and in -hordes before they lived in larger social aggregates. As representatives -of the lowest stage of society, we might instance the Esquimaux, whom -Cranz found ‘destitute of the very shadow of a civil polity;’ and we -might pass from the hunting populations of America, who only choose -rulers for the temporary purposes of war or the chase, to the despotic -forms of government characteristic of the agricultural communities of -Africa or Polynesia. - -It is not, however, worth insisting on an induction which would be at the -mercy of negative instances drawn from so large a surface as the whole -known globe. To supply only one instance, in which the hunting state -co-exists with a somewhat advanced political system. Most South American -tribes, who practised husbandry in addition to fishing and hunting to -a far greater extent than North American tribes, were found, in point -of social organisation, at a much lower level than the Northern tribes, -it being possible to classify the latter into nations by words supplied -by themselves, whilst in the South there were merely bands, and it was -necessary to invent names for such groups of bands as were allied -together by language.[182] Facts are the test of theories, not theories -of facts; and to insist on fitting facts to a theory is to fall into the -error of the unskilful shoemaker, who transposes the task of fitting -shoes to feet for the easier one of insisting that feet shall fit his -shoes. - -Without, therefore, attempting to elaborate theories about the -development of political ideas from their rudest beginnings to their -expression in mature and complex state-systems, it may not be labour lost -to collect, within readable compass, some estimate of the notions of -sovereignty, the political organisations, the relations of classes, and -the peculiar institutions found among those communities of the earth who -seem the best representatives of primitive manners and the least advanced -from a state of primitive barbarism. - -Statements concerning the total absence of civil government among -savages, like statements concerning their total ignorance of religion, -should be received with the reserve due to all propositions containing -terms of expansive signification. It is noteworthy that it is generally -tribes declared to be destitute of all religious feelings who in the -same sentence or paragraph are described as also destitute of political -ties; the statement that a tribe is entirely destitute of religion -or of any civil polity being, in fact, often only an hyperbolical -expression, intended to convey an extreme idea of their barbarity. -Bushmen, Californians, and Australians have severally been described as -not only not recognizing any gods, but as not recognizing any chiefs; -but subsequent research having proved that Bushmen, at least, possess an -elaborate mythology, worshipping the ethereal bodies, and having their -own distinctive myths concerning the Creation, suspicion is naturally -aroused that all broadly negative assertions of the same sort may be but -the results of insufficient observation.[183] ‘The Caribs,’ says one -writer, ‘had no chiefs; every man obeyed the dictates of his passions -unrestrained by government or laws;’ but according to another they lived -in hordes of from forty to fifty persons, under a patriarchal form of -government, and recognized a common chief whenever they went to war with -their neighbours.[184] - -Undoubtedly, however, in countries where excess of numbers has not driven -communities to improve their condition by raids against their neighbours, -and where, consequently, military skill has attained no importance nor -authority, much looser social bonds may be found than in places where -a sense of property and of its value has arisen. Among people like -the Esquimaux, the Lapps, or the Kamschadals, who live together in -independent families, age is the only title to authority; and if skill in -seal-catching or in weather-lore procure for a Greenlander the deference -of younger members of his race, he has no power to compel any of them -to follow his counsels, and the only moral check to a refractory person -is a possible refusal on the part of his fellows to share the same hut -with him. If, in distant voyages, all the boatmen submit their kajaks to -the guidance of their countryman who is best acquainted with the way, -they are at perfect liberty to separate from him at pleasure. Beyond -this slight tie they have, or had when Cranz wrote, no political union, -no system of taxation or legislation of any kind, albeit they were not -wanting in methods for the enforcement of certain moral duties and the -prevention of certain moral wrongs. Of the Kamschadals, Steller tells us -that they had no chief, but that everyone was allowed to live according -to his pleasure; yet that they chose leaders for their expeditions, -who were without even power to decide private disputes, and that each -_ostrog_, or family settlement, had its ruler (generally the oldest -male), whose power to punish consisted solely in the right of verbal -correction.[185] - -From the condition of the Kamschadals or Esquimaux to the condition of -Eastern Asia or Polynesia, where a king’s name is often so sacred as -to be avoided altogether, as many gradations of civil authority exist -as otherwise mark the difference of their respective civilisations. As -the progress of an individual from infancy to old age is marked at each -stage by a strict equipoise of good and evil, varying only in kind, so -every upward step in the social advancement of mankind seems attended -with some equivalent loss. Individual liberty is greatest where the -social bond is the loosest; and people like the rude hunting tribes of -Brazil, with only their hunting-grounds to defend and only temporary -leaders to obey, undoubtedly enjoy greater freedom than is compatible -with an agricultural life. As soon as tribes become settled and practise -husbandry they are naturally impelled to seek the labour of slaves, -which is a thing undesirable when a scanty subsistence is gained by -the exertions of the chase. And when once the existence of slavery has -established a difference between bondsmen and free, a way is open for all -those artificial divisions of society into ranks and castes which seem in -later times to belong to, nay, to constitute, the natural order of things. - -It is, however, even at lower levels of general culture, often among -tribes who are still in the hunting stage, that we find all traces -disappear of that condition of freedom and equality once fondly imagined -to belong to a ‘state of nature.’ Savages seldom constitute pure -democracies, in the sense either of all being equal or of all being -free. Even where the monarchical power is quite rudimentary well-marked -distinctions serve to sever them into aristocracy and commonalty; for -the natural differences of capacity between men divide them, if less -strongly, not less definitely than slavery. Superiority in courage, -strength, sagacity, or experience, entitles a savage to much the -same privileges that, in more civilised countries, are allotted to -superiority in wealth or lineage. The conditions, however, of savage life -cause merit, and not birth, to be the primary qualification both for -chieftainship and nobility. Where military capacity is the sole basis of -authority it follows that such authority only descends to sons, if they -are as gifted as their parents with military prowess; also, that any -commoner may at any time become a noble if duly qualified for a leader, -and that for the same reason even the female sex is not excluded from a -career of political ambition. Among the Abipones women were often raised -to the dignity of cacique or captainship of a horde; nor is it rare to -find them capable of occupying positions of similar dignity among tribes -who, in other respects, treat their women as little better than beasts -of burthen. The Iroquois women, for instance, on whom devolved all -daily labour, such as planting the corn, cutting and carrying firewood, -bearing all burdens when marching, had their representatives in the -public councils, enjoyed a veto upon declarations of war, and the right -of interposing to bring about a peace.[186] Khond wives filled the -same important post of mediators and peace-makers in the wars between -the tribes of their husbands and their parents; and in Africa, where -the position of women is almost uniformly one of slavery, they are -ambassadors, traders, warriors, sometimes queens, besides tilling the -ground, tending the herds, or working in mines.[187] - -As many savages surround the entrance to their paradise with imaginary -physical difficulties which only the bravest can overcome, so they -frequently make admission to the rank of their nobility dependent on the -performance of certain rites and ceremonies which sufficiently attest -the endurance of the aspirant to social elevation. An Indian tribe on -the Orinoco used to lay such a candidate on a hurdle, place burning -coals beneath, and then cover him with palm-leaves all over, in order -to make the heat more suffocating. Or, they would perhaps anoint him -with honey, and leave him for hours tied to a tree at the mercy of the -insects of those latitudes. The Abiponian plan was, to place a black -bead on a tribeman’s tongue and insist on his staying at home for three -days, abstaining all the while from the ordinary pleasures of food, -drink, and speech. Then on the eve of the day of his inauguration all -the women of the horde would come to his tent, in uncouth attire, and -lament loudly for the ancestors of the man who would fain be a noble. -The next day, after galloping spear in hand on horses decorated with -bells and feathers to the four quarters of the wind, he had to suffer the -priestess of the ceremonies to shave a band on his head, three inches -wide from the forehead backwards. A eulogy by the old woman, recording -his warlike character and noble actions, concluding with a change of name -befitting his change of rank, completed the ceremony of his installation. -In ancient Mexico a candidate for the noble order of the Tecuhtli had -to remain impassive whilst the high priest insulted him, whilst the -assistant priests mocked him as a coward and tore his clothes from his -body, and all this previous to a noviciate which lasted two years, and -ended with four days of severe penance, fastings, and prayers.[188] - -The prevalence, indeed, of equality among savages is one of those -fictions which date from the time when writers drew on their own minds -for a knowledge of anthropology: a fiction due to the same tendency which -created for the Greeks their Elysian Fields, or for the Tongan islanders -their Bolotu, leading them to refer to the distant or the unknown -the actualisation of those longings and ideals which the immediate -surroundings of the world could not gratify. But the truth is, that so -firmly among most savages has the idea become fixed of an essential -difference in the nature of nobles and commons, of governors and -governed, that the demarcations of their mundane economy are transferred -into their speculations about the unseen world, and the inequalities of -this life are often perpetuated in the next. New Zealanders believed -that, whilst all spirits at death went as falling stars to Reinga, or -the lower world, those of chiefs went first of all to heaven, where -their left eye remained as a star.[189] Among the Zulus the snakes into -which departed chiefs turn are easily distinguishable from those which -embody commoner people.[190] As paupers and bondsmen were not admitted -to Valhalla, so the ‘masses’ of the Tongan islanders have neither souls -nor futurity. The Dahomans who call this world their plantation and the -next their home, believe that in the latter ‘the king is a king and the -slave a slave for ever and ever.’[191] In Samoa not only had chiefs a -larger hole than plebeians by which to descend to the under world, but -also a separate habitation, serving as columns to support the temple -of the underground god, and enjoying the best of food and all other -pleasures.[192] Whilst the Thlinkeets burnt most bodies, that they might -be warm in their new home, slaves were buried, as only deserving to -freeze there; and the Ahts, allotting a plenteous and sunny land in the -sky to dead chiefs, relegate persons of low degree to a subterranean -abode, where the houses are poor, the deer small, and the blankets -thin.[193] - -Devices have varied all over the world for marking the innate or acquired -differences between men. The Tibboos of Africa denote difference of -rank by different scars on the face; but distinctions in dress or in -titles have been the usual resort of the civilised and semi-civilised -world alike; and the highest Fijian chiefs, who would style themselves -the ‘subjects of Heaven only,’ were prompted by the same natural vanity -that gave birth among ourselves to the ‘Knights of the Lion and Sun’ -or to the doctrine of the divine right of kings. But the most striking -device in the lower grades of civilisation is the conscious invention -and use of a different form of speech, amounting almost to the use of -a different language, such as was the plan adopted by the Abipones to -mark the difference between noble and plebeian. Persons advanced to the -rank of nobles, or the Hocheri, were not only distinguished from their -fellows by a change of name (men adding the suffix _in_, women _en_, to -their former appellation), but the whole language spoken by the Hocheri -was, by the insertion or addition of syllables, so altered from the -vulgar tongue as to amount to a distinct aristocratic dialect.[194] It is -remarkable how a similar practice prevails in widely remote parts of the -globe. Among Circassians the language for the common people is one, that -for the princes and nobility another; nor may the commonalty, though they -understand it, venture to speak in the secret or court language.[195] ‘As -in the Malayan so in the Fijian language, there exists an aristocratical -dialect,’ and in some places ‘not a member of a chiefs body or the -commonest acts of his life are mentioned in ordinary phraseology, -but are all hyperbolised.’[196] In the Sandwich Islands ‘the chiefs -formed a conventional dialect, or court language, understood only among -themselves. If any of its terms became known by the lower orders they -were immediately discarded and others substituted.’[197] So, too, it is -said that the island Caribs held their war councils in a secret dialect, -known only to the chiefs and elders, into which they were initiated after -attaining distinction in war.[198] Of the Society Islanders, Ellis tells -us that ‘sounds in the language composing the names of the king and queen -could no longer be applied to ordinary significations’—a rule, he adds, -which brought about many changes in the words used for things.[199] -Lastly, in the Tongan islands something of the same kind also prevailed, -for there we find that among the ways of paying special honour to the -Tooitonga, or divine chief, was the employment, in speaking with him, -of words devoted exclusively to his use, as substitutes for words of -ordinary parlance. - -Another method by which savages seek to mark the different grades of -society is to signalise by an excess of demonstration their sorrow for -the departure of persons of rank from among them. The custom of cutting -off finger-joints in token of grief, from its prevalence among the -Blackfeet Indians of North America, the Hottentots of South Africa, -some tribes of Australia, and among the female portion of the Charruas -of South America, may be considered to rank among the remarkable -analogies of world-culture, when we find that a similar custom prevailed -also among the Tongan Islanders whenever the death of a chief or a -superior relation left his survivors comfortless. It is possible that -the idea of propitiating angry gods by self-inflicted pains may have -originally underlain many of the practices in after times regarded as -mere manifestations of grief; for Captain Cook, speaking of the knocking -out of front teeth at funerals, says that he always understood that -this custom, like that of cutting off finger-joints, was not inflicted -from any violence of grief so much as intended for a propitiatory -sacrifice to the Atoa, to avert any possible danger or mischief from the -survivors.[200] Thus Bushmen sacrifice the end joints of their fingers in -sickness; and during the illness of a Tooitonga his countrymen would seek -to appease the god whose anger had caused the disease by the sacrifice -daily of the little finger of a young relation. Mariner mentions two -patriotic young Tonganers contesting with fist and foot the right thus -to testify their regard for the lord of their country. It is easily -conceivable how a practice, begun with the idea of conciliating the cause -of a disease, might be continued for the purpose of conciliating the -cause of death, and thus how (as in Fiji, where on the death of a king -orders were issued that one hundred fingers should be cut off) an archaic -superstition might pass into a meaningless formality. - -There are, however, various other ways of exhibiting regret for departed -nobility. In the Sandwich Islands, if a chief dies, the highest mark -of respect his survivors can show is to strike out one of their front -teeth with a stone. They also tattoo their tongues, deprive themselves -of an ear, or shave their heads in fantastic designs. The latter is -a world-wide symbol of sorrow; more peculiar is the license to rob -and burn houses and commit other enormities, which is, or was once, -customary in Hawaii on the death of a chief. In Tonga and Tahiti it was -customary on such occasions to cut the forehead and breast with sharks’ -teeth. Axes, clubs, knives, stones, or shells were employed freely for -self-mutilation, when Finow, the King of Tonga, died; his disconsolate -subjects seeking to induce him, by the energy of their blows and the -loudness of their prayers, to lay aside those suspicions of their loyalty -which had prompted him to depart from Tonga to Bolotu.[201] - -In modern civilised life such clear distinctions exist no longer, but -there is at least one symbol of nobility which bears distinct traces of -descent from uncivilised conceptions and usages. From the common practice -of making a particular species of animal the totem, or representative, -of a particular person, family, or tribe, arose probably the custom of -distinguishing persons or families by crests, figurative of their patron -animals. Both among the Kolushs, a fishing North American tribe, and -their neighbours, the Haidahs, of Queen Charlotte’s Island, the existence -of an aristocracy of birth is proved from the presence of family crests -among them, derived from figures of certain animals. Sir G. Grey noticed -in Australia that each family adopted some animal or vegetable for its -crest or Kobong,[202] and the hereditary nobility of the rude Thlinkeet -Indians paint or carve the heraldic emblem of their clan on their houses, -boats, robes, shields, or wherever else they can find room for it.[203] -These few instances from the lower culture suffice to explain how animal -figures, supposed to be expressive of the character of gods or warriors, -came to be worn above their helmets; and how in the case of warriors at -least, they gradually passed from their helmets to their shields, till -they became part of armorial bearings, so highly prized and zealously -transmitted from generation to generation. Newton, the author of the -‘Display of Heraldry,’ expresses his belief that the most ancient class -of crests were taken from ferocious animals, which were regarded as -figuratively representing the bearer and his pursuits. Certain it is that -a far larger proportion of crests are derived from the animal world, from -beasts, birds, fishes, reptiles, and even insects, than from any other -sublunary class of things.[204] - -If now we turn to the savage conception of monarchy, we shall find that, -wherever regal authority exists, it is sustained by a more or less strong -belief in the divine origin of kings. The constitutional power of a king -varies with the amount of divinity ascribed to him. As Russians of the -sixteenth century held the will of their Grand Duke to be the will of -God, and whatever he did to be done by the will of God,[205] so now in -Africa the king of Loango is not only honoured as a god, but known by -the same name as the Deity; namely, Samba. His subjects, accrediting him -with power over the elements, pray to him for rain in times of drought. -But as a king’s divine origin means his divine right, or in other words -his despotic power, his subjects only enjoy their lives and property -on the tenure of his will, nor does there seem any moral limitation to -his regal rights, save an obligation to make use of native products and -dresses. The king of Dahomey, also revered as a god, appears to possess -power over his countrymen which is only so far limited, that he cannot -behead princes of the blood royal but must confine his vengeance against -them to strangulation or slavery. Without his leave no caboceer may alter -his house, wear European shoes, or carry an umbrella. Many kings of the -Fiji Islands claimed a divine origin and asserted the rights of deities, -their persons indeed being so religiously revered that even in battle -their inferiors would fear to strike them. In Tahiti, Oro, the chief -god, was called the king’s father, and the same homage that was paid to -the gods and their temples was paid also to the king and his dwellings, -the homage, namely, of stripping to the waist. At his coronation the -king asserted his dominion over the sea, by being rowed in Oro’s sacred -canoe and receiving congratulation from two divine sharks. So that it -was no mere spirit of bombastic adulation that caused the king’s houses -to be identified, in popular parlance, with the Clouds of Heaven, the -lights in them with the Lightning, or his canoe with the Rainbow; and -if his voice was described as the Thunder, it doubtless was due to that -common association of electricity with divinity, such as, for instance, -prompted the savages of Chili to employ the same name for Thunder and for -God. The ceremony of creating a Tahitian king consisted in girding him -with a girdle of red feathers, which, as they were taken from the chief -idols, were thought to be capable of conferring on the monarch the divine -attributes of power and vengeance. That a human sacrifice was essential, -not only at the commencement and completion of the girdle, but often for -every piece successively added to it, confirms the experience of all -ages and countries respecting the tendency of monarchical governments -in barbarous times, a tendency which was never better appreciated than -by the ancient Japanese. For they used to make their prince sit crowned -on his throne for some hours every morning, without suffering him to -move his hands or feet, his head or eyes, or indeed any part of his -body, believing that by this means alone could peace and tranquillity be -preserved; and ‘if unfortunately he turned himself on one side or the -other, or if he looked a good while towards any part of his dominions, it -was apprehended that war, famine, fire, or some other great misfortune -was near at hand to desolate the country.’[206] The Samoans thought also -that some deadly influence radiated from the person of a king which could -only be broken by aspersion with water.[207] - -Inasmuch, however, as government of any kind is impossible without a -subdivision of functions, and a king needs ministers to execute his will, -the limitation of a council is almost inseparable from even the most -absolute monarchy. A perfectly pure despotism exists, therefore, nowhere -save in the definitions of the science of politics. It is, indeed, -difficult to conceive an arbitrary government except as a synonym for -total anarchy. In Loango, where the king nominates and displaces his -officers at pleasure, and is absolute disposer of his subjects’ lives and -liberties, armed resistance is said to be often made against him, and his -power to depend on his wealth and connections. Even a king of Dahomey -said that he would imperil his life if he attempted to put down slavery -and human sacrifices all at once, and it is said that whatever despotic -acts may be witnessed in Africa they are all performed according to the -common law of the land.[208] Among the Ashantees there are four men at -the head of the nobility who exert great influence and serve to balance -the monarchical power.[209] Among the Kaffirs, the chiefs of hordes, -though with power of life and death, are restrained by the councillors -they themselves nominate from attacking ancient usages; and though the -king is despotic, his despotism must not transgress known laws. The right -of desertion also which practically belongs to every member of a horde, -acts as a most effectual moral check upon tyrannical tendencies. Indeed, -throughout Africa, the differentiation of functions of government, or the -division of political labour, is carried to an extent which proves how -little necessary connection there is between high political capacity and -high culture in other respects. In Dahomey, where a man’s life is less -sacred than that of a fox in England, there are two chief ministers in -constant attendance on the king, a third who is commander-in-chief of the -army, and a fourth who superintends the due punishment of crimes. - -The existence, again, of grades of society, clearly marked by differences -of functions and privileges, is itself a proof of a political -organisation which implies limitations to the exercise of sovereignty. -Classes with distinct rights and relations prove the constraint of a -public law which even monarchs must recognise and respect. In Fetu in -Africa, where frequently from four to five hundred slaves are killed -at a king’s funeral to serve him beyond the grave, there is a distinct -class of freemen, with specific rights, sprung from the noble and slave -classes. So, also, wherever the Malay race has settled in the Pacific, -their feudal institutions and classes bear a striking resemblance to -those of mediæval Europe. In the Fiji Islands, such classes are said to -be so clearly defined as to amount almost to a system of caste. They are:— - - 1. The kings and queens. - - 2. Chiefs of large dependent islands or districts. - - 3. Chiefs of towns, and priests. - - 4. Warriors of low birth; chiefs of carpenters and of - turtle-fishers. - - 5. The people. - - 6. The slaves taken in war. - -With which may be compared the Tongan social scale:— - - 1. The Tooitonga and Veachi, chiefs of divine descent. - - 2. The king, or How. - - 3. The Egi, or nobles; all persons in any way related to the - two former classes. - - 4. The priests. - - 5. The Matabooles, attendants on chiefs, managers of - ceremonies, preservers of records, &c. - - 6. The Mooas, or younger sons or brothers of the Matabooles. - - 7. The Tooas, or common people, who practise such arts as are - not dignified enough to pass from father to son, as cookery, - club carving, shaving, or tattooing. - -These ranks are so fixed and unalterable that they form a prominent -feature in the Tongan conception of a future world. Rank, not merit, -constitutes the title of admission to Bolotu. All _noble_ souls arrive -there and enjoy a power similar but inferior to that of the original -deities, being capable, like the latter, of inspiring priests living on -earth. The Matabooles also gain admittance to Bolotu, but are unable to -cause priestly inspirations. The souls of the Tooas dissolve with the -body, as too plebeian to find a place in Paradise. - -In the Sandwich Islands, there were formerly three aristocratic -orders—the first consisting of the king and queen, their relations, and -the chief councillors; the second of the chiefs of dependent districts; -the third of the chiefs of villages and of priests. Servile homage from -all the inferior classes was paid to these three orders, but particularly -to the priests and higher chiefs, their very persons and houses being -accounted sacred, and the sight of them a peremptory signal for -prostration. The people, as in mediæval Europe, were attached to the soil -and transferred with it: but a strong customary law is said nevertheless -to have regulated both the tenure of land and personal security.[210] If -they had no voice in the government, they sometimes took part in public -meetings, nor did the king ever resolve on matters of weight without the -counsel of his principal chiefs. Yet government was more despotic in -the Sandwich than in either the Society or the Fiji Islands. In Tahiti, -public assemblies were held, in which the speakers did not hesitate to -compare the state to a ship, of which the king was only the mast, but the -landed nobility the ropes that kept it upright.[211] - -Many savage tribes have succeeded, by speciously devised forms and -ceremonies, in clothing arbitrary power with a cloak of legality, -inviolably divine. The most remarkable of these devices is the famous -institution of _tabu_, which, by transferring the divinity inherent -in a king or chief to everything that comes in contact with him, early -invested sovereign power with a most facile and elastic weapon of -government. For the principle, that whatever a king touched became sacred -to his use, supplied regal power with a most convenient immunity from -the shackles of ordinary morality. A Fijian king, by giving his dress to -an English sailor, enabled the latter to appropriate whatever food he -chose to envelope with the train of his dress. Whatever house a Tahitian -king or queen enters is vacated by its owners; the field they tread on -becomes theirs; their clothes, their canoes, the very men who carry them, -are invested with a sanctity the violation of which is death, and are -regarded as precisely as holy as objects less, ostensibly associated with -earthly necessities. - -But whether or not the institution of _tabu_ was a clever invention of -kings for increasing their power, its inevitable extension reacted in -time as a limitation to it. This may be illustrated from the Tongan -Islands, where the regal power, owing probably to a long constitutional -struggle between the rival claims to sovereignty of birth and merit, -stood in a most anomalous position. For the king did not belong to -the highest rank of the people, his title depending in part on birth, -but principally on his reputation for personal strength and military -capacity. Tooitonga and Veachi, the direct descendants of the gods who -first visited the island, or (as we may perhaps rationalistically -translate it) the direct descendants of the earliest kings, occupied -a higher status than the actual king, and were honoured with -acknowledgments of their divinity which even the king himself had to pay. -To the posterity of bygone monarchs the actual king stood in the relation -of a peasant to a prince, being expected, like anyone else, to sit down -on the ground when they passed, though they might be his inferiors in -wealth nor possessed of any direct power save over their own families and -attendants. The dignity of the Tooitonga survived not only in his not -being circumcised nor tattooed as other men, and in peculiar ceremonies -attending his marriage or his burial, but in the more substantial -offerings of the firstfruits of the year at stated periodical festivals. -The king used to consult him before undertaking a war or expedition, -though often regardless of the counsel offered; and in reference to the -person of either descendant of the gods the king was subject to tabu, or -even in reference to ordinary chiefs in any way related to them. If he -but touched the body, the dress, or the sleeping mat of a chief nearer -related to Tooitonga and Veachi than himself, he could only exempt -himself from the inconveniences incurred by the violation of tabu by the -dispensation attached to the ceremony of touching, with both his hands, -the feet of such supernatural chief, or of some one his equal in rank. - -In the Society Islands, in consequence of the regal attribute inseparable -from royalty of tabooing whatever ground it traversed, Tahitian kings -became in course of time either entirely restricted to walking in their -own domains, or subjected to the discomfort of a progress on servile -shoulders over whatever district they wished to visit. So that tabu in -both these instances acted as a limitation to the despotism of the king. - -In Tahiti, however, the king’s power was further limited by a custom -which, extending as it did to all the noble classes, was perhaps the most -anomalous institution in the world, whether as regards the theory or the -practice of inherited rank. For the custom compelling a king or a noble -to transfer all his titles and dignity to his firstborn son at the moment -of his birth, whether instituted originally for securing an undisputed -succession to the regency or due to a similar rude confusion of ideas, -such as associates the sanctity of a man’s origin with the sanctity of -all he touches, carried the claims of primogeniture to a degree unknown -either by the Jewish or the English law. ‘Whatever might be the age of -the king, his influence in the state, or the political aspect of affairs -in respect to other tribes, as soon as a son (of noble birth) was born, -the monarch became a subject; the infant son was at once proclaimed -sovereign of the people; the royal name was conferred upon him, and his -father was the first to do him homage by saluting his feet and declaring -him king.’ The national herald, sent round the island with the infant -ruler’s flag, proclaimed his name in every district, and, if it were -acknowledged by the aristocracy, edicts were thenceforth issued in his -name. Not only the homage of his people, but the lands and other sources -of his father’s power, were transferred to the minor child, the father -only continuing to act as regent till his child’s capacity for government -was matured. - -The Fijians also have a peculiar custom, the institution of Vasu, which -serves as a barrier both to regal and aristocratic oppression, and shows -how, even among savages, the caprice of individuals is held in bondage -by the traditions of the elders. Vasu signifies the common-law right of -a nephew to appropriate to his own use anything he chooses belonging to -an uncle or to anyone under his uncle’s power. The king often availed -himself of Vasu for his own benefit, it being customary for a nephew to -surrender as tribute most of the legal extortions which his title of Vasu -might enable him to levy. But the king himself was liable to Vasu; for we -are told that, ‘however high a chief may rank, _however powerful a king -may be_, if he has a nephew he has a master;’ for, except his lands and -his wives, neither chief nor king possessed anything which his nephew -might not appropriate at any moment. If, for instance, the uncle built -a canoe for himself, his nephew had only to come, mount the deck, and -sound his trumpet shell, to announce to all the world a legitimate and -indefeasible transfer of ownership. It is even said that on one occasion -a nephew at war with his uncle actually supplied himself, unresisted, -with ammunition from his enemy’s stores. It is difficult indeed to divine -the origin of so singular an institution, unless perhaps we regard it -as surviving from a time when as in so many parts of the world nephews -and not sons ranked as first in inheritance. In Loango the nephews of a -deceased king become princes, whilst his sons descend to the commonalty; -the throne of Ashantee passes not to a man’s natural heir, but to his -brother’s or sister’s son, and the same rule of descent prevails widely -over the world.[212] - -In two respects especially, savages may be accredited with having secured -a certain stability for their institutions and saved them from some of -the dangers which have been the bane of more civilised countries. It -entitles them to no slight praise that they have generally so adjusted -the relations of the temporal and spiritual powers as to prevent their -clashing, and have taken its sting from taxation by making the day of -taxpaying a day of public rejoicing. In the Tongan Islands (before the -custom was abolished by a revolutionary king) the tax of the annual -payment of firstfruits to the Tooitonga was almost forgotten in the grand -ceremonies with which it was associated, and tributes received from -inferiors by chiefs came as much as possible in the way of presents, -whilst so far away as the Slave Coast, the feast of taxpaying is the -great recurring Saturnalia of the year. In Dahomey income-tax is ‘paid -under a polite disguise,’ each man bringing a present to the king in -proportion to his rank, and at an annual festival.[213] The feast lasts -a whole month; public plays take place every four or five days; singers -chant the king’s praises and the historical traditions of the country; -and the whole concludes with the ever popular African entertainment -of human sacrifice, on an unlimited scale. In Fiji also taxpaying was -associated with all that the people love; the time of its taking place -being ‘a high day, a day for the best attire, the pleasantest looks, and -the kindest words; a day for display.’ The Fijian carried his tribute -with every demonstration of joyful excitement, paying it in with songs -and dances to a king who received it with smiles and who provided a -feast for the happy taxpayers. So among the Kaffirs the presence of the -four royal[214] taxgatherers in the town was the signal for feasting and -amusements, and when payment had been at last demanded by them they were -conducted out of the town, as they had been welcomed into it, by dancers -and musicians.[215] - -In all the lower communities of the globe the priest, as the Shaman who -can invoke rain, who can cause or cure diseases, who can detect the -unknown thief, or read the result of a coming battle, may be revered for -his power as a sorcerer, but he seldom enters into the scheme of the -body politic as an efficient political force. In the Sandwich Islands, -where priestly power was more developed than elsewhere, the priesthood, -though not merely an hereditary body and possessed of much property in -men and lands, but recipients of the same servile homage that was paid -to the highest chiefs, occupied, nevertheless, a subordinate position -to the governing class. As the nation retained a chief priest who had -charge of the national god, so each chief retained his own family priest, -whose function it was to follow him to the battle-field carrying his -war-god and to direct the sacred rites of his house. In New Zealand the -tohunga (or priest) was ‘not significative of a class separated from -the rest by certain distinctions of rank,’ but was an office open to -anyone.[216] In the Tongan Islands, a priest had no respect paid to -him beyond what was due to his family rank, owing to the fact that the -title to the priesthood was dependent on the accident of inspiration by -some god. Whenever a priest invoked the gods (and it was generally on -a person of the lower classes that such inspiration fell), the chiefs, -nay, even the king himself, would sit indiscriminately with the common -people in a circle round him, ‘on account of the sacredness of the -occasion, conceiving that such modest demeanour must be acceptable to -the gods.’[217] Whatever the priest then said was deemed a declaration -of the god, and, in accordance with a confusion of the human voice and -the divine, not unknown elsewhere, the oracle, in speaking, actually -made use of the first person, as though the relation of himself to -the god were not merely one of delegated authority, but of real and -complete identification. Except, however, on such special occasions, a -Tongan priest was distinguished by no particular dress, nor invested -with any official privileges. In Fiji, also, the priests ranked below -the principal chiefs; and the chief priest, though, as in Tahiti, it -was his office to perform the ceremony which introduced the monarch to -regal dignity, seems in nowise to have interfered afterwards with the -sovereignty of his temporal lord. It is remarkable that the power of -priestcraft increases with the increase of civilisation; ultimately -serving to arrest and retard the growth of which it is at once a symptom -and a measure. - -If from the foregoing data, collected from the best accredited missionary -sources, it is permissible to speak in general terms of primitive -political life, it would appear that the social organisation of the lower -races stands at a far higher level than too rapid an inspection would -lead a critic to suspect. Their institutions are such as to presuppose -as much ingenuity in their evolution as sagacity in their preservation. -Their despotism is never so unlimited but that it recognises the -existence of a customary code beside and above it; nor is individual -liberty ever so unchecked as to outweigh the advantages or imperil the -existence of a life in common. In short, the subordination of classes, -the belief in the divine right of kings and in differences ordained -by nature between nobles and populace, the principle of hereditary -government (often so firmly fixed that not even women are excluded from -the highest offices), the prevalence of feudalism with its ever-recurring -wars and revolutions, not only prove an identity of social instinct -which is irrespective of latitude or race, but prove also among the -lower races the existence of a capacity for self-government, which is -disturbing to all preconceptions derived from accounts of their manners -and superstitions in other relations of life. - - - - -VI. - -_SAVAGE PENAL LAWS._ - - -If, interpreting the present by the past, and taking as our standard of -the past contemporary savage life, we endeavour to gain some insight into -the origin of those legal customs and ideas which are so interwoven with -our civilisation, the statements of travellers relating to the judicial -institutions of savage tribes gain considerably in interest and value. -For savage modes of redressing injuries, of assessing punishment, of -discovering truth, reveal not a few striking points of resemblance and -of contrast to the practices prevalent in civilised communities; whilst -they serve at the same time to illustrate the natural laws at work in the -evolution of society. - -The different stages of progress from the lowest social state, where the -redress of wrongs is left to individual force or cunning, to the state -where the wrongs of individuals are regarded and punished as wrongs to -the community at large, may be all observed in the customs of modern -or recent savage tribes. Yet instances where the redress of wrongs -is purely a matter of personal retaliation are not really numerous, -occurring chiefly where the rulership of a tribe is ill-defined and is -an exercise of influence rather than authority, as among the Esquimaux, -the Kamschadals, and some Californian and other American tribes. In -such states of society, though some political sovereignty is vested in -the heads of the different families, they have but little power either -to make commands or to inflict punishments, so that self-help is for -individuals the first rule of existence. But generally this deficiency -in the legal protection of life and property is made up for by a -principle which lies at the root of savage law—the principle, that is, of -collective responsibility, of including in the guilt of an individual all -his blood relations jointly or singly. - -This consideration of crimes as family or tribal rather than as personal -matters, (the duty of satisfying the family or tribe of anyone injured -devolving upon the family or tribe of the wrongdoer,) must have tended in -the earliest times to withdraw attention from the merely personal aspect -of injuries and to direct it to their more social relations. The common -test of likelihood is no bad guide in ethnology; and the difficulty of -conceiving any society of men, even the most savage, living together -absolutely unaffected by, or uninterested in, wrongs done by one of -their members to another, is only equalled by the difficulty of finding -credible records of any such community. Even in Kamschatka, where the -head of an ostrog had only the power to punish verbally, a man caught -stealing was held so infamous, that no one would befriend him, and he had -to live thenceforth alone without help from anybody; whilst, if the habit -seemed inveterate, the thief was bound to a tree, and his arms bound by -a piece of birch-bark to a pole stretched crosswise; the bark was then -ignited, and the man’s hands, thereby branded, marked his character in -future to all who might be interested in knowing it.[218] Even in so rude -a tribe as the Brazilian Topanazes, a murderer of a fellow-tribesman -would be conducted by his relations to those of the deceased, to be by -them forthwith strangled and buried, in satisfaction of their rights; -the two families eating together for several days after the event as -though for the purpose of reconciliation.[219] And several other tribes, -destitute of any chiefs possessing the power or right to judge or punish, -have fixed customs regulating such offences as theft or murder. Thus -the Nootka Indians avenge or compound for punishable acts, though their -chiefs have little or no voice in the matter. Where, as among the Haidahs -of Columbia, crime likewise has no legal punishment, murder being simply -an affair to be settled with the robbed family, we may detect the -beginnings of later legal practices in the occasional agreement among -the leading men to put to death disagreeable members of the tribe, such -as medicine-men, and other great offenders.[220] So that wherever, from -causes of war or otherwise, tribal chieftaincy has become at all fixed -and powerful, we may expect to find the chief or chiefs called upon to -settle disputes between individuals or families; and thus gradually a way -would be found for the addition of judicial functions to the more primary -duties of government. - -From this natural tendency of submitting disputed claims or the measure -of redress to the decision of a single chieftain or of several, the -personal right of retaliation would soon become a tribal one; and though -ignorant of the science of jurisprudence, most savage tribes seem -early to have learnt to treat torts or offences against an individual -as crimes or offences against the community, taking as their standard -of punishment the measure of the wrong done to the individual. The -transfer of sovereignty from smaller units to the tribe is clearly -marked in instances where the chiefs of a tribe try crimes and decide -guilt, but leave the punishment of the offender to the discretion of the -injured persons or family; of which the following are characteristic -illustrations. - -According to Catlin, every Indian tribe he visited had a council-house -in the middle of their village, where the chiefs would assemble, as well -for the investigation of crimes as for public business, giving decisions -after trial concerning capital offences, but leaving the punishment to -the nearest of kin, to be inflicted by him under the penalty of social -disgrace, but free from any control by them as to time, place, or -manner.[221] So also on the Gold Coast, where suits lay at the decision -of the caboceros or chiefs, the original conception of murder appears -clearly, in the practice for the murderer to get generally from the -relations of the deceased some abatement of the pecuniary penalty affixed -by law to his crime; they being the only persons the criminal had to -agree with, and free to take from him as little as they pleased, whilst -the king had no pretence to any share of the fine except what he might -get for his trouble in exacting it.[222] In the Central African kingdom -of Bornou, a convicted murderer was handed over to the discretional -revenge of the murdered man’s family.[223] In Samoa, again, the chief of -a village and the heads of families, forming as they did the judicial as -well as legislative body, might condemn a culprit to sit for hours naked -in the sun, to be hung by his head, to take five bites from a pungent -root, or to play at ball with a prickly sea-urchin, according to the -nature of his offence. But one punishment was especially remarkable, as -showing how the right of punishment originally belonging to the family -may survive in form long after it has in reality passed to a wider -political union. This was the punishment of binding a criminal hand and -foot and carrying him suspended from a prickly pole run through between -his hands and feet, to the family of the village against which he had -transgressed, and there depositing him before them, as if to signify that -he lay at their mercy.[224] And in the villages of Afghanistan, where an -assembly of the elders act as the judges of the people, a show is always -made of delivering up the criminal to the accuser and of giving the -latter the chance of retaliating, though it is perfectly understood that -he must comply with the wishes of the assembly. This instance, therefore, -illustrates the two distinct methods of legal punishment in process of -actual transition from one to the other.[225] - -If then the original standard of punishment was just that amount of -severity which would suffice to prevent individuals from seeking -satisfaction by their private efforts and avenging their own wrongs, -it is intelligible that penal customs should be cruel in proportion to -their primitiveness. It is distinctly stated that in Samoa fines in food -and property gradually superseded more severe penalties. Yet, in the -face of the very varying penalties found in most different conditions of -culture, it is a subject on which it is difficult to lay down any rule. -Sometimes murder alone is a capital crime, sometimes theft, witchcraft, -and adultery as well; sometimes all or some of them are commutable by -fine. Nor does it seem that, wherever an offence is punishable by fine, -the penalty has been mitigated from one originally more severe. In some -cases the chief judges may have found their interest in assessing a more -humane, and to themselves more profitable, forfeit than that of life or -limb; but savages, living in the most primitive conditions, seem to have -been led by their natural reason alone to observe fitting proportions -between crime and retribution. For their punishments, in default -generally of imprisonment or banishment, are not as a rule gratuitously -cruel: though as occasional punishments among the Caffres are mentioned -the application of hot stones to the naked body, or exposure to the -torments of ants;[226] and slavery, so common a punishment in Africa, -far from being essentially cruel, is rather a sign of an amelioration -of manners, of a reasonable willingness to take the useful satisfaction -of a man’s labour in lieu of the useless one of his life. Severity of -the penal code would rather seem to be a concomitant of growth in -civilisation, of stronger and deeper moral feelings, of a sense of the -failure of milder means, than of a really primitive savagery. On the -whole continent of America no savage tribe ever approached the Aztecs in -cruelty of punishment, nor is it among people of a ruder type of culture -that we should ever look to find some form of death the penalty alike -for the lightest as for the gravest crimes, for slander no less than for -adultery, for intoxication as much as for homicide.[227] - -It might naturally be inferred that, because the laws of savages are -unwritten and depend on usage alone for their preservation, therefore -they are entirely uncertain and arbitrary. This, however, is not often -the case. On few points are the statements of travellers less vague than -on the details of native penal customs; a fact which is only compatible -with their being both well known and regularly enforced. What the Abbé -Froyart says of the natives of Loango, may be said of all but the -lowest tribes: ‘There is no one ignorant of the cases which incur the -pain of death, and of those for which the offender becomes the slave -of the person offended.’[228] The laws of the Caffre tribes are said -to be a collection of precedents, of decisions of bygone chiefs and -councils, appealing solely to what has been customary in the past, never -to the abstract merits of the case. There appears, it is said, to be -no uncertainty whatever in their administration, the criminality of -different acts being measured exactly by a fixed number of cattle payable -in atonement. And the customs reported from Ashantee manifest a similar -sense of the value of fixed penalties. An Ashantee is at liberty to kill -his slave, but is punished if he kills his wife or child; only a chief -can sell his wife or put her to death for infidelity; whilst a great -man who kills his equal in rank is generally suffered to die by his own -hands. If a man brings a frivolous accusation against another, he must -give an entertainment to the family and friends of the accused; if he -breaks an Aggry bead in a scuffle, he must pay seven slaves to the owner. -A wife who betrays a secret forfeits her upper lip, an ear if she listens -to a private conversation of her husband.[229] Savage also as is the -kingdom of Dahomey, arbitrary power is so far limited, that no sentence -of death or slavery, adjudged by an assembly of chiefs, can be carried -out without confirmation from the throne; and such a sentence ‘must be -executed in the capital, and notice given of it by the public crier in -the market.’ It is no paradox to say, that human life, even in Dahomey, -enjoys more efficient legal protection at this day than it did in England -in times long subsequent to the signature of Magna Charta. - -The forms of legal procedure manifest often no less regularity than the -laws themselves. In Congo the plaintiff opens his case on his knees -to the judge, who sits under a tree or in a great straw hut built on -purpose, holding a staff of authority in his hand. When he has heard the -plaintiff’s evidence he hears the defendant, then calls the witnesses, -and decides accordingly. The successful suitor pays a sum to the judge’s -box, and stretches himself at full length on the ground to testify -his gratitude.[230] In Loango, the king, acting as judge, has several -assessors to consult in difficult cases, and the suit begins by both -parties making a present to the king, who then proceeds to hear in turn -plaintiff, defendant, and witnesses. In default of witnesses the affair -is deferred, spies being sent to gather ampler information and ground for -judgment from the talk of the people. In the public trials of Ashantee -‘the accused is always heard fully, and is obliged either to commit or -exculpate himself on every point.’ On the Gold Coast a plaintiff would -sometimes defer his suit for thirty years, letting it devolve on his -heirs, if the judges, the caboceros, from interested motives, delayed to -grant him a trial and thus obliged him to wait, in hopes of finding less -impartial or else more amenable judges in the future.[231] - -Several rules of savage jurisprudence betray curiously different notions -of equity from those of more civilised lands. The Abbé Froyart was -shocked that, on the complaint of the missionaries to the King of Loango -of nocturnal disturbances round their dwellings, the king should have -issued an ordinance making the disturbance of the missionaries’ repose a -capital crime. The reason the natives gave him for thus putting slight -offences on an equality with grave ones was, that, in proportion to -the ease of abstinence from anything forbidden, or of the performance -of anything commanded was the inexcusableness of disobedience and the -deserved severity of punishment. Again, impartiality with regard to rank -or wealth, which is now regarded in England as a self-evident principle -of justice, as a primary instinct of equity, is by no means so regarded -by savages; for not only is murder often atoned for according to the -rank of the murderer, as on the Gold Coast or in old Anglo-Saxon law, -on the basis, apparently, of the value to the individual of his loss in -death, but such difference of rank sometimes enters into the estimate of -the due punishment for robbery. Thus the Guinea Coast negroes thought -it reasonable to punish rich persons guilty of robbery more severely -than the poor, because, they said, the rich were not urged to it by -necessity, and could better spare the money-fines laid on them. Caffre -law distinguishes broadly and clearly between injuries to a man’s person -and injuries to his property, accounting the former as offences against -the chief to whom he belongs, and making such chief sole recipient of all -fines, allowing only personal redress where a man’s property has been -damaged. Thus Caffre law divides itself into lines bearing some analogy -to those of our criminal and civil law: such offences as treason, murder, -assault, and witchcraft entering into the criminal code, and constituting -injuries to the actual sufferer’s chief; whilst adultery, slander, and -other forms of theft, enter as it were into the civil law, as injuries -for which there are direct personal remedies.[232] - -The almost universal test among savages of guilt or innocence, where -there is a want or conflict of evidence, is the ordeal. At first sight -it would appear that such a practice presupposes a belief in a personal -supernatural deity—that it is, in fact, as it was in the middle ages, -a judgment of God, an appeal to His decision. If so, a theistic belief -would be of wide extent, for the ordeal is common to very low strata of -culture; but, in consideration of the savage belief in the personality -and consciousness of natural objects or in spirits animating them, it -would seem best to regard the ordeal simply as a direct appeal to the -decision of such objects or spirits themselves, or through such objects -to the decision of dead ancestors, a means for the discovery of truth -that would naturally suggest itself to the shamanic class. For it is -at the peril of his life that a shaman, or priest, asserts a title to -superior power and wisdom; and as his skill is tested in every need or -peril that occurs, he is naturally as often called upon to detect hidden -guilt as to bring rain from the clouds, or drive sickness from the body. -Driven, therefore, to his inventive resources by the demands made upon -him, he thinks out a test which he may really consider just, or which, -by proving fatal to the suspected, may place alike his ingenuity and -the verdict beyond the reach of challenge. Such ordeals not only often -elicit true confessions of guilt by the very terror they inspire, so -that, according to Merolla, it sufficed for the Congo wizards to issue -proclamations for a restitution of stolen property under the threat of -otherwise resorting to their arts of detection, but they are valuable -in themselves to the shamanic class from being easily adapted to the -destruction of an enemy and offering a ready channel for the influx of -wealth. A comparison of some of these tests, which decide guilt not by an -appeal to the fear of falsehood, as an oath does, but by what is really -an appeal to the verdict of chance, will display so strong a family -resemblance, together with so many local peculiarities, as to make the -origin suggested appear not improbable. - -Bosman mentions the following ordeals as customary on the Gold Coast in -offences of a trivial character: - - 1. Stroking a red-hot copper arm-ring over the tongue of the - suspected person. - - 2. Squirting a vegetable juice into his eye. - - 3. Drawing a greased fowl’s feather through his tongue. - - 4. Making him draw cocks’ quills from a clod of earth. - -Innocence was staked on the innocuousness of the two former proceedings, -on the facility of the execution of the two latter. For great crimes the -water ordeal was employed, a certain river being endowed with the quality -of wafting innocent persons across it, how little soever they could swim, -and of only drowning the guilty.[233] - -Livingstone mentions the anxiety of negro women, suspected by their -husbands of having bewitched them, to drink a poisonous infusion prepared -by the shaman, and to submit their lives to the effect of this drink -on their bodies; a judicial method strikingly similar to the test of -bitter waters ordained in the Book of Numbers to decide the guilt of -Jewish wives whom their husbands had reason to suspect of infidelity. The -Barotse tribe, in Africa, who judge of the guilt of an accused person by -the effect of medicine poured down the throat of a dog or cock, manifest -more humanity in their system of detection.[234] - -But perhaps the best collection of African ordeals is that given in the -voyage of the Capuchin Merolla to Congo in 1682. In case of treason a -shaman would present a compound of vegetable juices, serpents’ flesh, -and such things to the delinquent, who would die if he were guilty, but -not otherwise; it being of course open to the administrator to omit at -will the poisonous ingredients. Innocence was further proved, if a man -suffered nothing from a red-hot iron passed over his leg, if he felt -no bad effects from chewing the root of the banana, from eating the -poisoned fruit of a certain palm, from drinking water in which a torch -of bitumen or a red-hot iron had been quenched, or from drawing a stone -out of boiling water. The crime of theft was proved by the ignition or -the non-ignition of a long thread held at either end by the shaman and -the accused, on the application of a red-hot iron to the middle. Among -the Bongo tribe a murder is often traced to its source, by making plastic -representations so closely resembling the victim, that at a feast given -with dances and songs the criminal will generally manifest a desire to -leave the company.[235] - -So great in general is the dread of such ordeals, that they often -actually serve as the most potent instruments for the discovery of -crimes. In the kingdom of Loango was kept a fetich in a large basket -before which all cases of theft and murder were tried; and when any great -man died, a whole town would be compelled to offer themselves for trial -for his murder by kissing and embracing the image, in the fear of falling -down dead if they fancied themselves guilty. In the space of one year -Andrew Battel witnessed the death of many natives in this way. - -In the Tongan Islands the king would call the people together, and, -after washing his hands in a wooden bowl, command everyone to touch it. -From a firm belief that touching the bowl, in case of guilt, would cause -instantaneous death, refusal to touch it amounted to conviction.[236] - -Among the Fijians, distinguished in so many points from other savages -by originality of conception, the ordeal of the scarf was the one of -greatest dread, extorting confession, it is said, as effectually as a -threat of the rack might have done. The chief or judge, having called for -a scarf, would proceed, if the culprit did not confess at the sight of -it, to wave it above his head, till he had caught the man’s soul, bereft -of which the culprit would be sure ultimately to pine away and die.[237] - -Among the ordeals of the Sandwich Islanders was one called the -‘shaking-water.’ The accused persons, sitting round a calabash full -of water, were required in turns to hold their hands above it, that -the priest, by watching the water, might detect, when it trembled, the -presence of guilt. On the Society Islands the ordeal only differed -slightly, the priest reading in the water the reflected image of the -thief, after prayer to the gods to cause his spirit to be present. The -mere report that such a measure had been resorted to often led to timely -restitutions of stolen goods.[238] - -In Sardinia there is, or was, a well, the waters of which were supposed -to blind a person suspected of robbery or lying, if he were guilty; -otherwise to strengthen and improve his sight.[239] - -The above instances, remarkable for their practical efficiency no less -than for their puerile ingenuity, suffice to illustrate the nature of -savage judicial ordeals and the extreme variety displayed in their -invention. The identity of many ordeals among different people, such -as that by fire or water, is probably due to the readiness with which -such tests would suggest themselves to the imagination. ‘He who, holding -fire in his hand,’ said the Indian law, ‘is not burnt, or who, diving -under water, is not soon forced up by it, must be held veracious in his -testimony upon oath;’ and the same was the idea in China and Africa as -well as in Europe. That these ordeals, like others, were originated by -the class of shamans, and were traditionally preserved by them as one of -the sources of their power, derives probability from their close analogy -to the judicial ordeals invented and administered by the priests of early -Europe. The trial by the hallowed morsel, which decided guilt by the -effects of swallowing a piece of hallowed bread or cheese; the trial by -the cross, when both accuser and accused were placed under a cross with -their arms extended, and the wrong adjudged to him who first let his -hands fall; or the trial by the two dice, when innocence was proved if -the first dice taken at hazard bore the sign of the cross—though they -may have been metamorphosed heathen ordeals, seem rather to have been of -pure Christian invention; nor are they distinguished in any point above -corresponding practices on the coast of Guinea, except in this, that they -were called the judgments of God, and implied some belief in a personal -spirit, who could and would control the verdict of chance to prove guilt -or innocence.[240] - -As in Europe after the fifteenth century the oath of canonical purgation -gradually displaced the older system of ordeals, so it would seem that -in savage life too the judicial oath succeeds in order of time the -judicial ordeal. An oath implies a prayer, an invocation of punishment -in case of perjury; and a man’s conscience is evidently more directly -appealed to where his guilt is tested to some extent by his own -confession, than where it is decided by something quite external to -himself. - -The witness in a modern English law court, invoking upon himself divine -wrath if he swear falsely by the book he kisses, preserves with curious -exactitude the judicial oath of savage times and lands. Our English -judicial oath, in use though no longer compulsory, has withstood all -attacks upon it, for the insuperable practical reason that the majority -of men are more afraid of swearing falsely than of speaking falsely, and -that the fewer scruples a man feels about lying, the more he is likely to -feel about perjury. The notion that one is morally worse than the other -is probably due to the imaginary terrors which, associated time out of -mind with perjury, have given it a legal existence apart, and made it, so -to speak, a kind of lying-extraordinary, a crime outside the jurisdiction -of humanity. - -In Samoa, as at Westminster, physical contact with a thing adds vast -weight to the value of a man’s evidence. Turner relates how in turn each -person suspected of a theft was obliged before the chiefs to touch a -sacred drinking-cup, made of cocoa-nut, and to invoke destruction upon -himself if he were the thief. The formula ran: ‘With my hand on this -cup, may the god look upon me and send swift destruction if I took the -thing which has been stolen.’ ‘Before this ordeal the truth was rarely -concealed,’ it being firmly believed that death would ensue, were the cup -touched and a lie told. Or the suspected would first place a handful of -grass on the stone or other representative of the village god, and laying -his hands on it, say, ‘In the presence of our chiefs now assembled, I -lay my hand on the stone; if I stole the thing, may I speedily die,’ -the grass being a symbolical curse of the destruction he invoked on all -his family, of the _grass_ that might grow over their dwellings. The -older ordeal of fixing the guilt upon a person to whom the face of a -spun cocoa-nut pointed when it rested, shows how ordeals may survive in -use after the attainment of judicial oaths and contemporaneously with -them.[241] - -To understand the binding force of oaths among savages it is necessary -to observe how closely connected they are with savage ideas of fetichism -and their belief in witchcraft as a really active natural force. The -hair or food of a man, which a savage burns to rid himself of an enemy, -is no mere symbol of that enemy so much as in some sense that enemy -himself. The physical act of touching the thing invoked has reference to -feelings of casual connection between things, as in Samoa, where a man, -to attest his veracity, would touch his eyes, to indicate a wish that -blindness might strike him if he lied, or would dig a hole in the ground, -to indicate a wish that he might be buried in the event of falsehood. -In Kamschatka, if a thief remained undetected, the elders would summon -all the ostrog together, young and old, and, forming a circle round the -fire, cause certain incantations to be employed. After the incantations -the sinews of the back and feet of a wild sheep were thrown into the fire -with magical words, and the wish expressed that the hands and feet of the -culprit might grow crooked; there being apparently a connection assumed -between the action of the fire on the animal’s sinews and on the limbs -of the man. And in Sweden there are still cunning men who can deprive a -real thief of his eye, by cutting a human figure on the bark of a tree -and driving nails and arrows into the representative feature. But perhaps -the best illustration of this feeling is the practice of the Ostiaks, -who offer their wives, if they suspect them of infidelity, a handful -of bear’s hairs, believing that, if they touch them and are guilty, -they will be bitten by a bear within the space of three days. It would -seem that oaths appeal to the same idea of vicarious or representative -influence, a real but invisible connection being imagined between the -actual thing touched and the calamity invoked in touching it. - -Instances from the oaths of other tribes will manifest the operation of -the same feeling as that which makes grass a symbol of utter ruin in -Samoa, or some bear’s hairs of a bear’s bite among the Ostiaks. - -North Asiatic tribes have in use three kinds of oaths, the first and -least solemn one being for the accused to face the sun with a knife, -pretending to fight against it, and to cry aloud, ‘If I am guilty, -may the sun cause sickness to rage in my body like this knife!’ The -second form of oath is to cry aloud from the tops of certain mountains, -invoking death, loss of children and cattle, or bad luck in hunting, -in the case of guilt being real. But the most solemn oath of all is to -exclaim, in drinking some of the blood of a dog, killed expressly by -the elders and burnt or thrown away, ‘If I die, may I perish, decay, -or burn away like this dog.’[242] Very similar is the oath in Sumatra, -where, a beast having been slain, the swearer says, ‘If I break my -oath, may I be slaughtered as this beast, and swallowed as this heart -I now consume.’[243] The most solemn oath of the Bedouins, that of the -cross-lines, is also characterised by the same belief which appears in -the case of the slain beast affecting with sympathetic decay anyone -guilty of perjury. If a Bedouin cannot convict a man he suspects of theft -it is usual for him to take the suspected before a sheikh or kady, and -there to call upon him to swear any oath he may demand. If the defendant -agrees, he is led to a certain distance from the camp, ‘because the -magical nature of the oath might prove pernicious to the general body -of Arabs were it to take place in their vicinity.’ Then the plaintiff -draws with his sekin, or crooked knife, a large circle in the sand with -many cross-lines inside it, places his right foot inside it, causes the -defendant to do the same, and makes him say after himself, ‘By God, -and in God, and through God, I swear I did not take the thing, nor is -it in my possession.’ To make the oath still more solemn, the accused -often puts also in the circle an ant and a bit of camel’s skin, the one -expressive of a hope that he may never be destitute of camel’s milk, -the other of a hope that he may never lack the winter substance of an -ant.[244] - -Firm, however, as is the savage belief that the consequences of perjury -are death or disease, a belief which shows itself not unfrequently in -actually inferring the fact of perjury from the fact of death, escape -from the obligation of an oath is not unknown among savages. On the -Guinea Coast recourse was had to the common expedient of priestly -absolution, so that when a man took a draught-oath, imprecating death -on himself if he failed in his promise, the priests were sometimes -compelled to take an oath too, to the effect that they would not employ -their absolving powers to release him. In Abyssinia a simpler process -seems to be in vogue; for the king, on one occasion having sworn by a -cross, thus addressed his servants: ‘You see the oath I have taken; I -scrape it clean away from my tongue that made it.’ Thereupon he scraped -his tongue and spat away his oath, thus validly releasing himself from -it.[245] - -It does not appear that savages refine on their motives for punishment, -the sum of their political philosophy in this respect being rather to -inflict penalties that accord with their ideas of retribution deserved -for each case or crime, than to deter other criminals by warning -examples. The statement that New Zealanders beat thieves to death, and -then hung them on a cross on the top of a hill, as a warning example, -conflicts with another account which says that thieves were punished -by banishment.[246] But, subject to the influence of collateral -circumstances, savage penal laws appear to be as fixed, regular, -and well-known, as inflexibly bound by precedent, as often improved -by the intelligence of individual chiefs, as penal laws are in more -advanced societies. The case of an Ashantee king, who, limiting the -number of lives to be sacrificed at his mother’s funeral, resisted all -importunities and appeals to precedent for a greater number, is not -without parallel in reforms of law. Thus we may read of one Caffre chief -who abolished in his tribe the fine payable for the crime of approaching -a chief’s krall with the head covered by a blanket; whilst another chief -made the homicide of a man taken in adultery a capital offence, thus -transferring the punishment for the crime from the individual to the -tribe.[247] - -In legal customs analogous to those of the savage or rather -semi-civilized world, the legal institutions of civilized countries, -their methods of procedure, of extorting truth, of punishing crimes, seem -to have their root and explanation. For this reason the same interest -attaches to the legal institutions of modern savages as attaches to the -laws of the ancient Germanic tribes or to the ordinances of Menu, the -interest, that is, of descent or relationship. The oath, for instance, -of our law courts presupposes in the past, if not in the present, -precisely the same state of thought as the oath customary in Samoa; and -the same virtue inherent in touching and kissing the Bible in England, -or the cross in Russia, leads the Tunguse Lapp to touch and then kiss -the cannon, gun, or sword, by which he swears allegiance to the Russian -crown.[248] The Highlander of olden time, kissing his dirk, to invoke -death by it if he lied, is a similar instance of the survival of the -primitive conception, that physical contact with a thing creates a -spiritual dependence upon it. The ordeal, so lately the judicial test of -witchcraft, still retains a foothold of faith among our country people, -as is proved by the fact that not longer ago than 1863 an octogenarian -died in consequence of having been ‘swum’ as a wizard at Little -Hedingham, in Essex. And, lastly, the English law that no person could -inherit an estate from anyone convicted of treason, or from a suicide, -shows how naturally the savage law of collective responsibility, in -reality so unjust, may survive into times of civilisation, whilst the -ignominy still attached to the blood-relations of a criminal shows with -what difficulty the feeling is eradicated. - - - - -VII. - -_EARLY WEDDING CUSTOMS._ - - -Amid the wonderful uniformity which pervades the thoughts and customs of -the world some strange reversals here and there occur, as where white -is the colour significative of grief, or where to turn one’s back on -a person is a sign of reverence. But perhaps few such reversals are -more curious than the custom of the Garos, in India, who consider any -infringement of the rule that all proposals of marriage must come from -the female side as an insult to the _mahári_ to which the lady belongs, -only to be atoned for by liberal donations of beer and pigs from the -man’s _mahári_ to that of the ‘proposee.’ More curious, however, than -even this is their marriage ceremony; at which, after the bride has been -bathed in the nearest stream, the wedding party proceed to the house of -the bridegroom, ‘_who pretends to be unwilling and runs away, but is -caught_ and subjected to a similar ablution, and _then taken, in spite of -the resistance and counterfeited grief and lamentations of his parents, -to the bride’s house_.’[249] - -An exactly analogous custom as regards the bride’s behaviour at her -wedding is sufficiently well known; and if it has been correctly -interpreted as the survival, in form and symbol, of a system of capturing -wives from a neighbouring tribe, there must have been a time when among -the Garos a husband could only have been obtained in a similar way. The -improbability of this suggests the possibility of some other explanation -underlying the reluctance, feigned or real, with which it is common in -savage life for a girl to enter upon the paths of matrimony, and for the -show of resistance with which her friends oppose her departure with her -husband. - -In many instances this peculiar feature of primitive life appears as -simply the outcome of feelings and affections which are the same, -howsoever different in expression, in savage as in civilised lands. The -conviction that there is an utter absence of anything like love between -children and their parents, or between men and women, in the ruder social -communities, is so strong and has been so often dwelt upon, that in -speculations on this subject there is a tendency and danger of altogether -overlooking the influence of natural affection in the formation of -customs. It is needful, therefore, to preface the present chapter with a -brief reference to the express statements of missionaries and travellers; -for if it can be shown that there is such a thing as affection between -parents and children, the inference is fair that neither would parents -part with their children nor children leave their parents without mutual -regret, when the children are married. - -Of the Fijians, so famous for their cannibalism and their parenticide, -it is declared to be ‘truly touching to see how parents are attached to -their children and children to their parents.’[250] Among the Tongans, -who would sacrifice their children cruelly for the recovery of the sick, -children were ‘taken the utmost care of.’[251] The New Zealanders were -not guiltless of infanticide, yet ‘some of them, and especially the -fathers, seemed fond of their children.’[252] The Papuans of New Guinea -manifested ‘respect for the aged, love for their children, and fidelity -to their wives.’[253] In Africa, Mungo Park says of the Mandingoes: ‘The -maternal affection is everywhere conspicuous among them, and creates -a corresponding return of tenderness in the child.’[254] Among the -Eastern Ethiopians were women who lived a wild life in the woods; yet -the testimony is the same: ‘However barbarous these people be by nature, -they yet are not devoid of feeling for their children; these they rear -with nicest care, and for their provision strive to amass what property -they can.’[255] Yoruba ‘children are much beloved by both parents.’[256] -Love for their children unites the greater number of the Bushmen for -their whole lives.[257] In North America the Thlinkeet Indians ‘treat -their wives and children with much affection and kindness.’[258] Among -the Greenlanders, says Cranz, ‘the bonds of filial and parental love -seem stronger than amongst any other nations.’ Their fondness for -their children is great; parents seldom let them out of their sight, -and mothers often throw themselves in the water to save a child from -drowning. In return ingratitude towards their aged parents is ‘scarcely -ever exemplified among them.’[259] Of the natives of Australia, Sir G. -Grey says that they ‘are always ardently attached to their children,’ and -similar testimony has been borne to the parental affection even of the -Tasmanians.[260] - -But, lest it should be thought that these evidences are drawn from -the higher savagery, let appeal be made to the case of savages who -confessedly belong to the lowest known types of mankind, the Andaman -Islanders, the Veddahs, and the Fuejians. - -In reference to the first it is said that ‘the parents are fond of their -children, and the affection is reciprocal.’[261] The Veddahs are not only -‘kind and constant to their wives,’ but ‘fond of their children;’[262] -whilst Mr. Parker Snow saw among the Fuejians ‘many instances of warm -love and affection for their children;’[263] so that if in the sequel -we find daughters at their marriage displaying a real or simulated -repugnance to their fate, the fact need not appear to us of such extreme -mystery as it otherwise might, nor as one in which natural affection can -play no part. - -A recent Italian writer on the primitive domestic state says that ‘la -passione viva d’amore che suole attribuirsi ai popoli primitivi ... é -una pura illusione.’[264] But happily for the primitive populations, -their lot is far from being really thus unbrightened by love, though -with them, as with the rest of the world, it is a frequent cause of wars -and quarrels, interfering especially with the savage custom of infant -betrothal, and leading to elopements in defeat of parental contracts. -It is peculiar to neither sex. A Tahitian girl, love-stricken, but not -encouraged, led her friends, by her threats of suicide, to persuade the -object of her affections to make her his wife.[265] The Tongans had a -pretty legend of a young chief, who, having fallen in love with a maiden -already betrothed to a superior, saved her, when she was condemned to be -killed with the other relations of a rebel, by hiding her in a cavern he -had found, whence they finally effected their joint escape to Fiji.[266] -New Zealand mythology abounds in love-tales. There is the tale of Hinemoa -and Tutanekai, which begins with stolen glances, and ends in a nocturnal -swim on the part of Hinemoa to the island, whither the music of her -lover guided her. There is the tale also of Takaranji and Raumahora—of -Takaranji, who, though besieging her father in his fortress, consented -to present both of them with water in their distress. ‘And Takaranji -gazed eagerly at the young girl, and she too looked eagerly at Takaranji -... and as the warriors of the army of Takaranji looked on, lo, he had -climbed up and was sitting at the young maiden’s side; and they said -among themselves, “O comrades, our lord Takaranji loves war, but one -would think he likes Raumahora almost as well.’”[267] - -Nor would it be fair to argue, because in most savage tribes the hard -work of life devolves upon the women, that therefore there is an -entire absence of affection in savage households, whether polygamous -or otherwise, during their continuance. It is scarcely a hundred years -ago that in Caithness ‘the hard work was chiefly done, and the burdens -borne, by the women; and if a cottier lost a horse, it was not unusual -for him to marry a wife as the cheapest substitute.’[268] The Fuejians, -whose condition Captain Weddell felt compelled to describe as that of -the lowest of mankind, and whose women did all the work, gathering the -shellfish, managing the canoes, and building the wigwams, are said to -have shown ‘a good deal of affection for their wives,’ and care for their -offspring.[269] Among the Fijians, who made their women carry all the -heavy loads and do all the field-work, and who remonstrated with the -Tongans for their more humane treatment of them, not only have widows -been known to kill themselves if their relatives refused to do the duty -which custom laid upon them—namely, of killing them at their husbands’ -burial—but ‘even widowers, in the depth of their grief, have frequently -terminated their existence when deprived of a dearly beloved wife.’[270] -In India, Abor husbands treated their wives with a consideration that -appeared ‘singular in so rude a race.’[271] In America the lot of a -woman was generally one of hardship; yet, says Schoolcraft, ‘the gentler -affections have a much more extensive and powerful exercise among the -Indians than is generally believed.’[272] Carib husbands are said to -have had much love for their wives, like as it was to a straw fire, -except with respect to the first wife they married.[273] Of the Thlinkeet -Indians, characterised by great cruelty to prisoners and other marks of -much barbarity, it is said that ‘there are few savage nations in which -the women have greater influence or command greater respect.’[274] ‘It -is one of the fine traits,’ says Schweinfurth of the cannibal Niam-Niam, -‘that they display an affection for their wives which is unparalleled -among natives of so low a grade ... a husband will spare no sacrifice to -redeem an imprisoned wife.’[275] Though against this evidence there is -much of a darker character to be set, the above instances will suffice -to demonstrate the real existence, the real operation, among some of -the rudest representatives of our species, of ordinary feelings of love -and affection. As in geology so in ethnology it holds true, that the -action of known existing causes is sufficient to account for much that is -obscure in the past and for all that is strange in the present. - -Having so far cleared the ground as to be justified in postulating the -existence of ordinary feelings of affection between parents and children, -and between men and women, as _veræ causæ_, or real forces, even in -the lowest known savage life, let us pass to the inference that at no -time are those feelings more likely to be called into play than at a -time when the daughter of a family is about to leave her parents, and -perhaps her clan, to live henceforth with a man whom she may not even -know, or knows only to dislike.[276] In China, where on the wedding-day -the bride is locked up in a sedan-chair, and the key and chair consigned -to the bridegroom, who may not see her before that day, a traveller -once witnessed a separation between the bride and her family. ‘All the -family appeared much affected, particularly the women, who sobbed aloud; -the father shed tears, and the daughter _was with difficulty torn from -the embraces of her parents_ and placed in the sedan-chair.’[277] It -seems more likely in this case that the reluctance and resistance were -real, than that they were merely the symbols, conventionally observed, -of a system of wife-capture. But in many instances it is impossible -to distinguish a real from a feigned grief. A witness of the marriage -ceremonies among the Tartars, who describes the bride and her girl -friends as raising piteous lamentations beforehand, says that the poor -girl either was or appeared to be a most unwilling victim.[278] - -Jenkinson, one of the earliest English travellers in Russia, noticed the -same custom there, but thought it affectation. On the day of marriage -the bride would in nowise consent to leave the house to go to church, -but would resist, strive, and weep, only suffering herself to be led -there by force, with her face covered, to hide her simulated grief, and -making a great noise, as though she were sobbing and weeping, all the way -to the scene of her wedding.[279] But a modern French writer ascribes -some reality to the custom, mentioning that traditional songs are still -sung in which the young bride addresses words of regret and sorrow to -her parents in the midst of her preparations for the nuptial feast.[280] -Before this last ceremony she is accustomed to go the round of her -village, with a woman who calls for the sympathy of her hearers for the -young girl whose carefree existence is about to be exchanged for the -troubles and anxieties of married life.[281] - -Yet, if in China and Russia, much more among uncivilized tribes, would -the life in prospect for a bride, unless perchance her wishes coincided -with her parents’ interest, cause her to leave the home of her youth with -something more than those ‘light regrets’ which cause tears to commingle -with smiles even in England. Greenland girls, says Cranz, do nothing -till they are fourteen but sing, dance, and romp about; but a life of -slavery is in store for them as soon as they are fit for it; ‘while -they remain with their parents they are well off, but from twenty years -of age till death their life is one series of anxieties, wretchedness, -and toil.’[282] Marriage is a fate they would not seek, but cannot -avoid. Should they, however, not oppose it, they must enter upon it with -reluctance, not with alacrity. - -It is worth noticing the reason Cranz gives for this reluctance, because, -in so far as modern savages may be taken to represent primitive life, -it proves the existence, in that condition, of notions, howsoever they -may have arisen, which are exactly analogous to those we connote by -the word ‘modesty.’ When the two old women, commissioned to negotiate -with a girl’s parents on behalf of a young man, first give a hint of -their purpose by praise of him and of his family, ‘the damsel directly -falls into the greatest apparent consternation and runs 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_, though their destined husbands -be previously well assured of their acquiescence.’[283] Not, indeed, -that the reluctance is always feigned, for sometimes the name of her -proposed husband causes her to swoon, to elope to a desert place, or to -effectually free herself from further addresses, by cutting off her hair -in token of grief. Should, however, her parents consent to the match, -the usual course is for the old women to go in search of her, ‘and _drag -her forcibly into the suitor’s house_, where she sits for several days -quite disconsolate, with dishevelled hair, and refuses nourishment. When -friendly exhortations are unavailing she is compelled by force, and even -blows, to receive her husband.’ - -In Greenland, then, as in China, the form of capture resolves itself -either into a most unequivocal reluctance to leave home or to a -reluctance so to do feigned from feelings of bashfulness. Nor about this -bashfulness does it appear that Cranz was in error, for Egede agrees -substantially with him, telling how the bridegroom, when he has obtained -her parents’ and relations’ consent, sends some old women _to carry away -the bride by force_; ‘for though she ever so much approves of the match, -yet _out of modesty she must make as if it went against the grain, and -as if she were much ruffled at it; else she will be blamed and get an -ill name_.’ When brought to his hut, therefore, she sits in a corner -with dishevelled hair, ‘covering her face, being bashful and ashamed.’ -For ‘_a new-married woman is ashamed of having changed her condition -for a married state_;’[284] and this feeling occurs again plainly in -South-Eastern Russia, where, on the eve of marriage, the bride goes round -the village, throwing herself on her knees before the head of each house -and _begging his pardon_.[285] - -This last statement of Egede is most important, since it proves the -existence of feelings which seem really to contain the keynote of the -symbol of capture, however slight the reasons for suspecting their -presence in particular cases. The sentiment prevalent in Greenland has -also been noticed among the Tartars, for an authentic witness writes, -‘that if one tells a Tartar girl that it is said she is about to be -married, she runs immediately out of the room and will never speak to a -stranger on that subject.’[286] It has been justly observed that it is -unlikely feminine delicacy should diminish with civilization. But the -principle _impuris omnia impura_ will meet the difficulty. The Aleutian -Islander, says a Russian writer, ‘knows nothing of what civilized nations -call modesty. He has his own ideas of what is modest and proper, while -we should consider them foolish.’[287] For, addicted though he is to the -worst vices of the Northern nations, he will yet blush to address his -wife or ask her for anything in the presence of strangers, and will be -bashful if he be caught doing anything unusual, as, for instance, buying -or selling directly for himself without the agency of an intermediary. - -Characteristic as it is of savages to express all the feelings they share -with us with an energy intensified a hundredfold, as is shown abundantly -in our different manner of grieving for the dead, it is not surprising -if we find their feelings of the kind in question display themselves -in extraordinary and often ludicrous rules of social intercourse. The -same rule, that an Aleutian husband and wife might not be seen speaking -together, led Kolbe to think that no such thing as affection existed -among the Hottentots. But this was simply for the same reason that -prohibited the Hottentot wife from ever setting foot in her husband’s -apartment in the hut, or the latter from ever entering hers except by -stealth.[288] Among the Yorubas a woman betrothed by her parents is so -far a wife that prematrimonial unfaithfulness is accounted adultery; -‘yet conventional modesty forbids her to speak to her husband, or even -to see him, if it can be avoided.’[289] A minority of the Afghan tribes -are careful to keep up a similar reserve between the time of betrothal -and marriage, so that, as among the warlike Eusofyzes, no man can see -his wife till the completion of the marriage ceremony.[290] Among the -Mongols not only may bride and bridegroom not see each other within -the same period, but the bride is not allowed to see his parents.[291] -In Russia it was once a disgrace for a young man to propose directly -to a lady, and between the day of settling the dowry with her parents -and the day of marriage he was strictly forbidden the house of his -betrothed.[292] But many tribes continue such reserve even after -marriage. A Circassian bridegroom must not see his wife or live with -her without the greatest mystery: ‘this reserve continues during life. -A Circassian will sometimes permit a stranger to see his wife, but he -must not accompany him.’[293] In parts of Fiji which are still unmodified -by Christian teaching it is ‘quite contrary to ideas of delicacy that a -man ever remains under the same roof with his wife or wives at night.’ -If they wish to meet, they must appoint a secret rendezvous.[294] And a -similar law of social decorum prevails, or prevailed, among the Spartans, -Lycians, Turcomans, and some tribes of America,[295] though the processes -of thought which led to such customs lie lost, perhaps hopelessly, behind -the darkness of a thousand ages. - -The custom, again, of deserting a husband and returning home for a longer -or shorter period, as found among the Votyaks of Russia and the Mezeyne -Arabs, may possibly be traced to feelings of the same description, for we -read that among the Hos, ‘after remaining with her husband for three days -only, it is _the correct thing for the wife to run away_ from him and -tell all her friends that she loves him not, and will see him no more;’ -it is also _correct_ for the husband to manifest great anxiety for his -loss, and diligently to seek his wife, and ‘when he finds her _he carries -her off by main force_.’[296] This second show of resistance, customary -also among the Votyaks, seems difficult to explain as a traditional -symbol of a system of capture. - -It is possible that in similar primitive ideas originated the curious -restrictions on the intercourse between a man and his mother-in-law, -or between a woman and her father-in-law. On the theory that these are -remnants of the real anger shown by parents when capture was real, it -is not easy to account for the fact that in Fiji the restriction as -to eating or speaking together existed not only between parents and -children-in-law, or brothers and sisters-in-law, but between brothers -and sisters of the same family, and also between first cousins.[297] In -Suffolk ‘it is (or was) very remarkable that neither father nor mother -of bride or bridegroom come with them to church’ at the weddings of -agricultural labourers; and it is said that at Russian weddings also the -parents are forbidden to be present, though the priest sometimes waives -the prohibition in favour of persons of the higher classes.[298] - -There is, therefore, no _à priori_ inconceivability against the theory -that kicking and screaming at weddings, where they do not arise from -genuine reluctance, are really a tribute to conventional propriety; that, -at the marriages of the uncivilized, just as at their burials, shrieks -and violence take the place of tears, and a vigorous struggle argues -a modest deportment. The evidence of quite independent eye-witnesses -confirms this interpretation. The Thlinkeet Indian, on his wedding-day, -goes to the bride’s house and sits with his back to her door. All her -relations then ‘raise a song, to allure the coy bride out of the corner -where she has been sitting;’ after which she goes to sit by her husband’s -side; but ‘_all this time she must keep her head bowed down_,’ nor is she -allowed to take part in the festivities of the day.[299] - -Atkinson, who was witness of the first visit of a Kirghiz bridegroom -to his wife, declares that the latter could only be persuaded by the -pressure of her female relations to see him at all; ‘after a display -of much coyness she consented, and was led by her friends to his -dwelling.’[300] - -In Kamschatka the original etiquette was for women to cover their faces -with some kind of veil when they went out, and if they met any man on the -road whom they could not avoid, to stand with their backs to him until -he had passed. They would also, if a stranger entered their huts, turn -their face to the wall or else hide behind a curtain of nettles.[301] -Kamschatka, however, being the last place where one would have looked -for such prudery, it is possible that the feelings of the Greenlanders -were also operative in the marriage customs of the Kamschadals. These -were rather extraordinary, the form of capture being anything but a mere -symbol for an aspirant to matrimony. Such an one, having looked for a -bride in some neighbouring village (seldom in his own), would offer his -services to the parent for a fixed term, and after some time would ask -for leave to seize the daughter for his bride. This obtained, he would -seek to find her alone or ill-attended, the marriage being complete -on his tearing from her some of the coats, fish-nets, and straps with -which from the day of proposal she was constantly enveloped. This was -never an easy matter, for she was never left alone a single instant, -her mother and a number of old women accompanying her everywhere, -sleeping with her, and never losing her out of sight upon any pretext -whatever. Any attempt to execute his task entailed upon the suitor -such kicking, hair-pulling, and face-scratching, at the hands of this -female body-guard, that sometimes a year or more would elapse before -he was entitled to call himself a husband; nay, there is record of one -pertinacious bachelor who found himself at the end of seven years, in -consequence of such treatment, not a husband, but a cripple. If he were -disheartened by repeated failures he incurred great disgrace and lost -all claim to the alliance; and if the bride continued obdurate from real -dislike, he was ultimately expelled from the village.[302] But, however -well-disposed towards him she might be, she had always to simulate -refusal as a point of honour, and proof was always required ‘that she was -taken by surprise and made fruitless efforts to defend herself.’[303] - -The Bushmen, again, generally betroth their daughters as children without -consulting them; but should a girl grow up unbetrothed her consent to be -married is as necessary as that of her parents to her lover’s suit, ‘and -on this occasion his attentions are received with an affectation of great -alarm and disinclination on her part.’[304] - -If, then, Greenlanders, Kamschadals, Thlinkeet Indians, and even Bushmen, -carry their notions of propriety to the extent asserted by eye-witnesses, -it is scarcely surprising to find very similar rules of etiquette among -the more advanced Zulus of Africa or Bedouins of Arabia in their wedding -ceremonials; especially when we are told that in some parts Bedouin -women sit down and turn their backs to any man they cannot avoid on the -road, and refuse to take anything from the hands of a stranger.[305] -‘The principal idea of a Kaffir wedding seems to be to show the great -unwillingness of the girl to be transformed into a wife,’ for which -reason a Zulu wife simulates several attempts to escape.[306] Both the -Arabs of Sinai and the Aenezes enact the form of capture to the greatest -perfection; among the latter ‘the bashful girl’ runs from the tent of -one friend to another till she is caught at last, whilst among the -former she acquires permanent repute in proportion to her struggles of -resistance. And if a Sinai Arab marries a bride belonging to a distant -tribe, she is placed on a camel and led to her husband’s camp escorted by -women: during which procession ‘_decency obliges her to cry and sob most -bitterly_.’[307] Also, among the modern Egyptians, ‘if the bridegroom -is young, one of his friends has to _carry him_ part of the way to the -hareem, to _show his bashfulness_.’[308] So that where the carrying of -the bride or bridegroom is not merely due to the same feelings that -caused our own ancestors to add solemnity to their weddings by such -singular sights as blue postilions, it appears in many cases to be -nothing more than a prudish way of saying, that matrimony is and ought to -be an estate forced upon reluctant victims, not entered upon by voluntary -agents. The early Christian Church said the same; but where the saint and -the savage meet in sentiment they differ in expression. - -Were it not for some of the concomitant and incidental signs, the bowed -or veiled head, the dishevelled hair, it might be said that the positive -statements of Cranz, Egede, Burchell, and other writers arose from -malobservation or from pure mistake. This objection, therefore, is of -little avail; and however difficult it may be to account for the presence -of such sentiments among tribes of so rude a type as the Esquimaux, -the Kamschadals, and the Bushmen, the fact remains, that in the cases -above cited the ‘form of capture’ is explicable as having its origin in -primitive conceptions of what is due to delicacy; as being, in fact, the -original expression of them in the language of pantomime so common to -savages.[309] And the presence of such feelings of delicacy may be often -suspected, even where they are not directly mentioned, in the ceremony -of capture; as, for instance, in the African kingdom of Futa, where the -form of capture prevails in the usual way, but where we have the indirect -evidence that for months after marriage the bride never stirs abroad -without a veil, and that Futa wives are ‘so bashful that they never -permit their husbands to see them unveiled for three years after their -marriage.’[310] - -There is, however, no reason to press this explanation too far, nor -to account it the only efficient cause. Quite as potent, and perhaps -a more natural one, is dislike and disinclination on the part of the -bride, which compels the bridegroom to resort to force. The conditions -of savage life are a sufficient explanation of this, irrespective of any -old custom of capturing wives out of a tribe by reason of a prejudice -against marrying within it. A man proposes personally or mediately to -the parents or relations of the woman he fancies for a wife; if they -consent to accept him as a son-in-law and they agree as to a price, there -is a reserved stipulation on the part of the vendor: ‘_If you can get -her._’ In Tartary, in the thirteenth century, after such a bargain, the -daughter would flee to one of her kinsfolk to hide; the father would say -to the husband, ‘My daughter is yours; take her wheresoever you can find -her.’ The suitor, seeking with his friends till he found her, would then -take her by force and carry her home.[311] Here the girl’s reluctance is -not so much feigned as overridden, and is only so far formal in that it -is entirely disregarded. Often it is no mere ceremony on her part, but a -natural and genuine protest—a protest against being treated as a chattel, -not as an individual—but a protest which, opposed as it is to parental -persuasion and marital force, tends, as far as the husband is concerned, -to pass into the region of the merest ceremony. - -A few instances will suffice to illustrate the co-operation of dislike -and force in savage matrimony. In some Californian tribes the consent -of the girl is necessary, although ‘if she violently opposes the match -she is seldom compelled to marry or to be sold.’ Among the Neshenam -tribe of the same people ‘the girl has no voice whatever in the matter, -and resistance on her part merely occasions brute force to be used by -her purchaser.’[312] So in the Utah country, where ‘families and tribes -living at peace would steal each others’ wives and children and sell -them as slaves,’ a wife is usually bought of her parents; but should she -refuse, ‘the warrior collects his friends, _carries off the recusant -fair_,’ and thus espouses her.[313] So among the Navajoes ‘the consent -of the father is absolute, and the one so purchased assents _or is taken -away by force_.’[314] It is the same with the Horse Indians of Patagonia. -There, as elsewhere, it is common for a cacique to have several wives, -and poor men only one, marriages being ‘made by sale more frequently -than by mutual agreement.’ The price is often high, and girls are -betrothed without their knowledge in infancy and married without their -consent at maturity. But ‘if a girl dislikes a match made for her she -resists; and although _dragged forcibly to the tent of her lawful owner_, -plagues him so much by her contumacy that he at last turns her away, -and sells her to the person on whom she has fixed her affections.’[315] -In Africa, Yorubas, Mandingoes, and Koossa Kafirs follow the custom of -infant betrothal (and it is worth notice as being quite in accordance -with the theory that kinship was originally traced through mothers, -that Yoruba, Mandingo, and Loango Africans, and some Esquimaux tribes, -regard the mother’s consent only as necessary to an engagement);[316] -but sometimes a Yoruba girl, when the time comes for her to fulfil her -mother’s engagement, preferring some other than the intended husband, -absolutely refuses to co-operate. ‘Then she is either teased and worried -into submission or the husband agrees to receive back her dowry and -release her.’[317] A Mandingo girl must either marry a suitor chosen for -her or remain ever afterwards unmarried. Should she refuse, the lover is -authorized by the parents ‘by the laws of the country to seize on the -girl as his slave.’[318] If a Koossa girl, bound by the contract of her -parents, ‘makes any attempt at resisting the union, corporal punishment -is even resorted to, in order to compel her submission.’[319] - -It appears, therefore, that resistance on the part of the bride in many -cases procures her ultimate release, so that her wishes in the matter -are always an element to be considered. In all contracts of marriage, -to which she is seldom a party, there is accordingly, in the nature of -things, an implied covenant that a daughter shall be so far allowed -a voice in the matter that if she can make good her resistance she -shall not become the property of the intending purchaser. The frequency -with which it must have occurred that a girl would defeat a match she -disliked by flight, elopement, or resistance, would tend to create -a sort of common law right, for all daughters sold in marriage to a -certain ‘run’ for their independence;[320] and the amusement naturally -connected with the exercise of such a right would help to preserve the -custom in a modified form; so that, however slight in some cases might -be the modesty of the bride or her dislike of her suitor, her friends, -if only for the sport of the thing, would gladly enact the fiction of an -outrage to be resented, of a woman to be defended. In all the interesting -cases of the form of capture cited by Sir John Lubbock it appears that -in eight (that is, among the Mantras, the Kalmucks, the Fuejians, the -Fijians, the New Zealanders, the Papuans of New Guinea, the Philippine -Islanders, and the African Kafirs and Futas), the ceremony affords the -bride a chance of an effectual escape from a match she dislikes. Should -she fly, should she hide successfully, or should her friends defend her -successfully, the contract between her parents and suitor becomes null -and void; or sometimes, as among the Zulus and Bassutos, the price for -her is raised.[321] And it is remarkable with what precision the rules of -the chase have been elaborated in many instances; as by the Oleepas of -Central California, among whom, if a bride is found twice out of three -times, she is legally the seeker’s; and the bridegroom, if he fails the -first time, is allowed a second and final attempt a few weeks later. -‘The simple result is, that if the girl likes him she hides where she is -easily found; but if she disapproves of the match a dozen Indians cannot -find her.’[322] - -Other feelings would also be present to sustain the pretence of -wife-capture. For the savage parent, in parting with his daughter for a -favourable settlement, does not act from gratuitous cruelty; he provides -for her future as best he can, sometimes in accordance with her wishes, -sometimes against them. As a rule marriage for her is a change for the -worse; but if she does not dislike the bridegroom to the extent of -availing herself of her prescriptive and real chance of escape, her -natural feelings for her parents and relations would make it incumbent -on her at least to affect a dutiful regret at leaving them (in cases -where she does), by a half-bashful, half-serious resistance. It would -be difficult to find a case of capture, whether in form or in fact, -which is not readily explicable as simply the outcome of the natural -affections and their protest against so artificial an arrangement as -marriage by purchase; for with marriage by purchase the form of capture -always co-exists, so that capture was not necessarily an earlier mode -of marriage than that by purchase or agreement. The mock fights between -the party of the bride and that of the bridegroom among so many Indian -tribes;[323] the dances, lasting several days, during which it is the -business of the squaws to keep the bridegroom at a distance from his -bride, among the Tucanas of South America;[324] the similar duty which -devolves on the matrons of the tribe at Sumatran weddings;[325] the mock -skirmishes at Arab weddings, and the efforts of the negresses to keep the -bridegroom away from the camel of the bride;[326] these are surely more -intelligible, as arising from the rude ideas and customs of savage life, -than as being survivals, artificially preserved, of a time when the bride -was really fought for or stolen; and if such explanation is sufficient, -should it not logically be admitted before resorting to the hypothesis -of a practice whose very existence is rather an inference from such -ceremonies than a cause observable in actual operation? - -To pass to a third and quite distinct class of marriages by capture, -in which the essential element is not maidenly bashfulness nor real -repugnance, but the voluntary elopement of a girl with her lover, in -defeat of a prior contract of betrothal. The large part which questions -of profit and property play in savage betrothals can never be lost sight -of, in estimating the causes of real wife abduction, either within or -without the tribe. The primary conception of a daughter is a saleable -possession, a source of profit, to her clan in marketings with other -clans or to her parents in their bargains in her own clan. This fact -alone militates against the supposition of the wide prevalence of -female infanticide in primitive communities, the prejudice being rather -in favour of killing the boys than the girls; not solely for the use -of the latter as slaves and labourers, but for the price which even -among Fuejians or Bushmen is payable in some form or another for their -companionship as wives. Abiponian mothers spared their girls oftener than -their boys, because their sons when grown up would want wherewithal to -purchase a wife, and so tend to impoverish them; whilst their daughters -would bring them in money by their sale in that capacity.[327] To raise -the price by limiting the supply was also the reason why the Guanas of -America preferred to bury their girls alive rather than their boys.[328] - -From this view of daughters as saleable commodities comes polygamy for -the rich, polyandry, or illicit elopement, for the poor. Among the Hos of -India so high at one time was the price in cattle placed by parents on -their daughters that the large number of adult unmarried girls became a -‘very peculiar feature in the social state of every considerable village -of the Kohlán.’ What, then, was the result? That ‘young men counteracted -the machinations of avaricious parents against the course of true love -by _forcibly carrying off the girl_,’ thus avoiding extortion by running -away with her. The parents in such cases had to submit to terms proposed -by arbitrators; but at last wife-abduction became so common that it could -only be checked by the limitation by general consent of the number of -cattle payable at marriage.[329] - -‘A very singular scene,’ it is said, ‘may sometimes be noticed in the -markets of Singbhoom. A young man suddenly makes a pounce on a girl -and carries her off bodily, his friends covering the retreat (like a -group from the picture of the Rape of the Sabines). This is generally -a _summary method of surmounting the obstacles that cruel parents may -have placed in the lovers’ path_; but though it is sometimes done in -anticipation of the favourable inclination of the girl herself, and in -spite of her struggles and tears, no disinterested person interferes, -and the girls, late companions of the abducted maiden, often applaud the -exploit.’[330] - -In Afghanistan the pecuniary value of women has given rise to the curious -custom of assessing part of the fines in criminal cases in a certain -number of young women payable in atonement as wives to the plaintiff or -to his relations from the family of the defendant. Thus murder is or was -expiated by the payment of twelve young women; the cutting off a hand, -an ear, or a nose by that of six; the breaking of a tooth by that of -three; a wound above the forehead by that of one. This was the logical -result of the state of thought which produces wife-purchase; but there -was also another. For in the country parts, where matches generally begin -in attachment, an enterprising lover may avoid the obstacle of parental -consent by a form of capture, which has a legal sanction, though it does -not exempt the captor from subsequent payment. This consists in a man’s -‘seizing an opportunity of cutting off a lock of her (the woman’s) hair, -snatching away her veil, or throwing a sheet over her, and claiming her -as his affianced wife.’ But the most common expedient is an ordinary -elopement; though this is held an outrage to a family equivalent to the -murder of one of its members; and being pursued with the same rancour, -is often the cause of long and bloody wars between the clans; for as the -fugitive couple are never refused an asylum, ‘the seduction of a woman of -one Oolooss by a man of another, or a man’s eloping with a girl of his -own Oolooss,’ is the commonest cause of feuds between the clans.[331] - -Love attachments, in defeat of parental plans, lead to very similar -results in Bokhara. For ‘the daughter of a Turcoman has a high price; -and the swain, in despair of making a legitimate purchase, seizes his -sweetheart, seats her behind him on the same horse, and gallops off -to the nearest camp, where the parties are united, and separation -is impossible. The parents and relations pursue the lovers, and the -marriage is adjusted by an intermarriage with some female relation of -the bridegroom, while he himself becomes bound to pay so many camels and -horses as the price of his bride.’[332] - -There is, therefore, evidence to justify the theory that the form of -capture may often be explained as an attempt to regulate by law the -danger to a tribe arising from too frequent elopements, naturally -resulting from the abuse of the parental right of selling daughters. In -Sumatra the defeat of matrimonial plans by an elopement with a preferred -suitor is so common as to be sanctioned and regulated by law, being -known as the system of marriage by _telari gadis_; the father in such -a case having to pay the fine to which he would have been liable for -bestowing his daughter after engagement to another suitor, and only being -allowed to recover her, if he catches her in immediate pursuit. ‘When -the parties,’ says Mr. McLennan, ‘cannot agree about the price, nothing -is more common among the Kalmucks, Kirghiz, Nogais, and Circassians than -to carry the lady off by actual force of arms. The wooer having once -got the lady into his _yurt_, she is his wife by the law, and peace is -established by her relations coming to terms as to the price.’ So too -in England, elopements have often preceded and promoted more definite -marriage settlements, or, with some slight observances, have stood -legally as a substitute for them. - -Considering, then, that the affections and wishes do not count for -nothing even among savages; considering that among savages, more even -than in civilized life, marriage is a question of property and of means, -so that, whilst the richest members of a tribe almost universally have -several wives, it is often all that the poorer can do to get a wife -at all, we have a set of circumstances leading naturally sometimes to -voluntary elopement on the part of the girl, in defeat of her parents, -sometimes to literal wife-capture by a man otherwise unable to become a -husband. This condition of things leads of necessity to polyandry and -wife-robbery. In some Australian tribes, owing to a disproportion between -the sexes, many men have to steal a wife from a neighbouring horde. But -it is not their normal recognized mode of marriage. On the contrary, -their laws on this subject are somewhat elaborate; and as it appears -that before that state of society in which a daughter belongs to her -father there is one in which she belongs to her mother, and perhaps a -still prior state in which she belongs to her tribe, so from their birth -Australian girls are appropriated to certain males of the tribe, nor can -the parents annul the obligation. If the male dies the mother may then -bestow her daughter on whom she will, for by the death of her legal owner -the girl becomes to some extent the property of her relations, who have -certain claims on her services for the procurement of food. But to the -surrender of a girl by her mother the full consent of the whole tribe is -necessary; and if, as sometimes happens, ‘the young people, listening -rather to the dictates of inclination than those of law, improvise a -marriage by absconding together,’ they incur the fatal enmity of the -whole tribe.[333] According to Bonwick, a Tasmanian or Australian woman -was never stolen contrary to her expectations or wishes. Only if all -other schemes to have her own way failed, would a girl face the penalty -of having ‘the spear of the disappointed, the spear of the guardian, and -the spears of the tribe’ thrown at her, for her breach of tribal law.[334] - -The conception of the daughters of a clan as its property, as a source -of contingent wealth to it, of additional income to it in sheep, dogs, -or whatever the medium of exchange, tends to keep up in many cases that -prohibition to marry in the same clan or subdivision of a tribe which is -known as exogamy. Among the Hindu Kafirs it is said to be uncertain why -a man may not sell his girls to his own tribe, and why a man must always -buy his wife from another; but it is certain that for this reason the -more girls a man has born to him the better he is pleased and the richer -his tribe becomes.[335] A Khond father distributes among the heads of the -families, belonging to his branch of a tribe, the sum raised on behalf of -a son-in-law by subscription from the son-in-law’s branch. But, supposing -a great inequality of wealth to arise between different clans, originally -united by profitable intermarriages, it might become more profitable -to sell within the clan than outside it, so that the same motives of -interest which, under some circumstances, would tend to encourage exogamy -would under others lead to the opposite principle, a rich bridegroom of -the same clan being preferable to a poor one of another, whether the gain -accrued to a girl’s parents or her clan. It is, perhaps, for this reason -that a Hindu Kooch incurs a fine if he marries a woman of another clan, -becoming a bondsman till his wife redeems him; that is, till she pays -back to his clan or its chief what the bridegroom, by purchasing her, has -alienated from the use of the tribe.[336] On the other hand, the reason -given by the Khonds for marrying women from distant places was, that they -gave much smaller sums than for women of their own tribe.[337] - -Exogamy and endogamy would thus co-exist, as the customs of tribes that -have attained to a more or less complete recognition of the rights of -property, and are so far advanced as to be capable of preserving complex -rules of social organization. Marriages, therefore, under either _régime_ -are matters generally of friendly settlement, of ordinary contract; and -where such arrangements are defeated by the perversity of the principal -parties—namely, the bride or the bridegroom—what more natural than the -device of giving legal sanction to an elopement by settling a subsequent -compensation with the parent? - -The custom of exogamy is so widely spread over the world that its origin -must be sought in conditions as prevalent as itself, and it is possible -that it arose out of the same condition which certainly sustains it -and is co-extensive with itself, namely, from the marketable position -of women. That female infanticide should have led to it is improbable, -not only from the comparative rarity of the practice among the _rudest_ -tribes, but from the negative instance of the Todas, a wild Indian -hill-tribe, who, notwithstanding the scarcity of their women, and a -scarcity actually attributed to former female infanticide, ‘never -contract marriage with the other tribes, though living together on most -friendly terms.’[338] Judging _à priori_, we should expect to find as of -earlier date a prejudice in favour of tribal exclusiveness, of strict -endogamy. The idea of the Abors that marriage out of the clan is a sin -only to be washed out by sacrifice—a sin so great as to cause war among -the elements, and even obscuration of the sun and moon—has a more archaic -appearance than the contrary principle; and the confinement of marriages -to a few families of known purity of descent is characteristic of some -of the lowest Hindu castes.[339] The prejudice against foreign women is -so strong that there is often a tendency to regard female prisoners of -war as merely slaves, as not of the same rank with the real wives of -their captors. Thus, ‘though the different tribes of the Aht nation are -frequently at war with one another, women are not captured from other -tribes for marriage, but only to be kept as slaves. The idea of slavery -connected with capture is so common that a free-born Aht would hesitate -to marry a woman taken in war, whatever her rank had been in her own -tribe.’[340] The Caribs, too, if they kept female prisoners as wives -always regarded them as slaves, as standing on a lower level than their -legitimate wives.[341] - -Leaving, however, the obscure problem of the origin of exogamy, there -is a point of view from which both that and endogamy are one. For -exogamy as regards the subdivisions of a tribe is endogamy as regards -the tribe itself, tending in fact to preserve tribal unity and to check -an indefinite divergency of interests and dialects. For example, where -a Hindoo caste or tribe is composed of several Gotrams, no person of -whom may marry an individual of the same Gotram, it is evident that -the unity of the tribe is actually sustained by the exogamy of its -constituent parts. Such a custom therefore, howsoever originated, would, -as serviceable in maintaining tribal unity against hostile neighbouring -people, tend to survive from motives of common expediency, from its -adaptation to the interests of peace; a beneficial result of the system -which in Mr. Bancroft’s account of the Thlinkeet and Kutchin Indians -clearly appears.[342] The Thlinkeets are nationally divided into two -great clans, under the totems of the Wolf and the Raven, and these two -are again subdivided into numerous sub-totems. ‘In this clanship some -singular social facts present themselves. People are at once thrust -widely apart and yet drawn together. Tribes of the same clan may not war -on each other, but at the same time members of the same clan may not -marry each other. Thus the young Wolf warrior must seek his mate among -the Ravens.... _Obviously this singular social fancy tends greatly to -keep the various tribes of the nation at peace._’ The Kutchins, again, -are divided into three castes, resident in different territories, no two -persons of the same caste being allowed to marry. ‘_This system operates -strongly against war between the tribes_, as in war it is caste against -caste, not tribe against tribe. As the father is never of the same caste -as the son, who receives clanship from the mother, there can never be -international war without ranging fathers and sons against each other.’ -So among the Khonds, who punish intermarriage between persons of the same -tribe with death, the intervention of the women was always essential to -peace, as they were neutral between the tribe of their fathers and that -of their husbands.[343] But it is difficult to think that, if hostile -relations between exogamous clans became permanent, the several clans -would still insist on exogamous marriages as the only marriages legally -valid, and consequently regard the use of force or fraud as the only -legitimate title to a wife. - -It seems indeed certain that wherever the rule of exogamy exists it -may be analysed into a prohibition to marry within the divisions of a -larger group; that larger group being consciously recognised as uniting -the divergent families by resemblance of dialect, common political -ties, or a traditional common descent. The Kalmucks, for instance, -call themselves ‘the peculiar people,’ or ‘the four allies,’ and any -danger of their national dissolution is obviously diminished by the -very fact of the exogamy of their four clans. The Circassians, whose -constituent brotherhoods are exogamous, by the occasional assemblies of -the brotherhoods for the settlement of disputes, show a consciousness of -their political unity, which by the exogamy of the brotherhoods they help -to maintain. The Hindu castes preserve their mutual exclusiveness by the -very fact of compelling all their constituent families to intermingle -in marriage, and so preventing any one of them from dissolving the -common relationship by absolute separation or independent growth. So -that exogamy rather sustains than prevents a system of marriages -within the same stock, and is a mark of a higher conception of social -organisation, when people have learned to classify themselves with -respect to their neighbours, when tribal and personal property is well -established, and when, consequently, marriages between the groups can -be effected by purchase better than by violence. Exogamy therefore as -the product or concomitant of a somewhat advanced state of thought, not -of utter barbarism, would never make marriages by capture a necessity -of existence; but, if it did, it would argue so much culture in a tribe -capable of maintaining such rules, as would equally justify us in -ascribing to them moral feelings, not less advanced and refined than -those involved in their adherence to so restrictive a political system. - -South Australia supplies a typical illustration of the confusion relating -to intertribal marriages which arises from the vague use of the word -_tribe_. For wherever there is reason to suspect that the word clan or -family should stand for the word tribe, it is probable that the exogamy -predicated of the tribe only prevails between its constituent elements; -in other words, that it is only, as among the Kalmucks, Circassians, -or Hindu castes, an extended form of the principle of endogamy. Thus, -Collins, describing wife-capture in New South Wales, says that ‘it -is believed’ the women so taken are always selected from women of a -different tribe from that of the males, and from one with whom they are -at enmity; that as wives ‘they are incorporated into the tribes to which -their husbands belong, and but seldom quit them for others.’ But he uses -the word tribe as convertible with the word family, as when he speaks of -the natives near Port Jackson being distributed into families, each under -the government of its own head, and deriving its name from its place of -residence.[344] And the statements of Captain Hunter, a previous writer, -that the natives are associated ‘in tribes of many families together,’ -living apparently without a fixed residence; that ‘the tribe takes its -name, from the place of their general residence;’ and that, the different -families wander in different directions for food, but unite on occasion -of disputes with another tribe, make it still more probable that when -Collins spoke of different tribes he meant merely, different families, -or groups, which with all their separate wanderings united sometimes in -cases of common danger. So when Captain Hunter himself says that ‘there -is some reason to suppose that most of their wives are taken by force -from the tribes with whom they are at variance, as the females bear -no proportion to the males,’ we may take it that by tribes he means -families, and families who recognise their community of blood when a -really different tribe provokes their hostility by assembling as a tribe -themselves.[345] Mr. Stanbridge, who spent eighteen years in the wilds of -Victoria, corroborates this view; for, according to him, each tribe has -its own boundaries, the land of which is parcelled out amongst families -and carefully transmitted by direct descent; these boundaries being so -sacredly maintained that the member of no one family will venture on the -lands of a neighbouring one without invitation. The several families (or -tribes) unite for mutual purposes under a chief. The women often, but -not always, marry into distant tribes; they are generally betrothed in -their infancy, but if they grow up unbetrothed the father’s consent must -be solicited; failing him, the brother’s; then the uncle’s; and last of -all that of a council or a chief of a tribe.[346] That force was ever the -normal method by which marriages were effected in Australia, there is no -proof; that, on the contrary, mutual likings often set the law, is proved -by the story of the native captive girl, who, after living among the -colonists for some time, expressed a desire to go away and be married to -a young native of her acquaintance; albeit that she left him after three -days, returning sadly beaten and jealous of the other wife.[347] - -Quite distinct, again, either from the real or pretended reluctance -of a savage girl to become a bride, or from the custom of forcing an -avaricious parent to a settlement by the shorter process of taking first -and paying afterwards, is the custom of stealing women from the same -or a neighbouring clan, a custom which prevailed widely in Ireland and -Scotland in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and which in the -latter country has been ‘glorified in a whole literature of songs and -ballads.’[348] - -That polygamy and wife-purchase and artificial tribal regulations often -lead to such a result cannot be denied; but that it is anywhere a -system, sustained by prejudices, whencesoever derived, seems completely -unwarranted by the evidence hitherto collected. The Coinmen of Patagonia, -who made annual inroads on the Tekeenica tribe, killing the men and -carrying off not only the women but the children, dogs, arrows, spears, -and canoes, seem to have been actuated rather by the ordinary motives -of freebooters (by such motives, for instance, as induced our early -convict settlers in Tasmania to set off with their bullock-chains to -make captives of the native women[349]) than by any scruples of marrying -relations at home. Carib wives taken in war were accounted slaves; and -so far were the Caribs from being dependent on aggression for their -wives, that before their customs were modified by acquaintance with the -Christians their only legitimate wives were their cousins.[350] If a man -had no cousin to marry, or put off doing so till it was too late, he -might then marry some non-relative, with the consent of her parents. At -the festival that followed a successful war the parents vied with one -another in offering their daughters as wives to those who were praised by -their captains as having fought with bravery. The Caribs of the continent -differed from those of the islands in that men and women spoke the same -language, not having corrupted their native tongue by marriages with -foreign women.[351] According to Humboldt, the language of the Caribs -of the continent was the same, from the source of the Rio Branco to the -steppes of Cumana; and the pride of race which led them to withdraw from -every other people, and was the cause of the failure of all missionary -efforts that tried to combine them with villages containing people of -another nation and speaking another idiom, would surely have militated -against making exogamy a preliminary condition of matrimony.[352] -Humboldt, indeed, says that polygamy was more extensively practised by -the Caribs and other nations that ‘preserved the custom of carrying off -young girls from the neighbouring tribe;’ but it would be contrary to -all previous accounts of the people to suppose these were their only -wives, such a supplement to domestic felicity being everywhere the -common reward, though seldom the chief object, of successful war. The -curious difference in the language of the men and of the women found to -exist among the Caribs of the West Indian Archipelago, and attributed -by tradition to the conquest of a former people on the islands, whose -wives the conquerors appropriated, has perhaps been rather exaggerated, -for in a list of 488 words and phrases employed by both sexes, in only -36 is there any difference marked between the language of the men and -that of the women. The origin of the difference may be doubted, as there -were also words and phrases used by the old men of the people which -the younger ones might not use; and there was a war-dialect of which -neither women, girls, or boys had any knowledge.[353] But probably the -difference arose from a custom similar to that of the Zulus, which makes -it unlawful for a woman to use any word containing the sound of her -father-in-law’s name or of the names of her husband’s male relations. -‘Whenever the emphatic syllable of either of their proper names occurs -in any other word, she must avoid it, by either substituting an entirely -new word, or at least another syllable in its place. Hence _this custom -has given rise to an almost distinct language among the women_.’[354] In -consequence of this _Hlonipa_ custom, according to another witness, ‘_the -language at this present time almost presents the phenomenon of a double -one_.’[355] That the Caribs maintained the common etiquette of reserve -between parents and children-in-law,[356] makes it not improbable that -the reserve extended itself to their language, and thus produced the same -phenomenon that we find in South Africa. - -In the same way other cases of wife-capture appear simply in the light of -savage lawlessness, which may have been more common among quite primitive -tribes than it is in their nearest modern representatives; but which, if -it ever was widely prevalent, is most unlikely to have been perpetuated -in symbol, by a form of capture. If then the form is easily explicable -on other grounds, such as have been suggested, we have a reason the less -for supposing in the past a state of things which would exclude from -the relations between male and female the happy influence of that mutual -affection which has been shown not to have been entirely absent even -among, perhaps, the rudest of our species, the aborigines of Australia -or the Veddahs of Ceylon, and which is certainly disseminated more or -less widely, outside the human race, through a large part of the animal -creation. - -It is probably impossible to resuscitate in imagination a picture of -primitive times. It is with the lower societies of the world as with the -lower animal organisms: the more they are studied, the more wonderful is -the complexity of structure they unfold. Tribal and subtribal divisions -of communities, tribal and subtribal divisions of territory, strong -distinctions of rank, stringent rules of etiquette, are found on all -sides to characterise populations in other circumstances of life scarcely -less rude than the brute creation around them. The first beginnings of -social evolution are lost, nor can they be observed in any known races -that appear to have advanced the least distance from the starting-point -of progress. But, as there is no reason to suppose that the external -conditions of primitive man were ever very different from those of -existing tribes; that those, for instance, of the shell-mound builders or -the cave-dwellers differed widely from those of existing Ahts or Bushmen, -so there is nothing unreasonable in believing, that the earliest human -denizens of the globe were endowed with the same rudiments of feelings -that prevail among them, and that these should, even in very early -times, have produced very similar social institutions. That Greeks and -Egyptians, Chinese and Hindus, had legends ascribing marriage to the -invention of a particular legislator, thereby implying there was a time -when marriage was not, no more proves that there was ever a time when -some sort of marriage was unrecognised than the many legends of the -origin of fire prove that mankind were ever destitute of the blessing -of its warmth. A minimum of reflection on the subject would produce the -legend, just as reflections on the world’s origin have produced countless -legends of its creation, of a time when it too was nonexistent. And -it will be found, wherever any known savage tribe really practises no -wedding customs, that the fact of the marriage is distinctly recognised, -either by payment in kind or labour by the bridegroom or by some -symbolical act notifying the union to all fellow-tribesmen. The Veddahs, -for instance, according to Tennant, used no marriage rites; but another -writer mentions, that on the day of marriage the husband received from -his bride a cord twisted by herself, which he had to wear round his waist -till his death, as a symbol of the lastingness of the union between them. -The Kherias of India, who have no word for marriage in their language, -give public recognition to the fact by certain rites and festivities, -closely analogous to those in vogue in neighbouring tribes. The Coroadas -of Brazil have no marriage solemnity, but the suitor presents the bride’s -parents with fruit or game, as a tacit engagement to support her by the -chase. Such a tacit expression of willingness and ability to take good -care of his wife is a common symbolical act among savages, even the -rudest; whilst the fact that for the married pair henceforth there will -be a union of life and fortune is indicated by many a wedding custom, of -no doubtful meaning, as by the eating of a cake together, or by the Dyak -custom of making the married couple sit together on two bars of iron, ‘to -intimate the wish of the bystanders that blessings as lasting and health -as vigorous as that metal may attend the pair.’ - -But symbolical acts like these—and they might be multiplied -indefinitely—presuppose an advanced state of thought and feeling, behind -which we cannot get in the observation of any existing savage tribes; and -since they are common wherever the pretence of capture is common, that -pretence may well be symbolical too; but symbolical, not of an earlier -system of marriage, but of a conventional regard for good manners. -Wherever the pretence of capture exists, it exists amid conditions -of life so far removed from what might naturally be conceived as the -most archaic, that it is quite legitimate to attribute the decorous -reluctance of the bride and the resistance of her relations at weddings -to such feelings as have been proved to prevail upon such occasions, and -so to consider the bride’s behaviour as something quite unconnected with -the lawless practice of wife-abduction, a practice which undoubtedly -prevails to a certain extent in the savage world (chiefly in consequence -of artificial social arrangements), which may have prevailed to a still -greater extent when men lived in the caves of Périgord or upon former -continents, but which it is incredible should ever have survived by -transmission as a symbol, as a custom worthy of religious preservation. - - - - -VIII. - -_THE FAIRY-LORE OF SAVAGES._ - - -A comparison of some of the fancies of the rudest known tribes of -the earth concerning the nature of the sun, the moon, and the stars, -proves abundantly not only that the demand for a reason for things is -a principle operative in every stage of human development, but that -the primitive explanation of things is sought in the occurrences of -daily experience and given in terms and figures originally applied to -terrestrial objects. From a philosophy of nature of so rude a type and -so humble an origin spring many of those marvellous traditions, which in -after times rank as the mythology, or perhaps serve as the religion, of -the people among whom they had birth. - -To begin with some of the astro-mythological ideas of the Australians. -Mr. Stanbridge mentions the astonishment with which, as he sat by -his camp fire, he listened for the first time to the remarks of two -Australian natives as they pointed to the beautiful constellations of -Castor and Pollux, of the Pleiades and Orion. These men belonged to a -race who had ‘the reputation of being lowest in the scale of mankind,’ -who were ‘cannibals of the lowest description,’ and ‘who had no name -for numerals above two;’ yet they could explain the wanderings of the -moon, by the story that, being once discovered trying to persuade the -wife of a certain star in Canis Major to elope with him, he was beaten -and put to flight by the angry husband. As so frequently elsewhere, most -of the stars were bound by the ties of human relationship, being wives, -brothers, sisters, or mothers to one another. The stars in the belt -of Orion were believed to be a group of young men dancing, whilst the -Pleiades were girls who played to them as they danced. Two large stars in -the fore legs of Centaurus were two brave brothers who speared Tchingal -to death, and the east stars of Crux were the points of the spears that -pierced his body.[357] - -Few tribes of known savages appear to be without conceptions of a similar -nature. The Tasmanians, according to Bonwick, were no exception to the -connection of theology with astronomy. To them Capella was a kangaroo -pursued by Castor and Pollux, whose smoke as it was roasted might be seen -till the autumn. The Pleiades were maidens who courted the kangaroo -hunters of Orion and dug up roots for their suppers. Two other stars were -two black men who of old appeared suddenly on a hill and threw fire down -to earth for the use of its inhabitants; whilst two other luminaries were -two women whom a sting-ray had killed as they dived for cray-fish, but -whom these same fire-bringers restored to life, by placing stinging ants -on their breasts; then escorting them to heaven, after they had first -killed the sting-ray.[358] - -Bushman star-lore is framed in exactly the same way, the planets of -distant solar systems sinking into the insignificance of daily African -surroundings. What is the moon but a man who, having incurred the wrath -of the sun, is pierced by his knife till he is nearly destroyed, and -who, having implored mercy, grows from the small piece left him, till -he is again large enough for the stabbing process to recommence? What -is the Milky Way but some wood ashes long ago thrown up into the sky by -a girl, that her people might be able to see their way home at night? -Other stars are reduced to mortal origin, or identified with certain -lions, tortoises, or clouds, that have place in Bushman mythology; nor -does it lie beyond their limits of belief that the sun should once have -been seen sitting by the wayside as he travelled on earth, and that -the jackal’s back is black to this day because he carried that burning -substance on his back.[359] This sun they believe was once a mortal on -earth who radiated light from his body, but only for a short space round -his house; till some children were sent to throw him as he slept into the -sky, whence he has ever since shone over the earth.[360] These children -belonged to an earlier race of Bushmen; and it is an odd coincidence that -in Victoria as in South Africa the belief about the sun is associated -with the tradition of a race that preceded both Bushmen and Australians -in their present homes. In the Australian creed, the earth lay in -darkness, till one of the former race threw an emu’s egg into space, -where it became the sun. That former race was translated in various forms -to the heavens, where they made all the celestial bodies, and where they -continue to cause all the good and evil that happens on earth. Such -traditions may point to a fact; for both Australians and Bushmen may be -degenerate from a better social type than they now present; but the fact -that, even if degenerate, they should preserve such tales and fictions, -makes it not inconceivable that such tales should arise, as spontaneous -products of the mind, among tribes that seem neither to have lapsed from -a higher condition, nor ever to have emerged from their primeval state of -barbarism. - -Of the Esquimaux, Egede observes that ‘their notion about the stars is -that some of them have been men and others different sorts of animals -or fishes.’[361] Here two stars are two persons at a singing combat, or -two rival women taking each other by the hair; those other three are -certain Greenlanders who, when once out seal-catching, failed to find -their way home again and were taken to heaven. It is true such fancies, -taken primarily from Cranz, must be received with the reservation that -he makes, namely, that they were only harboured by the weaker heads -of Greenland, and that the natives had art enough to play off on the -Europeans quite as marvellous stories as any they received.[362] But the -possible reality of such belief is vouched for by other testimony from -all parts of the globe, of which two instances, taken from the Hervey -Islanders and the Thlinkeet Indians, will suffice to illustrate the -general character. According to the former, a twin boy and girl were -badly treated by their mother; so they left their home and leapt into -the sky, whither they were also followed by their parents, and where -all four may still be seen shining; ‘brother and dearly-loved sister, -still linked together, pursue their never-ceasing flight, resolved -never again to meet their justly-enraged parents.’[363] The Thlinkeet -Indians ascribe to a being called Yehl the liberation of the world from -its pristine darkness; for, amid the many conflicting stories told of -him, it is agreed that he it was who obtained light for men at a time -when ‘sun, moon, and stars were kept by a rich chief in separate boxes -which he allowed no one to touch.’ Yehl, having become grandson to this -chief, cried one day so much for these boxes that his grandfather let -him have one. ‘He opened it, and lo! there were stars in the sky.’ The -grandparent was next cheated out of the moon in the same way; but to get -the sunbox Yehl had to refuse food and become really ill, and then its -owner only parted with it on condition that it should not be opened. The -prohibition, however, was unheeded. Yehl turned into a raven, flew off -with the box, and blessed mankind with the light of the sun.[364] - -From these samples of the fairy tales of savages, it is clear that, in -addition to the myths which arise from forgotten etymologies, there -are many others which are not formed at all by this process of gradual -forgetfulness, but spring directly from the use of the intellect and -the imagination, in obedience to the impulse to find a reason for -everything. To observe peculiarities in nature is the beginning of -science; to account for them in any way is science itself, true or false. -The science of savages is not limited to the skies, but is directed to -everything that calls for notice on earth; nor in the stories invented -by them to answer the various problems of existence, are they a whit -behind the traditions of European folk-lore on similar subjects, -their explanations of natural peculiarities disclosing quite as vivid -imaginative powers as the stories of the white race concerning birds or -beasts. - -Let us take, for instance, as a parallel to the German reason for the owl -flying in solitude by night (namely, that when set to watch the wren, -imprisoned in a mousehole, he fell asleep, and was so ashamed at letting -him thus escape that he has never since dared show himself by day), the -story of the rude Ahts, made to account for the melancholy note of the -loon as it is heard flying about the wild lakes of Vancouver’s Island; -and as a good instance of the resemblance in construction of plot often -found in very distant regions, let us place side by side with it a story -of the Basutos in the south of Africa:— - - _THE AHT STORY._ - - Two fishermen went one day in two canoes to catch halibut. - But while one of them caught many, the other caught none. So - the latter, angered by the taunts of his more fortunate but - physically weaker companion, bethought himself how he might - take all his fish from him by force, and cause him to return - home fishless and ashamed. Suddenly, whilst his friend was - pulling up a fish, he knocked him on the head with the wooden - club he used for killing halibut, and, to prevent the tale - ever being told, cut out his companion’s tongue, and took the - fish home to his own wife. When the tongueless man arrived at - the village, and his friends came to enquire of his sport, he - could only answer by a noise resembling the note of the loon. - ‘The great spirit, Quawteaht, was so angry at all this, that - he changed the injured Indian into a loon, and the other into - a crow; and the loon’s plaintive cry now is the voice of the - fisherman trying to make himself understood.’[365] - - _THE BASUTO STORY._ - - Two brothers, having gone in different directions to make - their fortunes, met again, after sundry adventures, the elder - enriched by a pack of dogs, the younger by a large number of - cows. The younger offered his brother as many of these cows - as he pleased, with the exception of a certain white one. - This he would not part with; so as they went home, and the - younger brother was drinking from a pool, Macilo, the elder, - seized his brother’s head and held it under the water till - he was dead. Then he buried the body, and covered it with a - stone, and proceeded to drive back the whole flock as his own. - He had not, however, gone far, before a small bird perched - itself on the horn of the white cow and exclaimed: ‘Macilo has - killed Maciloniane for the sake of the white cow he coveted.’ - Twice did Macilo kill the bird with a stone, but each time it - reappeared and uttered the same words. So the third time he - killed it he burnt it, and threw its ashes to the winds. Then - proudly he entered his village, and when they all enquired for - his brother, he said that they had taken different roads, and - that he was ignorant where he was. The white cow was greatly - admired, but suddenly a small bird perched itself on its horns - and exclaimed: ‘Macilo has killed Maciloniane for the sake of - the white cow he coveted.’ Thus, through a bird into which - the heart of the murdered man had been transformed, did the - truth become known, and everyone departed with horror from the - presence of the murderer.[366] - -European folk-lore accounts for the redness of the robin’s breast, -either by the theory that he extracted a thorn from the thorn-crown of -Christ, or by the theory that he daily bears a drop of water to quench -the flames of hell. For either reason he might be justly called the -friend of man; but for the bird’s friendliness the Chippewya Indians -give a more poetical explanation than either of the above. There was -once, they say, a hunter so ambitious that his only son should signalise -himself by endurance, when he came to the time of life to undergo the -fast preparatory to his choosing his guardian spirit, that after the lad -had fasted for eight days, his father still pressed him to persevere. But -next day, when the father entered the hut, his son had paid the penalty -of violated nature, and in the form of a robin had just flown to the top -of the lodge. There, before he flew away to the woods, he entreated his -father not to mourn his transformation. ‘I shall be happier,’ he said, -‘in my present state than I could have been as a man. I shall always be -the friend of men and keep near their dwellings; I could not gratify your -pride as a warrior, but I will cheer you by my songs.... I am now free -from cares and pains, my food is furnished by the fields and mountains, -and my path is in the bright air.’[367] - -Not less poetical is the Hervey Islanders’ account of the origin of some -peculiarities among fishes, and notably of the well-known conformation of -the head of the common sole. They relate how Ina, leaving the house of -her rich parents because she had been beaten and scolded for suffering -the arch-thief, Nyana, to steal certain treasures left in her charge, -resolved to make her way to the sea beach, and from thence to the Sacred -Isle that lay across the sea at the place where the sun set. Arrived -at the shore, she first asked the small fish, the _avini_, to bear her -across the sea; but the avini, unable to support her weight, soon let -her fall into the water, for which Ina in her anger struck it repeatedly -with her foot, thereby causing those beautiful stripes on its sides which -are called to this day ‘Ina’s tattooing.’ Trying next the _paoro_, and -meeting with the same mischance, she caused it in the same way to bear -ever after those blue marks which are now its glory; and it is said to be -historically true that tattooing on that island ‘was simply an imitation -of the stripes on the avini and the paoro.’ Then the _api_, a white -fish, incurring the same displeasure, became at once and for ever of -an intensely black hue. The sole, indeed, carried Ina farther than the -others, but no farther than the breakers by the reef; and Ina, now wild -with rage, stamped with such fury on its head that its underneath eye -was removed to the upper side, and thus it was condemned ever afterwards -to swim flatwise, unlike other fish, because one side of its face had no -eye. How Ina then caused a protuberance on the forehead of all sharks, -known to this day as Ina’s bump, by cracking a cocoa-nut she wished to -drink out of on the forehead of a shark that bore her, how the shark then -left her, and how she finally reached the Sacred Isle on the back of the -king of sharks, and became the wife of Timirau, the king of all fish, may -be read in further detail in Mr. Gill’s interesting collection of Myths -and Songs from the South Pacific.[368] - -The necessity for a reason for everything, exemplified in these -traditions, exercises its influence on mythology itself, reasons being -invented for inexplicable customs or beliefs just as they are for strange -phenomena in nature. The custom, for instance, of hunting a wren to death -once a year, which has been observed in Ireland, the isle of Man, and -the South of France, has for its general explanation a belief that the -wren is a fairy who, after having decoyed many men to meet their deaths -in the sea, took the form of a wren to escape the plot laid for her by -a certain knight-errant. But the Irish have found quite another reason -for the custom, having invented the story, that on the eve of the battle -of the Boyne the Irish had stolen up to King William’s sleeping camp and -were on the point of putting an end to the heretics, when a wren hopped -upon the drum of a Protestant drummer, and by thus waking him caused -their defeat; a defeat which they avenge on every anniversary of the day -by the persecution of that unhappy bird.[369] - -The story of the wren is well known; how, when the birds were competing -for the kingship by the test of the greatest height attained in flying, -the wren hid in the eagle’s feathers, and, when the eagle had flown -far beyond the other birds, darted himself yet a little above it. It -is said that the first appearance of this story is in a collection of -beast-fables, composed by a rabbi in the 13th century.[370] But the -resemblance between the wren-story as it is told in Germany or Ireland, -and a story of a linnet as told by the Odjibwas of North America, is so -striking a testimony of the way in which closely similar tales are framed -independently, that the two stories are worth comparing. - - _THE ODJIBWA STORY._ - - ‘The birds met together one day to try which could fly the - highest. Some flew up very swift, but soon got tired, and were - passed by others of stronger wing. But the eagle went up beyond - them all, and was ready to claim the victory, when the grey - linnet, a very small bird, flew from the eagle’s back, where - it had perched unperceived, and being fresh and unexhausted, - succeeded in going the highest. When the birds came down and - met in council to award the prize, it was given to the eagle, - because that bird had not only gone up nearer to the sun than - any of the larger birds, but it had carried the linnet on its - back.’ - - For this reason the eagle’s feathers became the most honourable - marks of distinction a man could bear.[371] - - _THE IRISH STORY._ - - ‘The birds all met together one day, and settled among - themselves that whichever of them could fly highest was to be - the king of all. Well, just as they were on the hinges of being - off, what does the little rogue of a wren do, but hop up and - perch himself unbeknown on the eagle’s tail. So they flew and - flew ever so high, till the eagle was miles above all the rest, - and could not fly another stroke, he was so tired. “Then,” - says he, “I’m king of the birds....” “You lie,” says the wren, - darting up a perch and a half above the big fellow. Well, the - eagle was so mad to think how he was done, that when the wren - was coming down, he gave him a stroke of his wing, and from - that day to this the wren was never able to fly further than a - hawthorn bush.’[372] - -It is impossible to assign limits either to the vitality or to the -range of a story. If the commerce which has ever prevailed between the -different tribes of the world, as it prevails to this day, either by -conquest or by barter, has caused so wide a dispersion of the races and -products of the earth, the wonder would rather be if the products of -men’s thoughts and fancies had not prevailed so widely, had not taken so -deep root in man’s memory, seeing that they cost nothing either to carry -or to keep. For many stories therefore of wide range, agreeing in such -minute particulars as to render difficult the theory of their independent -origin, the mystery of their resemblance is amply solved by the theory of -their gradual dispersion, without their proving anything as to the common -origin of those who tell them. The story, for instance, of Faithful -John, the central idea of which is, that a friend can only apprise -some one of a danger he will incur on his wedding night, by himself -incurring suspicion and being turned into stone, is told with little -variation in Bohemia, Greece, Italy, and Spain; and the discovery of the -leading thought in a story in India makes it possible that it was there -originated.[373] In Polynesia, again, the story of stopping the motion -of the sun is widely spread; in New Zealand, Maui makes ropes of flax, -goes with his brothers to the point where the sun rises, hides from it by -day, and when it rises next day succeeds in his purpose before letting -it go further. In Tahiti, Maui is a priest, or chief of olden time, who -builds a marae which must be finished by the evening, and who therefore -seizes the sun by its rays and binds him to a tree till his work is -finished. In Hawaii Maui stops the sun till evening, because his wife has -to finish a certain dress by twilight. In Samoa, Maui appears as Itu, a -man who is anxious to build a house of great stones, but is unable to do -so because the sun goes too fast; he therefore takes a boat and lays nets -in the sun’s path, but as these are broken through, he makes a noose, -catches the sun, and only lets it free when his house is finished.[374] -Obviously, these stories are all related, but it is impossible to say -whether they spread from any one place to the others, or whether they -are remnants, retained in altered form, from the primitive mythology -of a common Polynesian home. It is, however, worthy of notice that in -Wallachian fairy lore also a cow pushes back the sun to the hour of -mid-day, to enable a youth who had fallen asleep to accomplish his -task,[375] and that the idea of catching the sun is not unknown to the -mythology of America. - -There is, however, a large class of stories which arise independently, -and owe their remarkable family likeness neither to a common descent nor -to importation, but to the natural promptings of the imagination. Thus, -the idea of a tree so high that it reaches the heavens, and consequently -of the heavens as thereby attainable, naturally produces such a story as -Jack and the Beanstalk, a story which is said to be found all over the -world, but the versions of which agree in no other single point than in -the admission to the sky by dint of climbing.[376] In the same way many -of the ideas common to the Indo-European nations, and so often explained -as originally derived from the fanciful meteorology of the primitive -Aryans, find startling analogues outside the Aryan family, where there -is no reason to suppose them anything more than the direct offspring of -the dreamer or the story-teller. If the constancy of Penelope to Ulysses, -tormented by her suitors, is simply that of the evening light, assailed -by the powers of darkness, till the return of her husband the sun in the -morning,[377] shall we apply the same interpretation to the story of the -wife of the Red Swan, of the Odjibwas, who, when he returns from the -discovery of his magic arrows from the abode of the departed spirits, -finds that his two brothers have been quarrelling for the possession of -his wife, but been quarrelling in vain?[378] If the legend of Cadmus -recovering Europa, after she has been carried away by the white bull, the -spotless cloud, means that ‘the sun must journey westward until he sees -again the beautiful tints which greeted his eyes in the morning,’[379] -shall we say the same of a story current in North America, to the effect -that a man once had a beautiful daughter whom he forbade to leave the -lodge lest she should be carried off by the king of the buffaloes; and -that as she sat, notwithstanding, outside the house, combing her hair, -‘all of a sudden the king of the buffaloes came dashing on, with his herd -of followers, and taking her between his horns, away he cantered over -plains, plunged into a river which bounded his land, and carried her -safely to his lodge on the other side,’ whence she was finally recovered -by her father?[380] - -Again, in Hindu mythology, Urvasi came down from heaven and became the -wife of the son of Budha, only on condition that two pet rams should -never be taken from her bedside and that she should never behold her -lord undressed. The immortals, however, wishing Urvasi back in heaven, -contrived to steal the rams; and as the king pursued the robbers with -his sword in the dark, the lightning revealed his person, the compact -was broken, and Urvasi disappeared.[381] This same story is found in -different forms among many people of Aryan and Turanian descent, the -central idea being that of a man marrying someone of aerial or aquatic -origin, and living happily with her till he breaks the condition on which -her residence with him depends. Thus there is the story of Raymond -of Toulouse, who chances in the hunt upon the beautiful Melusina at a -fountain and lives with her happily till he discovers her fish-nature and -she vanishes; but exactly parallel stories come no less from Borneo, the -Celebes, or North America than from Ireland or Germany; for which reason -it seems sufficient to receive them simply as they stand, as fairy tales -natural to every tribe of mankind that has a fixed belief in supernatural -beings, rather than to explain these wonderful wives as the ‘bright -fleecy clouds of early morning, which vanish as the splendour of the sun -is unveiled.’[382] Let us compare the story as it is told in America and -Bornoese tradition. - - _THE BORNOESE STORY._ - - A certain Bornoese, when far from home, once climbed a tree to - rest, and whilst there ‘was attracted by the most ravishing - music, which ever and anon came nearer and nearer, until it - seemingly approached the very roots of the tree, when a pure - well of water burst out, at the bottom of which were seven - beautiful virgins. Ravished at the sight, and determined to - make one of them his son’s wife, he made a lasso of his rattan, - and drew her up.’ One day, however, her husband hit her in - anger, and she was taken up to the sky.[383] - - _THE AMERICAN STORY._ - - Wampee, a great hunter, once came to a strange prairie, where - he heard faint sounds of music, and looking up saw a speck in - the sky, which proved itself to be a basket containing twelve - most beautiful maidens, who, on reaching the earth, forthwith - set themselves to dance. He tried to catch the youngest, but - in vain; ultimately he succeeded by assuming the disguise of a - mouse. He was very attentive to his new wife, who was really a - daughter of one of the stars, but she wished to return home, so - she made a wicker basket secretly, and by help of a charm she - remembered, ascended to her father.[384] - -It has been imagined that all the fairy tales of the world may be reduced -to certain fundamental story roots; but these story roots we should look -for not in the clouds, but upon the earth, not in the various aspects of -nature, but in the daily occurrences and surroundings of savage life. The -uniformity which appears in so many of the myths or fairy tales of the -world would thus simply arise from a uniformity of the experiences of -existence. The evidence concerning savage astro-mythology is conclusive, -that nothing is conceived of the heavenly bodies that has not its -prototype on earth; that the skies do but mirror the events or objects -of earth, where the memorable incidents of the chase or the battle are -told of the stars: nor is it strange if in a few years such tales should -have so gained in the telling, that it is often impossible to separate -the fact from the fiction, or to distinguish a crude supposition from the -creation of a fanciful myth. - -For although it is difficult to lay down the boundaries between the -language of metaphor and the language of fact, inasmuch as what is faith -to one man is often but fancy to another, there is reason to believe -that savages really do very often confuse celestial with terrestrial -phenomena, that, for instance, the Zulus, when they speak of the stars as -the children of the sky and of the sun as their father, are expressing -rather a real belief than a poetical fancy, and that the conception -of the sun and moon as physically related is an actual belief quite -as much as a merely figurative explanation. If this be true, a large -part of mythology must be regarded not as a poetical explanation of -things, suggested by the grammatical form of words or by roots that lend -similar names to the most diverse conceptions, but as the direct effect -of primitive thought in its application to the phenomena of nature. It -is more likely that the early thoughts of men should have framed their -language than that the form of their language should have preceded -their form of thought. And if it be shown (by those who hold that the -personification of impersonal things is consequent on the grammatical -structure of a language) that the Kafirs and other tribes of South -Africa, whose language does not denote sex, are almost destitute of -myths and fables, whilst tribes who employ a sex-denoting language have -many,[385] it is noticeable that such personification has been shown to -exist among the natives of Australia, between the different dialects of -whose language it is said to have been one of the points of resemblance, -that they recognised no distinctions of gender.[386] - -A story of the Ottawa Indians (by internal evidence posterior in date -to their acquaintance with guns and ships) may be taken as a sample of -savage traditions, which prove that the convertibility of mankind with -sun, moon, or stars, is as natural a belief to a savage, as that his -next-door neighbour may turn at pleasure into a wolf or a snake. Six -young men finding themselves on a hill-top in close proximity to the -sun, resolved to travel to it. Two of them finally reached a beautiful -plain, lighted by the moon, which, as they advanced, appeared as an aged -woman with a white face, who spoke to them and promised to conduct them -to her brother, then absent on his daily course through the sky. This -woman ‘they knew from her first appearance’ to be the moon. When she -introduced them to her brother, ‘the sun motioned them with his hand to -follow him,’ and they accompanied him with some difficulty till they were -restored safe and sound to the earth.[387] So Sir G. Grey, collecting -native legends concerning a cave in Australia, found that the only point -of agreement was ‘that originally _the moon who was a man_ had lived -there.’[388] - -But, except on the assumption that savages are idiots, it is impossible -that such legends should not only obtain currency, but enjoy the vitality -of traditions, unless they conform to certain canons of belief, unless -they contain nothing inherently incredible. A fairy tale pleases a child, -not because it is known to be impossible, but because it carries the -mind further afield than actual experience does into the realms of the -possible; and a tale understood to be impossible would be as insipid to -a savage as it would be to a child. Schoolcraft, in reference to Indian -popular tales, speaks of the ‘belief of the narrators and listeners -in every wild and improbable thing told;’ and says, ‘Nothing is too -capacious for Indian belief.’[389] If, as their stories abundantly show, -they feel no difficulty in conceiving the instantaneous transformation -of men not merely into something living, but into stones or stumps, the -fact ceases to be strange, that in Indian faith ‘many of the planets are -transformed adventurers.’[390] What, then, more natural than that all -over the world the deeds of great tribesmen should be transferred to the -skies, and, under the action of uniform laws of fancy, should in time -become so overgrown with fiction as to pass into the domain of the purest -mythology, till at last they appear as mere figurative expressions of the -daily life of nature, of the struggle between the day and the night, of -the dispersion of the clouds by the sun? - -The condition of things which makes such conceptions of the heavens -the natural outcome of primitive speculation may perhaps, to a certain -extent, be recovered by observation of the laws conditioning the actually -existent thoughts of the savage world. - -The first entrance into Wonderland lies through Dreamland. Schoolcraft’s -testimony that ‘a dream or a fact is alike potent in the Indian mind’ -accords with much other evidence to the effect that, with savages, the -sensations of the sleeping or waking life are equally real or but vaguely -distinguished. A native of Zululand will leave his work and travel to his -home, perhaps a hundred miles away, to test the truth of a dream,[391] -and so great is the importance the Zulus attach to such monitions, that -‘he who dreams is the great man of the village;’ whilst the gift to them -of ‘_sight by night in dreams_’ is ascribed to their first ancestor, -the great Unkulunkulu.[392] But how far surpassing even the normal -experiences of sleep must be the dreams of men in the hunting or nomad -state, the law of whose lives is either a want or an excess of food! -What richer fund for story-material can be imagined than the dreams of a -savage, or what more likely to introduce him to the mysteries of romance -than recollections of those sudden transformations or those weird images, -which have haunted the repose of his slumbering hours? And into what -strange lands of beauty and plenty, into what secrets of the skies, -would not the flights of his sleep give him an insight! In all fairy -tales and all mythology a remarkable conformity to the deranged ideas -of sleep does thus occur; and especially do the stories of the lower -races, as for instance those of Schoolcraft’s ‘Algic Researches,’ read -far more like the recollections of bad dreams than like the worn ideas -of a once pure religion, or of a poetical interpretation of nature. The -most beautiful of the Indian legends, that of the origin of Indian corn, -was in native tradition actually referred to a dream, and to a dream -purposely resorted to, to gain a clearer insight into the mysteries of -nature.[393] And as dreams do but deal with the incidents of the waking -life, exaggerating them and contorting them, but never passing beyond -them, may not the somewhat uniform incidents of savage life, whether of -hunting, fishing, fighting, or travelling, offer some explanation of that -general similarity, which is so conspicuous an element in the comparative -mythology or the fairy-lore of the world? - -Then the fact that the dead reappear in dreams at that season of the -night in which also the stars are seen, would tend to confirm the -idea of some community of nature between the dead and the stars, such -community as is indeed not unfrequently found, as where the Aurora -Borealis or the Milky Way are identified with the souls of the departed. -So, too, a Californian tribe is mentioned as having believed that chiefs -and medicine-men became heavenly bodies after their death,[394] and even -Tasmanians could point to the stars they would go to at death.[395] - -But there is another reason which would still further create a mental -confusion between the deeds of a mortal on earth and the motions of some -luminary in heaven, and that is the language of adulation, which, from -ascribing the possession of the sky to a chief, in order to gratify -him, becomes imperceptibly the language of belief. It is common for the -Zulus to say of a chief, ‘That man is the owner of heaven and everything -is his,’ and a native once expressed his gratitude to a missionary by -pointing to the heaven and saying, ‘Sir, the sun is yours.’ ‘It does -not suffice them to honour a great man unless they place the heaven -on his shoulders; they do not believe what they say, they merely wish -to ascribe all greatness to him.’ If when a chief goes to war the sky -becomes overcast, they say, ‘The heaven of the chief feels that the -chief is suffering.’ Nor was any chief known to deprecate the use of -such language; he ‘expected to have it said always that the heaven was -his.’[396] - -Obviously, however, there is no fast line between the language of -flattery and the language of fact. From the Tahitians, who would speak of -their kings’ houses as the clouds of heaven, or the Kafirs of Ethiopia, -who called their kings lords of the sun and moon, it is easy to trace -the progress of thought which actually led the latter people to pray to -their kings for rain, fine weather, or the cessation of storms.[397] -The Zulus, like many other savages, think of the sky as at no great -distance from the earth, and thus as the roof of their king’s palace in -the same way that the earth is its floor. ‘Utshaka claimed to be king -of heaven as well as earth, and ordered the rain-doctors to be killed, -because in assuming power to control the weather they were interfering -with his royal prerogative.’[398] But if such confusion between royalty -and divinity can exist in the savage mind whilst the king is on earth, -how natural is it that a man, associated for so long in his lifetime -with power over the elements, should, after his removal from earth -and from sight, become still more mixed up with elemental forces, or -perhaps even localised in some point of space! The word Zulu actually -means the Heavens, and in Zululand King of the Zulus means king of the -heavens,[399] so that when the king is drawn in his waggon to the centre -of the kraal, it is not surprising that, among the other acclamations, -such as ‘Lion, King of the World,’ with which his creeping subjects -salute him, they should actually salute him as Zulu, Heaven.[400] It can -only be from the use of such language that among the Zulus ‘rain, storm, -sunshine, earthquakes, and all else which we ascribe to natural causes -are brought about or retarded by _various people_ to whom this power is -ascribed. Every rain that comes is spoken of as belonging to somebody, -and in a drought they say that the owners of rain are at variance among -themselves.’[401] - -That in aftertime, from these modes of thinking and speaking, the -attributes of a Zulu or Tahitian chief might become those of a -heaven-supporter, such as Atlas, or of a cloud-gatherer, such as Zeus, or -that, according as his body was consigned to the earth or the sea, such a -chief might become the earth-shaker or the ocean-ruler, is not only what -might be expected _à priori_, but what is to some extent justified by -facts. In South Africa the word which the missionaries have adopted for -both Hottentots and Kafirs as the name for the Deity, from its being the -nearest approach to the Christian conception, is believed to be derived -from two words signifying Wounded Knee, a term applied generations back -to a Hottentot sorcerer of great fame and skill, who happened to have -sustained some injury to his knees. ‘Having been held in high repute for -extraordinary powers during life, he (Utixo) continued to be invoked -even after death as one who could still relieve and protect; and hence -in process of time he became nearest to their first conceptions of -God.’[402] And the legend of Mannan Mac Lear, mythical first inhabitant -and first legislator of the Isle of Man, discloses a germ of similar -origin underlying the myth of a culture-hero, as his story preserved in -the following lines will show: - - ‘This merchant Manxman of the solemn smile, - First legislator of our rock-throned isle, - Dwelt in a fort (withdrawn from vulgar sight), - Cloud-capped Baroole, upon thy lofty height. - From New Year tide round to the Ides of Yule, - Nature submitted to his wizard rule. - Her secret force he could with charms compel - To brew a storm or raging tempests quell; - Make one man seem like twenty in a fray, - And drive the stranger (_i.e._ Scotch invaders) over seas away.’[403] - -In other words, he was a great sorcerer and a great warrior, whose deeds -lived after him in story, and whose name lent itself as a nucleus, like -that of Charlemagne or of Alfred, for every adventure that was strange, -for every imagination that was wonderful. - -There seems, indeed, no reason to seek for any higher genesis than this -for any of the culture-heroes of any mythology, notwithstanding that they -have with so much unanimity been forced into identification with the sun. -Zeus himself means but the same thing as Zulu, namely, the Sky or Heaven, -so that it is only natural that nothing that could be told of the sky -‘was not in some form or other ascribed to Zeus,’[404] just as we see -that modern Zulus ascribe to their chiefs all atmospheric phenomena, and -actually confer on them the appellation, Zulu. There is indeed nothing -in which Zeus differs essentially from Manabozho of North American -mythology, from Krishna of the Hindus, from Maui of the Polynesians, from -Quawteaht of the rude Ahts, or from Kutka of the still ruder Kamschadals. -The stories told of one may be more refined than those told of another, -but in no case are these divinities more than names, which serve as -convenient centres for the grouping of memorable feats or fictions. -Such names serve also, when once men have begun to reflect on the arts -or customs of their lives, as sufficient explanations of their origin; -and just as we find the institution of marriage attributed in China, or -Greece, or India to some mythical hero, so we find the discovery of fire -and light, or the invention of remarkable arts, duly ascribed to some -hypothetical originator. In Polynesian mythology, Maui, in Thlinkeet -Indian mythology, Yehl, played the part of Prometheus in procuring fire -for the use of men. From seeing a spider make its web, Manabozho invented -the art of making fishing nets; and Kutka (who, like Manabozho, is also -in some sense the maker of all things) taught the Kamschadals how to -build huts, how to catch birds, and beasts, and fish.[405] The supreme -deity of Finnish mythology not only brought fire for men from heaven but -was the inventor of music; yet like the other gods he was but a magician, -able to destroy the world at pleasure, to hold the sun captive in a box, -to conquer all monsters and heal all diseases.[406] - -American mythology abounds in culture-heroes, mythical personages who -taught men useful arts and laws, and left, in the reverence attached to -their memory, a quasi-religious system for their posterity.[407] These -too have been resolved into observation of the phenomena of the sun or -the dawn. Manabozho or Michabo, the ancestor of the Algonquins, whose -name literally means the Great Hare, and conferred peculiar respect on -the clan who bore it as their totem, means in reality (according to this -theory) the Great Light, the Spirit of Dawn, or under another aspect -the North-west Wind; the confusion between the hare and the dawn being -supposed to have arisen from a root _wab_, which gave two words, one -meaning _white_ and the other _hare_, so that what was originally told -of the White Light came to be told of a Hare, and what was at first but -a personification of natural phenomena became a tissue of inconsistent -absurdities.[408] Ingenious, however, as such a solution undoubtedly is, -it is easier to believe that the stories of the Great Hare have grown -round a man, called, in complete accordance with American custom, after -the hare, and once a famous sorcerer or warrior like Mannan Mac Lear; -for in all the more recent traditions of him, there is much more of the -magician or shaman than of the wind or the dawn. He turns at will into a -wolf or an oak stump, he converses with all creation, he outwits serpents -by his cunning, he has a lodge from which he utters oracles; as brother -of the winds, by reason of his swiftness, there is no incongruity in -the idea that since his death he is the director of storms, and resides -in the region of his brother, the North Wind. It is curious that he -is swallowed up by the king of the fish, in this resembling in Aryan -mythology Pradyumna, the son of Vishnu, who after being swallowed by a -fish is ultimately restored to life,[409] or in Polynesian mythology -Maui, who is rescued by the sky from the embrace of the jelly fish. Maui, -like Tell, Sigurd, Hercules, and others, has recently been discovered -to be the sun, the fish which swallows him signifying really the earth; -for does not the earth swallow the sun every night, and is not the sun -only freed by the eastern sky in the morning?[410] Doubtless, on such a -reading of his life, Manabozho has as just a claim as Mani to a place in -the solar system; but then—who that has ever lived and died but has the -same? - -Samé, the great name of Brazilian legend, came across the ocean from -the rising sun; he had power over the elements and tempests; the trees -of the forests would recede to make room for him, the animals used to -crouch before him; lakes and rivers became solid for him; and he taught -the use of agriculture and magic. Like him, Bochica, the great lawgiver -of the Muyscas and son of the sun, he who invented for them their -calendar and regulated their festivals, had a white beard, a detail in -which all the American culture-heroes agree.[411] It is not, however, -on this particular feature, so much as on their _whiteness_ in general -that stress has been laid to identify them with the great White Light of -Dawn. Of the Mexican Quetzalcoatl, Dr. Brinton says, ‘Like all the dawn -heroes he, too, was represented of white complexion, clothed in long -white robes.’ The white is the emphatic thing about them. So the name -Viracocha of the Peruvians, translated by Oviedo, ‘the foam of the sea,’ -is, we are to believe, a metaphor: ‘the dawn rises above the horizon as -the snowy foam on the surface of the lake.’[412] But Peruvian tradition -was confused as to whether Viracocha was the highest god and creator of -the world, or only the first Inca; and such confusion between humanity -and divinity, which is everywhere the normal result of the deification of -the dead, is at least a more natural account of the origin of his worship -than a fancied resemblance between the sea-foam and the dawn.[413] Heitsi -Eibip, whom the Namaqua Hottentots call their Great Father, and on whose -graves they throw stones for luck, so far resembles a solar hero that -he is believed to have come like Samé from the East; yet, though much -that is wonderful already attaches to his memory, he has not yet thrown -off his human personality, but is known to have been merely a sorcerer -of great fame;[414] so that in his deification we have almost living -evidence of the process here assumed to have operated widely in the -formation of the world’s mythology. - -To the influence of the language of adulation in the formation of -mythology, may also be added that of the language of affection or of -ridicule. Nicknames, taken at hazard from the animal world, or from any -object of earth, air, or water, would be obvious sources of improbable -stories, tending to the completest confusion between the doings of a -man and the attributes of the thing after which he was named. Nicknames -of affection would produce the same result; and if, as is likely, -other people besides the Finns call their daughters Moon, Sunshine, or -Water-glimmer, it is easy to see how, for instance, the departure of -Sunshine as a bride might come afterwards to be explained as a myth of -the dawn or of twilight, and in the same way anything else that happened -to her.[415] - -An elemental explanation has been applied with such uniform effect, -first to Aryan and then to Polynesian and American mythology, that in -the resort to a more natural, albeit less poetical hypothesis, there may -be danger of carrying opposing theories too far. There are, however, -certain obvious limits; nor, if we doubt whether man in a primitive state -really had the poetical views of nature so generally claimed for him, -need we deny to him all poetical origination in the construction of his -mythology. Take, for instance, this typical Aryan passage, ‘By the early -Aryan mind the howling wind was conceived as a great dog or wolf. As the -fearful beast was heard speeding by the windows or over the house-top, -the inmates trembled, for none knew but his own soul might forthwith be -required of him. Hence to this day, among ignorant people, the howling -of a dog is supposed to portend a death in the family.’[416] When we -find that a dog’s howling portends the death of its master among the -Nubians,[417] and is regarded as a dreaded omen by the Kamschadals,[418] -as well as by the Fijians,[419] and that the Esquimaux lay a dog’s head -by the grave of a child to show it the way to the land of souls, we may -safely reject the Aryan pedigree of the superstition, nor go any farther -for its explanation than the nature of the sound itself. But though -Aryan mythology may be taken to have grown, like any other, round human -personalities, and though popular superstitions are in many instances -the primary products of the laws of psychology, ranking rather among -the sources than the _débris_ of mythology, there is proof from the -fairy-lore of savages that some of them have so far advanced in thought -as to be not incapable of personifying abstract ideas. Dr. Rink alludes -to the tendency of the Esquimaux to give figurative explanations of -things, to personify, for instance, human qualities, just as they are -personified in the ‘Pilgrim’s Progress.’[420] The Chippewya Indians -personified sleep as Weeng, a giant insect that was once seen on a tree -in a wood, where it made a murmuring sound with its wings; and it was -generally conceived to cause sleep by sending a number of little fairies -to beat drowsy foreheads with their tiny clubs.[421] And the Odjibwas, -with a fancy which has been so poetically preserved by Longfellow, -identified Winter with an old hoary-headed man called Peboan, Spring with -a young man of quick step and rosy face called Segwun.[422] - -The testimony, therefore, afforded by the observation of modern savage -races as to the growth of mythology discloses several ways in which, -as it is being formed now, we may infer that it was formed thousands -of years ago. The evidence of Steller that the Kamschadals explained -everything to themselves according to the liveliness of their fancy, -letting nothing escape their examination,[423] accords with evidence -concerning other races to the effect that some intellectual curiosity -enters as a constituent into the lowest human intelligence, giving birth -to explanations which are as absurd to us as they are natural to their -original framers. A ready capacity for invention is no rare trait of the -savage character. Sir G. Grey found that the capability of Australian -natives to invent marvels and wonders was proportioned to the quantity -of food he offered them, and that rather than confess ignorance of a -thing they would _invent_ a tradition;[424] whilst in the fondness of the -Koranna Hottentots, as they sit round their evening fires, of relating -fictitious adventures, lies a source of legendary lore which is not -likely to be limited to South Africa, and is probably aided elsewhere as -it is there by the knowledge, common to so many savage tribes, of the -preparation of intoxicating drinks.[425] If to these sources of mythology -be added the help supplied by dreams to the elaboration of fiction; the -misconceptions effected in traditions by the language of flattery, of -affection, or of ridicule; and, lastly, the tendency, probably consequent -on such confusion, to personify things or even abstract ideas; the wonder -will no longer be that the mythology of the different races of the world -displays so much uniformity, but that uniformity within limited ranges -should ever have been taken as a proof of a common ethnological origin. - - - - -IX. - -_COMPARATIVE FOLK-LORE._ - - -Folk-lore is often explained as the remains of ancient mythology, but -the explanation, though perhaps true of some traditional lore still -surviving in legends and fairy tales, seems of doubtful application to -those popular superstitions yet so prevalent among us, of which our -kitchens, our cottages, and our nurseries are the chief depositories. -Beliefs, fancies, and customs, however trivial in themselves, and locally -absurd, gain an interest from the area they cover and the races they -connect; suggesting past unions between nations now remote, in the same -way as the smallest weeds are capable of telling, by their geographical -dispersion, of lands that once stretched where seas now roll. To take -some instances. The English tradition that a swallow’s nest is lucky, -and its life protected by imaginary penalties, is one that in isolation -we should naturally and rightly disregard. But when we find that the -belief belongs to Germany, and that the supposed penalties are the same -in Yorkshire as they are in Swabia, our wonder is aroused; and when we -further learn that in China, too, the swallow’s nest is lucky and its -life inviolate, we become aware of a possible history and antiquity -attaching to the superstition, which offer an inviting field for -speculation and study. The belief, that the first appearance of mice in -a house betokens death, becomes of interest when we find it in Russia as -well as in Devonshire. Mothers there are both in Germany and in England -who fear their children may grow up to be thieves if their nails are cut -before their first year is over. Such superstitions, as we call them, -had, without doubt, once a reason; in some cases still to be traced, in -others effaced by the wear and tear of time. By the application to them -of the comparative method not only may we hope to explain and connect -ideas otherwise inexplicable, but also to come to conclusions not -uninteresting from an archæological point of view. For if it can be shown -that they are the remains of ancient barbarism rather than of ancient -mythology, their testimony may be added to that, long since given by the -more material relics and witnesses of early times, concerning the general -history of civilisation. - -For the existence of similar traditions as of similar fairy-tales in -widely remote districts there are three possible hypotheses. These are, -migration, community of origin, or similarity of development. Either -they have spread from one place to another, or they are the legacies of -times when the people possessing them were actually united, or they have -sprung up independently in different localities, in virtue of the natural -laws of mental growth. It may be difficult of any given belief to say to -which of these three classes it belongs; but there are many beliefs, so -alike in general features, yet so divergent in detail, as best to accord -with the theory of a common descent or a common development. Some, for -instance, may be so common to the different nations of one stock, as to -be traceable to periods anterior to their dispersion; whilst others, yet -more widely spread than these, suggest relationships between races of men -more fundamental and remote than can be detected in language, and point -to an affinity that is older and stronger than mere affinity of blood, an -affinity, that is, in the conceptions and fancies of primitive thought. -For where actual relationship is not proved by language, analogies in -tradition are better accounted for by supposing similar grooves of mental -development than by any other theory. Philology may prove a relationship -between, let us say, the Nixens of Germany and the Nisses of Scandinavia: -but there is no relationship beyond similarity of conception between -the Nereids of antiquity and the mermaids of the North, or between the -Brownies of Scotland and the Lares of Latium. Children, of whatever race -or country they may be, dislike the dark, nor is it thought necessary to -account for this common trait by any theory of connection or descent. -So it is with nations. They are or were, in the face of nature, but as -children in the dark, and the nearly similar phenomena of sun and storm, -breeze and calm, have sufficed to create for them, in their several -homes, many of those fears and fancies we find common to them all. - -No one who has not turned special attention to the subject, can form -any conception of the mass of purely pagan ideas, which, varnished over -by Christianity, but barely hidden by it, grow in rank profusion in our -very midst and exercise a living hold, which it is impossible either to -realise or to fathom, on the popular mind. Like old Roman or British -remains, buried under subsequent accumulations of earth and stones, or -superficially concealed by an overgrowth of herbage, uninjured during -all the length of time they have lain unobserved, there they lie just -beneath the surface of nineteenth-century life, as indelible records -of our mental history and origin. Only in the higher social strata can -they be deemed extinct; but if it can no longer be said, as it was in -the seventeenth century, that most houses of the West-end of London have -the horse-shoe on the threshold,[426] yet it may still be said of many -a farm or cottage in the country. The astronomer Tycho Brahe, if he met -an old woman or hare on leaving home, would take the hint to turn back: -but it seems to be only the working population of England, Scotland, -or Germany who still do the same. Statistics show that the receipts of -omnibus and railway companies in France are less on Friday than on any -other day; and many a German that lay dead on the carnage fields of the -late war was found to have carried his word-charm as his safest shield -against sword or bullet. Most English villages still have their wise men -or women, whose powers range, like those of the shamans in savage tribes, -from ruling the planets to curing rheumatics or detecting thieves; and -witchcraft still has its believers, occasionally its victims, as of -yore.[427] - -We who have been brought up to look upon the classification of things -into animal, vegetable, and mineral, as primary, or indeed intuitive, -are apt to forget that savages never classify, and that animate and -inanimate to them are both alike. Sir John Lubbock has collected -conclusive evidence that so inconceivable a confusion of thought -exists.[428] The Tahitians, who sowed some iron nails that young ones -might grow from them; the Esquimaux, who thought a musical-box the child -of a small hand-organ; the Bushmen, who mistook a large waggon for the -mother of some smaller ones, show the tendency of savages to identify -motion with life, and to attribute feelings and relations such as actuate -or connect themselves to everything that moves of itself or is capable of -being moved. A native sent by one missionary to another with some loaves, -and a letter stating the number, having eaten two of them and been -detected through the letter, took the precaution the next time to put the -letter under a stone that it might not _see_ the theft committed.[429] -Now there are numerous superstitions, which there is reason to think are -relics of this savage state of thought, when all that existed existed -under the same conditions as man himself, capable of the same feelings, -and subject to the same wants and sorrows. Take, for example, bees. Bees -are credited with a perfect comprehension of all that men do and utter, -and, as members themselves of the family they belong to, they must -be treated in every way as human in their emotions. On the day of the -Purification in France it is customary in some parts for women to read -the Gospel of the day to the bees.[430] French children are taught that -the inmates of the hive will come out to sting them for any bad language -uttered within their hearing; and in South Russia it is believed ‘that -if any robbery be committed where a number of hives are kept, the whole -stock will gradually diminish, and in a short time die; for bees, they -say, will not suffer thieving.’[431] Many persons have probably at some -time of their lives, on seeing a crape-covered hive, learnt on inquiry -that the bees were in mourning for some member of their owner’s family. -In Suffolk, when a death occurs in a house, the inmates immediately -tell the bees, ask them formally to the funeral, and fix crape on their -hives; otherwise it is believed they would die or desert. And the same -custom, for the same reason, prevails, with local modifications, not only -in nearly every English county, but very widely over the continent. In -Normandy and Brittany may be seen, as in England, the crape-set hives; -in Yorkshire some of the funeral bread, in Lincolnshire some cake and -sugar, may be seen at the hive door; and a Devonshire nurse on her way -to a funeral has been known to send back a child to perform the duty -she herself had forgotten, of telling the bees. The usual explanation -of these customs and ideas is that they originated long ago with the -death or flight of some bees, consequent on the neglect they incurred -when the hand that once tended them could do so no longer. Yet a wider -survey of analogous facts leads to the explanation above suggested; for, -not to dwell on the fact that in some places in England they are informed -of weddings as well as of funerals, and their hives are decorated with -favours as well as with crape, the practice of giving information of -deaths extends in some parts not only to other animals as well, but, in -addition, to inanimate things. In Lithuania, deaths are announced, not -only to the bees, but to horses and cattle, by the rattling of a bunch of -keys, and the same custom is reported from Dartford in Kent. In the North -Riding, not long since, a farmer gravely attributed the loss of a cow -to his not having told it of his wife’s death. In Cornwall, the indoor -plants are often put into mourning as well as the hives; and at Rauen, in -North Germany, not only are the bees informed of their master’s death, -but the trees also, by means of shaking them. Near Speier, not only must -the bees be moved, but the wine and vinegar must be shaken, if it is -wished that they shall not turn bad. Near Würtemburg, the vinegar must be -shaken, the bird-cage hung differently, the cattle tied up differently, -and the beehive transposed. Near Ausbach the flower-pots must also -be moved, and the wine-casks knocked three times; while at Gernsheim, -not only must the wine in the cellar be shaken, to prevent it turning -sour, but the corn in the loft must be moved if the sown corn is to -sprout.[432] But all these customs, being too much alike to be unrelated, -and too widely spread to have sprung up without some reason, by some mere -caprice or coincidence, it is difficult to suggest any other reason for -them than that they go back to a time when not only bees and cattle, but -trees and flowers, vinegar and wine, were, like human beings, considered -liable to take offence, and capable also of being pacified by kind -treatment, since, according as their several temperaments predisposed -them, they were able, by deserting, dying, turning sour, or other -untoward conduct, to resent neglect or disrespect on the part of their -owners. Such beliefs belong to the lowest state of mental development, to -a time when the most obvious marks of natural differentiation were as yet -insufficient to produce corresponding distinctions in the minds of their -beholders. - -Other popular traditions strengthen this interpretation. In Normandy -and Brittany it is thought that bees will not suffer themselves to be -bought or sold; in other words, that they would take offence if made the -subjects of sale and barter.[433] The same belief prevails in Cheshire, -Suffolk, Hampshire, Cornwall, and Devonshire, like the old Russian -rule that sacred images might not be spoken of as ‘bought’ but only as -‘exchanged for money.’[434] The value of bees is measured, not by money, -but by corn, hay, or some other exchangeable commodity; in Sussex, if any -money is given for bees, it must be gold. Connected with this idea of -the quasi-humanity of bees is the world-wide fear of slighting dangerous -animals by calling them by their customary names. Mahometan women dare -not call a snake a snake lest they should be bitten by one; Swedish -women avert the wrath of bears by speaking of them as old men. Livonian -fishermen, when at sea, fear to endanger their nets by calling any animal -by its common name. At Mecklenburg, in the twelve days after Christmas, -the fox goes by the appellation of the ‘Long Tail;’ even the timid mouse -by that of the ‘Floor-runner.’ The Esthonians at all times call the fox -‘Gray Coat,’ the bear ‘Broad-foot,’ and should they take the liberty of -too often mentioning the hare, their flax crops, they fear, would be in -peril. In Sweden people dare not mention to anyone in the course of the -day the number of fish they have caught, if they would catch any more; a -feeling to which is probably related the North-Country prejudice against -counting one’s fish before the day’s sport is over. - -Witchcraft, although it represents a very low stage of religious -conception, yet in its primary idea of a sympathy or identity existing -between an original and its image, manifests some degree of intellectual -advancement. For the idea of vicarious or representative influence, -that if you wish to injure a man you can do so by an injury to a bit of -his clothing or a lock of his hair, is, so far as it goes, a spiritual -idea, presupposing notions about the interdependence of nature, and as -far as possible removed from what we understand by mere materialism. -Materialism indeed is one of the latest growths of the human mind, whilst -spiritualism is one of its earliest. For to a savage, everything that -exists lives and feels like himself, and the unseen spirits that surround -and affect him are as the motes in a sunbeam for variety and number. The -native Indian speaks of the earth as ‘the big plate where all the spirits -eat.’[435] Yet the fetichistic mode of thought is undoubtedly a low, and -to us an absurd one. Burnings in effigy may probably be traced to it, and -the stories so common in the annals of witchcraft of waxen images stuck -with pins or burned, in order to injure the person they represented, -undoubtedly belong to it. In America Kane found an Indian tribe who -believed that the hair of an enemy confined with a frog in a hole would -cause the owner of the hair to suffer the torments of the frog.[436] In -the Fiji Islands the health of a person can be made to fail with the -decay of a cocoa-nut buried under a temple.[437] The Finns are said to -this day to shoot in the water at images of their absent enemies. But -our own country has its analogies. In Suffolk, in the last century, if -an animal was thought to be bewitched, it was burned over a large fire, -under the idea that as it consumed away the author of its bewitchment -would consume away too. In Anglesey it is still believed that the name -of a person inscribed on a pipkin, containing a live frog stuck full of -pins, will injuriously affect the bearer of the name. - -There are a numerous set of popular traditions which clearly relate to -the same state of thought. There is a feeling so wide that it may be -called European, that cut hair should always be burned, never thrown -away: the reason given in France, in the Netherlands, in Denmark, and -near Saalfeld in Germany, being, that its discovery by a witch would -subject its owner to sorcery; that generally given in England and also -in Swabia being, that if a bird took any of it for its nest the bearer -would suffer from headache or lose the rest of his hair. A similar idea -prevails about teeth: all over England children are taught to throw -extracted teeth into the fire, lest a dog by swallowing them should -induce the toothache. So with the nail that has scratched you, or the -knife that has cut you,—keep the nail or knife free from rust, and the -wound will not fester. But all such ideas are explained by those actually -existent in savage parts, by the custom, for instance, of the Fijians -of hiding their cut hair in the thatch of the house, that it may not be -used against them in witchcraft, or by the practice of Zulu sorcerers -to destroy their victims by burying some of his hair, his nails, or his -dress in a secret place, that the decay of the one may ensure that of -the other. And a similar philosophy lies at the root of most popular -charms for certain complaints. The remedies for warts, for instance, are -all vicarious. Both at home and abroad the most usual method is to rub -a black snail on the wart, and then to hang it on a hedge, trusting to -the sympathetic decay of the wart and snail. But a piece of stolen raw -meat, a stalk of wheat or a hair with as many knots in them as there are -warts on the hand, or two apple halves tied together, will, if applied -to the part and then buried, cause effectual relief. The essential thing -is to ensure the decay of the representative object. In Somersetshire a -good ague cure is to shut up a large black spider in a box and leave it -to perish, that spider and ague may disappear together. In many places, -it is thought that the whooping-cough may be transferred to a hairy -caterpillar tied in a bag round the neck: as the insect dies the cough -will go. And in Devonshire some of the patient’s hair is given to a dog -between two slices of buttered bread, that the dog may take the hair -and the cough together; whilst in Sunderland the head is shaved and the -hair (risking we must suppose a headache) left on a bush for the birds -to carry off, that the cough itself may pass to them. May it not be said -that such customs and fancies betray a mental constitution radically -different from our present one, taking us back and ever reminding us of -the savagery of our lineage as surely as do flint-flakes or bone-needles, -and teaching us that only by the slowest degrees can emancipation be -achieved from the superstitions, or, as some think, from the poetry, of -ignorance? - -Again, trees, stones, waters, stars, serpents, or animals, are all to -this day worshipped far and wide by uncivilised races, and the marks -of a similar object-worship by our own race still survive in many a -popular tradition. A law of Canute earnestly forbade the heathenship of -reverencing ‘the sun or moon, fire or flood, waterwhylls, or stones, -or trees of the wood of any sort;’ yet, if such things are no longer -worshipped, it may be certainly said that some of them are still -reverenced. To take, for instance, tree-worship. Both in Guiana and -Africa the natives have so superstitious a reverence for the silk cotton -tree that they fear to cut it down lest death should ensue.[438] In New -Zealand mythology, Rata was rebuked and put to shame by the spirits -of the forest for cutting down a tall tree-divinity for making his -canoe.[439] The trees which occupy the most prominent place in European -folk-lore are the elder, the thorn, and the rowan or mountain ash. In -Denmark a twig of elder placed silently in the ground is a popular cure -for toothache or ague, whilst no furniture, least of all a cradle, may -be made of its wood; for the tree is protected by the Elder-mother, -without whose consent not a leaf may be touched, and who would strangle -the baby as it lay asleep. So also about Chemnitz, elder boughs fixed -before stalls keep witchcraft from the cattle; and wreaths of it hung up -in houses on Good Friday, after sunset, are believed to confer immunity -from the ravages of caterpillars. In Suffolk, it is the safest tree to -stand under in a thunderstorm, and misfortune will ensue if ever it is -burned. The legend that the cross was made of its wood is evidently an -aftergrowth, an attempt, of which we have so many examples, to give a -Christian colour to a heathen practice; for the elder was the tree under -which, in pre-Christian times, the old Prussian Earth-god was fabled to -dwell. Like the elder, the whitethorn was once an object of worship, for -it too is held to be scatheless in storms; and how else can we account -for the fact that in Switzerland, as in the Eastern counties of England, -to bring its flowers into a house is thought to bring death, than by -supposing it was once a tree too sacred to be touched, and likely to -avenge in some way the profanation that was done to it? Too deeply rooted -in popular veneration for its sacred character to disappear, the Church, -in course of time, wound its own legend round it, and by the fiction that -its wood had composed the Crown of Thorns, deprived the worship of its -heathen sting. But if round the elder and the thorn feelings of reverence -once gathered and still linger, yet more is it true of the rowan. In -England, Germany, and Sweden its leaves are still the most potent -instrument against the darker powers: Highlanders still insert crosses of -it with red thread in the lining of their clothes, and Cornish peasants -still carry some in their pocket and wind it round the horns of their -cattle in order to keep off evil eyes. In Lancashire sprigs of it are for -the same reason hung up at bedheads, and the churn staff is generally -made of its wood. It used to stand in nearly every churchyard in Wales, -and crosses of it were regularly distributed on Christian festivals as -sure preservatives against evil spirits. But this is another attempt to -Christianise what was heathen, for the ancient Danes always used some of -it for their ships, to secure them against the storms which Rân, the -great Ocean God’s wife, with her net for capsized mariners, was ever -ready and desirous to raise. The rowan in heathen mythology was called -Thor’s Helper, because it bent to his grasp in his passage over a flooded -river on his way to the land of the Frost Giants; and it has been thought -that the later sanctity of the tree may be due to the place it occupied -in mythological fancy. Yet it seems more reasonable to trace the myth to -a yet older superstition than to trace the superstition to the myth. For -from the exceeding beauty of their berries the rowan and the elder and -the thorn would naturally impress the savage mind with the feelings of -actual divinity, and would consequently lend themselves to the earliest -imaginings about the universe of things. It is more likely that they -progressed from a divinity on earth to their position in mythology than -from their position in mythology to a divinity on earth, for the mind -is capable of employing things for worship long before it is capable of -employing them for fable. Worship is the product of fear, and fable of -fancy; and before men can indulge in fancy they must to some extent have -cast off fear. - -Certain traditions relating to birds and beasts are only explicable on -the supposition that they were once objects of divination or worship. -The old Germans, we know from Tacitus, used white horses, as the Romans -used chickens, for purposes of augury, and divined future events from -different intonations of neighings. Hence it probably is that the -discovery of a horse-shoe is so universally thought lucky, some of -the feelings that once attached to the animal still surviving round -the iron of its hoof. For horses, like dogs or birds, were invariably -accredited with a greater insight into futurity than man himself; and the -many superstitions connected with the flight or voice of birds resolve -themselves into the fancy, not inconceivable among men surrounded on all -sides by unintelligible tongues, that birds were the bearers of messages -and warnings to men, which skill and observation might hope to interpret. -Why is the robin’s life and nest sacred, and why does an injury to either -bring about bloody milk, lightning, or rain? It has been suggested that -the robin, on account of its colour, was once sacred to Thor, the god -of lightning; but it is possible that its red breast singled it out for -worship from among birds, just as its red berries the rowan from among -trees, long before its worshippers had arrived at any ideas of abstract -divinities. All over the world there is a regard for things red. Captain -Cook noticed a predilection for red feathers throughout all the islands -of the Pacific.[440] In the Highlands women tie some red thread round -the cows’ tails before turning them out to grass in spring, and tie red -silk round their own fingers to keep off the witches: and just as in -Esthonia, mothers put some red thread in their babies’ cradles, so in -China they tie some round their children’s wrists, and teach them to -regard red as the best known safeguard against evil spirits. - -One, indeed, of the chief lessons of Comparative Folk-Lore is a caution -against the theory which deduces popular traditions from Aryan or other -mythology. The fact has been already alluded to, that in parts of China -the same feelings prevail about the swallow as in England or Germany. But -there are yet other analogies between the East and the West. A crowing -hen is an object of universal dislike in England and Brittany; and few -families in China will keep a crowing hen.[441] The owl’s voice is -ominous of death or other calamity in England and Germany, as it was in -Greece (except at Athens); but in the Celestial Empire also it presages -death, and is regarded as the bird which calls for the soul. And the crow -also is in China a bird of ill omen. Is it not therefore likely that -all popular fancies about birds and animals have begun in the same way, -among the same or different races of the globe, and were subsequently -adopted but never originated by mythology? May it not be that certain -birds or animals became prominent in mythology because they had already -been prominent in superstition, rather than that they became prominent -in superstition because they previously had been prominent in mythology? -For instance, instead of tracing a dog’s howling as a death omen to an -Aryan belief that the dog guided the soul from its earthly tenement to -its abode in heaven, may we not suppose that the myth arose from an -already existing omen, and that the latter arose, as omens still do, -from a coincidence which suggested a connection, subsequently sustained -by superficial observation? The St. Swithin fallacy, which arose within -historical memory and still holds its ground in an age of scientific -observation, well illustrates how one striking coincidence may grow -into a belief, which no amount of later evidence can weaken or destroy. -Just so, if it happened that a dog howled shortly before some calamity -occurred to our Aryan forefathers, thousands and thousands of years ago, -long before they had attained to any thoughts of soul or heaven, we can -well imagine that the dog, thus thought to betoken death, should, when -they came to frame the myth, be conceived as the guide which was waiting -for the soul to take it to heaven, and that the belief thus perpetuated -by the myth might survive to the latest ages. - -There is abundant evidence in the practices to this very day, or till -lately, prevalent in England and Europe, that the worship of the sun -or of fire fills a large part in primitive religion. The passing of -children through the fire is not only a Semitic custom, but extends -wherever the human mind has attained to the idea of purification -and sacrifice. Some North American tribes used to burn to the sun a -man-offering in the spring, to the moon a woman-offering in the autumn, -expressing thereby their sense of the blessings of light and a desire -for their continuance. And traces of such fire-worship and of its -accompanying human sacrifices lasted in Europe into the very heart of -this century, and in many places still survive. The similarity that -exists between them, both in their seasons and mode of observance, -illustrates the marvellous sameness of ideas which may so often be found -among people in widely remote districts of the globe. - -The three great festivals of the Druids took place on Mayday Eve, on -Midsummer Eve, and on All Hallow-e’en. On those days went up from cairns, -foothills, and Belenian heights fires and sacrifices to the sun-god -Beal: and from such fires the lord of the neighbourhood would take the -entrails of the sacrificed animal, and, walking barefoot over the ashes, -carry them to the Druid who presided over the ceremonies. These fires -have descended to us as the famous Beltane fires, lit still, or till -lately, in Ireland, Scotland, Northern England, and Cornwall, on the -eve of the summer solstice and at the equinoxes, usually on hill tops, -with rejoicing and merriment and leaping through the flames on the part -of all ages and sexes of the population.[442] It is possible that this -leaping through the flames is a relic of the time when men fell victims -to them, a modification of the more barbarous custom. In the Highlands, -where at the Beltane feast an oatmeal cake is toasted and portions of -it drawn for blindfold by the company as they sit in a trench round a -grass table, whosoever is the drawer of that portion which has been -purposely toasted black is devoted to Baal to be sacrificed, and must -leap perforce three times through the flames. In the same country it is, -or was, customary on Yeule or Christmas Eve to burn in a cartload of -lighted peat the stump of an old tree, which went by the name of Callac -Nollic, or Christmas Old Wife. And in several Continental traditions -we find the memory of a sacrifice still adhering to Midsummer Eve, or -St. John the Baptist’s Vigil. On that day, in Livonia, one or two old -boats were burned to the songs and dances of young and old; whilst at -Reichenbach, in the Voightland, a May-pole, planted on the green, was, -after similar festivities, thrown into the water. On the same day many -watermen still refrain from committing themselves to the Elbe, the -Unstrut, or the Elster, from the belief that upon that day those rivers -require a sacrifice; and the Saale is avoided for the same reason on -Walpurgis, or Mayday Eve, as well. From the latter cases we may infer -that, where rivers flowed near, a sacrifice by water was as usual as one -by fire, which possibly explains the custom so common in many places in -connection with these Beltane fires of rolling something lighted down a -hill, and, if possible, into a river. At Conz, on the Moselle, a burning -wheel was rolled down the hill into the river, and Scotch children at -the Beltane feast used to roll their bannocks three times down a hill -before consuming them round a good fire of heath and brushwood. So in -Swabia, wheels of lighted straw were rolled down the Frauenberg, and on -Scheiblen-Sonntag the young people still go by night to a hill, and after -dancing and singing round a fire, swing wooden wheels by means of a stick -round and round till they are thoroughly alight, and then fling them down -the hill. In North Germany, where the fires take place at Easter instead -of at Midsummer, lighted tar-barrels are rolled down the Osterberge. -The Church, to sanctify these fires, made the day of John the Baptist -coincident with Midsummer-day, and taught that the heathen customs were -symbolical of Christian doctrine. The fires themselves signified the -Baptist, that burning and shining light who was to precede the true -light; whilst the rolling wheels, as they represented the gradual descent -of the sun in heaven after it had reached the highest point, so they -illustrated the diminution of the fame of John, who was at first thought -to be the real Messiah, till on his own testimony he said, ‘He must -increase, but I must decrease.’ It has even been attempted in recent -times to show that the Midsummer fires, in spite of all their heathen -surroundings, were really of Christian origin, and in some way connected -with John the Baptist. The two chief objections to this theory are, the -survival of heathen names for the fires, as for instance, among others, -the name Himmelsfeuer, and not the usual Johannisfeuer, in one of the -districts of Upper Swabia, and also the close analogy, both in the idea -and mode of purification, which exists between the Midsummer fire for men -and the Needfires for cattle. - -Needfires were fires through which cattle were driven if any disease -broke out amongst them. Such a fire was lit in Mull in 1767, and was not -only the method lately employed in Lower Saxony, but is said to be still -actually prevalent in Caithness. It would thus appear that after the -sacrifice to fire had been modified into the custom of passing through or -over it, the newer mode of cure gradually found its explanation in the -idea, that fire was a healing or purifying agent on account of its power -to drive away those evil spirits, which in savage estimation cause or -constitute natural disease. The essential thing was that all fires in the -neighbourhood should be first extinguished and new ones relit by means of -friction for the cattle to go through. The virtue lay in the new virgin -fire uncontaminated by previous use for any purpose whatsoever; and the -Forlorn Fires, which are said to be still lighted in Scotland when any -_man_ thinks himself the victim of witchcraft,[443] agree closely in -ceremonial with the Needfires for cattle. A notice having been given to -all the householders within the two nearest streams to extinguish all -lights and fires on a given morning, the sufferer and his friends on the -day cause the emission of new fire by a spinning-wheel or other means -of friction, and having spread it from some tow to a candle, thence to -a torch, and from the torch to a peatload, send it by messengers to -the expectant houses. But exactly similar purificatory effects were -attributed to the Midsummer fires. As far as their light reached, crops -enjoyed immunity from sorcery for a year, and the ashes collected from -them were a constant insurance against calamities of all sorts. Leaping -through them was held to avert malignant spirits for a year, and in many -places not only did men leap, but cattle were driven, through the flames. -Both America and Africa supply curious analogues to the Needfires of -Scotland. In the former the Mayas at a festivity in honour of their gods -of agriculture danced about the ashes of a burnt pile of wood, and passed -barefooted over the coals with or without injury, believing that thus -they would avert misfortune and appease the anger of the gods.[444] And -among the Hottentots Kolbe attests the custom of driving sheep through a -fire, and though the reason told to him for it was, the warding off the -attacks of wild dogs by the smell of smoke, the other ceremonies usual -on the occasion suggest the interpretation applicable to the Scotch -custom.[445] Purification by passing between two fires was also a custom -of the Tartars.[446] - -Hence there is reason to think that the Midsummer fires were simply -annual and public Needfires, resembling the yearly harvest feasts of -the Creeks of North America, among whom, as among the ancients who -annually imported fresh fire from Delos to Lemnos, there was an idea -of a new and purified life commencing with a new and pure flame, after -all fires, debased by their subservience to human needs, had been first -extinguished. The Minnetarees at their feast of the new corn made a new -fire by drilling the end of a stick into a piece of hard wood;[447] and -the Sioux at their sacred feasts were wont to remove all fire from the -lodge and rekindle a fresh fire before cooking the food, in order to have -nothing unclean at the feast.[448] In India the Nagas, when they clear a -fresh piece of jungle, first put out their old fires, and produce a new -fire by friction, that of ordinary domestic use not being considered pure -enough for the purpose.[449] - -The same idea has been found among the Indian tribes of South America. -There it was the duty of the high-priests ‘to guard the Eternal Fire in -the Rotunda; and, in the solemn, annual festival of the Busque, when -all the fires of the nation were extinguished, the high-priest alone -was commissioned, in the temple, to reproduce the celestial spark and -give new fire to the community.’[450] So that from this most remarkable -identity of conception between our forefathers and the native tribes of -America, it is evident there is nothing exclusively Indo-Germanic in the -holiness ascribed to virgin-fire, and that there is no need to ascribe to -Phœnician influence customs which occur where such influence is at most -uncertain. The wheel ignited by friction of its axle was, it has been -suggested, an emblem of the sun, and the old Aryan belief, that when the -sun was hidden by clouds its light was extinguished and needed renewing, -which could only take place by some god working a ‘pramantha’ in its cold -wheel till it glowed again, has been referred to as the possible root of -the custom. But such an origin being of difficult application outside the -geographical limits of Aryanism, it is obviously better to refer the myth -to the custom than the custom to the myth, and to a custom moreover which -is as wide as the world. - -It may here be noticed in connection with the sacrificial customs which -were once a part of the heathen worship, that the idea of a sacrifice -to appease an angry spirit that has caused a disease is still far from -extinct. The burial of a live animal is still believed in Wärend and -North Sweden to prevent the cattle-plague, and an instance of such a -sacrifice to the earth spirits is said to have occurred in Jönköping so -recently as 1843. In Moray not long ago, whenever a herd of cattle was -seized with the murrain, one of them was buried alive, just as in the -North-west Highlands and in Cornwall a black cock is buried alive on the -spot where a person is first attacked by epilepsy; or as, in Algeria, one -is drowned in a sacred well for a similar purpose. A case is even cited -in this century of an Englishman who burned a live calf to counteract the -attacks of evil spirits.[451] Near Speier in Germany, if many hens or -pigs or ducks died in quick succession, one of their kind was thrown into -the fire, and the Esthonians, if a fire broke out, were wont to throw in -a black living fowl to appease the flames. - -English country boys, when on the sight of a new moon they turn the -money in their pockets to ensure a constant supply there, have no idea -of the reason that once underlay the practice. But a wide comparison of -customs supplies us with a key; for we find everywhere a prevalent mental -association between the increase or wane of the moon and the increase or -wane of things on earth. Maladies, it is thought, will wane more readily -if the medicine be taken in the moon’s wane, and wood cut at that time -will burn better, just as, on the other hand, crops are more likely to -be plentiful if sown whilst the moon is young, and marriages more likely -to be happy. In some English counties pigs must be killed at the same -season, lest the pork should waste in boiling. In Germany it is the best -time for the father of a family to die, for in the latter half of the -month his death would portend the decrease of his whole family; it is -also the best time for counting money which it is desired may increase. -An invalid in face of a waning moon should pray that his pains may -diminish with it. Hence, too, the French idea that hair cut in the moon’s -wane will never grow again, or the similar one in Devonshire and Iceland, -that the rest will fall off; and hence probably the popular English -belief that the weather of the new moon foreshadows the weather for the -month. But are all these fancies relics of an old moon-worship, of the -existence of which we have other evidence, or simply expressions of that -feeling, once so prevalent, that there existed an intimate sympathy -between man and nature, and that everything which affected the former was -in some way or another typified by the latter? Analogy seems to favour -the latter hypothesis. For instance, all along the East coast of England -it is thought that most deaths occur at the fall of the tide, a sympathy -being imagined between the ebbing of the water and the ebbing of life; -and it is curious that Aristotle and Pliny entertained a similar idea, -the former with respect to all animals, the latter only about man; and -though Pliny’s observation of the fact was instigated by the statement -of his predecessor, it is likely that the latter was led to the inquiry -by the notoriety of a popular belief. The Cornish idea that deaths -are delayed till the ebb-tide, or the Icelandic one that more blood -flows from sheep killed while the sea is running out, or that chimneys -smoke more if built when the sea is running in, may be cited as similar -instances. The inhabitants of Esthonia, if a wolf runs away with a lamb, -think, by a kind of sympathy, to cause the wolf to drop it by themselves -dropping something out of their pockets. And in parts of England to this -day, the bloodstone is a remedy for a bleeding nose, and nettle-tea for a -nettle-rash; just as turmeric was once accounted a cure for the jaundice -on account of its yellow colour, and the lungs of a fox were held good -for asthma on account of that animal’s respiratory powers. - -Water-worship, whether as river, lake, or spring, seems as widely spread -as that of trees or other natural objects, and the numerous traditions -connected with it form yet another link between our civilised present -and our barbarous past. ‘There is scarcely,’ says a writer on Lancashire -Folk-Lore, ‘a stream of any magnitude in either Lancashire or Yorkshire, -which does not possess a presiding spirit in some part of its course.’ -A water-spirit that haunts some stepping-stones near Clitheroe is still -believed once in every seven years to require a human life; nor is it -long since a farmer in Anglesea had to drain a well belonging to him, -on account of the damage done by persons resorting thither, under the -belief that if they cursed the disease they suffered from and dropped -pins about the well, they would shortly be cured. There is still a -pin-well in Northumberland, and another in Westmoreland, wherein country -girls in passing throw an offering of pins to the resident spirits. So in -Ireland, votive rags may be seen on trees and hedges that surround sacred -wells, whither people travel great distances in order to crawl an uneven -number of times in the sun’s direction round the water, hoping thereby to -propitiate the fairies and to avert sorceries.[452] St. Gowen’s well on -the coast of Pembroke was lately or is still frequented for the cure of -paralysis and other maladies, and there are few counties in England where -the dedication of curative wells to Christian saints does not betray -the attempt to hallow and hide a heathen practice under a Christian -name. In Northampton alone we find St. Lawrence’s at Peterborough, St. -John’s at Boughton, St. Rumbald’s at Brackley, St. Loy’s at Weedon-Loys, -St. Dennis’ at Naseby, St. Mary’s at Hardwick, and St. Thomas’ at -Northampton. So in Normandy, people still resort from all parts of the -province, on the eve of the first of June, to the fountain of St. -Clotilde, near Andelys, and there are other French wells of no inferior -celebrity. As English peasants propitiate bad water-spirits by presents -of pins, so do the Bretons by slices of bread and butter; and the -Livonians, before starting on a voyage, calm the sea-mother by a libation -of brandy.[453] But water, in addition to its dangerous and curative -properties, is supposed to contain prophetic ones as well. The Castalian -fountain in Greece was prophetic; and as the Laconians, by cakes thrown -into a pool sacred to Juno, used to augur good or bad to themselves -according as their cakes sank or floated, so do our Cornish countrymen -by dropping pins or pebbles into wells read futurity in the signs of the -bubbles. - -The belief in unseen spirits, which underlies many of the foregoing -superstitions, as it is one of the earliest beliefs of the human mind, -so it is one of the most persistent. The worship of water, fire, and -other natural objects probably arose from a dread of spirits thought -to be resident within them, whom it was as well to cajole by gifts and -prayers. Earth and air, like fire and water, were peopled respectively -with invisible demons, which survive in still current traditions of the -Gabriel Hounds, the Seven Whistlers, fairies, elves, and all their tribe. -Our countrymen in Cornwall, if the breeze fail while they are winnowing, -whistle to the Spriggian, or air-spirits, to bring it back; and the -Esthonians on the Gulf of Finland do, or did, precisely the same. In -Northamptonshire, till lately, women used to sweep the hearth before they -went to bed, and leave vessels of water for the ablutions of the fairies -or spirits of the earth, just as in Siberia food is placed daily in the -cellar for the benefit of the Domavoi or house-spirits. In Scotland green -patches may still be seen on field or moor left uncultivated as ‘the -gudeman’s croft,’ by which it has been hoped to buy the goodwill of the -otherwise evil-disposed Devil or earth-spirit; and it is doubtless from -a similar fear of showing neglect or disrespect that Esthonian peasants -dislike parting with any earth from their fields, and in drinking beer -or eating bread recognise the existence and wants of the earth-spirit by -letting some drops of the one and some crumbs of the other find their way -to the floor.[454] - -The foregoing instances of actual Folk-Lore, many of them now mere -meaningless survivals, seem only intelligible on the ground that they -have descended to us either from the earliest inhabitants of Western -Europe, or from times when our Aryan progenitors were perhaps not unlike -modern Fuejians. The existence has been proved, not only in England but -throughout Europe, of phases of thought and modes of worship closely -similar to those still found among actual savages. There is no nation -that we know in the present or read of in the past so cultivated as not -to retain many spots from the dark ages of its infancy and ignorance; -but these, absurd as they may seem, hold the rank and claim the interest -of prehistoric antiquities. The fact that there still survive among -civilised people ideas and practices, corresponding in structure to those -found in the various stages of the lower races, is of the same force to -prove that we once went through those several stages, as the survival of -traits in the growth of the individual, similar to those actually found -in lower animals, point to our gradual ascent from a lower scale of -being. The belief in, and dread of, evil spirits; the endeavour to affect -them by acting on their fetishes or substitutes; the worship of natural -objects, as trees, animals, water or even stones; the mistaking of mere -sequence in time for causal connection and the consequent importance -attached to such occurrences as have been observed to precede remarkable -phenomena,—these and many other characteristics of modern savages find -abundant representation in modern civilisation, and it is more likely -they are there as survivals than as importations. - -But it may be urged that no necessary antiquity can be asserted of -traditions simply on account of the wide area they range over, and -instances may be cited of Christian superstitions no less widely extended -than many above mentioned. The belief, for instance, that about midnight -on Christmas Eve, cattle rise on their knees to salute the Nativity, is -found with slight modifications in England, Brittany, the Netherlands, -and Denmark. In Cornwall a strong prejudice exists against burying on -the north side of a church, and precisely the same feeling is found in -Esthonia, for the reason there given that at the end of the world all -churches will fall on that side. So, too, the custom of opening all -doors and windows at a death, to give free outlet to the departing soul, -prevails no less in the south of Spain than in England or in parts of -Germany. - -To this objection there are two answers: first, that the capacity of -superstitions to spread widely and rapidly is by no means denied; -secondly, that many Christian traditions are really heathen, though their -origin and meaning may now be lost. For the policy of the Church towards -paganism, though at times one of radical opposition, was generally one -better calculated for success. It learned to prefer gradual triumphs -to speedy conquests, aware that the former were more likely to last, -and was pleased to satisfy its conscience and hide its impotence under -connivance and compromise. It assimilated beliefs which it could not -destroy, and glossed over what it could not erase, substituting simply -its saints and angels for the gods and spirits of older cults. On Monte -Casino, near Rome, there existed down to the sixth century a temple -sacred to Apollo, till St. Benedict came and, like another Josiah, broke -the idols and overthrew the altar and burned the grove, but set up a -temple to St. Martin in its stead. And this case is typical of the way -in which obstinate heathen rites were diverted and customs consecrated. -Some illustrations may be added to those already incidentally alluded -to, since they serve to explain how so many relics of heathenism have -resisted centuries of Christian teaching. The Scandinavian water-spirit, -Nikur, inhabitant of lakes and rivers and raiser of storms, whose favour -could only be won by sacrifices, became in the middle ages St. Nicholas, -the patron of sailors and sole refuge in danger; and near St. Nicholas’ -church at Liverpool there stood a statue of the Christian saint, to whom -sailors used to present a peace-offering when they went to sea, and a -wave-offering when they returned. So it was with sacred trees and flowers -and waters. Their sanctity was transferred, not destroyed. St. Boniface, -with the wood of the oak he so miraculously felled, raised an oratory -to St. Peter, to whom were thenceforth paid the honours of Thor. Nobody -ventured the more to touch the famous oak at Kenmare when blown down -by a storm, because it had been handed over to the protection of St. -Columba, nor did a fragment of St. Colman’s oak held in the mouth the -less avert death by hanging because it had been sanctified by the name of -a saint. The Breton princes, before they entered the church at Vretou, -offered prayers under a yew outside, which was said to have sprung from -St. Martin’s staff and to have been so replete with holiness that the -very birds of the air left its berries untouched. The great goddess -Freja could only be banished from men’s thoughts by transferring what -had been sacred to her to the Virgin Mary; and the names of such common -plants as Lady’s Grass, Lady’s Smock, Lady’s Slipper, Lady’s Mantle, -and others, attest to this day the wrong that was done to the Northern -goddess. Bits of seaweed called Lady’s Trees still decorate many a -Cornish chimney-piece, and protect the house from fire and other evils. -The Ladybird was once Freja’s bird; and Orion’s belt, which in Sweden is -still called Freja’s spindle, in Zealand now belongs to her successor -Mary. In the same way Christmas has supplanted the old Yule festival, and -the Yule log still testifies to the rites of fire-worship once connected -with the season. So we now keep Easter at the time when our pagan -forefathers used to sacrifice to the goddess Eostre, and hot cross-buns -are perhaps the descendants of cakes once eaten in her honour, on which -the mark of Christianity has taken the place of some heathen sign. - -Such then is the evidence which Comparative Folk-Lore affords in -confirmation of the teaching of history, that the people from whom we -inherit our popular traditions were once as miserable and savage as those -we now place in the lowest scale of the human family. The evidence that -the nations now highest in culture were once in the position of those now -the lowest is ever increasing, and the study of Folk-Lore corroborates -the conclusions long since arrived at by archæological science. For, just -as stone monuments, flint knives, lake-piles, or shell-mounds point to -a time when Europeans resembled races where such things are still part -of actual life, so do the traces in our social organism of fetishism, -totemism, and other low forms of thought, connect our past with people -where such forms of thought are still predominant. The analogies with -barbarism which still flourish in civilised communities seem only -explicable on the theory of a slow and more or less uniform metamorphosis -to higher types and modes of life, whilst they enforce the belief that -before long it will appear a law of development, as firmly established -on the inconceivability of the contrary, that civilisation should emerge -from barbarism, as that butterflies should first be caterpillars, or -that ignorance should precede knowledge. In this way superstition itself -turns to the service of science, confirming its teaching, that the -history of humanity has been a rise, not a fall, not a degradation from -completeness to imperfection, but a constantly accelerating progress from -savagery to culture; that, in short, the iron age of the world belongs to -the past, its golden one to the future. - - - - -FOOTNOTES - - -[1] The justification of the use of the word _force_ is not far to seek. -One of the demands in the ultimatum addressed to Cetewayo, which helped -to bring about the present unhappy Zulu war, was for the reinstatement -of missionaries in Zululand. A Natal correspondent of the _Times_, -January 28, 1879, justly observes about this: ‘If the Zulus object to -missionaries—_who certainly in many cases have acted as spies_—why -_force_ missionaries upon them?’ The italics are not the correspondent’s. - -[2] See on this subject Mr. Wallace’s _Tropical Nature_, pp. 290-300. - -[3] Tylor, _Primitive Culture_, ii. 312, 313, 333. - -[4] Sproat, _Savage Life_, 178, 179, 209, 210. - -[5] Schoolcraft, _Indian Tribes_, v. 173; and Bancroft, iii. 105. - -[6] Mariner, _Tonga Islands_, ii. 121-4. - -[7] Schoolcraft, _I. T._, v. p. 155. - -[8] Schoolcraft, _I. T._, iv. 496. See Dr. Brinton’s explanation of the -story in his _Myths of the New World_, pp. 170-3. - -[9] Humboldt, _Personal Narrative_, v. 595-7. - -[10] Forbes Leslie, _Early Races in Scotland_, i. 177. - -[11] Klemm, _Cultur-Geschichte_, ii. 155-7, where the beliefs are -referred to. Franklin’s _Second Journey_, p. 308. They are so remarkable -as to arouse suspicion that European influence has affected the native -imagination; but the influence, if any, seems beyond the reach of -criticism in this as in other striking cases of analogy. - -[12] Schoolcraft, _I. T._, iv. 255. - -[13] Hutton, _Voyage to Africa_, p. 320; and Bosman in Pinkerton, xvi. -396. - -[14] Schoolcraft, iv. 90. - -[15] Klemm, _Cultur-Geschichte_, vii. 368. - -[16] _Trans. Eth. Soc._ iii. 233, 234; Oldfield’s _Aborigines of -Australia_. - -[17] Bancroft, _Native Races of the Pacific States_, iii. 112. - -[18] Brinton, pp. 198, 199. - -[19] Brinton, p. 210. - -[20] Catlin, ii. 127. For some other deluge-myths of a similar kind see -Bancroft, iii. 46, 47, 64, 75, 76, 88, 100; Turner’s _Polynesia_, p. 249; -Ellis, _Polynesian Researches_, i. 386; Franklin, i. 113; Sir G. Grey, -_Polynesian Mythology_, 61; Brett, _Indian Tribes of Guiana_, pp. 381, -385, 398, 399; Dall, _Alaska_, p. 423. - -[21] Koehler, _Volksbrauch im Voightland_, p. 444. ‘Dem Verstorbenen -giebt man die Gegenstände mit in das Grab, welche er im Leben am liebsten -hatte: so ist es geschehen, dass man selbst Regenschirm und Gummischühe -mitgab. (Reichenbach.) ... In Schweden hat man dem Todten Tabakspfeife, -Tabaksbeutel, Geld und Feuerzeug mitgegeben, damit er nicht spuke.... In -einem Grabe des Gottesackers zu Elsterberg wurde eine Anzahl Kupfermünzen -gefunden.’ - -[22] This fact has been denied in King’s _Greek Church_, p. 358, but it -is mentioned by most of the earliest English travellers in Russia; by -Chancelor, in _Hackluyt’s Voyages_, i. 283; Jenkinson, ibid., p. 361; and -Fletcher, _Russe Commonwealth_, 106; as well as by later ones. - -[23] Klemm, _Cultur-Geschichte_, ii. 165. - -[24] Stevenson, _Travels in South America_, i. 58. - -[25] Klemm, _Cultur-Geschichte_, ii. 166. - -[26] See Brinton, p. 242. ‘Nowhere (in the New World) was any -well-defined doctrine that moral turpitude was judged and punished in the -next world. No contrast is discoverable between a place of torments and a -realm of joy; at the worst but a negative castigation awaited the liar, -the coward, and the niggard.’ - -[27] For other instances of the myth of the heaven-bridge, and its wide -range, see Mr. Tylor’s _Early History of Mankind_, p. 348. - -[28] Williams, _Fiji_, i. 244. - -[29] Klemm, _Cultur-Geschichte_, iii. 71-77. - -[30] Mariner, ii. 137. - -[31] Klemm, _Cultur-Geschichte_, ii. 315. ‘Jedes Thier, auch die kleinste -Fliege, ersteht sofort nach ihrem Tode und lebt unter der Erde.’ - -[32] Klemm, _Cultur-Geschichte_, iii. 83. ‘Endlich wurden die besonderten -Theile nebst den Knochen in der Kiste begraben. Man glaubte, das -Opferthier werde von den Göttern wieder belebt und in den Saiwo versetzt.’ - -[33] Dall, _Alaska_, p. 89. - -[34] Schoolcraft, _I. T._, v. 91, 403; ii. 68. - -[35] Schoolcraft, _Indian Tribes_, iii. 268. - -[36] Ellis, _Polynesian Researches_, i. 350. - -[37] Reade, _Savage Africa_, p. 536. - -[38] _Cape Monthly Magazine_, July 1874. - -[39] Bleek, _Bushman Folk-lore_, pp. 15, 18. - -[40] Steller, _Kamschatka_, p. 280. - -[41] Waitz, _Anthropologie der Naturvölker_, ii. 170. - -[42] Callaway, _Religious System of the Amazulu_, pt. ii. 182. - -[43] Latham, _Descriptive Ethnology_, ii. 437-444. - -[44] Waitz, ii. 169. - -[45] Ellis, i. 402. - -[46] Brinton, _Myths of the New World_, p. 297. - -[47] Page 150. - -[48] Pinkerton, xvi. 304. - -[49] Pinkerton, xvi. 388, 874. - -[50] Williams, _Fiji_, p. 176. - -[51] Dieffenbach, p. 28. - -[52] Gill, p. 36. - -[53] Brett, _Indian Tribes of Guiana_, p. 370. - -[54] Harmon, _Journal of Voyages, &c._, p. 345. - -[55] Brinton, p. 126. - -[56] Bancroft, iii. 370-3. For baptismal rites in Northern Europe before -Christianity, see Mallet, _Northern Antiquities_, p. 205. - -[57] Franklin, _Journey to the Polar Sea_, p. 255. - -[58] Tylor, _Primitive Culture_, ii. 299. - -[59] Schoolcraft, _Indian Tribes_, iii. 237. - -[60] Callaway, i. 33. - -[61] Latham, _Descriptive Ethnology_, ii. 187. - -[62] Reade, _Savage Africa_, p. 250. - -[63] Harmon, _Journal of Voyages_, p. 363. - -[64] Lord Kames, _History of Man_, vol. iv., asserts this of many tribes, -the Tahitians, Hottentots, and others. See also pp. 234, 238, 297. - -[65] Latham, _Descriptive Ethnology_, i. 480. - -[66] Cf. Reade, _Savage Africa_, p. 250, and Du Chaillu’s _Explorations_, -pp. 202-3. - -[67] Lichtenstein, ii. 332; Callaway, i. 111. - -[68] Pinkerton, xvi. 402, 530. - -[69] Schoolcraft, _Indian Tribes_, iv. 635-7. The admission quoted seems -to cancel the statements repeated clearly and positively in i. 16, 17, -32, 35, 38, and iii. 60, of a dualism as decided as that between Ahriman -and Ormuzd. In i. 32 it is said that the _first_ notice of such a -doctrine occurs in Charlevoix, _Voyage to North America in 1721_. - -[70] Schoolcraft, iv. 642-3. - -[71] _Ibid._, ii. 195, 197; iii. 231. - -[72] Schoolcraft, ii. 131. - -[73] Franklin, i. 114-15. - -[74] Ellis, i. 350. - -[75] Klemm, iii. 120. - -[76] Kames, _History of Man_, iv. 327. - -[77] Kames, _History of Man_, iv. 321. - -[78] Klemm, vi. 423. - -[79] Brinton, p. 298. - -[80] Schoolcraft, iii. 226. - -[81] Brinton, p. 297. - -[82] Turner, _Nineteen Years in Polynesia_, pp. 88, 200, 239. - -[83] Williams, p. 144. - -[84] Ellis, i. 349. - -[85] Catlin, i. 133; ii. 247. Cf. Schoolcraft, iii. 243. - -[86] Bancroft, _Native Races, &c._, ii. 705. - -[87] Bancroft, _Native Races, &c._, iii. 428; Burton, _Mission to -Gelele_, ii. 18-25. - -[88] Klemm, ii. 216, from Langsdorf, ii. 261. - -[89] Sproat, p. 66. The Juangs of Bengal practise a bear dance, a pigeon -dance, a pig dance, a tortoise dance, a quail dance, a vulture dance. -Dalton, _Desc. Eth. of Bengal_, p. 156; and see _New Encyc. Brit._ for -similar cases: article, ‘Dance.’ - -[90] Reade, _Savage Africa_, p. 200. - -[91] Sproat, p. 208. - -[92] Bancroft, _Native Races_, iii. 167. - -[93] Ellis, i. 348. - -[94] Latham, _Desc. Eth._, i. 459. - -[95] Catlin, i. 127, 164, 182. - -[96] Klemm, ii. 120. ‘Ahmten die knarrende röchelnde Stimme des -Bisonthiers in grosser Vollkommenheit nach.’ - -[97] Catlin, i. 244-5. - -[98] Schoolcraft, iii. 487. - -[99] ‘Ein wunderbares Spiel, das zum glücklichen Erfolg des Untermehmens -_durchaus nothwendig_ gehalten wird.’ - -[100] Lichtenstein, i. 444. - -[101] Mrs. Eastman, _Dahcotah_, p. 77. - -[102] Sproat, p. 146. - -[103] Collins, _New South Wales_, p. 368. - -[104] Callaway, i. 125. - -[105] Schoolcraft, iv. 80. - -[106] _Ibid._, iii. 285. - -[107] Isert, _Guinea_, in French translation, p. 204: ‘L’action de ramer -voulait dire que leurs maris allaient passer la rivière Volta pour se -battre avec les Augéens et les noyer; la truelle et le travail de maçon -indiquait l’érection de fort Konigstein.’ - -[108] Casalis, p. 265. - -[109] Schoolcraft (Prescott), iii. 230. - -[110] Schoolcraft, iii. 273, 231. - -[111] Gill, 312. - -[112] Pinkerton, xvi. 875. - -[113] Pinkerton, xvi. 875. - -[114] Livingstone, _South Africa_, p. 235. - -[115] Franklin, _First Journey_, i. 160. - -[116] Wuttke, _Deutsche Volksaberglaube_, p. 14. - -[117] Polwhele, _History of Cornwall_, p. 48. - -[118] ‘Da Dios alas á la hormiga para que se pierda mas aina,’ is the -Spanish version.—_Polyglot of Foreign Proverbs_, 210. Compare with -Roebuck’s _Persian and Hindoostanee Proverbs_, i. 365, and ii. 283; -Thornburn’s _Afghan Frontier_, 279; and Burckhardt’s _Arabic Proverbs_. - -[119] Most of the African proverbs here referred to are taken from -Captain Burton’s collection from various sources in his _Wit and Wisdom -of West Africa_. - -[120] _Central Africa_, p. 289. - -[121] Oscar Peschel, _The Races of Mankind_, translation, p. 150. - -[122] Casalis, _Les Basutos_, pp. 324-8. - -[123] Captain Burton justly calls attention to the possibility of many -Yoruban proverbs being relics of the Moslems, who, in the tenth century, -overran the Soudan. - -[124] For a collection of Pashto proverbs see Thornburn’s _Afghan -Frontier_, 1876. - -[125] Sir G. Grey, _Polynesian Mythology_, p. 21. - -[126] Williams, _Fiji_, p. 97. - -[127] Callaway, ii. 171. - -[128] Burton, _Mission to Dahome_, ii. - -[129] Tylor, _Primitive Culture_, i. 333. - -[130] Trench, _On the Study of Words_, p. 17. - -[131] - - ‘Nec commune bonum poterant spectare nec ullis - Moribus inter se scierant nec legibus uti.’—V. 956. - -So Virgil, _Æn._, viii. 317. - -[132] Bancroft, _Native Races of the Pacific States of North America_, i. -426, 560. - -[133] Peschel, _Races of Man_, pp. 39, 209. - -[134] Burchell, _Travels in Southern Africa_, i. 456-62. Compare Waitz, -_Anthropologie der Naturvölker_, i. 376. Also Wuttke, _Geschichte des -Heidenthums_, p. 164. _Ein Brudermord wurde von ihnen als etwas ganz -Harmloses erzählt._ - -[135] Bancroft, _Native Races_, i. 348. - -[136] _Ibid._, i. 130. - -[137] Klemm, _Culturgeschichte_, iii. 69. - -[138] Bancroft, i. 520, 553. - -[139] Dall, _Alaska_, p. 416. - -[140] Kane, _Wanderings of an Artist_, p. 115. - -[141] Catlin, _North American Indians_, ii. 192. - -[142] Bancroft, iii. 167. - -[143] Turner, _Nineteen Years in Polynesia_, p. 285. - -[144] Sir G. Grey, _Journals in Australia_, ii. 239. - -[145] Williams, _Fiji_. - -[146] _Old New Zealand._ By a Pakeha Maori, p. 105. - -[147] Harmon’s _Journal_, pp. 299, 300. - -[148] Seemann says of Fijian cruelty (_Viti_, p. 192): ‘Affection for the -departed—of course mistaken affection—prompted their relatives or friends -to dispatch widows at the time of their husband’s burial,’ &c. - -[149] Turner, _Polynesia_, pp. 294-5. - -[150] Mariner, ii. 233. - -[151] Pinkerton, xvi. 595, from Froyart’s _Loango_. - -[152] Fitzroy, _Voyages of ‘Adventure’ and ‘Beagle,’_ ii. 574. - -[153] _Old New Zealand_, pp. 96-100. - -[154] Lichtenstein, i. 259. - -[155] Schoolcraft, _I. T._, i. 39. - -[156] Livingstone, _Missionary Travels in South Africa_, p. 255. - -[157] Harmon, _Journal_, p. 300. - -[158] Turner, _Polynesia_, p. 224. - -[159] Bancroft, iii. 486. - -[160] Fitzroy, _Voyages_, ii. 180. - -[161] Sproat, _Scenes and Studies of Savage Life_, p. 265. - -[162] Shortland, _Southern Districts of New Zealand_, p. 30. - -[163] Turner, _Polynesia_, pp. 225, 236. - -[164] Kane, p. 205. - -[165] _Ibid._; Seemann, p. 190. - -[166] Bancroft, i. 245, 285, 438. - -[167] Klemm, _Culturgeschichte_, iii. 78. - -[168] Cook, _Voyages_, iii. 158. - -[169] Dobritzhoffer, _Abipones_, ii. 203, 274. - -[170] Burton, _Mission_, i. 231. - -[171] Bancroft, ii. 357. - -[172] Dali, _Alaska_, 524. For instances of the feeling in North America -see Bancroft, i. 205, 288, 544, 745; iii. 521, 522. - -[173] Gill, _Myths and Songs of the South Pacific_, p. 154. - -[174] _Ibid._, p. 38. - -[175] Catlin, _North American Indians_, i. 157. - -[176] Bancroft, iii. 519; and other instances in the same work, chapter -xii. - -[177] Williams, _Fiji_, p. 247. - -[178] Schoolcraft, _Indian Tribes_, v. 403, 404. - -[179] Dr. Brinton (p. 250) says that no ethical bearing was assigned -to the myth of the future by the red race till they were taught by -Europeans, and that all Father Brebeuf could find was, that the souls of -suicides and persons killed in war lived apart from others after death. - -[180] Bowen, _Central Africa_, p. 285. - -[181] Mariner, _Tongan Islands_, ii. 154. - -[182] Peschel, 428-31. - -[183] The collection of native Bushman literature is said to have reached -eighty-four volumes! In Dr. Bleek’s _Brief Account of Bushman Folk-lore_, -and in the _Cape Monthly Magazine_ for July 1874, some account is given -of their mythology. - -[184] Comp. Bancroft, i. 771, and Humboldt, _Personal Narrative_, v. 269. - -[185] Steller, _Kamschatka_, pp. 234, 355. - -[186] Schoolcraft, _I. T._, iii. 191. - -[187] Reade, _Savage Africa_, p. 51; Burton, _Dahome_, ii. 76; Pinkerton, -xvi. 492. - -[188] Bancroft, ii. 194, and i. 414, 280. Compare Catlin, i. 170; and -Grote’s _Greece_, for an ordeal at Sparta. - -[189] Dieffenbach, p. 667. - -[190] Callaway, ii. 196. - -[191] Burton, _Mission_, ii. 157. - -[192] Turner, p. 236. - -[193] Sproat, p. 213. - -[194] Dobritzhoffer, _Abipones_, ii. 204, 441. - -[195] Klemm, _Culturgeschichte_, iv. 101. - -[196] Williams, _Fiji_, p. 29. - -[197] Jarves, _History of Hawaii_, p. 23. - -[198] Brett, _Wild Tribes of Guiana_, p. 131. - -[199] Ellis, _Polynesian Researches_, iii. 104. - -[200] Cook, _Voyages_, vii. 149. - -[201] Mariner, _Tongan Islands_, i. 380, 403. - -[202] _Travels in Australia_, ii. 228. - -[203] Bancroft, i. 109 - -[204] In Papworth’s _Ordinary of British Armorials_, no less than 124 -pages are filled with the names of families who take their crest from -some animal; 34 pages of families take their crests from the lion alone. - -[205] Herberstein, i. 32. - -[206] Kempper, _Japan_; Pinkerton, vii. 718. - -[207] Turner, p. 343. - -[208] Reade, _Savage Africa_, p. 43. - -[209] Burton, _Mission_, ii. 367; and Bowen, _Central Africa_, p. 318. - -[210] Jarves, _History of Hawaii_, pp. 21, 23. - -[211] Ellis, _Polynesian Researches_, iii. 97. - -[212] _See_ Klemm, iii. 330, for the custom in Loango; Reade, _Savage -Africa_, p. 43, for that in Ashantee; and Peschel, _Races of Man_, p. -235, for other instances. - -[213] _Savage Africa_, p. 48. - -[214] Williams, p. 40. - -[215] Santo, _Eastern Ethiopia_. Pink, xvi. 698. - -[216] Dieffenbach, ii. 100. - -[217] Mariner, _Tonga Islands_, i. 100. It has generally been thought -best, in referring to books written some time ago, to employ the past -tense where possibly the present would still be applicable. Wherever the -present is used, it must be taken to refer not necessarily to the actual -present but to the present of the original authority for the fact. - -[218] Steller, _Kamschatka_, p. 356. - -[219] Eschwege, _Brazilien_, i. 221. - -[220] Bancroft, _Native Races of Pacific States_, i. 168. - -[221] Catlin, ii. 240. - -[222] Pinkerton. Bosnian, _Guinea_, xvi. 406. - -[223] Denham, _Discoveries in Africa_, i. 167. - -[224] Turner, _Polynesia_, p. 286. - -[225] Elphinstone, _Caubul_, ii. 223. - -[226] Thompson, _South Africa_, ii. 351. - -[227] _See_ Bancroft, ii. 454-472, for the penal code of the Aztecs. - -[228] Pinkerton. Froyart, _History of Loango_, xvi. 581. - -[229] Hutton, _Voyage to Africa_, p. 319. - -[230] Pinkerton, xvi. 242, in Merolla’s _Voyage to Congo_. - -[231] Pinkerton. Bosman, _Guinea_, xvi. 405. For an account of a savage -law suit, see Maclean’s _Caffre Laws and Customs_, pp. 38-43. - -[232] Maclean, _Caffre Laws_, p. 34. - -[233] Pinkerton, xvi. 259. - -[234] Livingstone, _South Africa_, pp. 621, 642. - -[235] Schweinfurth, _Heart of Africa_, i. 285. - -[236] Klemm, _Culturgeschichte_, iii. 334. - -[237] Williams, _Fiji_, p. 250. - -[238] Ellis, _Polynesian Researches_, i. 378; iv. 423. - -[239] Pinkerton, xvi. 690. - -[240] Wuttke, _Geschichte des Heidenthums_, p. 102, speaking of savage -ordeals, says: ‘Wir können nicht sagen, dass ein monotheistischer Gedanke -hier vorhanden sei; die Menschen glauben an die Gerechtigkeit des -Schicksals noch nicht an einen gerechten Gott.’ - -[241] Turner, _Polynesia_, pp. 215, 241, 293. - -[242] Klemm, iii. 68. - -[243] Wuttke, _Geschichte des Heidenthums_, p. 103. - -[244] Burckhardt, _Notes on the Bedouins_, p. 73. - -[245] Latham, _Descriptive Ethnology_, ii. 98. - -[246] Klemm, iv. 334. - -[247] Maclean, pp. 124, 110. - -[248] Klemm, iii. 69. - -[249] Dalton, _Descriptive Ethnology of Bengal_, p. 64. - -[250] Seemann, _Mission to Viti_, p. 192. - -[251] Mariner, ii. 302. - -[252] Ellis, iii. 349. - -[253] Earle, _Indian Archipelago_, p. 81. - -[254] Pinkerton, xvi. 872. - -[255] _Ibid._, p. 697. - -[256] Bowen, _Central Africa_, p. 305. - -[257] Lichtenstein, ii. 48. - -[258] Portlock’s _Voyage_, p. 260, in Bancroft, i. 110. - -[259] Cranz, i. 149, 150, 174, 218. - -[260] _Travels in Australia_, ii. 355; and Bonwick, _Daily Life of the -Tasmanians_, pp. 10, 78-98. - -[261] _Transactions of Ethnological Society_, Prof. Owen, ii. 36. - -[262] _Transactions of Ethnological Society_, ii. 291. - -[263] _Ibid._, i. 264. - -[264] _Nuova Antologia_, Jan. 1876. - -[265] Ellis, i. 268. - -[266] Mariner, i. 271-7. - -[267] These stories are worth reading at length in Grey’s _Polynesian -Mythology_, pp. 233-246, 296-301. See also pp. 246-273, 301-313. For a -good Zulu love-story see Leslie’s _Among the Zulus_, pp. 275-284; and, -for a Tasmanian love-legend, Bonwick, p. 34. - -[268] Smiles, _Self-help_, p. 325; Pennant’s _Tour_, in Pinkerton, iii. -89: ‘Their tender sex are their only animals of burden.’ - -[269] Weddell, _Voyage to South Pole_, 1825, p. 156. - -[270] Seemann, p. 192. - -[271] Dalton, _Bengal_, p. 28. - -[272] _Indian Tribes_, v. 131-2. - -[273] Rochefort, _Les Îles Antilles_, p. 544. - -[274] Bancroft, i. 110. - -[275] _Heart of Africa_, i. 472; ii. 28. - -[276] The best illustration of this side of savage life, of the sorrow -felt by a bride on leaving her home, occurs in the _Finnish Kalewala_, in -Schiefner’s German translation, pp. 126-132, 147-150. - -[277] Dobell, _Travels in Kamtschatka_, &c., ii. 293. - -[278] Holderness, _Journey from Riga_, p. 233. - -[279] Hakluyt, i. 360; Pierson, _Russlands Vergangenheit_, pp. 202, 208. - -[280] Marmier, _Sur la Russie_, ii. 154. ‘Au moment de se mettre en -marche pour l’église, elle soupire, pleure, refuse de sortir. Tous ses -parents essayent de la consoler,’ &c. - -P. 149: ‘Rien ne donne une idée plus touchante du caractère du peuple -russe que ces paroles de regret et de douleur que la jeune fiancée -adresse à ses parents au milieu des joyeux préparatifs de la fête -nuptiale.’ - -[281] Marmier, i. 127, 229. - -[282] Cranz, i. 151. - -[283] _Ibid._, i. 146. - -[284] Egede, pp. 143-145. - -[285] Chambers, _Book of Days_, ii. 721. - -[286] Holderness, p. 234. - -[287] Dall, _Alaska_, pp. 396, 399. - -[288] Kolbe, in Medley’s translation, i. 161. - -[289] Bowen, _Central Africa_, p. 303. - -[290] Elphinstone, _Caubul_, i. 240. - -[291] Latham, _Descriptive Ethnology_, i. 313. - -[292] Herberstein, i. 92. - -[293] Pinkerton, _Modern Geography_, ii. 524. - -[294] Seemann, _Mission to Fiji_, p. 190. - -[295] Si J. Lubbock, _Origin of Civilization_, pp. 75-76. - -[296] Dalton, _Bengal_, p. 193. - -[297] Williams, _Fiji_, p. 136. - -[298] Chambers, _Book of Days_, ii. 733; Holman, _Travels_, i. 153. - -[299] Dall, _Alaska_, p. 415. - -[300] _Trans. Eth. Soc._, i. 98. - -[301] Krashenninonikov, _Kamtshatka_, p. 215. - -[302] ‘Beschwerte sich aber die Braut, dass sie den Brautigam durchaus -nicht haben noch sich von ihm erobern lassen wollte, so musste er aus dem -Ostrog fort.’—Steller, _Kamtschatka_, p. 345. - -[303] Lesseps, _Travels in Kamtschatka_ (translated), ii. 93. The account -here given of the Kamschadal marriage customs is from Krashenninonikov -(translated by Grieve), _Travels in Kamtshatka_, pp. 212-214 (1764); -Steller, pp. 343-349 (1774); Lesseps, ii. 93 (1790). They differ in some -minor details. - -[304] Burchell, ii. 56. - -[305] Burckhardt, _Notes on the Bedouins_, p. 200. - -[306] Leslie, pp. 117, 196. - -[307] Burckhardt, _Notes_, p. 151. - -[308] Lane, _Modern Egyptians_, i. 217. - -[309] Gaya, _Marriage Ceremonies_ (pp. 30, 48, 81), for similar old -customs, interpreted in the same way, formerly in vogue in France, -Germany, and Turkey. - -[310] Astley, _Collection of Voyages_, ii. 240, 273. It is a common rule -of etiquette that, when a proposal of marriage is made, the purport -of the visit shall only be approached indirectly and cursorily. It is -curious to find such a rule among the Red Indians (_Algic Researches_, -ii. 24; i. 130), the Kafirs (Maclean, p. 47), the Esquimaux (Cranz, i. -146), even the Hottentots (Kolbe, i. 149). - -[311] Pinkerton, vii. 34. - -[312] Bancroft, _Native Races_, &c., i. 389. - -[313] _Ibid._, i. 436. - -[314] _Ibid._, i. 512. - -[315] Fitzroy, _Voyage of ‘Beagle,’_ ii. 152. - -[316] Compare Bowen’s _Central Africa_, pp. 303-304; Gray’s _Travels in -South Africa_, p. 56; Pinkerton, xvi. 568-569; and Bancroft, i. 66. - -[317] Bowen, p. 104. - -[318] Pinkerton, xvi. 873. - -[319] Lichtenstein, i. 263. - -[320] Thus Bonwick mentions a custom whereby a woman ‘was allowed some -chance in her life-settlement. The applicant for her hand was permitted -on a certain day to _run_ for her;’ if she passed three appointed trees -without being caught she was free.—_Daily Life, &c._, p. 70. - -[321] It is also an old custom in Finland, that, when a suitor tells a -girl he has settled matters with her parents, she should ask him what he -has given, and then, declaring it to be too little, should proceed to run -away from him.—_Marmier_, i. 176. - -[322] Delano, _Life on the Plains_, p. 346. In _Notes and Queries_, 1861, -vol. xii. 414, it is said that in Wales a girl would often escape a -disliked suitor through the custom of the pursuit on horseback—by taking -a line of country of her own. - -[323] Dalton, _Descriptive Ethnology of Bengal_, pp. 16, 194, 234, 252, -319. - -[324] Bates, _Naturalist on the River Amazon_, p. 382. - -[325] Marsden, _Sumatra_, p. 269. - -[326] Denham, _Discoveries in Africa_, i. 32-35. - -[327] Dobritzhoffer, ii. 97. - -[328] Wuttke, _Heidenthum_, i. 185. ‘Die Guanas in Amerika begraben ihre -Kinder lebendig, besonders die Mädchen, um diese _seltner und gesuchter -zu machen_.’ - -[329] Dalton, p. 192. - -[330] Colonel Dalton, in _Trans. Eth. Soc._, vi. 27. - -[331] Elphinstone, _Cabul_, i. 239; ii. 23. - -[332] Burnes, _Travels to Bokhara_, iii. 47. - -[333] _Trans. Eth. Soc._, iii. 348-351, in Oldfield’s _Aborigines of -Australia_, 1864. - -[334] Bonwick, pp. 65-68. - -[335] Latham, _Desc. Ethn._, ii. 159. - -[336] Latham, _Desc. Ethn._, i. 96. - -[337] Campbell, _Indian Journal_, 142. - -[338] _Journal of Anthropology_ (July 1870), p. 33; _Trans. Eth. Soc._, -vii. 236, 242. - -[339] Buchanan, _Travels_, i. 251, 273, 321, 358, 394; iii. 100. - -[340] Sproat, p. 98. - -[341] Rochefort, _Les Îles Antilles_, 545. - -[342] Bancroft, _Native Races_, i. 109, 132. - -[343] Macpherson, 65. - -[344] Collins (1796), _New South Wales_, 362, 351-3. - -[345] Hunter (1790), _Voyage to New South Wales_, 62, 494. - -[346] _Trans. Eth. Soc._, i. 217-8, and compare Sir G. Grey, _Travels, -&c._, ii. 224. - -[347] Hunter, 466, 479. - -[348] Lecky, _Hist. of England in Eighteenth Century_, ii. 366. - -[349] Bonwick, _Daily Life of the Tasmanians_, 60. - -[350] Rochefort, _Les Îles Antilles_, 545. ‘Ils ne prenaient pour femmes -légitimes que leurs cousines, qui leur étoyent aquises de droit naturel.’ -Compare Burckhardt’s _Notes on the Bedouins_, 64: ‘A man has an exclusive -right to the hand of his cousin;’ not that he was obliged to marry her, -but without his consent she could marry no one else.’ - -[351] Rochefort, _Les Îles Antilles_, 460. ‘Il est à remarquer que les -Caraibes du continent, hommes et femmes, parlent un même langage, n’ayant -point corrumpu leur langue naturelle par des mariages avec des femmes -étrangères.’ (1511.) - -[352] Humboldt, personal narrative, vi. 40-43. - -[353] See chapter on Carib language in _Les Îles Antilles_, 449, and -collection of words, where those used exclusively by either sex are -marked with an H and F (_Hommes et Femmes_) respectively. - -[354] Maclean, 95. - -[355] Leslie, 177. - -[356] Du Tertre, _Hist. Gén. des Antilles_, 378. - -[357] _Transactions of Ethnological Society_, i. 301-3. - -[358] Bonwick, _Daily Life of the Tasmanians_, 188, 206. The author -suggestively calls attention to the similarity of this legend to the -Hindu legend of Indra, who delivers the lovely Apas from the monster -Vitra in the dark cavern of Ahi, a legend which has been taken to mean -the fire-god who destroys the dark storm cloud that chases and maltreats -the fleecy maidens of the sky. - -[359] Bleek, _Hottentot Fables_, 67. - -[360] Bleek, _Bushman Folk-lore_. - -[361] Egede, 209. - -[362] Cranz, i. 213. - -[363] Gill, 40-2. - -[364] Dall, _Alaska_. - -[365] Sproat, p. 182. - -[366] Casalis, _Les Basutos_. With this story Grimm compares a German -one, _Kinder und Hausmärchen_, i. 172. - -[367] Schoolcraft, _Indian Tribes_, ii. 229-30. - -[368] Gill, 88-98. - -[369] Mrs. Cookson, _Legends of the Manx_, 27-30. - -[370] Wolf, _Zeitschrift für deutsche Mythologie_, i. 2. - -[371] _Algic Researches_, ii. 216. - -[372] Kelly, _Indo-European Traditions_, 78. See the German version of -the tale in Grimm’s _Hausmärchen_, ii. 394. - -[373] Köhler, _Weimarische Beiträge zur Literatur_, Jan. 1865. - -[374] Schirren, _Wandersagen der Neuseeländer_, 31, 37-39. - -[375] Grimm, _Hausmärchen_, i. Pref. 53. - -[376] See the different versions in Mr. Tylor’s _Early History of -Mankind_, 344. - -[377] Cox, _Aryan Mythology_, ii. 173. - -[378] _Algic Researches_, ii. 1-33. - -[379] _Aryan Mythology_, ii. 85. - -[380] _Algic Researches_, ii. 34. - -[381] Wilson, _Vishnu Purana_, 394-5. - -[382] Fiske, _Myths and Myth Makers_, 97, and Cox, _Aryan Mythology_, ii. -282. - -[383] _Transactions of Ethnological Society_, ii. 27. - -[384] _Algic Researches_, i. 67. - -[385] Bleek, _Hottentot Fables_, Pref. xxv. - -[386] Bonwick, _Daily Life of the Tasmanians_, 148. - -[387] _Algic Researches_, ii. 40. - -[388] _Travels in Australia_, i. 261. - -[389] Schoolcraft, _Algic Researches_, i. 41. - -[390] Schoolcraft, _Indian Tribes_, v. 409. - -[391] D. Leslie, _Among the Zulus_, 168. - -[392] Callaway, _Religious System of the Amazulu_, Part i. 5. - -[393] _Algic Researches_, i. 122-8. - -[394] Bancroft, _Native Races_, iii. 526. - -[395] Bonwick, _Daily Life of the Tasmanians_, 182. - -[396] Callaway, _Religious System of the Amazulu_, Part i. 122-3. - -[397] Pinkerton, xvi. 689. - -[398] Callaway, _Zulu Nursery Tales_, i. 152. - -[399] Leslie, 81, 98. - -[400] _Ibid._ 79. - -[401] _Ibid._ 169. - -[402] Appleyard, _Kafir Grammar_, 13. - -[403] Mrs. Cookson, _Legends of the Manx_, 23. - -[404] Prof. Max Müller, _Science of Language_, ii. 444. - -[405] Steller, 253-4. - -[406] Léouzon le Duc, _La Finlande_, 51, 87. ‘À dire vrai, _tous les -dieux de la mythologie finnoise ne sont que les magiciens_.’ - -[407] Bancroft, v. 23. - -[408] Brinton, _Myths of the New World_, 164. - -[409] Vishnu Purana, 575. - -[410] Schirren, 144. Maui wird im Meere geformt, von einem Fisch -verschluckt, mit diesem ans Land geworfen und herausgeschnitten. _Der -Fisch ist die Erde welche die Sonne zur Nacht verschlingt; der Himmel im -Osten befreit die Sonne aus der Erde._ - -[411] Bancroft, v. 23. - -[412] Brinton, 180. - -[413] Waitz (_Anthropologie_, iv. 394, 448, 455) adopts the view of the -human origin of Viracocha. - -[414] Bleek, _Hottentot Fables_, 75. - -[415] Schiefner, _Kalewala_, 129. In the lamentations over an approaching -marriage, an old man says to the bride: - - ‘_Seinen Mond nannt’ dich der Vater,_ - _Sonnenschein nannt’ dich die Mutter,_ - _Wasserschimmer dich der Bruder,_’ &c. - -[416] Fiske, 35, 76. - -[417] Schweinfurth, _Heart of Africa_, ii. 326. - -[418] Steller, 279. - -[419] Williams, _Fiji_, 204. - -[420] Rink, _Tales, &c. of the Esquimaux_, 90. - -[421] _Algic Researches_, ii. 226. - -[422] _Hiawatha_, Canto xxi. - -[423] Steller, 267. ‘Die Italmanes geben nach ihrer _ungemein lebhaften -Phantasie_ von allen Dingen Raison, und lassen nicht das geringste ohne -Critic vorbei.’ Yet they had neither reverence nor names for the stars, -calling only the Great Bear the moving star, 281. - -[424] _Travels in Australia_, i. 261, 297. - -[425] Thompson, _South Africa_, ii. 34. - -[426] Aubrey’s _Miscellanies_, 197. - -[427] Those who doubt the existence of much popular superstition in this -century may judge of the amount and value of the evidence by referring -to the following books: 1. All the volumes of _Notes and Queries_, -Index, Folk-Lore. 2. Harland and Wilkinson, _Lancashire Folk-Lore_, -1867. 3. Henderson’s _Notes on the Folk-Lore of the Northern Counties of -England and the Borders_, 1866. 4. Kelly’s _Curiosities of Indo-European -Tradition and Folk-Lore_, 1863. 5. Stewart’s _Popular Superstitions of -the Highlanders of Scotland_, 1851. 6. Sternberg’s _Dialect and Folk-Lore -of Northamptonshire_, 1851. 7. Thorpe’s _Northern Mythology_, 1851. 8. -Birlinger, _Volksthümliches aus Schwaben_, 1861. 9. Koehler, _Volksbrauch -im Voigtlande_, 1867. 10. Bosquet, _La Normandie Romanesque_, 1845. - -[428] _Origin of Civilisation_, 33. - -[429] _Ibid._, 23. - -[430] Hammerton, _Round my House_, 254. - -[431] Holderness, _Journey from Riga to the Crimea_, 254. - -[432] Grimm, _Deutsche Mythologie_, ‘Aberglaube,’ cases 576, 664, 698, -898. These practices, even if no longer existent, throw light upon those -that still are. - -[433] Amélie Bosquet, _La Normandie pittoresque_, 217. - -[434] Fletcher, _Russe Commonweal_, 78. - -[435] Schoolcraft, _Indian Tribes_, v. 419. - -[436] Kane, 216. - -[437] Williams, 248. - -[438] Brett, _Indian Tribes of Guiana_, 369. - -[439] Grey, _Polynesian Mythology_, 111-114. - -[440] Cook, vi. 192. - -[441] Doolittle, _Social Life of the Chinese_, ii. 328. - -[442] There are several derivations for Beltane or Bealteine: 1. From -Baal or Belus, the Phœnician god, the worship being supposed to be -of Phœnician origin; 2. from Baldur, one of the gods of Valhalla who -represented the Sun; 3. from lá = day, teine = fire, and Beal = the name -of some god, but not Belus; 4. from Paleteine, Pales’ fire, the worship -being identified with that of the Roman goddess Pales, who presided over -cattle and pastures, and to whom, on April 21, prayers and offerings were -made. At the Palilia shepherds purified their flocks by sulphur and fires -of olive and pine wood, and presented the goddess with cakes of millet -and milk, whilst the people leaped thrice through straw fires kindled -in a row. Yet we should probably be right if we connected the Palilia -and the Beltanes, not as directly borrowed one from the other, but as -co-descendants from one and the same origin. - -Mr. Forbes-Leslie speaks of Beltane fires as still to be seen in 1865. -The Beltane feast proper was on May-day, but the word was also applied to -fires kindled in honour of Bel on other days, as on Midsummer Eve, All -Hallow-e’en, and Yeule, now Christmas. (_Early Races of Scotland_, i. -120-1.) - -[443] Stewart, _Popular Superstitions of the Highlanders_, p. 149. - -[444] Bancroft, iii. 701. - -[445] Kolbe, _Caput bonæ Spei_, ii. 431-2, and Thunberg, in Pinkerton, -xvi. 143. Kolbe gives a picture of the practice. - -[446] Kerr, _Voyages_, i. 131. - -[447] Catlin, ii. 189. - -[448] Schoolcraft, _Indian Tribes_, iii. 228. - -[449] Latham, _Desc. Ethn._, i. 141. - -[450] Jones, _Antiquities of the Southern Indians_, p. 21, and -Schoolcraft, _I.T._, v. 267. - -[451] _Lancashire Folk-Lore_, p. 63. - -[452] Sir W. Betham, _Gael and Cimbri_: 1834. ‘The branches of a tree -near the Stone of Fire Temple in the Persian province of Fars were found -thickly hung with rags, and the same offerings are common on bushes round -sacred wells in the Dekkan of India and Ceylon.’ (Forbes-Leslie, _Early -Races of Scotland_, i. 163.) - -[453] Schiefner, _Introduction to Sjögren’s Livische Grammatik_. St. -Petersburg, 1861. - -[454] The instances of Esthonian superstitions are taken from Grimm’s -collection in the _Deutsche Mythologie_. Their date is 1788. The same -interest attaches to them from an archæological point of view, whether -they exist still or have become extinct. - - -THE END. - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Primitive Manners and Customs, by -James Anson Farrer - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PRIMITIVE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS *** - -***** This file should be named 60943-0.txt or 60943-0.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/6/0/9/4/60943/ - -Produced by Turgut Dincer and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - -Title: Primitive Manners and Customs - -Author: James Anson Farrer - -Release Date: December 17, 2019 [EBook #60943] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PRIMITIVE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS *** - - - - -Produced by Turgut Dincer and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - - - - - - -</pre> - - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_i" id="Page_i">[i]</a></span></p> - -<div class="ad"> - -<p class="hanging"><b>MORGAN’S ANCIENT SOCIETY</b>; or, Researches -on the Lines of Human Progress through -Savagery and Barbarism to Civilization. By <span class="smcap">Lewis -H. Morgan</span>, LL.D. 8vo. $4.</p> - -<p class="hanging"><b>SIR HENRY SUMNER MAINE’S WORKS</b>:</p> - -<p><b>Ancient Law</b>: Its Connection with the Early -History of Society, and its Relation to Modern Ideas. -By <span class="smcap">Henry Sumner Maine</span>, Member of the Supreme -Council of India, and Regius Professor of the Civil -Law in the University of Cambridge. With an Introduction -by Theodore W. Dwight, LL.D. 8vo. -$3.50.</p> - -<p><b>Lectures on the Early History of Institutions.</b> -A Sequel to “Ancient Law.” 8vo. $3.50.</p> - -<p><b>Village Communities in the East and West.</b> -Six Lectures delivered at Oxford: to which are added -other Lectures, Addresses, and Essays. 8vo. $3.50.</p> - -<p class="hanging"><b>E. B. TYLOR’S WORKS</b>:</p> - -<p><b>Primitive Culture</b>: Researches into the Development -of Mythology, Philosophy, Religion, Art, and -Custom. 2 vols. 8vo. $7.00.</p> - -<p><b>Researches into the Early History of Mankind</b>, -and the Development of Civilization. 8vo. -$3.50.</p> - -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_ii" id="Page_ii">[ii]</a></span></p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_iii" id="Page_iii">[iii]</a></span></p> - -<h1>PRIMITIVE MANNERS<br /> -AND CUSTOMS</h1> - -<p class="titlepage"><span class="smaller">BY</span><br /> -JAMES A. FARRER</p> - -<div class="figcenter titlepage" style="width: 100px;"> -<img src="images/owl.jpg" width="100" height="115" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="titlepage"><span class="smaller">NEW YORK</span><br /> -HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY<br /> -1879</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_iv" id="Page_iv">[iv]</a></span></p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_v" id="Page_v">[v]</a></span></p> - -<h2><i>INTRODUCTION.</i></h2> - -<p>From the myths characteristic of savage tribes, from -their beliefs, their proverbs, their political and social -regulations, it is here sought to gain some general -estimate of their powers of intelligence and imagination, -their moral ideas, and their religion; subjects -naturally of much interest and inevitably of some -dispute. For the reason that in savagery as in civilisation -there are heights and depths, with more of -light here, more of darkness there, it is quite impossible -to bring the whole of savage life into focus at -once, so that every general conclusion can only be -taken as true within limits. The field to be studied -is also so large and diversified, that no two minds can -expect to derive from it the same impressions, nor to -attain to more than partial truth about it. But since -the savage can never hope to be heard in court himself, -it is only fair to start with certain considerations<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_vi" id="Page_vi">[vi]</a></span> -which he would be entitled to urge, and which deserve -to weigh in any judgment made regarding him.</p> - -<p>Statements of very low powers of numeration -have been perhaps too hastily taken as indicative of -a low state of intelligence; for not only have similar -assertions concerning American and Tasmanian -tribes by the earliest voyagers proved on subsequent -investigation to be erroneous, but many savages have -substitutes for our arithmetic which serve them perfectly -well, the Loangese, for instance, expressing -numbers in narration not by words but by gestures; -and the Koossa Kaffirs—very few of whom are said to -be able to count above ten—possessing the peculiar -faculty of detecting almost at a glance any loss in a -herd of cattle which may amount to half a thousand. -In the same way the want of a written language is often -supplied by symbolism. Puzzle as it might a person -of education to read a letter, expressed by a bundle -containing a stone, a piece of charcoal, a rag, a -pepper-pod, and a grain of parched corn, this would -be the way of saying in Yoruba, that, though the -sender was as strong and firm as a stone, his prospects -were as dark as charcoal; that his clothes were -in rags; that he was so feverish with anxiety that -his skin burned like pepper, even enough to cause<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_vii" id="Page_vii">[vii]</a></span> -corn to wither. The Niam-Niam, again, who declare -war by hanging on a tree an ear of maize, a fowl’s -feather, and an arrow, thereby giving contingent -enemies to understand that arrows will avenge any -injury done to a single fowl or a single ear of maize, -convey their meaning quite as clearly as the most -politely framed ultimata of any Foreign Office in -Europe.</p> - -<p>Many of the beliefs attributed to savages are no -fair test of their general reasoning capabilities; for -there are degrees of credulity in savage as in civilised -life, and reason everywhere struggles to exist. When -Pelopidas, on the eve of the battle of Leuctra, received -commands in a dream to sacrifice to certain shades a -virgin with chestnut hair, there were not wanting -soldiers, even in that army of Bœotians, who had the -shrewdness to think and the courage to say, that it -was absurd to suppose any divine powers could delight -in the slaughter and sacrifice of human beings, and -that, if there were such, they deserved no reverence. -All stages of culture thus have their dissenters, their -wicked reasoners. Among the Ahts only the most -superstitious now burn the house of a dead man, with -all its contents, for fear of offending his ghost. The -Zulus, whose sole religion consists in ancestor-worship,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_viii" id="Page_viii">[viii]</a></span> -exhibited often in the most ridiculous ceremonies, -begin to doubt the power and even the existence of -their Amatongo, or dead ancestors, if, when they are -sick, their prayers and sacrifices fail to effect a cure.</p> - -<p>The Tongan king, Finow, often stated to Mariner -his doubts about the existence of the gods, and -expressed the opinion, that men were fools for believing -all they were told by the priests; whilst his -saying, that the gods always favoured that side in war -on which there were the greatest chiefs and warriors, -recalls the opinion of a far more famous potentate than -Finow. The disrespect, indeed, that Finow showed -to the Tongan religion was such, that his subjects -explained violent thunderstorms as the dissensions of -the gods in Bolotu about his punishment. On the -other hand, savages are also subject to relapses of -superstition, such as with us are dignified by the name -of ‘movements;’ an American tribe who traced their -origin to a dog were so firmly impressed by a fanatic -with the sin of attaching their canine relatives to their -sledges, that they resolved to use dogs no more, but -women instead, for dragging their possessions.</p> - -<p>Savage ideas of morality and of government seem -to agree fundamentally with those of more advanced -populations, the ideas of the latter differing, indeed,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_ix" id="Page_ix">[ix]</a></span> -from the barbaric much as a finished photograph -differs from its earlier stage; that is to say, not as -essentially different, but as having become ‘fixed’ after -a process of development. The idea of the wrongfulness -of certain acts starts with the fear of their -consequences, that of murder, for instance, from the -fear of revenge; nor are such ideas ever separable -from the lowest levels of savage life. The sense of -the sanctity of property begins with what an individual -can make or catch for himself apart from tribal -claims; nor is any state of tribal communism so strong -as to recognise no private rights in the people or -things a man takes in war, the game he kills, or the -weapons he fashions. Respect for the aged is one of -the best traits of savage life, for the tribes of whom it -is asserted seem to outnumber those of whom it is -denied. In Equatorial Africa young men never -appear before old ones without curtseying nor pass -them by without stooping; should they sit in their -presence, it is ‘at a humble distance.’ Nor are cases -of the abandonment of the aged and infirm conclusive -proof of a deficiency of natural affection; one tribe -who were accused of so acting are also known to have -carried about with them for years a palsied man with -great tenderness and attention. Truthfulness, again,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_x" id="Page_x">[x]</a></span> -is recognised as a virtue outside the pale of the higher -religions, for Mungo Park found it one of the first -lessons taught by Mandingo women to their children, -and he mentions the case of one mother, whose only -consolation on the murder of her son ‘was the reflection -that the poor boy in the course of his life had -never told an untruth.’</p> - -<p>Strange contradictions abound in savage life, extremes -of barbarity sometimes co-existing with habits -of some refinement. The Ahts, who occasionally -sacrifice one of their number to the gods, and till -lately deserted their sick and aged, without the excuse -of scarcity of food, keep small mats of bark strips for -strangers to wipe their feet with, and after meals -offer them water and cedar-bark for washing their -hands and mouths. They have also a strict etiquette -regulating their reception of guests; they observe -public ceremonies with extreme formality; their men -of rank vie with one another in politeness. The Niam-Niam -are generally cannibals, but when several of -them drink together ‘they may each be observed -to wipe the rim of the drinking-vessel before passing -it on.’ The Bachapins, among whom it is said that a -murderer incurs no disgrace, yet measure a man’s -merit by his industry, and despise a man who does<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xi" id="Page_xi">[xi]</a></span> -not work, that is, hunt, for his living. The Aztecs, with -their constant and frightful human sacrifices, were so -afraid of incurring divine wrath for the blood they -spilled in the chase, that they would always preface a -hunt by burning incense to their idols, and conclude -it by smearing the faces of their divinities with -the blood of their game. To turn back from the -procession which accompanied the sacrifice of young -children to the gods of rain and water rendered a man -infamous and incapable of public office; yet death was -the penalty for drunkenness in either sex, and ‘it was -considered degrading for a person of quality to touch -wine at all, even in seasons of festival.’ Similar -inconsistencies are common in social regulations, -especially in those relating to marriage, stringent -laws of prohibited degrees and the strictest etiquette -often affording no further evidence of purity of -manners. The most barbarous marriage ceremonies -are frequently attended with absurd forms of prudery, -which it is perhaps impossible to trace to their origin. -The instance of the Aleutian islanders, who with the -grossest vices connect such notions of propriety as -that either a husband or a wife would blush to address -the other in the presence of a stranger, is one among -many similar illustrations of a side of savage life<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xii" id="Page_xii">[xii]</a></span> -which but for parallels in our own social usages might -present itself as an inexplicable anomaly.</p> - -<p>Better experience has in so many cases dissipated -original assertions of an absolute want of religious -ideas among savages, that the strongest doubts must -be felt of all similar negative propositions. Theology -in one of three grades seems rather to be the -universal property of mankind, appearing either -harmless, as at the beginning or end of its historical -career, or in its second and middle stage as identical -with all that is abominable and cruel. The classification -of mankind on such a basis of division, though it -could never aspire to scientific exactness, would afford -at least a standard of practical discrimination, by -which the relations between Christian and non-Christian -communities might to some extent be adjusted; -for, by considering any people under one of these three -aspects, it would be possible to form some estimate -of their aptitude for, or need of, our theology, and of -the advisability of our seeking to force it upon them.<a name="FNanchor_1" id="FNanchor_1"></a><a href="#Footnote_1" class="fnanchor">[1]</a><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xiii" id="Page_xiii">[xiii]</a></span> -Should the principle ever meet with the acceptance -it deserves, that missions, like charities, ought to be -discriminate, it is not difficult to perceive the direction -in which such a truth will be likely some day to -receive practical recognition.</p> - -<p>For wherever native theology takes the form of -cannibalism, sutteeism, human sacrifices, or other -rites directly destructive of earthly happiness, there -the teaching of missionaries affords the only hope of -a speedy reform, the only acquaintance possible for -savage tribes with a culture higher than their own, -save that which is likely to come to them through -the medium of the brandy-bottle or the bayonet. But -to send missions to countries like Russia or China, -where there exist established systems of religion -undefiled by cruelty, violates the first principle of -the faith so conveyed, disturbing the peace of families -and nations with the curse of religious animosity. -When the Jesuits entreated the Chinese Emperor, -Young-tching, to reconsider his resolution to proscribe -Christianity, there was some reason in the imperial -answer: ‘What should you say if I sent a troop of -lamas and bonzes to your country, to preach their -law there?’ The Taeping rebellion, or civil war, -which devastated China for about fifteen years,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xiv" id="Page_xiv">[xiv]</a></span> -desolating hundreds of miles of fair towns and fertile -fields, and fought out among massacres, sieges, and -famines, of quite indescribable cruelty and horror, -owed its impulse distinctly to the working of Christian -tracts among the more ignorant classes, followed by -a fanatical endeavour to substitute a travesty of -Christianity for the older religions; yet the seeds of all -this misery are still sown in China, in the name and -by the ministers of a religion of Peace, a religion that -has for its first and final rule of life the duty of so -dealing with others as we should wish them to deal -with ourselves.</p> - -<p>Cases of the third class, where the state of religious -belief is so rudimentary as to be innocuous, are unhappily -few; but where such belief has not advanced to -the detriment of the general welfare, it would seem the -kindest policy not to inspire men, whose lives are spent -in the constant perils of the woods or waves, with fears -of more malignant spirits than those their own fancy -has created for them, nor to teach them the doctrine -that, hard and black as this world often proves to them, -there is a yet harder and blacker one beyond. There -is also some charm in that variety of belief and -custom against which we wage unremitting war; and -only a tasteless fanaticism can think with pure joy of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xv" id="Page_xv">[xv]</a></span> -the time, when sectarian chapels shall stand on every -island of the seas, and Tartarus be taught wherever -the sun shines. Rites and beliefs lose the interest -which cling to them in their native home as soon as it -is sought to transplant them elsewhere, just as flowers -lose their fragrance and beauty when once they have -been separated from the plant on which they grew. -For this reason Puritanism has but little charm out of -England; and though it should please our love of -uniformity to read (as we may) of a Tahitian chief -carrying his Sabbatarian scruples so far as to ask -whether, if he saw ripe plantains by his garden-path -on Sunday, he might pick and eat them; or of another -abstaining from turning a pig out of his garden on -Sunday, preferring to let his sugar-canes be devoured; -such facts are yet no proof that we make Christians -of savages; they only prove that, with some trouble, -we may make them imbeciles.</p> - -<p>It would be difficult, indeed, to pay too high a -tribute to the unselfish efforts of missionaries, now -and in past times, directly for the benefit of mankind -and indirectly for that of science; yet the question, -besides its speculative interest, derives some justification -from the general results of missions over the -world, and from the melancholy disproportion between<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xvi" id="Page_xvi">[xvi]</a></span> -their actual and their merited successes: Whether the -welfare and improvement of savage tribes would not -be best left to themselves and to time? That they -are not incapable of independent improvement there -is abundant evidence to show. Sometimes it arises in a -tribe from imitation of some neighbouring tribe, more -powerful but less barbarous than itself; sometimes -from the initiative of some reforming chief of its own. -Thus the Comanche Indians of Texas, among whom -‘Christianity had never been introduced,’ abolished, -in consequence of their intercourse with tribes less -savage than themselves, the inhuman custom of killing -a favourite wife at her husband’s funeral. Mariner -was himself a witness of the abolition on the Tongan -Islands of the custom of strangling the wife of the -great Tooitonga chief at his death. It is said, again, -to be an indisputable fact, that the Monbuttoos of -Africa, whose ‘cannibalism is the most pronounced -of all the known nations of Africa,’ have, ‘without -any influence from the Mahometan or Christian world, -attained to no contemptible degree of external culture.’ -Finow, the Tongan king, was a genuine reformer; -and there have even been kings of Dahome -who have wished the abolition of human sacrifices. -Bianswah, the great Chippewya chief, put a stop, by<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xvii" id="Page_xvii">[xvii]</a></span> -a treaty of peace with the Sioux, to the horrible practice -of burning prisoners alive; and, though the peace -between the tribes was often broken, their compact -in this respect was never violated. In other instances -the modification of older usages points to the operation -of reformative tendencies. Thus the Nootka -Indians, who used to conclude their hunting festivals -with a human sacrifice, subsequently changed the -custom into the more lenient one of sticking a boy -with knives in various parts of his body. The Zulus -abolished the custom of killing slaves with a chief, to -prepare food and other things for him in the next -world; so that now it is only a tradition with them -that formerly when a chief died he did not die alone: -‘when the fire was kindled the chief was put in, and -then his servants were chosen and put in after the -chief; the great men followed—they were taken one -by one.’</p> - -<p>It is moreover certain that in some instances -savages have arrived spontaneously at no contemptible -notions of morality, and that they have often lost -their native virtues by their very contact with a higher -form of faith. The African Bakwains declared that -nothing described by the missionaries as sin had ever -appeared to them otherwise, except polygamy; and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xviii" id="Page_xviii">[xviii]</a></span> -the Tongan chiefs (if Mariner may be trusted), when -asked what motives they had, beyond their fear of -misfortunes in this life, for virtuous conduct, replied, -‘<i>as if they wondered such a question should be asked</i>:’ -‘The agreeable and happy feelings which a man experiences -within himself when he does any good -action and conducts himself nobly and generously, as -a man ought to do.’ The natural virtues attributed -to the same people include honour, justice, patriotism, -friendship, meekness, modesty, conjugal fidelity, -parental and filial love, patience in suffering, forbearance -of temper, respect for rank and for age. The -Khonds of India, much more savage than the Tongans -(their chief virtues consisting in killing an enemy, -dying as a warrior, or living as a priest), yet account -as sinful acts the refusal of hospitality, the breach of -an oath or promise, a lie, or the violation of a pledge -of friendship. The virtues the Maoris now possess -they are said to have possessed before we came among -them, namely honesty, self-respect, truthfulness; and -the belief that these virtues are even ‘fading under -their assumed Christianity’ recalls the tradition of -certain American tribes, that their lives and manners -were originally less barbarous, the Odjibwas, for instance, -actually tracing the increase of murders, thefts,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xix" id="Page_xix">[xix]</a></span> -falsehood, and disobedience to parents, to the advent -of the Christian whites.</p> - -<p>It is also remarkable that in several instances -savages have of themselves hit upon those very helps to -the maintenance of virtue which all Christian Churches -have found so efficacious. For we find existing -among them as religious and moral observances not -only Fasting and Confession, but occasionally even -Sermons. In the Tongan Islands <i>fonos</i>, or public -assemblies, were held, at which the king would address -his subjects, not only on agriculture but on morals -and politics; and the lower chiefs had <i>fonos</i> also for -the similar benefit of their feudal subordinates. In -America, also, some tribes observed feasts at which -the young were addressed on their moral duties, being -admonished to be attentive and respectful to the old, -to obey their parents, never to scoff at the decrepit or -deformed, to be charitable and hospitable. Not only -were such precepts dwelt on at great length, but enforced -by the examples of good and bad individuals, -just as they might be in London or Rome. Such -considerations, indeed, prove nothing against the additional -good that missionaries may do; but they add -some force to the thought that had a tithe of the -energy, the devotion, the suffering, the money, that has<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xx" id="Page_xx">[xx]</a></span> -been lavished on coaxing savages to be baptized, been -spent on promoting international peace in Europe, -wars might by this time be as extinct, belong as -purely to a past state of things, as judicial combats, -the thumbscrew, or the knout.</p> - -<p>The vexed question, whether savage life represents -a primitive or a decadent condition, whether it represents -what man at first everywhere was, or only -what he may become, has throughout the following -chapters been avoided, that controversy being regarded -as ‘laid’ by the exhaustive researches of -Mr. Tylor and other writers. But whilst the state -of the lowest modern savages is taken as the nearest -approximation we have of the primitive state from -which mankind has risen, it is not pretended that -the state of any particular tribe may not be one to -which it has fallen. As the low position of many -Bushmen tribes is quite explicable by their long -border-warfare with the Dutch, and the consequent -cruelties they were exposed to, or as the state of -many Brazilian savages may be traced to similar -contact with the Portuguese, so any case of extreme -savagery may be the result of causes, whose operation -has no historical or written proof to attest them. -The gigantic stone images on Easter Island, or the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xxi" id="Page_xxi">[xxi]</a></span> -great earthworks in America, are among the proofs, -that but for such material traces of its existence it -is possible for a whole civilisation to vanish, and to -leave only the veriest savages on the soil where it -flourished.<a name="FNanchor_2" id="FNanchor_2"></a><a href="#Footnote_2" class="fnanchor">[2]</a> As we know that Europe was once as -purely savage as parts of Africa are still, and can -conceive the cycle of events restoring it to barbarism, so -in the depths of time it may have happened in places -where no suspicion of such a history is possible. As -the surface of the earth seems subjected to processes -of elevation and subsidence, land and sea constantly -alternating their dominion, so it may be with civilisation, -destined to no permanent home on the earth, -but subsiding here to reappear there, and varying -its level as it varies its latitude.</p> - -<p>As the practical infinity of past time makes it -impossible to calculate the influence exercised in -different parts of the world by migrations, by conquests, -or by commerce, except within a very limited -period, so it precludes any definite belief in ethnological -divisions, and relegates the question of the -unity of the human race, like that of its origin, to the -limbo of profitless discussion. No characteristic has -yet been found by which mankind can be classified<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xxii" id="Page_xxii">[xxii]</a></span> -distinctly into races; and with all the differences of -colour, hair, skull, or language, which now suffice -for purposes of nomenclature, it remains true that -there is nothing to choose between the hypothesis -that we constitute only one species and the hypothesis -that we constitute several. The world is so old as -to admit of divergences from a single original type -quite as wide as any that exist; whilst, on the other -hand, similarity of customs (such, for instance, as that -Tartars in Asia, Sioux Indians in America, and -Kamschadals should all regard it as a sin to touch -a fire with a knife), fail us as a proof of a unity of -origin, in the face of our ignorance of prehistoric -antiquity.</p> - -<p>That the works which have treated before, and -better, of the subjects included in the following -chapters should have exercised no deterrent effect in -treating of them again, must find its excuse in the -general interest which those works have produced -for the studies in question, and of which the present -work is but a sign and consequence. The reader -has only himself to blame, if, having read the works -on the same or similar subjects by Mr. Tylor, Mr. -Spencer, and Sir John Lubbock, or those in German -by Peschel, Wuttke, or Waitz, he troubles himself<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xxiii" id="Page_xxiii">[xxiii]</a></span> -with yet another book which seeks rather to illustrate -than to exhaust the many interesting problems connected -with savage life; but the present writer, whilst -under the deepest obligations to the labours of his -predecessors—without which his own would have -been impossible—has not studied simply to recapitulate -their conclusions, but has sought rather to arrive -at such results as the evidence forced upon him, independently -as far as possible of existing theories or of -the authority upon which they rest. Should he have -succeeded in making anyone think better than before, -with more interest and sympathy, of those outcasts -of the world whom we designate as savage, something -at least will have been done to claim for them a kindlier -treatment and respect than in popular estimation -they either deserve or obtain.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xxiv" id="Page_xxiv">[xxiv]</a></span></p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xxv" id="Page_xxv">[xxv]</a></span></p> - -<h2><i>CONTENTS.</i></h2> - -<table summary="Contents"> - <tr> - <td class="tdc">CHAPTER I.<br />SOME SAVAGE MYTHS AND BELIEFS.</td> - <td class="tdpg"></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>The universality of religion—Nature and tests of the evidence relating - to the subject—Savage ideas of creation: ideas of a first man confused - with ideas of a first cause—Illustrative examples of primitive - cosmogony—Origin of the myth of the Two Contending Brothers—Prevalence - of the belief in a Golden Age—Deluge-myths—Their - possible origin in recollections of local floods, in the changes of the - land-level, or in fancies about the skies—Absence in most of them - of any connection with human crime—Vivid belief in futurity among - the lower races—Gradual growth of the idea of the future life as - affected by the present one—Difficulties in the attainment of future - happiness—The great difference between savage and civilised beliefs - regarding the Unknown illustrated by the savage belief in a future - life for animals or things as well as for men—Compensations in the - savage’s creed: no terror of death nor of the future</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_I">pages 1-40</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdc">CHAPTER II.<br />SAVAGE MODES OF PRAYER.</td> - <td class="tdpg"></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>Difficulties in the study of natural religions—Importance of prayer in - savage life—Examples of savage prayers—Are they limited to temporal - interests?—Baptismal rites equivalent to prayers—Prayers in - the form of toasts—The worship of evil spirits—Doubtful distinction - between good and bad divinities among savages—Treatment - of obdurate gods—Relation of sacrifice to prayer—Tendency of - sacrifices to become more numerous and severe—Pantomimic dances - possibly acted petitions—The African gorilla-dance, the Mandan<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xxvi" id="Page_xxvi">[xxvi]</a></span> - buffalo-dance, the Sioux bear-dance, the Australian kangaroo-dance—A - similar idea in prayers for rain—War-dances—Fetichistic - practices perhaps extinct forms of prayer—Prayers to animals, to the - moon, to trees, and their survival in modern folk-lore</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_II">41-77</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdc">CHAPTER III.<br />SOME SAVAGE PROVERBS.</td> - <td class="tdpg"></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>Differences of national character reflected in proverbs—Illustrated by - Italian and German sayings on the custom of the Vendetta, by - Italian and Persian proverbs about truth, by Catholic and Protestant - sentiments about priests—Comparison between the proverbs of - savage and civilised communities—Similarities of their feeling as - regards poverty, blame, experience, perseverance, habit, cause, - mendacity—Intelligence displayed in many savage proverbs—European - proverbs of savage coinage, exemplified by a comparison - between African and European proverbs relating to women—Inferences - deducible from known proverbs</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_III">78-100</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdc">CHAPTER IV.<br />SAVAGE MORAL PHILOSOPHY.</td> - <td class="tdpg"></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>Are there any authentic cases of a total absence of moral distinctions - among savages?—Unsatisfactory evidence regarding their moral - notions—The Bushman’s notion of a good and bad action—The - fear of fellow-tribesmen, of spirits and ghosts, the primary source of - distinction in the moral quality of actions—Moral restraints in - secular punishments—Compensation necessary for homicide—Collective - responsibility for crimes—Is murder ever regarded as indifferent?—Different - institutions for the prevention of wrongs—Greenland - singing-combats, <i>tabu</i>, <i>muru</i>, confession. Sins or fanciful - wrong acts, illustrated by feelings of proper behaviour with - regard to storms, to ancestors, to names, and to animals—Little - evidence among savages of any idea of moral qualities apart from - the consequences of actions—Their ideas of a future state throw - little light on their moral sentiments—Doubtful evidence of a belief - in a future life as affected by good or bad conduct—Fundamental - agreement between savage and civilised morality</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV">101-129</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdc"><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xxvii" id="Page_xxvii">[xxvii]</a></span>CHAPTER V.<br />SAVAGE POLITICAL LIFE.</td> - <td class="tdpg"></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>Theory of social evolution—The hunting state not necessarily one of - political inferiority—Do any tribes exist without any form of social - government?—Examples of the loosest social connections—Connection - of agriculture and slavery with more complex social systems—Freedom - and equality little known in savage life—Natural foundations - for distinction between aristocracy and commonalty—Ordeals - previous to admission to higher ranks—Devices for marking differences - of position: scars, dress, titles, artificial language, funeral - ceremonies, crests—Savage monarchy—Confusion between gods - and kings—Old Japanese and Samoan feelings about monarchy—Limitations - on savage despotism—Orders of society, approaching - to a system of caste—The relation of tabu to monarchy—Primogeniture - in Tahiti—Absurd rights of nephews in Fiji—Taxation a - festival in savage life—The subordination of the priesthood to the - State</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_V">130-161</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdc">CHAPTER VI.<br />SAVAGE PENAL LAWS.</td> - <td class="tdpg"></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>The interest of savage laws—Stage in which the redress of wrongs is a - merely personal matter—Tendency of offences to be regarded as - matters of family or tribal interest—Growth of the conception of - crime as an offence against the tribe, promoted by the custom of - submitting disputes to the judgment of chiefs, and marked by - customs, which, while making such chiefs judges, leave the punishment - of the criminal to the injured party—Such customs found in - America, Africa, Samoa, Afghanistan—Tendency of penal laws to - become more cruel—Primitive punishments not gratuitously cruel—Savage - laws not always arbitrary nor uncertain—Force of precedents - in Caffre law—Regularity in legal procedure—Curious notions - of equity—The ordeal in savage law, not an appeal to the judgment - of God, but an invention of priestcraft for the detection of guilt—Comparison - of some ordeals—Their utility for the discovery of guilt—Death<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xxviii" id="Page_xxviii">[xxviii]</a></span> - a frequent result of concealing real or fancied guilt—Oaths a - later development of the ordeal—The English judicial oath compared - with that in vogue in Samoa—Origin of the supposed virtue - in touching or kissing the thing sworn by—Invisible connection - between the thing touched and the calamity invoked in touching - it</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_VI">162-187</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdc">CHAPTER VII.<br />EARLY WEDDING CUSTOMS.</td> - <td class="tdpg"></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>Curious wedding custom of the Garos, in India—Natural affection - among savages, tested by some of the evidence of eye-witnesses—Love-stories—Treatment - of women not uniformly bad among savages—Married - life—Duty of bashfulness, displayed in curious manners and - notions of the Esquimaux, the Hottentots, the Hos, the Thlinkeets, - the Kirghiz, Kamschadals, the Bushmen, the Zulus, and the Bedouins—Conventional - reserve between husband and wife—Restrictions - on intercourse between near relations—Kicking and screaming - the <i>proper</i> behaviour at weddings—Real disinclination also often a - cause for the employment of real force—The ceremony of capture - affords a bride a real chance of escape from a bridegroom she - dislikes—Mercantile aspect of marriage—Marriages by capture often - voluntary elopements in defeat of parental contracts, illustrated by - customs in India, Afghanistan, Bokhara—Such marriages legalised - by successful elopement and subsequent settlement with parents—Exogamy - and endogamy, how related—Doubtful origin of exogamy—Its - effect in preserving peace between tribes—Woman-stealing the - result of artificial social customs—Origin of the difference of language - between the sexes among the Caribs—The same phenomenon - among the Zulus—Doubtful evidence of a total absence of marriage - ceremonies</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_VII">188-238</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdc">CHAPTER VIII.<br />THE FAIRY-LORE OF SAVAGES.</td> - <td class="tdpg"></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>Primitive philosophy of nature—Astro-mythology of Australian tribes, - of the Tasmanians, the Bushmen, the Esquimaux, Hervey Islanders,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xxix" id="Page_xxix">[xxix]</a></span> - Thlinkeet Indians—Such myths invented to account for natural - phenomena—Not always the result of forgotten etymologies—The - Aht story of the origin of the moon—American story of the robin—Hervey - Islanders’ story of the sole—Stories also invented to account - for curious customs or beliefs—Reason given by the Irish for their - annual persecution of the wren—The story of the wren and the - eagle, very similar in Ireland and North America—Facility of the - dispersion of stories often accounts for their resemblance—Wide - range of the story of Faithful John—Polynesian stories of Maui - stopping the sun’s motion—the same idea in Wallachia and North - America—Many similar stories arose independently of each other, - as the versions of the idea contained in Jack and the Beanstalk—Some - Aryan myths, explained as fancies about the clouds, found - also in the New World—Hindu myth of Urvasi compared with - myths from Borneo and America—Story-roots to be looked for on - earth, not in the clouds—Celestial and terrestrial phenomena confused—The - influence of dreams in the production of myths—The - influence of flattery—Tendency of chiefs and sorcerers to become - gods and heroes after death—Zeus compared with the culture-heroes - of savage mythology—The Hottentot Utixo, Mannan MacLear, - Manabozho, Viracocha, Quetzalcoatl, Heitsi Eibip, all probably of - human origin—Nicknames a factor in mythology—Tendency to - personify abstractions—Vivid imagination of savages</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">239-275</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdc">CHAPTER IX.<br />COMPARATIVE FOLK-LORE.</td> - <td class="tdpg"></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td>Interest of folk-lore due to the wide range of similar superstitions—Three - ways of accounting for such resemblances—Great extent of - superstition in civilised life—Savage incomplete distinction of things—Motion - and life identified—Analogy of bee superstitions with - superstitions about inanimate things—Fear of offending animals - by a light use of their names—Spiritualistic character of witchcraft—Illustrations—Relics - of object-worship—Sacred trees, animals, - birds—Reverence for red things—Chinese analogues to Aryan folk-lore—Mythology - probably founded on folk-lore, not folk-lore on<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_xxx" id="Page_xxx">[xxx]</a></span> - mythology—Traces of fire-worship—Beltane fires, formerly perhaps - connected with human sacrifices—Scotch needfires for cattle—Similar - customs among the Mayas of America and the Hottentots—Ideas - about the purity of new fire—Recent examples of the sacrifice - of living things to appease spirits—Moon superstitions like - those about the tides—Remnants of water-worship—Folk-lore a link - between civilisation and barbarism—Influence of Christianity on - folk-lore—The history of mankind that of a rise, not of a fall</td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_IX">276-315</a></td> - </tr> -</table> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_1" id="Page_1">[1]</a></span></p> - -<h2 id="CHAPTER_I">I.<br /> -<span class="smaller"><i>SOME SAVAGE MYTHS AND BELIEFS.</i></span></h2> - -<p>The question of the universality of religion, of its -presence in some form or another in every part of the -world, seems to be one of those which lie beyond the -bounds of a dogmatic answer. For the accounts of -missionaries and travellers, which furnish the only -data for its solution, have been so largely vitiated, if -not by a consciousness of the interests supposed to -be at stake, at least by so strong an intolerance for -the tenets of native savage religions, that it seems -impossible to make sufficient allowance either for the -bias of individual writers or for the extent to which -they may have misunderstood, or been purposely -misled by, their informants.</p> - -<p>Although, however, on the subject of native -religions we can never hope for more than approximate -truth, the reports of missionaries and others, -written at different periods of time about the same -place or contemporaneously about widely remote -places, as they must be free from all possible suspicion<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_2" id="Page_2">[2]</a></span> -of collusion, so they supply a kind of measure -of probability by which the credibility of any given -belief may be tested. Thus an idea, too inconceivable -to be credited, if only reported of one tribe of the -human race, may be safely accepted as seriously held, -if reported of several tribes in different parts of the -world. An Englishman, for instance, however much -winds and storms may mentally vex him, would -scarcely think of testifying his repugnance to them -by the physical remonstrance of his fists and lungs, -nor would he easily believe that any people of the -earth should seriously treat the wind in this way as a -material agent. If he were told that the Namaquas -shot poisoned arrows at storms to drive them away, -he would show no unreasonable scepticism in disbelieving -the fact; but if he learnt on independent -authority that the Payaguan Indians of North -America rush with firebrands and clenched fists -against the wind that threatens to blow down their -huts; that in Russia the Esthonians throw stones -and knives against a whirlwind of dust, pursuing it -with cries; that the Kalmucks fire their guns to drive -the storm-demons away; that Zulu rain-doctors or -heaven-herds whistle to lightning to leave the skies -just as they whistle to cattle to leave their pens; -and that also in the Aleutian Islands a whole village -will unite to shriek and strike against the raging wind, -he would have to acknowledge that the statement<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_3" id="Page_3">[3]</a></span> -about the Namaquas contained in itself nothing -intrinsically improbable. And besides this test of -genuine savage thought, a test which obviously -admits of almost infinite application, there is another -one no less serviceable in ethnological criticism, -namely, where the reality of a belief is supported by -customs, widely spread and otherwise unintelligible. -No better illustration can be given of this than the -belief, which, asserted by itself, would be universally -disbelieved, in a second life not only for men but for -material things; but which, supported as it is by the -practice, common alike in the old world and the new, -of burying objects with their owner to live again with -him in another state, is certified beyond all possibility -of doubt. If to us there seems a no more self-evident -truth than that a man can take nothing with him out -of the world, a vast mass of evidence proves, that the -discovery of this truth is one of comparatively modern -date and of still quite partial distribution over the -globe.</p> - -<p>So much, then, being premised as to the nature of -the evidence on which our knowledge of the lower -races depends, and as to the limits within which such -evidence may be received and its veracity tested, let -us proceed to examine some of the higher beliefs of -savages, which, as they bear some analogy to the -beliefs on similar subjects of more advanced societies, -are in a sense religious, and, so far at least as the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_4" id="Page_4">[4]</a></span> -collected information justifies us in judging, seem of -indigenous and independent growth.</p> - -<p>Few results of ethnology are more interesting -than the wide-spread belief among savages, arrived at -purely by their own reasoning faculties, in a creator -of things. The recorded instances of such a belief -are, indeed, so numerous as to make it doubtful -whether instances to the contrary may not have been -based on too scant information. The difficulty of -obtaining sound evidence on such subjects is well -illustrated by the experience of Dobritzhoffer, the -Jesuit missionary, who spent seven years among the -Abipones of South America. For when he asked -them whether the wonderful course of the stars and -heavenly bodies had never raised in their minds the -thought of an invisible being who had made and who -guided them, he got for answer that of what happened -in heaven, or of the maker or ruler of the stars, the -ancestors of the Abipones had never cared to think, -finding ample occupation for their thoughts in the providing -of grass and water for their horses. Yet the -Abipones really believed that they had been created -by an Indian like themselves, whose name they -mentioned with great reverence and whom they -spoke of as their ‘grandfather,’ because he had lived -so long ago. He was still, they fancied, to be seen in -the Pleiades; and when that constellation disappeared -for some months from the sky they would bewail the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_5" id="Page_5">[5]</a></span> -illness of their grandfather, and congratulate him on -his recovery when he returned in May. Still, the -creator of savage reasoning is not necessarily a -creator of all things, but only of some, like Caliban’s -Setebos, who made the moon and the sun, and the -isle and all things on it—</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"> -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="verse">But not the stars; the stars came otherwise.</div> -</div> -</div> - -<p>So that it is possible the creator of the Abipones was -merely their deified First Ancestor. For on nothing -is savage thought more confused than on the connection -between the first man who lived on the world -and the actual Creator of the world, as if in the -logical need of a first cause they had been unable to -divest it of human personality, or as if the natural -idea of a first man had led to the idea of his having -created the world. Thus Greenlanders are divided -as to whether Kaliak was really the creator of all -things or only the first man who sprang from the -earth. The Minnetarrees of North America believed -that at first everything was water and there was no -earth at all, till the First Man, the never-dying one, -the Lord of Life, sent down the great red-eyed bird -to bring up the earth. The Mingo tribes also ‘revere -and make offerings to the First Man, he who was -saved at the great deluge, as a powerful deity under -the Master of Life, or <i>even as identified with him</i>;’ -whilst among the Dog-ribs the First Man, Chapewee,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_6" id="Page_6">[6]</a></span> -was also creator of the sun and moon. The Zulus of -Africa likewise merge the ideas of the First Man and -the Creator, the great Unkulunkulu; as also do the -Caribs, who believe that Louquo, the uncreate first -Carib, descended from heaven to make the earth and -also to become the father of men.<a name="FNanchor_3" id="FNanchor_3"></a><a href="#Footnote_3" class="fnanchor">[3]</a> So again in the -Aht belief Quawteaht is not only ‘the first Indian who -ever lived,’ their forefather, but the maker of most -things visible, of the earth and all animals, yet not of -the sun and moon.<a name="FNanchor_4" id="FNanchor_4"></a><a href="#Footnote_4" class="fnanchor">[4]</a> It seems, therefore, not improbable -that savage speculation, being more naturally -impelled to assume a cause for men than a cause for -other things, postulated a First Man as primeval -ancestor, and then applying an hypothesis, which -served so well to account for their own existence, to -account for that of the world in general, made the -Father of Men the creator of all things; in other -words, that the idea of a First Man preceded and -prepared the way for the idea of a first cause.</p> - -<p>However this may be, and admitting the possible -existence of tribes absolutely devoid of any idea of -creation at all, the following savage fancies about it -are not without their interest as typical examples of -primitive cosmogony.</p> - -<p>In one of the Dog-rib Indian sagas an important -part in the creation is played by a great bird, as among<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_7" id="Page_7">[7]</a></span> -several other tribes who loved to trace their origin -to a bird, as some would trace theirs to a toad or a -rattlesnake. Originally, the saga runs, the world was -nothing but a wide, waste sea, without any living -thing upon it save a gigantic bird, who with the -glance of its fiery eyes produced the lightning, and -with the flapping of its wings the thunder. This bird, -by diving into the sea, caused the earth to appear -above it, and proceeded to call all animals to its -surface (except, indeed, the Chippewya Indians, who -were descended from a dog). When its work was -complete it made a great arrow, which it bade the -Indians keep with great care; and when this was -lost, owing to the stupidity of the Chippewyas, it was -so angry that it left the earth, never afterwards to revisit -it; and men now live no longer, as they did in -those days, till their throats are worn through with -eating and their feet with walking the earth.<a name="FNanchor_5" id="FNanchor_5"></a><a href="#Footnote_5" class="fnanchor">[5]</a></p> - -<p>Many thousands of miles separate the Tongan -Islands from North America, yet there too we find -the idea of the earth having come from the waters. -In the beginning nothing was to be seen above the -waste of waters but the Island of Bolotu, which is as -everlasting as the gods who dwell there or as the -stars and the sea. One day the god Tangaloa went -to fish in the sea, when, feeling something heavy at -the end of his line, he drew it in, and there perceived<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_8" id="Page_8">[8]</a></span> -the tops of rocks, which continued to increase in size -and number till they formed a large continent, and -his line broke, and only the Tongan Islands remained -above the surface. These Tangaloa, with the help -of the other gods, filled with trees and herbs and -animals from Bolotu, only of a smaller size and not -immortal. Then he bade his two sons take their -wives and go to dwell in Tonga, dividing the land -and dwelling apart. The younger brother was -steady and industrious, and made many discoveries; -but the elder was idle and slept away his time, and -envied the works of his brother, till at last his envy -grew so strong that one day he murdered him. Then -came Tangaloa in wrath from Bolotu, to ask him -why he had slain his brother, and he bade him bring -his brother’s family to him. They were told to take -their boats and sail eastward till they came to a -great land to dwell in. ‘Your skin’ (to this effect -ran Tangaloa’s blessing) ‘shall be white as your -souls, for your souls are pure; you shall be wise, -make axes, have all other riches, and great boats. -I myself will command the wind to blow from your -land to Tonga, but the people of Tonga will not be -able with their bad boats to reach you.’ To the -others he said: ‘You shall be black, because your -souls are black, and you shall remain poor. You -shall not be able to prepare useful things, nor to go -to the land of your brothers. But your brothers<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_9" id="Page_9">[9]</a></span> -shall come to Tonga and trade with you as they -please.’<a name="FNanchor_6" id="FNanchor_6"></a><a href="#Footnote_6" class="fnanchor">[6]</a></p> - -<p>This Tongan creation-myth is especially striking, -not only from its resemblance to the well-known -stories of Cain and Abel or of Romulus and Remus, -but from the wonderful extension of a similar story -over the world. It has been found among the Esquimaux, -among the Hervey Islanders, among the -Hindoos, among the Iroquois of America. Its origin -perhaps lies in early and rude attempts to account -for the more obvious dualisms in nature, as those, for -instance, between the sun and the moon, or between -warm and cold winds. In the Iroquois version -the elder brother who killed the younger is said to -have been identical with the sun, though his mother, -not the brother he killed, was the moon.<a name="FNanchor_7" id="FNanchor_7"></a><a href="#Footnote_7" class="fnanchor">[7]</a> A curious -Indian drawing has been preserved in which the god -of the north wind, or of cold weather, contends with -the god of the south, or of warmth. The former is -figured in a snowstorm, the latter in rain; wolves -fight on the side of the one, the crow and plover on -that of the other. The conflict is terrible; the -southern god is worsted, cold weather prevails, and -the earth is frozen up. But in spring he sends forth -his crow and plover, who defeat the wolves, and the -northern god is drowned in a flood of spray which -arises from the melting of the snow and ice. And in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_10" id="Page_10">[10]</a></span> -this contention for cold and warm weather it is believed -they will battle as long as the world shall endure.<a name="FNanchor_8" id="FNanchor_8"></a><a href="#Footnote_8" class="fnanchor">[8]</a></p> - -<p>The Kamchadal belief is instructive, as showing -that by the creation of the world the savage only means -that small portion of it which he knows, and that, so far -from it being any proof of his intelligence to suppose a -cause for the hills or island which limit his energies, -it is rather his want of logical thought which impels -him to the belief. For seeing, as he does, a spirit in -everything, whether it be moving animal, or rushing -wind, or standing stone, and accounting, as he does, -for everything by a spirit which is at once its cause -and controlling principle, it is only natural that he -should draw from his unlimited spirit-world one who -made and governs all things. Thus the Kamchadals -believe that after their supreme deity, of whom -they predicate nothing but existence, the greatest -god is Kutka. Kutka created the heavens and -the earth, making both eternal, like the men and -creatures he placed on the earth. But the Kamchadals -openly avow that they think themselves -much cleverer than Kutka, who in their eyes is so -stupid as to be quite undeserving of prayers or gratitude. -Had he been cleverer, they say, he would -have made the world much better, without so many -mountains and inaccessible cliffs, without streams<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_11" id="Page_11">[11]</a></span> -of such rapidity, or such tempests of wind and rain. -In winter, if they are climbing a mountain, or in -summer, if their canoes come to rapids, they will -vent loud curses on Kutka for having made the -streams too strong for their canoes, or the mountains -so wearisome for their feet.</p> - -<p>The Tamanaks of the Orinoco manifested a not -much higher conception of a creator than the Kamchadals. -For they ascribed the creation of the world -to Amalivacca, who in the course of his work discussed -long with his brother about the Orinoco, having the -kind wish so to make it that ships might as easily -go up its stream as down, but being compelled to -abandon a task which so far transcended his powers. -The Tamanaks recently showed a cave where Amalivacca -dwelt when he lived among them, before -he took a boat and sailed to the other side of the -sea.<a name="FNanchor_9" id="FNanchor_9"></a><a href="#Footnote_9" class="fnanchor">[9]</a></p> - -<p>Not only, however, is the idea of a creation of -things quite common among untutored savages, but -there is often a belief closely connected therewith -that in the beginning death and sickness were unknown -in the world, but came into it in consequence -of some fault committed by its hitherto immortal occupants. -Such a belief, reported as it is from places -so widely sundered as Ceylon, North America, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_12" id="Page_12">[12]</a></span> -the Tongan Islands, seems effectually to discountenance -the suspicion which might otherwise attach to -it of collusion or mistake on the part of our informants. -It is the fancy of the Cingalese cosmogony -that, in the fifth period of creative energy, the immortal -beings who then inhabited the earth ate of -certain plants, and thereby involved themselves in -darkness and mortality. ‘It was then that they were -formed male and female, and lost the power of returning -to the heavenly mansions.’ Liable as they -had theretofore been to mental passions, such as envy, -covetousness, and ambition, they were thenceforward -subjected to corporeal passions as well, and the race -now inhabiting the earth became subject to all the evils -that afflict them.<a name="FNanchor_10" id="FNanchor_10"></a><a href="#Footnote_10" class="fnanchor">[10]</a> According to the saga of the Dog-rib -Indians the first man who lived upon the earth, when -food and other good things abounded, was Chapewee, -who afterwards, giving his children two kinds of food, -black and white, forbade them to eat of the former. -When he went away for a long journey to bring the -sun into the world, his children were obedient and -ate only of the white fruit, but ate it all. But when -he went away a second time to bring the moon into -the world, in their hunger his children forgot his -prohibition and ate of the black fruit. So when -Chapewee returned he was very wroth, and declared<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_13" id="Page_13">[13]</a></span> -that thenceforth the earth should only produce bad -fruit and that men should be subject to sickness and -death. Afterwards, indeed, when his family lamented -that men should have been made mortal for eating -the black fruit, Chapewee granted that those who -dreamt certain dreams should have the power of -curing sickness and so of prolonging human life; -but that was the extent to which Chapewee relented.<a name="FNanchor_11" id="FNanchor_11"></a><a href="#Footnote_11" class="fnanchor">[11]</a> -The Caribs, Waraues, and Arawaks are said to believe -in two distinct creators of men and women; -the creator of the former being superior and doing -neither good nor harm. After he had created men -he came on the earth to see what they were doing; -but finding them so bad that they even attempted -his own life, he took from them their immortality -and gave it to skin-casting creatures instead. The -Aleutian Islanders believe that the god who made -their islands completed his work by making men to -inhabit them; but these men were immortal beings, -for when age came over them they had but to climb -a lofty mountain and plunge from thence into a lake, -in order to come forth young again and vigorous. Then -it happened that a mortal woman, who had the misfortune -to draw upon herself celestial love, remonstrated<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_14" id="Page_14">[14]</a></span> -one day with her lover for having, in his -creation of the Aleutian Islands, made so many -mountains and forgotten to supply the land with -forests. This imprudent criticism caused her brother -to be slain by the angry god, and all men after -him to be subject to death. A similar idea is contained -in one of the Tongan traditions of creation; -for when the islands were made, but before they were -inhabited by reasonable beings, some two hundred -of the lower gods, male and female alike, took a -great boat to go to see the new land fished up by -Tangaloa. So delighted were they with it that they -immediately broke up their big boat, intending to -make some smaller ones out of it. But after a few -days some of them died; and one of them, inspired -by God, told them that since they had come to Tonga, -and breathed its air and eaten its fruits, they should -be mortal and fill the world with mortals. Then -were they sorry that they had broken their big boat, -and they set to work to make another, and went to -sea, hoping again to reach Bolotu, the heaven they -had left; but being unable to find it, they returned -regretfully to Tonga.</p> - -<p>Thus it would seem that wherever men have -so far advanced in power of thought as to realise -the conception of antiquity, the troubles of their -actual lot have always tempted them to idealise the -past, and the glories of the age of gold have been<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_15" id="Page_15">[15]</a></span> -sung by the poets of no particular land nor literature. -The Shawnee Indians believed there was a time -when they could walk on the ocean or restore life -to the dead, till they lost these privileges when the -nation by its carelessness became divided into two.<a name="FNanchor_12" id="FNanchor_12"></a><a href="#Footnote_12" class="fnanchor">[12]</a> -The Ashantees trace all their calamities to the folly -of their ancestors, for when the first created black -men were given their choice between a large box -and a piece of sealed-up paper they elected to take -the box, but found therein only some gold, iron, and -other metals, whilst the white men on opening the -paper found all that was needful to make them wise, -and have ever since treated the blacks as their slaves.<a name="FNanchor_13" id="FNanchor_13"></a><a href="#Footnote_13" class="fnanchor">[13]</a> -It is remarkable that a similar fancy is ascribed to the -Navajoes of New Mexico. For their ancestors, after -creating the sun and moon, made two water-jars, both -covered at the top, but one gorgeously painted, containing -only rubbish, the other of plain earthenware, -unpainted, but containing flocks and herds and other -valuables. The Navajoes, allowed to choose before -the Pueblos, took the beautiful but worthless jar; -whereupon the old men said: ‘Thus it will always -be with the two nations. You, Navajoes, will be a -poor and wandering race; destitute of the comforts -of life and ever greedy for things on account of their -outward show rather than their intrinsic value; while<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_16" id="Page_16">[16]</a></span> -the Pueblos will enjoy an abundance of the good -things of life, will occupy houses, and have plenty of -flocks and herds.’<a name="FNanchor_14" id="FNanchor_14"></a><a href="#Footnote_14" class="fnanchor">[14]</a> According to the legend in the -Zend-Avesta, when Ormuzd created Meschia and -Meschiana, the first man and woman, he appointed -heaven as their dwelling, under the sole condition of -humility and obedience to the law of pure thought, -pure speech, and pure action. For some time they -were a blessing to one another and lived happily, -saying that it was from Ormuzd that all things came—the -water and earth, trees and animals, sun, moon, -and stars, and all good roots and fruits on the earth. -But at last Ahriman became master over their -thoughts, and they ascribed the creation of all things -to him. So they lost their happiness and their virtue, -and their souls were condemned to remain in Duzakh -until the resurrection of their bodies, when Sosiosch -should restore life to the dead.<a name="FNanchor_15" id="FNanchor_15"></a><a href="#Footnote_15" class="fnanchor">[15]</a></p> - -<p>Among the myths, however, most widely spread -over the world and common to races in all stages -of culture, from the most barbarous to the most -civilized, a prominent place is due to the legend of an -all-destructive deluge, a legend which, arising as it -probably did in many different places from exaggerated -memories of purely local floods, must, in spite -of its seeming universality, remain a merely local<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_17" id="Page_17">[17]</a></span> -myth, entirely destitute of all bearing on the question -of the unity of the human race, or of any connection -with the story told in Genesis. A local flood -like that which on the occasion of an earthquake in -1819 was caused by the sea flowing in at the eastern -mouth of the Indus and converting in the space of a -few hours a district of 2,000 square miles into a vast -lagoon, would naturally be an event which would remain -for ever in the oral traditions of the district and -tend to become magnified when the event itself was -forgotten. In Australia, which is subject at certain -epochs and in certain localities to great inundations, -and which bears evidence of former floods in what -are now waterless deserts, flood stories are said to -be ‘exceedingly common’ among all the tribes, one -tribe having a tradition that when they returned to -their old hunting-grounds on the banks of a river, -after a great flood, they found the sea flowing where -had stood the other bank, nor any trace left of its -former inhabitants.<a name="FNanchor_16" id="FNanchor_16"></a><a href="#Footnote_16" class="fnanchor">[16]</a></p> - -<p>Or, again, it is possible that alterations in the -level of the sea and land or the subsidence of a large -continent, such as that of which on geological as well -as ethnological grounds it has been supposed that the -Polynesian islands are the remains, may have originated -the tradition. Thus, the Abbé Brasseur de Bourbourg -imagined the submersion of a large country in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_18" id="Page_18">[18]</a></span> -the Atlantic to account for the deluge-myths of the -Central American nations.<a name="FNanchor_17" id="FNanchor_17"></a><a href="#Footnote_17" class="fnanchor">[17]</a> Dr. Brinton, indeed, suggests, -that not physics, but metaphysics is the exciting -cause of beliefs in periodical convulsions of the globe, -maintaining that ‘by nothing short of a miracle’ -could savages preserve the remembrance of even the -most terrible catastrophe beyond a few generations. -But it is at least as likely that such remembrance -should be possible as that savages, starting, as he -supposes, with an idea of creation as a reconstruction -of existing elements, should have added thereto the -myth of a universal catastrophe, ‘to avoid the dilemma -of a creation from nothing on the one hand and the -eternity of matter on the other.’<a name="FNanchor_18" id="FNanchor_18"></a><a href="#Footnote_18" class="fnanchor">[18]</a> Perhaps, however, -all such legends are best regarded as pure nature-myths, -to which we may possibly find the key in the -belief of the Esquimaux, that the souls of the dead are -encamped round a large lake in the sky, which when it -overflows causes rain upon earth and would cause a -universal deluge if at any time its floodgates were -burst. The belief in a contingency is never far from -the assertion of its actuality, nor are the steps of thought -always visible which separate the possible from the real.</p> - -<p>Although many of the deluge-myths of the world -have doubtless owed their origin to the zeal with -which they have been sought for in the cause of orthodox<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_19" id="Page_19">[19]</a></span> -theories, it is improbable that all of them have -been produced in this way. Dr. Brinton, who has -examined the evidence with care, asserts that there -are twenty-eight American nations among whom a -distinct and well-authenticated myth of the deluge -was found.<a name="FNanchor_19" id="FNanchor_19"></a><a href="#Footnote_19" class="fnanchor">[19]</a></p> - -<p>It would be tedious to allude to more than a few -illustrations of the belief as it exists in the world, or -to try to distinguish the elements in them of purely -native growth from the influences of Christian teaching. -The Kamchadals believe that the earth was -once flooded and many persons drowned, though they -tried to save themselves in boats, those only succeeding -who made great rafts of trees and let down stones -for anchors, to prevent themselves from drifting out -to sea; when the waters subsided their rafts rested on -the mountain-tops. The Esquimaux appealed to the -bones of whales found on their mountains in support -of their assertion that the world had once been -tilted over and all men drowned but one. The -Mandan Indians, according to Catlin, celebrated every -year in pantomime the subsidence of the great waters.<a name="FNanchor_20" id="FNanchor_20"></a><a href="#Footnote_20" class="fnanchor">[20]</a></p> - -<p>It is noticeable that in most savage legends of a -flood (and it may, perhaps, be taken as some test of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_20" id="Page_20">[20]</a></span> -their authenticity) there is an entire absence of the -idea, so familiar to ourselves, of the flood having resulted -from any fault committed by the then inhabitants -of the earth. At most such an idea appears -in germ, as in the tradition of the Society Islanders, -that a fisherman, catching his hook in the hair of the -great sea-god as he lay asleep in his coral grove, so -angered that divinity that he caused the waters to -arise till they flooded the very tops of the mountains -and drowned the inhabitants, the fisherman and his -family alone being suffered to escape, and thereby -serving to attest the genuineness of the tradition. -So in Fiji the deluge was caused by two grandsons -of a god killing his favourite bird, and instead of -being apologetic acting with insolence and fortifying -the town they lived in for the purpose of defying -their grandfather. The connection of the catastrophe -with human wickedness belongs apparently to a more -advanced state of thought, of which the recently deciphered -Chaldæan version may be taken as a sample. -In it Hasisadra, the sage, who with his wife escaped -the general destruction, tells Izdubar, the giant, how -he built a vessel according to the directions of Hea, -to save himself and his family from the universal -deluge which the gods sent upon the earth to punish -the wickedness of men; how the deluge lasted six -days, and on the seventh, when the storm ceased, the -vessel was stranded for seven days on the mountains<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_21" id="Page_21">[21]</a></span> -of Nizir; and how on the seventh day, he Hasisadra, -sent out first a dove and then a swallow, both of whom, -finding no resting-place, returned to the vessel, till a -raven was sent forth and did not return; and Hasisadra -sent out the animals to the four winds, and poured out -a libation in thanksgiving, and built an altar on the -summit of the mountain.</p> - -<p>The belief in a future life—a belief perhaps first -suggested in that rude state of culture where the -dreaming and waking life are not clearly distinct but -are both equally real—appears to prevail so generally -among the lower races, that it is more difficult to find -instances where it is <i>not</i> found than instances where it -is. The dead who visit the living in their sleep are -not thought of as dead, but as simply invisible; and -for this reason all over the globe it is so common to -bury material things in the graves of the departed, to -serve them in that other world which is so vividly -conceived as but a continuation of this one. The -Red Indian takes his horses, the Greenlander his reindeer, -and both the common requisites of earthly -economy; just as many tribes still take their slaves -and their wives to accompany them on that journey -which, as it is imagined so distinctly, is undertaken -without mystery to a fresh existence. Till lately, in -parts of Sweden, a man’s pipe and tobacco-pouch, -some money and lights, were interred with him; and -at Reichenbach, in Germany, a man’s umbrella and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_22" id="Page_22">[22]</a></span> -goloshes are still placed in his grave.<a name="FNanchor_21" id="FNanchor_21"></a><a href="#Footnote_21" class="fnanchor">[21]</a> In Russia -formerly a new pair of shoes was put on the feet of -the dead for the long journey before him, a custom -also found among the natives of California, and the -Christian priest used to place on a man’s breast, as he -lay in his coffin, a pass, which, besides being inscribed -with his Christian name and the dates of his birth -and death, was also a certificate of his baptism, of -the piety of his life, and of his having partaken of the -communion before his death.<a name="FNanchor_22" id="FNanchor_22"></a><a href="#Footnote_22" class="fnanchor">[22]</a> These are but survivals -of savage ideas, which picture the continuation of -consciousness far more vividly than more advanced -religions. The Ahts bury blankets with their dead, -that they may not shiver in the cold ones provided in -the land of Chayher. The Delawar Indian used to -make an opening at the head-end of the coffin, that -the soul of the deceased might go in and out till it -had thoroughly settled on its future place of residence. -When the Chippewyas killed their aged relatives who -could hunt no more, the medicine-song used proves<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_23" id="Page_23">[23]</a></span> -the simple faith which made the cruel deed an act of -mercy: ‘The Lord of life gives courage. It is true -all Indians know that he loves us, and we give over to -him our father, that he may feel himself young in -another land and able to hunt.’</p> - -<p>It is possible, indeed, that in many cases the -attention shown by savages to their dead, by the burial -of property which would have been of use to the survivors, -or by the placing of food on their graves at -periodical feasts, arose rather from fear than from any -kinder motive, dictated by the dread always felt by -the living of the dead and the wish to satisfy them, -if possible, by some peace-offering. The Samoyed -sorcerer, after a funeral, goes through the ceremony of -soothing the departed, that he may not trouble the -survivors nor take their best game; a feeling still -further illustrated by their habit of not taking the dead -out to be buried by the regular hut door, but by a -side-opening, that if possible they may not find their -way back—a habit found also in Greenland and in -many other parts of the world. For the fear of the -dead is a universal sentiment, common no less to the -Abipones, who thought that sorcerers could bring the -dead from their graves to visit the living, or to the -Kaffirs, who think that bad men alone live a second -time and try to kill the living by night, than it is to -the ignorant who still believe in the blood-sucking -vampire, a belief which little more than a century<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_24" id="Page_24">[24]</a></span> -ago amounted to a kind of epidemic in Hungary, -resulting in a general disinterment and the burning -or staking of the suspected bodies. In the sepulture, -therefore, of men with their possessions, it was probably -the original thought that the dead would be -less likely to haunt the dwellings of the living, if they -were not compelled to re-seek upon earth those articles -of daily use which they knew were to be found there.</p> - -<p>But the savage belief in a future is very variable; -nor could we expect to find it much affected by ideas -of earthly morality, when such ideas themselves -hardly appear to exist. At most it is men of -rank and courage who live again, while cowards -and the commonalty perish utterly; generally there is -no qualification of any kind. The Bedouins have no -fixed belief at all, some thinking that after death they -are changed into screech-owls, and others that if a -camel is slain on their graves they will return to -life riding on it, but otherwise on foot. All North -American Indians are said to believe in the continual -life of the soul, and, because they think themselves the -highest beings on earth, postulate a hereafter where -all their earthly longings will be satisfied.<a name="FNanchor_23" id="FNanchor_23"></a><a href="#Footnote_23" class="fnanchor">[23]</a> But they -trouble themselves little about it, thinking that the -god they recognise as supreme is too good to punish -them. Thus the Indians of Arauco look forward to an -eternal life in a beautiful land which lies to the west,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_25" id="Page_25">[25]</a></span> -far over the sea, whither souls are taken by the sailor -Tempulazy and where no punishment is expected: -for Pillican, their god, the Lord of the world, would -not inflict pain.<a name="FNanchor_24" id="FNanchor_24"></a><a href="#Footnote_24" class="fnanchor">[24]</a> The Tunguz Lapps look on the next -life as simply a continuation of this one; in it there -will be no punishment, for here everyone is as good as -he can be, and the gods kill men reluctantly, but are -thereby satisfied. In the Polynesian future there is a -similar absence of any idea of retribution. There is, -for instance, no moral qualification, but only one of -rank, for Bolotu, that happy land of the dead which -lies far away to the north-west of Tonga, beyond the -reach of Tongan boats and greater than all the -Tongan islands put together, wherein abound beautiful -and useful trees, whose plucked fruit instantly -grows again; where a delicious fragrance fills the air, -and birds of the loveliest colours sit upon the trees; -where the woods swarm with pigs, which are immortal -so long as they are not eaten by the gods. Nothing, -indeed, shows better how independent is imagination -of race than the great similarity of those idealised -earths which constitute the heavens of the most distant -savage tribes. The American Indian, who visits in -a dream the unseen world, reports of it, in language -recalling that of Homer, that it is a land where there is -neither day nor night, where the sun never rises nor -sets; where rain and tomahawks and arrows are never<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_26" id="Page_26">[26]</a></span> -seen; where pipes abound everywhere, lying ready to -be smoked; where the earth is ever green, the trees -ever in leaf; where there is no need of bearskin nor of -hut; where, if you would travel, the rivers will take -your boat whithersoever you will, without the need of -rudder or of paddle. And just as in the Tongan -Bolotu the plucked fruit is replaced, so there the goat -voluntarily offers its shoulder to the hungry man, in -full confidence that it will grow again, and the beaver -for the same reason makes a ready sacrifice of its -beautiful tail.<a name="FNanchor_25" id="FNanchor_25"></a><a href="#Footnote_25" class="fnanchor">[25]</a></p> - -<p>So far there is no idea of a future life as in any -way affected by this one. But such ideas do exist -among savages, and are extremely interesting as indications -of the growth of their moral ideas. The -quality most necessary for a savage is pre-eminently -courage, and courage, therefore, appearing as the first -recognised virtue, lays first claim, as such, to consideration -hereafter. The Brazilians believed that the -souls of the dead became beautiful birds, whilst cowards -were turned into reptiles. The Minnetarrees held that -there were two villages which received the dead; but -that the cowardly and bad went to the small one, -whilst the brave and good occupied the larger. Among -the Caribs, who entertain the strange fancy that they -have as many souls as they feel nerves in their body, -but that the chief of these resides in the heart and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_27" id="Page_27">[27]</a></span> -goes to heaven at death, whilst the others go to the -sea or the woods, we meet again with the reservation of -happiness to the souls of the brave. They alone will -live merrily, dancing, feasting, and talking; they alone -will swim in the great streams, feeling no fatigue; the -Arawaks will either serve them as slaves or wander -about in desert mountains. Somewhat similar was -the faith of the old Mexicans, who divided the future -world into three parts: the first, the House of the -Sun, where the days were spent in joyful attendance -on that luminary, with songs and games and dances, -by such brave soldiers as had died in battle or as -prisoners had been sacrificed to the gods, and by -women who had died in giving children to the community; -the second, the kingdom of Tlalocan, hidden -among the Mexican mountains, not so bright as the -former, but cool and pleasant, and filled with unfailing -pumpkins and tomatoes, reserved for priests and for -children sacrificed to Tlaloc and for all persons killed -by lightning, by drowning, or by sickness; the third, -the kingdom of Mictlauteuctli, reserved for all other -persons, but with nothing said of any punishment -there awaiting them. One of the beliefs in Greenland -is, that heaven is situate in the sky or the moon, and -that the journey thither is so easy that a soul may -reach it the same evening that it quits the body, and -play at ball and dance with those other departed -souls who are encamped round the great lake and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_28" id="Page_28">[28]</a></span> -shine in heaven as the northern lights. But others -say that it is only witches and bad people who join -the heavenly lights, where they not only enjoy no -rest, owing to the rapid revolutions of the sky, but -are so plagued with ravens that they cannot keep -them from settling in their hair. They believe that -heaven lies under the earth or sea, where dwells -Torngarsuk, the Creator, with his mother, in perpetual -summer and beautiful sunshine. There the water is -good and there is no night, and there are plenty of -birds, and fish, and seals, and reindeer, all to be caught -at pleasure, or ready cooking in a great kettle; but -these delights are reserved for persons who have done -great deeds and worked steadfastly, who have caught -many whales or seals, who have been drowned at sea, -or have died in childbirth. These persons alone may -hope to join the great company and feast on inconsumable -seals. Even then they must slide for five -days down the blood-stained precipice; and unhappy -they to whom the journey falls in stormy weather or -in winter, for then they may suffer that other death -of total extinction, especially if their survivors disturb -them by their noise or affect them injuriously by the -food they eat. The Kamchadal belief is very curious, -as showing how the idea of compensation in the next -world for the evils of this—an idea already apparent -in the Mexican and Greenland beliefs—may have -served to bridge over the conception of a mere continuance<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_29" id="Page_29">[29]</a></span> -of life for the soul, and the conception of -an actual retribution awaiting it. They imagine -that the dead come to a place under the earth, where -Haetsch dwells, son of Kutka the Creator, and the first -man who died on earth, now Lord of the under-world -and general receiver of souls. To those who come -dressed in fine furs and drive fat dogs before their -sledges, he gives instead old ragged furs and lean dogs; -but to those who have known poverty on earth he gives -new furs and beautiful dogs and also a better place to -live in than the others. The dead live again as on -earth; their wives are restored to them, they build -ostrogs again, and catch fish, and dance and sing; -there is less storm and snow than above ground, and -more people; indeed, abundance of everything.</p> - -<p>It is easy to conceive how, when once the idea -had been reached that the brave deserved compensation -in the next world for their earthly courage, the -poor for their earthly wretchedness, or the sick for -their earthly sufferings, and all men for the misfortune -of premature death, it should also be inferred, -as soon as any criterion between goodness and badness -more refined than the mere difference between -courage and cowardice had been attained, that the -good should have some advantage over the bad, and -from such an inference to a complete theory of retribution -and punishment of the bad the logical steps -seem fairly obvious. Few things, indeed, are more<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_30" id="Page_30">[30]</a></span> -remarkable among the lower races than the general -absence of the ideas we associate with hell.<a name="FNanchor_26" id="FNanchor_26"></a><a href="#Footnote_26" class="fnanchor">[26]</a> At -most the idea of future punishment is negative, the -lives of slaves and cowards terminating in a total cessation -of consciousness, as opposed to its continuance -for warriors and chiefs. Still, the idea of difficulty -in attaining the blessed abodes, such as that above -noticed as prevalent in Greenland—an idea, as Mr. -Tylor suggests, probably connected with the sun’s passage -across the sky to the west, where the happy land -is so generally figured to lie—is very common, and -from such an idea it is natural to connect the difficulty -of the journey to Paradise with the destruction of -those whose presence in it would mar its blessedness.</p> - -<p>The trial of merit, varying with experiences of -physical geography, generally lies either in the passage -of a river or gulf by a narrow bridge, or in the -climbing of a steep mountain. The Choctaws, for -instance, believe that the dead have to pass a long -and slippery pine-log, across a deep and rapid river, -on the other side of which stand six persons, who pelt -new-comers with stones and cause the bad ones to -fall in.<a name="FNanchor_27" id="FNanchor_27"></a><a href="#Footnote_27" class="fnanchor">[27]</a> In Khond theology the judge of the dead<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_31" id="Page_31">[31]</a></span> -resides beyond the sea, on the smooth and slippery -Leaping Rock, below which flows a black unfathomable -river; and the souls of men take bold leaps to -reach the rock, those that fail contracting a deformity -which is transferred to the next soul animated on -earth. The Blackfoot Indians, on the other hand, -believe that departed souls have to climb a steep -mountain, from the summit of which is seen a great -plain, with new tents and swarms of game; that the -dwellers in that happy plain advance to them and -welcome those who have led a good life, but reject -the bad—those who have soiled their hands in the -blood of their countrymen—and throw them headlong -from the mountain; whilst women who have been -guilty of infanticide never reach the mountain at all, -but hover round the seat of their crimes with branches -of trees tied to their legs. The Fijians think that -even the brave have some difficulty in reaching the -judgment-seat of Ndengei, and they provide the dead -with war-clubs to resist Sama and his host, who will -dispute their passage. But celibacy is in their eyes -apparently the only offence which calls for peremptory -and hopeless punishment. Unmarried Fijians are -dashed to pieces by Nangananga as in vain attempts -to steal round to a certain reef they are driven ashore -by the rising tide.<a name="FNanchor_28" id="FNanchor_28"></a><a href="#Footnote_28" class="fnanchor">[28]</a> The Norwegian Lapps consider<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_32" id="Page_32">[32]</a></span> -that abstinence from stealing, lying, and quarrelling -entitles a man to compensation hereafter. Such -receive after death a new body, and live with the -higher gods in Saiwo, and indulge in hunting and -magic, brandy-drinking and smoking, to a far -higher degree than was possible on earth. Wicked -men, perjurers, and thieves go to the place of the bad -spirits, to Gerre-Mubben-Aimo.<a name="FNanchor_29" id="FNanchor_29"></a><a href="#Footnote_29" class="fnanchor">[29]</a> The idea of compensation -of the good leads naturally to the idea of -retribution for the bad; and even among the Guinea -Coast negroes we find future inducements to the practice -of such moral duties as they recognise. For they are -wont to make for themselves idols, called Sumanes -whose favour they endeavour to secure by abstinence -from certain kinds of foods, believing that after death -those who have been constant in their vows of abstinence -and in offerings to the Sumanes will come -to a large inland river, where a god inquires of -everyone how he has lived his days on earth, and those -who have not kept their vows are drowned and destroyed -for ever. The inland-dwelling negroes declare -that at this river dwells a powerful god in a beautiful -house, which, though always exposed, is never touched -by rain. He knows all past and present things; he can -send any kind of weather, he can heal sicknesses and -work miracles. Before him must all the dead appear;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_33" id="Page_33">[33]</a></span> -the good to receive a happy and peaceful life, the bad -to be killed for ever by the large wooden club which -hangs before his door. Lastly, it may be noticed that -negro tribes believe that death will take them to the -land of the European and give them the white man’s -skin; but, as they generally paint their devil white, -we cannot be sure that such a change is not rather -dreaded as a punishment for the bad than regarded -as a change for the better.</p> - -<p>So far it appears that savages have developed from -the promptings and imaginings of their own minds -some idea of a Creator and of a soul, as well as of a -future to some extent dependent on earthly antecedents. -It is of course difficult to judge how far the -missionaries or travellers, who have mainly supplied -the only evidence we have, may have clearly understood, -or how much they may have unintentionally -imported into, beliefs they represent as purely indigenous. -In many cases a remarkable similarity may -lead us to suspect that the belief is not native, but -implanted at some time by Christian or other influence, -though traces of such influence may be absolutely -wanting or at least not proved. There can, for instance, -be little doubt whence Sissa, the devil of the -Guinea Coast negroes, derived the pair of horns and -long tail with which he is usually depicted. But, on -the other hand, we cannot lay down any rigid canon -for the imaginations of men, nor say that if one belief<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_34" id="Page_34">[34]</a></span> -is identical with another a thousand miles off it must -therefore have been borrowed and cannot be of independent -growth. Indeed, when we reflect on the -limited nature of the mental faculties of savages, on -the limited range of objects for their minds to work -upon, on their childlike fear of the dark and the unseen, -and their still more childlike delight in the indulgence -of their fancy, so far from there being anything strange -in the analogies of thought between distant tribes, the -strangeness would rather be if such analogies did not -exist. It is probable that children tell one another -much the same stories in London as they do at the -Antipodes, and there is no more reason to be surprised -at finding much the same theologies current in Africa -as in Australia or Ceylon. The same sun, which shines -on men’s bodies alike, shines on their minds alike too; -and myths, like dreams, with all the apparent field -for variety in their formation, are really subject to -the closest laws of uniformity and sameness.</p> - -<p>We have, however, to be careful, in applying terms -of our own religious phraseology to savage thoughts -and fancies, to discriminate between the higher and -lower meaning they bear, and always to employ them -in the lower. The belief, already noticed, of the -Kamchadals in Kutka well illustrates how different -is the meaning involved in the Kamchadal theory of -creation from that involved in Genesis or the Zend-Avesta. -The same is true of the belief in a soul and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_35" id="Page_35">[35]</a></span> -its future life; for the savage, intensely vivid as is -his future beyond the grave, seldom doubts for an -instant but that he will share it with all the rest, -not only of the animate, but of the inanimate world. -For that reason he buries axes, and clothes, and food -with the dead, to be of service in the next world. -The Fijians used to show ‘the souls of men and -women, beasts and plants, of stocks and stones, -canoes and houses, and of all the utensils of this -frail world, swimming, or rather tumbling one over -the other,’ as they were borne by a swift stream -at the bottom of a deep hole to the regions of immortality.<a name="FNanchor_30" id="FNanchor_30"></a><a href="#Footnote_30" class="fnanchor">[30]</a> -So of the animate world. The Kamchadal -believes that the smallest fly that breathes will rise -after death to live again in the under-world.<a name="FNanchor_31" id="FNanchor_31"></a><a href="#Footnote_31" class="fnanchor">[31]</a> If the -Laplander expects that all honest people will re-meet -in Aimo, he as fully expects that bears and wolves -will meet there too. The Greenlander believes that -all the heavenly bodies were once Greenlanders, <i>or -animals</i>, and that they shine with a pale or red light -according to the food they ate on earth. He also -believes that when all things now living on the earth -are dead, and the earth cleansed from their blood by -a great water-flood; when the purified dust is consolidated<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_36" id="Page_36">[36]</a></span> -again by a great wind, and a fairer earth, all -plain and no cliffs, is substituted for the present one; -when Priksoma, he who is above, breathes on men -that they may live again—then animals will also rise -again and be in great abundance. The old inhabitants -of Anahuac and Egypt believed equally that animals -would share the next world with them; and, if the -universality of an opinion were any reason for its -credibility, few opinions could claim a better title to -acceptance than this one. So confident were the -Swedish Lapps of the future life of animals, that -whenever they killed one in sacrifice they buried the -bones in a box, that the gods might more easily restore -it to life.<a name="FNanchor_32" id="FNanchor_32"></a><a href="#Footnote_32" class="fnanchor">[32]</a> There is really nothing very unnatural in -this idea, when we remember that in the lower stages -of culture man not only admits the equality of -brutes with himself, but even acknowledges their -superiority by actual worship of them. It is not -difficult to understand how it is that savages who see -deities in everything, in the motionless mountain or -stone no less than in the rushing river or wind, should -see in animals deities of extraordinary power, whose -capacities infinitely transcend their own. Recognising -as they do in the tiger a strength, in the deer a speed,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_37" id="Page_37">[37]</a></span> -in the monkey a cunning, all superior to their own, -they naturally conceive of them as deities whom above -all others it is expedient to humour by adoration and -sacrifice. Some negro tribes, holding that all animals -enshrine a spirit, which may injure or benefit -themselves, will refrain from eating certain animals, -otherwise perfectly edible, and endeavour to propitiate -them by lifelong attention. Thus some regularly -offer food at the earth-houses of termites, or fatten -sheep and goats, for a purely temporary and perfectly -spiritual advantage. It is on account of their divine -and immortal nature that the well-known custom -of apologising to animals killed in the chase is so -general among savages. It is generally a deprecation -of any post-mortem vindictiveness on the part of the -animal’s ghost. The natives of Greenland refrain -from breaking seals’ heads or throwing them into the -sea; but they pile them in a heap before their hut -door, that the souls of the seals may not be angry -and in their spite frighten living seals away. The -Yuracares of Bolivia were careful to put small fish-bones -carefully aside, lest fish should disappear; and -other Indian tribes would keep the bones of beavers -and sables from their dogs for a year and then bury -them, lest the spirits of those animals should take -offence and no more of them be killed or trapped.<a name="FNanchor_33" id="FNanchor_33"></a><a href="#Footnote_33" class="fnanchor">[33]</a> -The Lapps are so afraid that the soul of the animal<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_38" id="Page_38">[38]</a></span> -whose flesh they have killed may take its revenge as -a disembodied spirit, that before eating it they not only -entreat pardon for its death, but perform the ceremony -of treating it first with nuts or other delicacies, that -it may be led to believe it is present as a guest—not -to be eaten, but to eat. Another Kamchadal fancy -indicates how savages, whose theory of cause and -effect appears to be that it is quite sufficient for two -things to be connected contemporaneously for one to -be cause and the other effect, are led more especially -to see deities in birds, from the observation that -changes in weather are associated with their arrival -and departure. Since to be associated with a thing -is to be caused by it, migratory birds take away -or bring the summer with them. For the reason -that the spring and the wagtails return together the -Kamchadal thanks the wagtail for bringing back the -spring, and it is probably from a similar confusion -of thought that he thanks the ravens and crows for -fine weather.</p> - -<p>Whether, in conclusion, it be true or not that the -more civilised nations of the earth have gone through -stages of growth in which their religious conceptions -resembled those of contemporary savage tribes, one -result at least is clear, that the actual standpoint of -the savage with regard to the great mysteries of -existence is removed <i>toto cœlo</i> from that of Christian, -or Mahometan, or Parsee. The Creator he believes<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_39" id="Page_39">[39]</a></span> -in is not so much the cause of all things as the maker -of some things, because seemingly the first father of -men needed the wherewithal to exercise his energies. -The savage’s soul is simply his breath or ghost, -which indeed will survive his body, but which may -lose its identity in the body of an animal or thing, -destined like himself to live again. He conceives of -himself generally as not mortal, but not therefore -as immortal. His future is but a repetition of his -present, with the same base wants and pursuits, only -with a greater possibility of indulgence, and not -necessarily indefinite in duration. It is, perhaps, -some compensation for this, that, if it does not hold -out great hopes, its prospect serves to deprive death -of its terror, and brightens the sufferings of the passing -day. To the native American death is said to -be rather an event of gladness than of terror, bringing -him rest or enjoyment after his period of toil; nor -does he fear to go to a land ‘which all his life long -he has heard abounds in rewards without punishments.’<a name="FNanchor_34" id="FNanchor_34"></a><a href="#Footnote_34" class="fnanchor">[34]</a> -No thought of possibly flying from present -evils to find immeasurably greater ones awaiting him -after death would ever occur to a savage, and he will -even kill himself or cheerfully submit to be killed -by his friends, in order to realise the sooner the -difference imagined between earth and heaven. The<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_40" id="Page_40">[40]</a></span> -powers of evil which vex him here will be absent -hereafter, and the Spirit he recognises as supreme in -his hierarchy of invisible powers is either conceived -as too beneficent to punish, or, if he punishes at all, -as likely to punish at once and for ever.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_41" id="Page_41">[41]</a></span></p> - -<h2 id="CHAPTER_II">II.<br /> -<span class="smaller"><i>SAVAGE MODES OF PRAYER.</i></span></h2> - -<p>In the same way as a child is insensibly educated by -the very efforts of an adult to place himself on its -level, so any tribe of savages is to some extent -modified by the time that a stranger has fitted himself, -by long residence among them and the acquisition -of their language, to tell us anything about them. -This primary difficulty, amounting theoretically to insuperability, -might alone suffice to invalidate most -of the received evidence which asserts or denies -concerning savages anything whatsoever in broad -general terms. But when the evidence concerns -religious ideas another difficulty is superadded, and -one which appertains to the subject of religion alone—the -reserve, that is, (attested by too many travellers -to need specific references,) with which savages guard -their stock of fundamental beliefs. The delicacy -manifested by the most skilled of the Iowa Indian -tribe as to communicating fully or freely on religious<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_42" id="Page_42">[42]</a></span> -subjects, lest they should bring on themselves or their -nation some great calamity,<a name="FNanchor_35" id="FNanchor_35"></a><a href="#Footnote_35" class="fnanchor">[35]</a> indicates the feeling that -probably underlies such religious reticence. If a -savage dare not pronounce his own name, much less -the names of his dead, it is a fair matter of wonder -that he should ever have become so free with the names -and attributes of his divinities as to have rendered it -possible for such systematic representations of his -theology as are current to appear before the world.</p> - -<p>The evidence afforded by ethnology as to the -nature of prayer among savages is slighter than on -most subjects relating to them, partly from the -natural disregard paid to such matters by most -Christian missionaries, partly from the secret and -hidden character of prayer, which alone would make -its study impossible; but there is abundant evidence -to show that religious supplication of a certain kind -enters more deeply than might be supposed into the -daily lives of the lower races of mankind. Says Ellis -of the Society Islanders: ‘Religious rites were connected -with almost every act of their lives. An <i>ubu</i> or -prayer was offered before they ate their food, planted -their gardens, built their houses, launched their canoes, -cast their nets, and commenced or concluded a -journey.’<a name="FNanchor_36" id="FNanchor_36"></a><a href="#Footnote_36" class="fnanchor">[36]</a> In the Fijian Islands business transactions -were commonly terminated by a short wish or prayer;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_43" id="Page_43">[43]</a></span> -and in the Sandwich Islands the priest would pray -before a battle that the gods he addressed would -prove themselves stronger than the gods of his foes, -promising them hecatombs of victims in the event of -victory. But the mere fact of such prayers is of -less interest than the actual formulas used; these, -however, have more rarely been thought worth -recording.</p> - -<p>According to a recent African traveller it is a -daily prayer in some parts of Guinea: ‘O God, I -know thee not, but thou knowest me: thy aid is -necessary to me.’ Or again: ‘O God, help us; we -do not know whether we shall live to-morrow: we are -in thy hand.’<a name="FNanchor_37" id="FNanchor_37"></a><a href="#Footnote_37" class="fnanchor">[37]</a> A Bushman, being asked how he -prayed to Cagn (recognised by his tribe as the first -being and creator of all things), answered, in a low, -imploring tone: ‘O Cagn, O Cagn, are we not -your children? do you not see our hunger? Give us -food;’ ‘and,’ he added, ‘he gives us both hands full.’<a name="FNanchor_38" id="FNanchor_38"></a><a href="#Footnote_38" class="fnanchor">[38]</a> -It further appears that the Bushmen address petitions -to the sun, to the moon, and to the stars;<a name="FNanchor_39" id="FNanchor_39"></a><a href="#Footnote_39" class="fnanchor">[39]</a> and the -Kamchadals, who have been made to dispute with -them the lowest rank of humanity, had a rude form of -prayer to the Storm-god, which was uttered by a -small child, sent naked round the ostrog with a shell<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_44" id="Page_44">[44]</a></span> -in its uplifted hand: ‘Gsanlga, sit down and cease to -storm; the mussel is accustomed to salt, not to sweet -water; you make me too wet, and from the wet I -must freeze. I have no clothes; see how I freeze.’<a name="FNanchor_40" id="FNanchor_40"></a><a href="#Footnote_40" class="fnanchor">[40]</a> -In a certain African tribe it is said to be usual for -the men to go every morning to a river, and there, -after splashing water in their faces, or throwing sand -over their heads, after clasping and loosing their hands -and whispering softly the words <i>Eksuvais</i>, to pray: -‘Give me to-day rice and yams, gold and aggry-beads, -slaves, riches, and health; make me active and -strong.’<a name="FNanchor_41" id="FNanchor_41"></a><a href="#Footnote_41" class="fnanchor">[41]</a></p> - -<p>The Zulus of Africa and the Khonds of India -supply good illustrations of savage prayer. The head -man of a Zulu village, at the sacrifice of a bullock to -the spirits of the dead, thus addresses them in prayer: -‘I pray for cattle that they may fill this pen. I pray -for corn that many people may come to this village -of yours and make a noise and glorify you. I also -ask for children, that this village may have a large -population and that your name may never come to an -end.’<a name="FNanchor_42" id="FNanchor_42"></a><a href="#Footnote_42" class="fnanchor">[42]</a> The Khonds, also, at the sacrifice of a bullock -express their wishes with rather more emphasis: -‘Let our herds be so numerous that they cannot be -housed; let children so abound that care of them shall<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_45" id="Page_45">[45]</a></span> -overcome their parents, as shall be seen by their burnt -hands.’ Or, again, they will ask that their swine -may so abound that their fields shall require no -other ploughs than their ‘rooting snouts;’ that their -poultry may be so numerous as to hide the thatch -of their houses; that neither fish, frog, nor worm -shall be able to live in their drinking ponds beneath -the trampling feet of their multitude of cattle.<a name="FNanchor_43" id="FNanchor_43"></a><a href="#Footnote_43" class="fnanchor">[43]</a></p> - -<p>These may be taken as fair samples of primitive -prayer; but it is only just, as against the inference -that a savage’s prayers have reference solely to the -good and evil things of this world, to notice indications -of higher sentiments. The Yebus of Africa, with faces -bowed to the earth, are said commonly to pray, not -only for preservation from sickness and death, but -for the gifts of happiness and <i>wisdom</i>.<a name="FNanchor_44" id="FNanchor_44"></a><a href="#Footnote_44" class="fnanchor">[44]</a> The Tahitian -priest, praying to the god by whom it was supposed -that a dead man’s spirit had been required, that the -sins of the latter, especially that one for which he had -lost his life, might be buried in a hole then dug -in the ground and not attach to the survivors, points -to the occasional presence of a moral motive in prayer; -though even here the deprecation of further anger on -the part of the gods appears the principal object of -concern.<a name="FNanchor_45" id="FNanchor_45"></a><a href="#Footnote_45" class="fnanchor">[45]</a> So little indeed do thoughts of morality -or of a future state enter as factors into savage prayer,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_46" id="Page_46">[46]</a></span> -and so little does any ethical distinction appear in the -savage conception of supernatural powers, that not -unfrequently supplication is directed to the attainment -of ends morally the reverse of desirable. Like the -Roman tradesman praying to Mercury to aid him in -cheating, the Nootka warrior would entreat his god -that he might find his foes asleep, and so kill a great -many of them.<a name="FNanchor_46" id="FNanchor_46"></a><a href="#Footnote_46" class="fnanchor">[46]</a> But perhaps the best illustration of -the perverted use of prayer is one employed by a clan of -the Hervey Islanders when engaged on a thieving and -murdering expedition, and uttered as near as possible -to the dwelling of the person about to be robbed. It -is apparently addressed to Rongo, or Oro, the great -Polynesian god of war, and is thus translated in Mr. -Gill’s ‘Myths and Songs of the South Pacific’:—<a name="FNanchor_47" id="FNanchor_47"></a><a href="#Footnote_47" class="fnanchor">[47]</a></p> - -<div class="poetry-container"> -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="verse">We are on a thieving expedition;</div> -<div class="verse">Be close to our left side to give aid.</div> -<div class="verse indent1">Let all be wrapped in sleep;</div> -<div class="verse">Be as a lofty cocoa-nut tree to support us.</div> -</div> -</div> - -<p>The god is then entreated to cause all things to sleep; -the owner of the house is entreated to sleep on, likewise -the threshold of the house, the insects, beetles, -earwigs, and ants that inhabit it, the central post, the -several rafters and beams that support it; and after -the thatch of the house has been asked to sleep on, -the prayer thus concludes:—</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_47" id="Page_47">[47]</a></span></p> - -<div class="poetry-container"> -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="verse">The first of its inmates unluckily awaking</div> -<div class="verse">Put soundly to sleep again.</div> -<div class="verse">If the Divinity so please, man’s spirit must yield.</div> -<div class="verse">O Rongo, grant thou complete success.</div> -</div> -</div> - -<p>If, however, we may hope to find anywhere indications -of a higher purpose in prayer than the attainment -of merely temporary or personal needs, we must -seek it (nor is the search entirely vain) in those rites -of religion which, from the highest to the lowest levels -of culture, are customary upon the entrance of a fresh -life on the stage of this world’s trials and sorrows. -The popular saying, that the cries of a child at its -christening are the cries of the devil going out of -it, expresses identically the same belief which still -prompts our savage contemporaries to drive evil -spirits from a new-born child by rites of mysterious -spiritual efficacy; and it is probably to the indigenous -prevalence of baptism among many savage tribes that -some Catholic missionaries, complacently identifying -conversion with immersion, have owed the success of -their efforts. It would at least be interesting to know -whether baptism was a native African rite at the time -that the Capuchin Merolla baptized with his own -hands 13,000 negroes, and Padre Jerom da Montefarchio -his 100,000 in the space of twenty years.<a name="FNanchor_48" id="FNanchor_48"></a><a href="#Footnote_48" class="fnanchor">[48]</a> -Mungo Park gives an account of a purely heathen -festival held about a week after the birth of a child,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_48" id="Page_48">[48]</a></span> -at which a priest, taking the latter in his arms, would -pray, soliciting repeatedly the blessing of God on the -child and all the company. And Bosman tells of a -priest binding ropes, corals, and other things round -the limbs of a new-born child, and exorcising the -spirits of sickness and evil.<a name="FNanchor_49" id="FNanchor_49"></a><a href="#Footnote_49" class="fnanchor">[49]</a></p> - -<p>It cannot, however, be proved with certainty that -such rites are of native growth wherever they have -been found, though similar feelings of natural impurity, -of natural anxiety, may well have contributed to -make them common all the world over. With this -reservation, let it suffice to recall some illustrations -drawn from the most distant parts of the world. -The most touching form of the custom is told of a -tribe in the Fiji Islands, where the priest, presented -by the relations with food with which to notify -the event to the gods before the birth-festival, -would thus petition the latter: ‘This is the food of -the little child: take knowledge of it, ye gods. Be kind -to him. Do not pelt him or spit upon him, or seize -him, but let him live to plant sugar-canes.’<a name="FNanchor_50" id="FNanchor_50"></a><a href="#Footnote_50" class="fnanchor">[50]</a> In New -Zealand, the tohunga, or priest, dipping a green branch -into a calabash of water, sprinkled the child therewith -and made incantations according to its sex;<a name="FNanchor_51" id="FNanchor_51"></a><a href="#Footnote_51" class="fnanchor">[51]</a> whilst in -the Hervey Islands, where the child was immersed in -a taro leaf filled with water, the ceremony was intimately<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_49" id="Page_49">[49]</a></span> -connected with their system of tribes and -dedication for future sacrifice.<a name="FNanchor_52" id="FNanchor_52"></a><a href="#Footnote_52" class="fnanchor">[52]</a> Crossing over to -America, we find among the Indian tribes of Guiana -the native priest dancing about an infant and dashing -water over it, finishing the ceremony by passing his -hands over its limbs, muttering all the while incantations -and charms.<a name="FNanchor_53" id="FNanchor_53"></a><a href="#Footnote_53" class="fnanchor">[53]</a> In some North American tribes, -water having been boiled with a certain sweet-scented -root, and some of it having been first thrown into the -fire and the rest distributed to the company by the -oldest woman present, the latter would then offer a -short prayer to the Master of Life, on behalf of the -child, that its life might be spared and that it might -grow; and if, at the festival held to commemorate -the child’s first slain animal, one of the chief persons -present would entreat the Great Spirit to be kind to -the lad and let him grow to be a great hunter, in war -to take many scalps and not to behave like an old -woman, it cannot be said that such a prayer was -purely selfish in its aim or confined solely to present -necessities.<a name="FNanchor_54" id="FNanchor_54"></a><a href="#Footnote_54" class="fnanchor">[54]</a></p> - -<p>Although, however, it is impossible to dissociate -baptismal rites so rude as these from a belief in magic, -the idea of water as conferring moral as well as physical -purity appears to have been attained by some of -the more advanced heathen tribes. The rite of baptism,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_50" id="Page_50">[50]</a></span> -says Dr. Brinton, was of immemorial antiquity -among the Cherokees, Aztecs, Mayas, and Peruvians: -the use of water as symbolical of spiritual cleansing -clearly appearing, for instance, in the prayer of the -Peruvian Indian, who after confessing his guilt would -bathe in the river and say: ‘O river, receive the -sins I have this day confessed unto the sun, carry -them down to the sea, and let them never more -appear.’<a name="FNanchor_55" id="FNanchor_55"></a><a href="#Footnote_55" class="fnanchor">[55]</a> It has often been told, on the original -authority of Sahagun, how the Mexican nurse, after -bathing the new-born child, would bid it approach its -mother, the goddess of water; praying at the same -time to her that she would receive it and wash it, -would take away its inherited impurity, make it -good and clean, and instil into it good habits and -manners.<a name="FNanchor_56" id="FNanchor_56"></a><a href="#Footnote_56" class="fnanchor">[56]</a></p> - -<p>The mere enunciation of a wish often amounts -among savages to a complete prayer, it being conceived -that the expression of desire is of more -moment than the manner of such expression; such a -conception still surviving among ourselves at certain -wishing towers, wishing gates, or on the occurrence of -certain natural phenomena. In Fiji it was common -to shout aloud, after drinking a toast, the name of -some object of desire, and this was equivalent to a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_51" id="Page_51">[51]</a></span> -prayer for whatever it might be—for food, wealth, a -fair wind, or even for the gratification of cannibal -gluttony. Franklin tells how some Indians, disappointed -in the chase, set themselves to beat a large -tambourine and sing an address to the Great Spirit, -praying for relief, their prayer consisting solely of -three words constantly repeated;<a name="FNanchor_57" id="FNanchor_57"></a><a href="#Footnote_57" class="fnanchor">[57]</a> the tambourine probably -being employed for the same purpose that the -Sioux Indians kept a whistle in the mouth of one of -their gods, namely, to make their invocation audible. -The Ahts, praying to the moon, sometimes say no -more than <i>teech, teech</i>, that is, Health or Life; and it -is curious that the rude savages of Brazil exclaim <i>teh, -teh</i>, to the same luminary.<a name="FNanchor_58" id="FNanchor_58"></a><a href="#Footnote_58" class="fnanchor">[58]</a> The Sioux would often -say, ‘Spirits of the dead, have mercy!’ adding thereto -a notification of their wishes, whether for good -health, good luck in hunting, or anything else.<a name="FNanchor_59" id="FNanchor_59"></a><a href="#Footnote_59" class="fnanchor">[59]</a> -The Zulus, however, sometimes carry this principle of -brevity furthest, for sometimes in their prayers to the -spirits of their dead they simply say, ‘Ye people of -our house,’ ‘the suppliant taking it for granted that -the Amatongo will know what he wants;’ though -generally their addresses to their ancestors are of a -much more orthodox length than this.<a name="FNanchor_60" id="FNanchor_60"></a><a href="#Footnote_60" class="fnanchor">[60]</a> When we -consider how large a place the spirits of the dead fill in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_52" id="Page_52">[52]</a></span> -the savage’s spirit-world it appears possible that many -of the prayers and sacrifices, said to be offered to the -Great Spirit or unknown divinities, are really addressed -to the all-controlling, ever-present spirits of the -departed.</p> - -<p>If we may believe the testimony of a great many -travellers in all parts of the world, the case of the -Yezidis, who to the recognition of a supreme being -are said to join actual worship of the chief power of -evil, represents no exceptional phase of human -thought. Yet even the Yezidis, according to Dr. -Latham, are said to be improperly called Devil-worshippers, -since they only try to conciliate Satan, -speak of him with respect or not at all, avoid his -name in all their oaths, and are pained if they hear -people make a light use of it.<a name="FNanchor_61" id="FNanchor_61"></a><a href="#Footnote_61" class="fnanchor">[61]</a> In Equatorial Africa -it is said that whilst Mburri, the spirit of evil, is -worshipped piously as a tyrant to be appeased, it is -not considered necessary to pray to Njambi, the good -spirit.<a name="FNanchor_62" id="FNanchor_62"></a><a href="#Footnote_62" class="fnanchor">[62]</a> Harmon says distinctly of all the different -Indian tribes east of the Rocky Mountains that they -pray and make frequent and costly sacrifices to the -bad spirit for delivery from evils they feel or fear, -but that they seldom pray to the supreme good spirit, -to whom they ascribe every perfection, and whom -they consider too benevolent ever to inflict evil on<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_53" id="Page_53">[53]</a></span> -his creatures.<a name="FNanchor_63" id="FNanchor_63"></a><a href="#Footnote_63" class="fnanchor">[63]</a> There is, indeed, little doubt that, if a -certain amount of evidence suffices the requirements -of proof, we must yield consent to the fact, in itself -neither incredible nor unintelligible, that many savage -tribes, recognising and believing in a good and -powerful spirit, make that very goodness a reason for -their neglect of him, and address their petitions -instead to the mercy of that other spirit to whose -power for evil they conceive the world to lie subject.<a name="FNanchor_64" id="FNanchor_64"></a><a href="#Footnote_64" class="fnanchor">[64]</a> -There is, however, much to be said in favour of the -view, that the mind in its primitive state is unconscious -of this moral dualism in the spirit-world, attributing -rather (in perfect accordance with the analogy -of human relationships) good and bad things alike to -the agency of the same beings, according as transitory -impulses affect them.</p> - -<p>Thus, according to Castren, an antagonism -between absolute good and absolute evil finds no -place among the Samoyeds. They have no extreme -divinities corresponding in their attributes to Ahriman -and Ormuzd. ‘The human temper is the divine -temper also, good and bad mixed.’<a name="FNanchor_65" id="FNanchor_65"></a><a href="#Footnote_65" class="fnanchor">[65]</a> Mburri, who, -according to one writer, is the evil spirit in Equatorial -Africa, is, according to another, the good spirit, or at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_54" id="Page_54">[54]</a></span> -least the less wicked of the two, both the good and -bad receiving worship, and being endowed with much -the same powers.<a name="FNanchor_66" id="FNanchor_66"></a><a href="#Footnote_66" class="fnanchor">[66]</a> The Beetjuans, venerating Morimo -as the source of all good and evil that happened to -them, were not agreed as to whether he was entirely -a beneficent or a malevolent being; and, if they -thanked him for benefits, they never hesitated to -curse him for ills or for wishes unfulfilled.<a name="FNanchor_67" id="FNanchor_67"></a><a href="#Footnote_67" class="fnanchor">[67]</a> ‘To the -very same image,’ says Bosman of the negroes, ‘they -at one time make offerings to God and at another to -the devil, so that one image serves them in the -capacity of god and devil.’ It was untrue, he declares, -that the negroes prayed and made offerings -to the devil, though some of them would try to -appease a devil by leaving thousands of pots of -victuals standing ever ready for his gratification; on -the contrary, the devil was annually banished from -their towns with great ceremony, being hunted away -with dismal cries, and his spirit pelted with wood and -stones.<a name="FNanchor_68" id="FNanchor_68"></a><a href="#Footnote_68" class="fnanchor">[68]</a></p> - -<p>The evidence, again, in this respect concerning the -aborigines of America is important. The Winnebagoes -are said to have had a tradition that soon after -the creation a bad spirit appeared on the scene, whose -attempts to vie with the products of the Good Spirit<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_55" id="Page_55">[55]</a></span> -resulted in making a negro in failure of an Indian, -a grizzly bear in failure of a black one, and snakes -which were endowed with venom; he also it was who -made all the worthless trees, thistles, and weeds, who -tempted Indians to lie, murder, and steal, and who -receives bad Indians when they die. The suspicion, -however, of Christian influence among this tribe -makes the tradition of little value to the argument. -Turning to other evidence, amid Schoolcraft’s reiterated -statements of the original dualism of Indian -theology, whereby the Indian was careful ‘to guard -his good and merciful God from all evil acts and -intentions, by attributing the whole catalogue of evil -deeds among the sons of men to the Great Bad Spirit -of his theology,’ we yet find this admission, that ‘it is -impossible to witness closely the rites and ceremonies -which the tribes practise in their sacred and ceremonial -societies without perceiving that <i>there is no very accurate -or uniform discrimination between the powers of -the two antagonistical deities</i>.’<a name="FNanchor_69" id="FNanchor_69"></a><a href="#Footnote_69" class="fnanchor">[69]</a> Mr. Pond, who resided -with the Sioux Indians for eighteen years and had -every opportunity to become acquainted with such -matters, declares that it was ‘next to impossible to -penetrate’ into the subject of their divinities; but he<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_56" id="Page_56">[56]</a></span> -was never able to discover ‘the least degree of evidence -that they divide the gods into classes of good -and evil,’ nor did he believe that they ever distinguished -the Great Spirit from other divinities ‘till -they learnt to do so from intercourse with the -whites;’ for they had no chants, feasts, dances, nor -sacrificial rites which had any reference to such a -being, or which, if they had, were not of recent origin.<a name="FNanchor_70" id="FNanchor_70"></a><a href="#Footnote_70" class="fnanchor">[70]</a> -Of the same people says Mr. Prescott, a man related -to and resident among them many years: ‘As to -their belief in evil spirits, they do not understand the -difference between a great good spirit and a great -evil spirit, as we do. <i>The idea the Indians have is -that a spirit can be good if necessary, and do evil if it -thinks fit.</i>’ They ‘know very little about whether the -Great Spirit has anything to do with their affairs, -present or future.’ Their idea of the Great Spirit is -of the vaguest possible kind, since they lack entirely -any conception of his power, or of the mode of, or of -a reason for, man’s creation. The Great Spirit they -believe made everything but the wild rice and the -thunder; and they have been known to accuse their -deity of badness in sending storms to cause them -misery.<a name="FNanchor_71" id="FNanchor_71"></a><a href="#Footnote_71" class="fnanchor">[71]</a> In the same way the Comanches of Texas -neither worship the evil spirit nor are aware of his -existence, ‘<i>attributing everything to arise from the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_57" id="Page_57">[57]</a></span> -Great Spirit, whether of good or evil</i>.’<a name="FNanchor_72" id="FNanchor_72"></a><a href="#Footnote_72" class="fnanchor">[72]</a> Had the -ancient Jews been described by Greek travellers instead -of by themselves, we may fairly suspect that -they would have been introduced to posterity as a -people, consciously theistic indeed, but at the same -time as addicted, in most of their rites, to demonolatry -and the propitiation of imaginary evil beings. The -true view would seem to be that the theology of the -lower races does not admit of that preciseness of -terminology, of that clear distinction of qualities, of -that systematic marshalling of powers, which has -been so often predicated of it, but that in its growth -it undergoes a period of flux and change similar to -that which may be seen to occur in the evolution of -the lowest forms of physical life into more determinate -types of being.</p> - -<p>The Sioux Indians, abusing their Great Spirit for -sending them storms, or the Kamschadals cursing -Kutka for having created their mountains so high and -their streams so rapid, expose a state of thought relating -to the gods which is most difficult to reconcile -with the savage’s habitual dread of them, still more -with a high conception of them, but which is too -well authenticated to admit of doubt. Franklin saw -a Cree hunter tie offerings (a cotton handkerchief, -looking-glass, tin pin, some ribbon and tobacco) to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_58" id="Page_58">[58]</a></span> -the value of twenty skins round an image of the god -Kepoochikan, at the same time praying to him in a -rapid monotonous tone to be propitious, explaining to -him the value of his presents, and strongly cautioning -him against ingratitude.<a name="FNanchor_73" id="FNanchor_73"></a><a href="#Footnote_73" class="fnanchor">[73]</a> If all the prayers and presents -made to their god by the Tahitians to save their -chiefs from dying proved in vain, his image was inexorably -banished from the temple and destroyed.<a name="FNanchor_74" id="FNanchor_74"></a><a href="#Footnote_74" class="fnanchor">[74]</a> -The Ostiaks of Siberia, if things went badly with -them, would pull down from their place of honour in -the hut and in every way maltreat the idols they -generally honoured so exceedingly; the idols whose -mouths were always so diligently smeared with fish-fat, -and within whose reach a supply of snuff ever lay -ready.<a name="FNanchor_75" id="FNanchor_75"></a><a href="#Footnote_75" class="fnanchor">[75]</a> The Chinese are said to do the same by -their household gods, if for a long time they are deaf -to their prayers, and so do the Cinghalese;<a name="FNanchor_76" id="FNanchor_76"></a><a href="#Footnote_76" class="fnanchor">[76]</a> so that -the practice is more than an impulsive manifestation of -merely local feeling. That such feelings occasionally -crop out in civilised Catholic countries is matter of -more surprise; but it is an authentic historical fact -that the good people of Castelbranco, in Portugal, -were once so angry with St. Anthony for letting the -Spaniards plunder their town, contrary to his agreement, -that they broke many of his statues in pieces, -and, taking the head off one they specially revered,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_59" id="Page_59">[59]</a></span> -substituted for it the head of St. Francis.<a name="FNanchor_77" id="FNanchor_77"></a><a href="#Footnote_77" class="fnanchor">[77]</a> Neapolitan -fishermen are said to this day to throw their saints -overboard if they do not help them in a storm; and -the images of the Virgin or of St. Januarius, worn in -Neapolitan caps, are in danger of being trodden under -foot and destroyed, if adverse contingencies arise. The -latter saint, indeed, once received during a famine -very clear intimation, that, unless corn came by a certain -time, he would forfeit his saintship.<a name="FNanchor_78" id="FNanchor_78"></a><a href="#Footnote_78" class="fnanchor">[78]</a></p> - -<p>It is perhaps a refinement of thought when a -present becomes an advisable accompaniment to a -simple petition; but the principle of exchange once -entered into, the relations between man and the -supernatural lead logically from the offering of fruits -and flowers to the sacrifice of animals and of men. -Some Algonkin Indians, mistaking once a missionary -for a god, and petitioning his mercy, begged him to let -the earth yield them corn, the rivers fish, and to prevent -sickness from slaying or hunger from tormenting them. -Their request they backed with the offer of a pipe;<a name="FNanchor_79" id="FNanchor_79"></a><a href="#Footnote_79" class="fnanchor">[79]</a> -and in this ridiculous incident the whole of the savage’s -philosophy of sacrifice is contained. Prescott, coming -with some Indians to a lake they were to cross, saw -his companions light their pipes and smoke by way -of invoking the winds to be calm.<a name="FNanchor_80" id="FNanchor_80"></a><a href="#Footnote_80" class="fnanchor">[80]</a> And the Hurons -offered a similar prayer with tobacco to a local god,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_60" id="Page_60">[60]</a></span> -saying: ‘Oki, thou who livest on this spot, we offer -thee tobacco. Help us, save us from shipwreck. -Defend us from our enemies. Give us good trade, -and bring us safe back to our villages.’<a name="FNanchor_81" id="FNanchor_81"></a><a href="#Footnote_81" class="fnanchor">[81]</a> In the -island of Tanna, the village priest, addressing the -spirits of departed chiefs (thought to preside over the -growth of yams and fruits), after the firstfruits of -vegetation had been deposited on a stone, on the -branch of a tree, or on a rude altar of sticks, would -pray: ‘Compassionate father, here is some food; eat -it, be kind to us on account of it;’ and in Samoa, too, -a libation of ava at the evening meal was the offering, -in return for which the father of a family would beg -of the gods health and prosperity, productiveness for -his plantations, and for his tribe generally a strong -and large population for war.<a name="FNanchor_82" id="FNanchor_82"></a><a href="#Footnote_82" class="fnanchor">[82]</a> In Fiji, again, when -the chief priests and leading men assembled to -discuss public affairs in the yaquona or kava circle, -the chief herald, as the water was poured into the -kava, after naming the gods for whom the libation was -prepared, would say: ‘Be gracious, ye lords, the gods, -that the rain may cease, and the sun shine forth;’ -and again when the potion was ready: ‘Let the gods -be of a gracious mind, and send a wind from the -east.’<a name="FNanchor_83" id="FNanchor_83"></a><a href="#Footnote_83" class="fnanchor">[83]</a></p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_61" id="Page_61">[61]</a></span></p> - -<p>It is a somewhat obvious inference, if presents -like these fail to obtain corresponding results, that -the spirit addressed is not satisfied, and that he -requires a greater value in exchange for the blessings -at his disposal. The crowning petition, therefore, of -disappointed and despairing humanity is, by an -irrefragable chain of reasoning, the sacrifice of a -human life, or, if this fails, of many lives. Long and -frequent were the prayers of the Tahitians to the -gods when their chiefs were ill, for, under the idea -that ‘the gods were always influenced by the same -motives as themselves, they imagined that the efficacy -of their prayers would be in exact proportion to the -value of the offerings with which they were accompanied.’ -Hence, if the disease grew violent, the fruits -of whole plantain fields or more than a hundred pigs -would be hurried to the marae; nay, not unfrequently -a number of men with ropes round their -necks would be led to the altar and presented to the -idol, with prayers that the mere sight of them might -satisfy his wrath.<a name="FNanchor_84" id="FNanchor_84"></a><a href="#Footnote_84" class="fnanchor">[84]</a> It does not appear that on such -occasions they were actually slain, but we seem here -rather to see the first step towards human sacrifice than -merely a survival of it, for the obtaining of this particular -wish. The process is naturally from the sacrifice of -the least possible to the sacrifice of the greatest possible,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_62" id="Page_62">[62]</a></span> -though after that point has been reached there may -well be a tendency, varying with the character of a -tribe, to fall back upon make-believe, curtailed losses. -The Mandan Indians, Catlin repeats, always sacrificed -the best of its kind to the Great Spirit, the favourite -horse, the best arrow, or the best piece of buffalo;<a name="FNanchor_85" id="FNanchor_85"></a><a href="#Footnote_85" class="fnanchor">[85]</a> -so that the sacrifice of their fingers was more probably -a form of incipient human sacrifice than, as it sometimes -is, a relic of a more complete self-surrender. -Both the Aztecs and the Mayas, with all the cruel -forms of sacrifice that disgraced their civilization, -retained traditions of a time when the gods were contented -with the milder offerings of fruits and flowers; -and in Yucatan, where hundreds of young girls were -sacrificed in the dark but sacred pit of Chichen, there -were recollections of a time when one victim sufficed -the demands of the spirit-world. And in this instance -may be seen how human sacrifice, besides being the -highest gift man could offer to his god or gods, was -in yet another sense a mode of prayer; for whilst the -victims stood round the pit, whilst the incense burnt -on the altar and in the braziers, the officiating priest -explained to the messengers from earth ‘the things for -which they were to implore the gods into whose presence -they were about to be introduced.’<a name="FNanchor_86" id="FNanchor_86"></a><a href="#Footnote_86" class="fnanchor">[86]</a> So also the -priests of Mexico would exhort the deputation of eighteen<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_63" id="Page_63">[63]</a></span> -souls they sent to the sun to remember the mission -for which they were sent, the people’s wants they were -to make known, the favours they were to ask for their -countrymen.<a name="FNanchor_87" id="FNanchor_87"></a><a href="#Footnote_87" class="fnanchor">[87]</a></p> - -<p>Less obviously connected with prayer than sacrifice -is dancing, a custom which the civilized world -has long since ceased to regard as in any sense -connected with religion, but which among savages, -besides being a natural expression of joy in life, of -thankfulness for sun or shower, is not unfrequently a -mode of prayer, a means employed for the attainment -of desire. This at least seems the case with those -imitative dances or pantomimes in which with marvellous -exactitude the savage all the world over acts -the part of the animals he pursues in the chase. The -national dance of the Kamschadals consists in the -imitation of the manners and motions of seals and -bears, varying from the gentlest movement of their -bodies to the most violent agitation of their thighs -and knees, accompanied with singing and stamping -in time;<a name="FNanchor_88" id="FNanchor_88"></a><a href="#Footnote_88" class="fnanchor">[88]</a> and it is remarkable that in Vancouver’s -Island also there is a seal dance, for which the -natives, stripping themselves naked, enter the water, -regardless of the cold of the night, and emerge -‘dragging their bodies along the sand like seals,’ then<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_64" id="Page_64">[64]</a></span> -enter the houses and crawl about the fires, and finally -jump up and dance about.<a name="FNanchor_89" id="FNanchor_89"></a><a href="#Footnote_89" class="fnanchor">[89]</a></p> - -<p>But although it is intelligible that such facility -and perfection of beast-acting as, for instance, enabled -the Dog-rib Indians to approach and kill the reindeer, -acquired originally by the necessities of the -chase, should be perpetuated as a religious ceremony -to keep up a habit of actual importance to existence, -there are cases to which this explanation would hardly -apply, as, for example, to the African gorilla dance, -which has been so vividly described by a recent eye-witness, -and which, he says, ‘was a religious festival -held on the eve of an enterprise,’ the eve, namely, of -a gorilla hunt. An African dancing to a drum and -harp imitated closely all the attitudes and movements -of the gorilla, being joined in the chorus by all the -rest present. ‘Now he would be seated on the -ground, his legs apart, his hands resting on his knees, -his head drooping, and in his face the vacant expression -of the brute. Sometimes he folded his arms on -his forehead. Suddenly he would raise his head with -prone ears and flaming eyes,’ till in the last act he -represented the gorilla attacked and killed.<a name="FNanchor_90" id="FNanchor_90"></a><a href="#Footnote_90" class="fnanchor">[90]</a> But, -unless gorillas are ever killed by so clever an imitation<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_65" id="Page_65">[65]</a></span> -of themselves that they really mistake their -African neighbours for their own brothers, the gorilla -dance must, by a phenomenon of thought not without -analogy, be a mode of prayer for obtaining a desired -result; the same fetishistic law of thought prevailing -that is traceable in the idea that by pouring water on -a stone you can bring rain on the earth, or that you -can injure your enemy by an injury to his effigy.</p> - -<p>It may be, however, that pantomimic dances were -employed originally as a clearer expression than -mere words of the suppliant’s wishes, the acting of a -hunt or battle being equivalent to a petition for -favour and success in the same, and the unseen deities -addressed being not unnaturally conceived as more -likely to see the bodily movements than to hear the -feeble voice of the petitioner. The analogy of the -various tongues, prevalent among birds, beasts, and -men, might well suggest to a savage the possibility -of the spiritual world being unavoidably deaf to his -utterances from mere inability to comprehend them; -whilst dealings with the nearest tribe might make it -natural for him to resort to the use of signs and -symbols as the least mistakable vehicle for his meaning. -The Ahts, retiring to the solitude of the woods, -and there standing naked with outstretched arms before -the moon, employ set words and gestures according -to the nature of the object they desire. Thus in -praying for salmon the suppliant rubs the back of his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_66" id="Page_66">[66]</a></span> -hands, and, looking upwards, says, ‘Many salmon, -many salmon;’ in asking for deer he carefully rubs -both his eyes, for geese the back of his shoulders, for -bears his sides and legs, uttering in a sing-song way the -usual formula. The meaning of all these rubbings is -obscure; but it has been suggested that the rubbing -of the hands indicates a wish that the hand may -have the requisite steadiness for throwing the salmon -spear; the rubbing of the eyes, a prayer, that they -may be opened to discern deer in the forest.<a name="FNanchor_91" id="FNanchor_91"></a><a href="#Footnote_91" class="fnanchor">[91]</a> -Among a Californian tribe it was usual, preparatory -to the chase, to resort to a certain stake-inclosure -and there to pray to the god’s image for success, by -mimicry of the actions of the hunt, as by leaping and -twanging of the bow.<a name="FNanchor_92" id="FNanchor_92"></a><a href="#Footnote_92" class="fnanchor">[92]</a> In the Society Islands, if the -land had been in any way defiled by an enemy, a -mode of religious purification consisted in offering -pieces of coral, collected expressly, on the altar to -the gods, to induce them ‘to cleanse the land from -pollution, that it might be pure as the coral fresh -from the sea.’<a name="FNanchor_93" id="FNanchor_93"></a><a href="#Footnote_93" class="fnanchor">[93]</a></p> - -<p>The Voguls, whose most frequent prayers are for -success in hunting, are said to promote their fulfilment -by ‘<i>images in the shape of the beast more especially -sought for, rudely shaped out of wood or stone</i>.’<a name="FNanchor_94" id="FNanchor_94"></a><a href="#Footnote_94" class="fnanchor">[94]</a> But -to dance like the animal would naturally serve the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_67" id="Page_67">[67]</a></span> -purpose as well; and so the interpretation of some -dances as symbolised prayers explains several -American customs which are strikingly analogous to -the African gorilla dance already described. Every -Mandan Indian was compelled by social law to keep -his buffalo’s mask, consisting of the skin and horns of -a buffalo’s head, in his lodge, ready to put on and wear -in the buffalo dance, whenever the protracted absence -of that animal from the prairie rendered it expedient -to resort to this means for the purpose of inducing -the herds to change the direction of their wanderings -and bend their course towards the Mandan villages. -And a principal part in the annual celebration of the -subsidence of the great waters consisted in the buffalo -dance, wherein eight men dressed in entire buffalo -skins, so as to imitate closely the appearance and -motions of buffaloes, were the chief actors, and four -old men chanted prayers to the Great Spirit for the -continuation of his favours in sending them good -supplies of buffaloes for the coming year.<a name="FNanchor_95" id="FNanchor_95"></a><a href="#Footnote_95" class="fnanchor">[95]</a> In this -instance the close relation between dance and prayer, -the dance being either supplementary or explicative, -clearly appears; as it also does in a very similar -buffalo dance performed by a neighbouring tribe of -the Mandans, the Minnatarees. In their ceremony six -elderly men acted the animals, imitating with great<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_68" id="Page_68">[68]</a></span> -perfection even the peculiar sound of their voice.<a name="FNanchor_96" id="FNanchor_96"></a><a href="#Footnote_96" class="fnanchor">[96]</a> -Behind them came a man, who represented the driving -of the beasts forward, and who, at a certain point, -placing his hands before his face, sang, and made a -long speech in the nature of a prayer, containing good -wishes for the buffalo hunt and for war, as also an -appeal to the heavenly powers to be propitious to -the huntsmen and their arms. So again the Sioux -Indians for several days before starting on a bear -hunt would hold a bear dance, which was regarded as -‘a most important and indispensable form,’ and in -which the whole tribe joined in a song to the Bear -Spirit, to conciliate as well as to consult him. ‘All -with the motions of their hands closely imitated the -movements of that animal; some representing its -motion in running, and others the peculiar attitude -and hanging of the paws when it is sitting up on its -hind feet and looking out for the approach of an -enemy.’<a name="FNanchor_97" id="FNanchor_97"></a><a href="#Footnote_97" class="fnanchor">[97]</a> And the same tribe, whenever they had -bad luck in hunting, would institute a dance to invoke -the aid of one of their gods.<a name="FNanchor_98" id="FNanchor_98"></a><a href="#Footnote_98" class="fnanchor">[98]</a></p> - -<p>To the African gorilla dance, the Mandan buffalo -dance, the Sioux bear dance, may be added the -custom of the Koossa Kafirs, who, before they start -on a hunt, perform a wonderful game, which is<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_69" id="Page_69">[69]</a></span> -considered absolutely necessary to the success of -the undertaking.<a name="FNanchor_99" id="FNanchor_99"></a><a href="#Footnote_99" class="fnanchor">[99]</a> One of them, representing some -kind of game, takes a handful of grass in his mouth -and runs about on all fours; whilst the rest make-believe -to transfix him with their spears, till at last he -throws himself on the ground as if he were killed.<a name="FNanchor_100" id="FNanchor_100"></a><a href="#Footnote_100" class="fnanchor">[100]</a> -On the occasion of a Sioux Indian dreaming of the -fish-eating cormorant, a fish dance was instituted, to -ward off any danger portended, in which the most -elaborate imitation of the cormorant was observed. -The medicine-men, dancing up to a fish, affixed to a -pole, began quacking, flapping their arms like wings, -biting at the fish, and pretending to hide a piece in -their nests away from the wolves.<a name="FNanchor_101" id="FNanchor_101"></a><a href="#Footnote_101" class="fnanchor">[101]</a> The Ahts, again, -Sproat observed, spent the eve of a deer hunt ‘in -dancing and singing and in various ceremonies intended -to secure good luck on the morrow.’<a name="FNanchor_102" id="FNanchor_102"></a><a href="#Footnote_102" class="fnanchor">[102]</a> And -in South Australia it is remarkable that, when boys -of a certain age undergo the ceremony of losing -their front teeth, power is conferred on them of -killing the kangaroo by a kind of kangaroo dance. -First of all, a kangaroo of grass is deposited at -their feet; and then the actors, the adults of the tribe, -having fitted themselves with long tails of grass, set -off ‘as a herd of kangaroos, now jumping along, then<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_70" id="Page_70">[70]</a></span> -lying down and scratching themselves, as those animals -do when basking in the sun,’ two armed men -following them meanwhile, as it were to steal on them -unmolested and spear them.<a name="FNanchor_103" id="FNanchor_103"></a><a href="#Footnote_103" class="fnanchor">[103]</a></p> - -<p>The same thought occurs in prayers for rain. -Modern Servian peasants, pouring water over a girl -covered with grass and flowers, employ a mode of petition -for rain very similar to that in vogue near Lake -Nyanza. There, after a wild dance, a jar of water -is placed before the village chief: the woman who -acts as priestess of the ceremonies washes her hands, -arms, and face with the water; then a large quantity -of it is poured over her, and finally all the women -present rush to dip their calabashes in the jar and to -toss the water in the air with loud cries and wild -gesticulations.<a name="FNanchor_104" id="FNanchor_104"></a><a href="#Footnote_104" class="fnanchor">[104]</a></p> - -<p>Again, the common savage war dance may be -taken to have a religious significance in addition to -its secular motive of sustaining martial feelings and -habits. In the war dance of the Navajoes of New -Mexico the most important part of the war dance -was the arrow dance, when a young virgin, beautifully -dressed, represented in gesture ‘the war path.’ An -eye-witness has described it as a really beautiful -performance. Slowly and steadily she would pursue -her imaginary foe; suddenly her step would quicken -as she came in sight of the enemy; she would dance<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_71" id="Page_71">[71]</a></span> -faster and faster, and, seizing an arrow, demonstrate -by the rapidity of her movements that the fight had -begun; she would point with the arrow, show how -it wings its course, how the scalp is taken, how the -victory is won.<a name="FNanchor_105" id="FNanchor_105"></a><a href="#Footnote_105" class="fnanchor">[105]</a> Among the Winnebagoe Indians -also it was part of the war dance for a warrior to -go through the pantomime of the discovery of the -enemy, of the ambuscade, the attack, the slaughter, -and the scalping.<a name="FNanchor_106" id="FNanchor_106"></a><a href="#Footnote_106" class="fnanchor">[106]</a> And in this reference may be -noted the curious proceeding of the women of Accra, -on the Guinea Coast, who, whilst the male population -were engaged in war with a neighbouring people, endeavoured -every day to bring it to a happy issue by -dancing fetish; that is, by fighting sham battles with -wooden swords, flying to the boats on the beach and -pretending to row, throwing some one into the sea, -taking a trowel and making believe to build a wall—all -actions literally symbolical of corresponding ones -to be performed by the men in the course of defeating -their enemy.<a name="FNanchor_107" id="FNanchor_107"></a><a href="#Footnote_107" class="fnanchor">[107]</a> In Madagascar, too, when the men are -absent in war, the custom of the women to dance, in -order to inspire their husbands with courage, has been -thought not to be destitute of a religious meaning.</p> - -<p>That a dance may be in reality a form of prayer,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_72" id="Page_72">[72]</a></span> -a petition acted instead of spoken, as more likely so -to be understood, makes it possible that prayers may -be hidden under customs which are generally only -cited to illustrate the absurdity of primitive metaphysics. -May it not be that the Indian, when he -thinks to ensure a successful chase by drawing a figure -of his game with a line leading to its heart from its -mouth, and by so subjecting its movements to himself, -or when he thinks to cure a man of sickness by shooting -the bark-effigy of the animal supposed to possess -him—may it not be that he thereby hopes to influence -known or unknown natural forces in his favour by a -clear representation of his wants? The control of -natural phenomena by witchcraft may thus have been -in its origin a direction to natural phenomena, or -rather to the spirits ruling them; an address perhaps -to those spirits of the dead which to a savage are his -earliest and for long his only gods; and thus the -absurdities of fetishism might become intelligible as -lifeless prayers, with more or less of their primal -meaning, descended from such a philosophy of nature. -The Kamschadal child sent out naked to make the rain -stop, clear as the meaning of the custom is with the -prayer joined to it, would without it appear in the -light of ordinary fetishism. So the Khond, carrying -a branch cut from hostile soil to his god of war, and -there, after he has dressed it like one of the enemy, -throwing it down, with certain incantations, on the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_73" id="Page_73">[73]</a></span> -shrine of the divinity, urges his petition in a way which -even the god of war can scarcely fail to understand. -And the Basuto woman, who in her wish for children, -prays to her tutelary divinity for the accomplishment -of her desires by making dolls of clay and treating -them as infants, affords yet another illustration of the -operation of the same law of thought.<a name="FNanchor_108" id="FNanchor_108"></a><a href="#Footnote_108" class="fnanchor">[108]</a></p> - -<p>It remains to show how, in primitive theology, -prayer attaches itself as well to the material as the -spiritual world, for it is here especially that it finds -its counterpart in the folk-lore of our own day. As, -however, there is scarcely an object in nature which -in a state of ignorance may not with reason be worshipped, -a few illustrations must be taken for thousands -on a subject it were less easy to exhaust than -the patience of the reader.</p> - -<p>‘As for animals having reasoning powers,’ says -an exceptionally credible witness, ‘I have heard Indians -talk and reason with a horse the same as with -a person.’<a name="FNanchor_109" id="FNanchor_109"></a><a href="#Footnote_109" class="fnanchor">[109]</a> Our fairy tales of talking animals would -be commonplace facts to a savage. Hence it can be -no matter of surprise to find that it is a common -Indian custom to converse with rattlesnakes, and to -endeavour to propitiate them with presents of tobacco. -On one occasion, the Iowas having begun to build a -village, the presence of a rattlesnake on a neighbouring<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_74" id="Page_74">[74]</a></span> -hill was suddenly announced, when forthwith -started the great snake doctor with tobacco and other -presents: when he had offered these, and had had a -long talk with the snake, he returned to his village, -with the satisfactory news that his tribesmen might -now travel in safety, as peace had been made between -them and the snakes.<a name="FNanchor_110" id="FNanchor_110"></a><a href="#Footnote_110" class="fnanchor">[110]</a></p> - -<p>But perhaps of all natural objects that have -attracted human worship, and been regarded as a -supreme source of human woe or welfare, none can -compare with the moon. For the moon’s changes -of aspect being far more remarkable than any of the -sun’s, and more calculated to inspire dread by the -nocturnal darkness they contend with, are held in -popular fancy nearly everywhere to cause, portend, or -accord with changes in the lot of mortals and all -things terrestrial. In the Hervey Islands cocoa-nuts -are invariably planted at the full of the moon, the -size of the latter being held symbolical of the future -fulness of the fruit;<a name="FNanchor_111" id="FNanchor_111"></a><a href="#Footnote_111" class="fnanchor">[111]</a> and in South Africa it is unlucky -to begin a journey or any work of importance in the -last quarter of the moon.<a name="FNanchor_112" id="FNanchor_112"></a><a href="#Footnote_112" class="fnanchor">[112]</a> The moon’s wane makes -things on earth wane too; when it is new or full, it is -everywhere the proper season for new crops to be -sown, new households to be formed, new weather to -begin.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_75" id="Page_75">[75]</a></span></p> - -<p>The feeling of the Congo Africans, who at the -sight of the new moon fall on their knees or stand and -clap their hands, praying that their lives may be renewed -like that of the moon, corresponds exactly with -the idea of English folk-lore that crops are more -likely to be plentiful if sown when the moon is young, -or with the idea of German folk-lore that the new -moon is the season for counting money which it is -desired may increase. ‘On the first appearance of the -new moon, which,’ says Mungo Park, ‘the Kafirs look -upon as newly created, the pagan natives, as well as -Mahomedans, say a short prayer,’ seemingly the only -adoration they offer to the Supreme Being;<a name="FNanchor_113" id="FNanchor_113"></a><a href="#Footnote_113" class="fnanchor">[113]</a> so that the -sentiment of the Congo prayer may be guessed to underlie, -consciously or not, the salutations by which the -new moon is greeted generally throughout Africa, from -the salutations of the Hottentots to the prayers of -the Makololos, for the success of their journeys or -the destruction of their enemies.<a name="FNanchor_114" id="FNanchor_114"></a><a href="#Footnote_114" class="fnanchor">[114]</a></p> - -<p>More difficult to understand than the worship of -either animals or the heavenly bodies is that of such -inanimate things as stones, trees, or rivers. Yet the -state of thought is not so far remote from our own but -that we can still listen with pleasure, in stories like -‘Undine,’ to the voices of the forest or the river. To -a savage, however, it is not only the motion or the -sound of natural objects which suggests their divinity,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_76" id="Page_76">[76]</a></span> -but the danger that is ever latent in them; and it is -rather to prevent the river from drowning him or the -tree from falling on him than from any perception of -their beauty that he makes offerings to them and -pays them homage. Such feelings as that of the Cree -Indians, who believed that a deer, found dead within -a few yards of a willow bush which they worshipped -and of which it had eaten, had fallen a victim to the -sin of its sacrilege, are not confined to savage lands -nor times.<a name="FNanchor_115" id="FNanchor_115"></a><a href="#Footnote_115" class="fnanchor">[115]</a> As savages have been known to apologize -to a slain elephant or bear, assuring it that its death was -accidental, so it is said that in parts of Germany a -woodcutter will still (or would recently) beg the pardon -of a fine healthy tree before cutting it down.<a name="FNanchor_116" id="FNanchor_116"></a><a href="#Footnote_116" class="fnanchor">[116]</a> In our -own midland counties there is a feeling to this day -against binding up elder-wood with other faggots; and -in Suffolk it is believed misfortune will ensue if ever -it is burnt. In Germany formerly an elder-tree might -not be cut down entirely; and Grimm was himself an -eye-witness of a peasant praying with bare head and -folded hands before venturing to cut its branches. -That trees are still popularly endowed with a conscious -personality is further proved by the custom, -not yet extinct, of trying to secure the future favours -of fruit trees by presents and prayers. The placing -of money in a hole dug at the foot of them, the presenting<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_77" id="Page_77">[77]</a></span> -them with money on New Year’s Day, the -shaking under them of the remainder of the Christmas -dinner, the beating of them with rods on Holy -Innocents’ Day—all German methods to incite fruit -trees to further fertility—answer closely to the English -custom of apple-howling or wassailing, when at -Christmas or Epiphany the inhabitants of a parish, -walking in procession to the principal orchards, and -there singling out the principal tree, sprinkle it with -cider, or place cider-soaked cakes of toast and sugar -in its branches, saluting it at the same time with set -words in the form of a prayer to the trees to be fruitful -for the ensuing year, as the doggerel verses following -show plainly enough:—</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"> -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="verse">Here’s to thee, old apple tree,</div> -<div class="verse">Whence thou mayst bud and whence thou mayst blow,</div> -<div class="verse">And whence thou mayst bear apples enow,</div> -<div class="verse">Hats full, caps full,</div> -<div class="verse">Bushel, bushel, sacks full,</div> -<div class="verse">And my pocket full too.<a name="FNanchor_117" id="FNanchor_117"></a><a href="#Footnote_117" class="fnanchor">[117]</a></div> -</div> -</div> - -<p>And similar prayers, as lifeless now as the fossil -shells on the shore of some ancient coral sea, lie -scattered abundantly in many an English rhyme and -ballad, serving to show how the philosophy of one age -passes into the nonsense of a later one, and how ideas -which constituted a religion for one time may only -survive as an amusement for another.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_78" id="Page_78">[78]</a></span></p> - -<h2 id="CHAPTER_III">III.<br /> -<span class="smaller"><i>SOME SAVAGE PROVERBS.</i></span></h2> - -<p>The German proverb, ‘Speak, that I may see thee,’ -may be applied as truly to a whole community as to -an individual. For proverbs—or, roughly defining, -popular sayings—reflect conspicuously the general -character of a nation, constituting its actual code of -social, political, and moral philosophy. Besides the -beauty and wisdom, from which alone many of them -derive an imperishable charm, they serve as a kind of -literature in miniature, in which the inner life of a -nation is more clearly legible than in its more voluminous -writings. And in spite of the general -resemblance which seems to pervade the proverbial -lore of the world, arising partly from the direct interchange -of thought inseparable from international -commerce of any kind, partly from a uniformity of -experience—such, for example, as has impressed on -all people the wisdom of caution and truth—there are -yet well-marked differences in the proverbs of nations,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_79" id="Page_79">[79]</a></span> -which as clearly retain the records of their several -histories as do their different laws and customs. -Remarkable, therefore, as is the substantial similarity -of proverbial codes, of which the general characteristic -is a high sense of right coupled with a mournful -consciousness of human infirmity, they betray often in -the very expression of the same idea the individuality -of their national birthplace. It is obvious, for instance, -that, largely as all modern nations are indebted to -a writer like Æsop for the thoughts they share in -common, each nation severally will owe more of its -wisdom to writers of its own, who, like Shakespeare -or Cervantes, have, from greater familiarity -with the manners, been more competent to express -the feelings, of their different countries. But the -way in which good proverbs, like good gold, find -acceptance everywhere, and pass readily into the -current coinage of different realms, may be illustrated -by the fact of the existence, in countries so widely -remote as Spain, Arabia, Persia, Afghanistan, and -India, of a saying, second to none in all the essentials -of a good proverb, to the effect that ‘when God wills -the destruction of an ant, he supplies it with wings.’<a name="FNanchor_118" id="FNanchor_118"></a><a href="#Footnote_118" class="fnanchor">[118]</a></p> - -<p>An instructive instance of the light thrown on -national character by proverbs may be supplied from<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_80" id="Page_80">[80]</a></span> -a comparison of Italian, German, and Persian teaching -on the subject of vindictiveness. In communities -destitute of social organisation, the ‘vendetta,’ or duty -of blood-revenge, probably preceded and led the way -to the practice of legal punishment. Originally it was -a kind of lynch-law, supplying the default of any legal -protection of life; and all nations bear traces in their -history of having passed through a stage of growth in -which the sacred duty of vengeance was the germ of -any idea of a more judicial retribution. Confucius -made it a duty for a son to slay his father’s murderer, -just as Moses insisted on a strictly retaliatory penalty -for bloodshed. The duty of revenge, which if it is yet -extinct in Corsica survives with so much interest in -the play of ‘The Corsican Brothers,’ to this day, in -places like Fiji, still passes from father to son, and -from the son to the nearest relation. The longer -survival of such feelings in Italy, consequent on the -different circumstances of her history, is clearly impressed -on the proverbial philosophy of her people, -constituting a remarkable contrast to the sentiments -of other countries. For the Italian, extolling the -sweetness of revenge, declares it a morsel fit for God; -and, expressing pity or contempt for the man who -either cannot or will not carry out his revenge, counsels -patience and the waiting of time and place for its -successful execution. In a proverb so terribly expressive -that you seem to hear in it the assassin’s gnashing<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_81" id="Page_81">[81]</a></span> -teeth, he will tell you that ‘revenge, though a hundred -years old, still has its milk teeth,’ a maxim which stands -on no higher a level than the pagan African saying, -‘Hate hath no medicine,’ or than that of Afghanistan, -‘Speak good words to an enemy very softly, gradually -destroy him root and branch;’ and which may be fitly -compared with the Fijian expression of malice: ‘Let -the shell of the oyster perish by reason of years, and -to these add a thousand more, still my hatred shall -be hot.’ How much purer than the Italian is the -German teaching, which declares revenge to be fresh -wrong, the conversion of a little right into a great -injustice, and sure in its turn to draw revenge after it; -or how far nobler still is the more positive sentiment -of Persia, that to take revenge for an injury is the -sign of a mean spirit; that it is easy to return evil -for evil, but that the manly thing is to return good -for it!</p> - -<p>The contrast conveyed in these proverbs is the -more striking, in that Italy might pre-eminently call -herself the Catholic, as against Germany the heretical, -or Persia the infidel, land. It has been said that -every tenth proverb in an Italian collection contains -a selfish or cynical maxim; and though the beauty -and purity of many Italian sayings counterbalance the -baseness of others—those, for instance, on love being -as refined as those on revenge are barbarous—it may -not be uninteresting to compare generally the proverbs<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_82" id="Page_82">[82]</a></span> -of Italy with those of a land like Persia where the -religious history has been so different.</p> - -<p>The noblest Italian proverb is to the effect that -a hundred years cannot repair a moment’s loss of -honour; the basest, perhaps, that bad as it is to be a -knave, it is worse to be known as one. To love a -friend with all his faults; to associate with the good -in order to be good; to work in order to rest; to do -right in spite of consequences, and good irrespectively -of persons; to do evil never, whatever the benefit—these -are among the highest lessons of Italian -proverb-lore. That among men of honour a word is -a bond, and that conscience is as good as a thousand -witnesses; that the best sermon is a good life, and -that the gains of begging are dearly bought, are -maxims of the same upright tendency. Yet, over -against these, are proverbs pervaded by the saddest -spirit of universal mistrust, instilling utter disbelief -of any sincerity in friendship, and even counselling to -selfish or downright wicked conduct. What more -melancholy evidence of this than is afforded by the -following common sayings?—</p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>He who suspects is seldom to blame.</p> - -<p>Trust was a good man, Trust-not a better.</p> - -<p>From those I trust God guard me; from those I mistrust I will guard myself.</p> - -<p>Who would have many friends let him test but few.</p> - -<p>Tell your secret to your friend, and he will set his foot on your neck.</p> - -</div> - -<p>Or, again, what can be thought of such maxims<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_83" id="Page_83">[83]</a></span> -as, that it is expedient to peel a fig for your friend -but a peach for your enemy; that the man who -esteems none but himself is happy as a king; that -public money, like holy water, is the property of all -men; or that with art and knavery men may live -through half the year, and with knavery and art -through the other?</p> - -<p>The Persian proverbs seem to breathe a different -moral atmosphere from these, being as generous in -character as the Italian are cynical, and displaying a -free spirit of liberality, trust, independence, above all, -of truthfulness, which is unsurpassed in any country -of Europe. If in Italy it is common to say that a -man who cannot flatter knows not how to talk, in -Persia the sentiment prevails that to flatter is worse -than to abuse. The Persian, true to the character -given of him by Herodotus, holds boldly, that the -man who speaks truth is always at ease; that men -never suffer from speaking the truth; that it behoves -them to speak their minds unreservedly, for that -there is no hill in front of the tongue. Add to this -the popular sayings, that the accounts of friends are -in the heart, and that it is better to be in chains with -friends than in the garden with strangers. That it -should have become proverbial in Persia, that a man -lowers himself by vexing the poor, and loses all claim -to greatness by finding fault with his inferiors, proves -the purity of a religion which has instilled such<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_84" id="Page_84">[84]</a></span> -thoughts into the ethics of a nation; nor could any -language in Europe produce proverbs characterised -by a higher spirit of morality than is revealed in the -following selection:—</p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>A high name is better than a high house.</p> - -<p>The cure for anger is silence.</p> - -<p>A man must cut out his own garments of reputation.</p> - -<p>Heaven is at the feet of mothers (<i>i.e.</i> lies in dutiful obedience).</p> - -<p>It is better to die of want than to beg.</p> - -<p>The liberal man is the friend of God.</p> - -<p>Practise liberality, but lay no stress on the obligation.</p> - -</div> - -<p>As another illustration of the way in which a -few proverbs may condense centuries of history, may -be instanced the recorded experiences of mankind -touching priests and priestcraft. With no other -evidence than that of proverbs before him, a future -historian of Europe might easily detect a marked -difference of feeling on this matter between Protestant -Germany and the Catholic countries of -Europe. Not that the latter are wanting in sayings -to the prejudice of the priestly class, but they are not -so numerous as in Germany. The French have two -proverbs, marked with all the wit and boldness of -their genius, one charging anyone who values a clean -house not to let into it either a priest or a pigeon; -the other declaring that it is human ignorance alone -which causes the pot to boil for priests. The Spanish -experience also is, that it is best neither to have a -good friar for a friend nor a bad one for an enemy,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_85" id="Page_85">[85]</a></span> -and that it is well to keep awake in a land thickly -tenanted by monks. But the Germans go much -farther than this. In German estimation the priest -is a being who, in company with a woman, may be -found at the bottom of all the mischief that goes on -in the world, and is as little likely as a woman to -forgive you an injury. Like the bites of wolves, -those of priests are hard to heal, so that it is best, if -you fight with them at all, to beat them to death. If -they are ever hot, it is from eating, not from work; for -they always take care to bless themselves first, nor -do they ever pay any tithes to one another.</p> - -<p>The above comparisons suffice to show how differences -of national character, and even how the -operation of different forms of faith, may reveal -themselves in proverbs. Yet such estimates must -be formed with caution, in consideration of the wide -possibilities of error which are inseparable from so -inexhaustible a subject. For not only may the -proverb-collector easily attribute to one country -alone a saying which belongs equally to, or may even -have originated in, another, but his canon of selection -is somewhat arbitrary and dependent on his preconceptions -of what a proverb really is. ‘To take the -ball on the hop,’ for instance, is as genuine an English -proverb as ‘to make hay whilst the sun shines,’ which -contains the same idea; yet whilst the one might be -heard every day, the other might not be heard once a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_86" id="Page_86">[86]</a></span> -year, so that it might easily escape notice altogether, -or if found be rejected as obsolete. We can consequently, -as in other branches of human study, only -make use, <i>on trust</i>, of such data as lie at hand, and, -whilst fully acknowledging the imperfection of the -evidence, strive after an approximation to truth, without -hope for its actual attainment.</p> - -<p>If now we extend the limits of our comparison, to -take in some proverbs of the lower races as well as of -the higher, we shall find therein a strong corroboration -of the lesson already learnt in any comparison -of the superstitions, myths, and manners of different -societies; namely, that differences of race, colour, and -even structure, sink into insignificance when compared -with the intellectual affinities which unite the families -of mankind, and that there is, perhaps, no phase of -thought nor shade of feeling belonging to the higher -culture of the world to which we may not find an antitype -or even an equivalent in the lower. If we take -some of the proverbs collected from tribes confessedly -low in civilisation—those, for instance, of West Africa—and -compare them with proverbs still prevalent in -Europe, we cannot fail to be struck with the strong -likeness between them, as well as impressed with the -idea, that many actually existent common sayings -may have had their birth in days of the most remote -and savage antiquity. The immense number of -modern proverbs, drawn from the observation of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_87" id="Page_87">[87]</a></span> -natural, and especially of the animal, world (a number -which must be nearly one out of five), coupled -with the coincidence that the same fact is perhaps -the most striking one in the proverbs collected from -West Africa, seems to lend some support to such -a theory.</p> - -<p>As an introductory instance let us take savage -and civilised sentiments about poverty, a belief in -the misfortune of which is written clearly in every -language of Europe. Italian experience says that -poverty has no kin, and that poor men do penance -for rich men’s sins; in Germany the poor have to -dance as the rich pipe; whilst in Spain and Denmark -the evil is expressed more graphically still, it being -a matter of observation in the one country that the -poor man’s crop is destroyed by hail every year; in -the other, that the poor man’s corn always grows thin. -And, in the Oji dialect, spoken by about two millions -of people, including the Ashantees, Fantees, and -others, it is also proverbial that the poor man has no -friend, that poverty makes a man a slave, and that -hard words are fit for the poor. And as the Dutch -have learnt, that ‘poor folks’ wisdom goes for little,’ -or the Italians, that ‘the words of the poor go many -to the sackful,’ so in Oji exactly the same idea is -conveyed in the saying, that ‘when a poor man -makes a proverb it does not spread’; in Yoruba, in -the saying, that ‘poverty destroys a man’s reputation;’<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_88" id="Page_88">[88]</a></span> -and in Accra in the still cleverer proverb, -that ‘a poor man’s pipe does not sound.’<a name="FNanchor_119" id="FNanchor_119"></a><a href="#Footnote_119" class="fnanchor">[119]</a></p> - -<p>The proverbs of savages are moral and immoral, -elevated and base, precisely as are those of more -civilised nations. The proverbs of the Yorubas, justly -observes the missionary, Mr. Bowen,<a name="FNanchor_120" id="FNanchor_120"></a><a href="#Footnote_120" class="fnanchor">[120]</a> ‘are among the -most remarkable of the world;’ and indeed the intellectual -powers and moral ideas displayed in West -African proverbs generally ought largely to modify -our conceptions of their originators, and make us -sceptical of that extreme dearth of mental wealth -which has so frequently been declared to attend a low -standard of material advancement. Their wit, terseness, -vividness of illustration, and insight into life, are -all alike surprising; and acquaintance with them -must suggest caution in any estimate of the mental -capacities of savages whose languages may have -been less investigated and consequently remain less -known. ‘It has always been passing travellers who -have drawn the most doleful pictures of so-called -savages, and especially have asserted the poverty of -their language.’<a name="FNanchor_121" id="FNanchor_121"></a><a href="#Footnote_121" class="fnanchor">[121]</a> It may well prove that better acquaintance -with the languages of tribes, classed at -present for various reasons almost outside the human<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_89" id="Page_89">[89]</a></span> -family, may show them to combine, as Humboldt -found was the case with the once depreciated Carib -language, ‘wealth, grace, strength, and gentleness.’ -It was said of the Veddahs once that they were -utterly destitute of either religion or <i>language</i>; and -the Samojeds were reported to shriek and chatter like -apes.</p> - -<p>The Basutos of South Africa are savages, yet the -following proverbs are current among them:—</p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>A good name makes one sleep well.</p> - -<p>Stolen goods do not make one grow.</p> - -<p>Famine dwells in the house of the quarrelsome.</p> - -<p>The thief catches himself.</p> - -<p>A lent knife does not come back alone. -(<i>i.e.</i> a good deed is never thrown away.)<a name="FNanchor_122" id="FNanchor_122"></a><a href="#Footnote_122" class="fnanchor">[122]</a></p> - -</div> - -<p>Compare, for elevation of mind, these Yoruban -proverbs with those already noticed as current in -Italy:—</p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>He that forgives gains the victory.</p> - -<p>He who injures another injures himself.</p> - -<p>Anger benefits no one.</p> - -<p>We should not treat others with contempt.<a name="FNanchor_123" id="FNanchor_123"></a><a href="#Footnote_123" class="fnanchor">[123]</a></p> - -</div> - -<p>On the other hand, ‘If a great man should wrong -you, smile on him,’ may be compared with the Arabic -advice about dangerous friends, ‘If a serpent love -thee, wear him as a necklace;’ or with the Pashto<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_90" id="Page_90">[90]</a></span> -proverb of the same intention, ‘Though your enemy -be a rope of reeds, call him a serpent.’</p> - -<p>Here are some more proverbs with whose European -equivalents everyone will be familiar:—</p> - -<p class="center"><span class="smcap">On Faultfinding.</span></p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>If you can pull out, pull out your own grey hairs. (Oji.)</p> - -<p>Before healing others, heal yourself. (Wolof.)</p> - -</div> - -<p>With which we may compare the Chinese:—</p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>Sweep the snow from your own doors without troubling about -the frost on your neighbour’s tiles.</p> - -</div> - -<p class="center"><span class="smcap">On the Value of Experience.</span></p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>Nobody is twice a fool. (Accra.)</p> - -<p>Nobody is twice ashamed. (Accra.)</p> - -<p>He is a fool whose sheep run away twice. (Oji.)</p> - -<p>He dreads a slowworm who has been bitten by a serpent. (Oji.)</p> - -</div> - -<p>With which we may compare our own—</p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>It’s a silly fish that’s caught twice with the same bait.</p> - -</div> - -<p>Or the German—</p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>An old fox is not caught twice in the same trap.</p> - -</div> - -<p>To which both Italy and Holland have exactly similar -proverbs.</p> - -<p class="center"><span class="smcap">On Perseverance.</span></p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>Perseverance always triumphs. (Basuto.)</p> - -<p>The moon does not grow full in a day. (Oji.)</p> - -<p>Perseverance is everything.</p> - -<p>Who has patience has all things. (Yoruba.)</p> - -<p>By going and coming a bird builds its nest. (Oji.)</p> - -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_91" id="Page_91">[91]</a></span></p> - -<p>Which latter may be compared with the Dutch -proverb—</p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>By slow degrees a bird builds its nest.</p> - -</div> - -<p>And all of them with the Chinese—</p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>A mulberry-leaf becomes satin with time.</p> - -</div> - -<p class="center"><span class="smcap">On the Force of Habit.</span></p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>The thread follows the needle.</p> - -<p>Its shell follows the snail wherever it goes. (Yoruba.)</p> - -<p>As is the sword so is the scabbard. (Oji.)</p> - -</div> - -<p>To which again China supplies a good parallel in</p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>The growth of the mulberry tree follows its early bent.</p> - -</div> - -<p class="center"><span class="smcap">On Causation.</span></p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>If nothing touches the palm-leaves they do not rustle. (Oji.)</p> - -<p>Nobody hates another without a cause. (Accra.)</p> - -<p>A feather does not stick without gum. (A Pashto proverb.)</p> - -</div> - -<p>Again, the Turkish proverb, that curses, like -chickens, come home to roost, or the Italian one that, -like processions, they come back to their starting-point, -is well matched by the Yoruba proverb that ‘ashes -fly back in the face of their thrower.’ Or the tendency -of travellers to exaggerate or tell lies, impressed as it -has been on all human experience, is also confirmed -by the Oji proverb, that ‘he who travels alone tells -lies.’ And the universal belief in the ultimate exposure -of falsehood conveyed in such proverbs as -the Arabian, ‘The liar is short-lived;’ the Persian,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_92" id="Page_92">[92]</a></span> -‘Liars have bad memories;’ or the still more expressive -Italian saying, that ‘the liar is sooner caught than a -cripple,’ finds itself corroborated by the Wolof proverb, -that ‘lies, though many, will be caught by Truth as -soon as she rises up.’ Even in Afghanistan, where it -is said that no disgrace attaches to lying <i>per se</i>, and -where lying is called an honest man’s wings, while -truth can only be spoken by a strong man or a fool, -there is also a proverb with the moral, that the career -of falsehood is short.<a name="FNanchor_124" id="FNanchor_124"></a><a href="#Footnote_124" class="fnanchor">[124]</a></p> - -<p>That ‘hope is the pillar of the world,’ that ‘it is -the heart which carries one to hell or heaven,’ or that -‘preparation is better than after-thought’—all experiences -of the Kanuri, a Moslem tribe, who think it a -personal adornment to cut each side of their face in -twenty places—shows that there is no necessary connection -between general savagery and an absence of -moral culture. The natives of New Zealand, with all -their barbarity, had in common use a saying which -were a desirable maxim for European diplomacy: -‘When you are on friendly terms, settle your disputes -in a friendly way; when you are at war, redress your -injuries by violence.’<a name="FNanchor_125" id="FNanchor_125"></a><a href="#Footnote_125" class="fnanchor">[125]</a> Even the Fijians would say -that an unimproved day was not to be counted, and -that no food was ever cooked by gay clothes and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_93" id="Page_93">[93]</a></span> -frivolity.<a name="FNanchor_126" id="FNanchor_126"></a><a href="#Footnote_126" class="fnanchor">[126]</a> A good Ashantee proverb warns people -not to speak ill of their benefactors, by forbidding -them to call a forest a shrubbery that has once given -them shelter. The proverbs already quoted from Yoruba -teach the same lesson, nor would it be difficult -to add many more, all proving the existence among -savages of a morality identical in its main features -with that of the higher group of nations to which we -ourselves belong, interpenetrated as it has been for ages -with the philosophies and religions of the civilised -East.</p> - -<p>A similar testimony to the intellectual powers -of savages is afforded by their proverbs, though of -course the argument is only a suggestive one from -tribes whose language has been well studied to others -not so well known. That the Soudan negroes are on -a higher level of general culture than many savages -of other islands or continents is proved by the fact -that all known Africans are acquainted with the art -of smelting iron and converting it into weapons and -utensils; so that they may be said to be living in -the iron age, and thus, materially at least, are more -advanced than the Botocudos of Brazil, who are still -in the age of polished stone implements. From the -fact alone that the Yorubas express their contempt -for a stupid man by saying that he cannot count nine -times nine, we are enabled at once to place them<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_94" id="Page_94">[94]</a></span> -above tribes whose powers of numeration fall short of -such readiness. Hence we should not be justified in -expecting to find among Australian or American -aborigines proverbs of so high an intellectual order -as abound in Africa, of which the following may -be selected as samples:—</p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>Were no elephant in the jungle the buffalo would be large;</p> - -</div> - -<p>or—</p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>The dust of the buffalo is lost in that of the elephant.</p> - -<p>A crab does not bring forth a bird.</p> - -<p>Two small antelopes beat a big one.</p> - -<p>Two crocodiles do not live in one hole.</p> - -<p>A child can crush a snail, but not a tortoise.</p> - -<p>A razor cannot shave itself.</p> - -<p>You cannot stop the sun by standing before it.</p> - -<p>If you like honey, do not fear the bees.</p> - -<p>When a fish is killed its tail is inserted in its own mouth. -(Said of people who reap the reward of their deeds.)</p> - -</div> - -<p>The Zulus, speaking of the uncertainty of a result, say, -‘It is not known what calf the cow will have;’<a name="FNanchor_127" id="FNanchor_127"></a><a href="#Footnote_127" class="fnanchor">[127]</a> and -when the Fantees tell you to ‘cross the river before you -abuse the crocodile,’<a name="FNanchor_128" id="FNanchor_128"></a><a href="#Footnote_128" class="fnanchor">[128]</a> there is no difficulty in translating -their meaning into English. In all these -proverbs it is obvious how the facts of every-day life -have readily served everywhere as the basis of intellectual -advancement, and how similar lessons have -everywhere been drawn from the observation of -similar occurrences.</p> - -<p>Leaving now the analogy between African and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_95" id="Page_95">[95]</a></span> -European proverb-lore, which the uniformity of moral -experiences and the observation of similar laws of -nature sufficiently account for, let us endeavour to find -among civilised nations any proverbs which, by the -figures involved in them or their likeness to savage -maxims, seem to bear a distinct impression of a -barbaric coinage. One French proverb may almost -certainly be so explained. It is, for instance, well -known that the lower races very generally account for -eclipses of either sun or moon by supposing them -to be the victims of the fury or voracity of some ill-disposed -animal, whom they try to divert by every -horrible noise they can produce, or by any weapon -they have learnt to fashion. A typical instance of -this was the belief of the Chiquitos of South America -that the moon was hunted across the sky by dogs, -who tore her in pieces when they caught her, till -driven off by the Indian arrows. It has been suggested -that the French proverb, ‘Dieu garde la lune -des loups,’ said in deprecation of a dread of remote -danger, is a survival of a similar rude philosophy of -nature which is still prevalent in the capital of Turkey, -and in the days of St. Augustine was current over -Europe.<a name="FNanchor_129" id="FNanchor_129"></a><a href="#Footnote_129" class="fnanchor">[129]</a></p> - -<p>Another instructive set of proverbs may be adduced -to show how the social philosophy current in -the savage state may survive in contemporary expressions<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_96" id="Page_96">[96]</a></span> -of modern Europe. In Africa, where, speaking -generally, a man’s wife has no better status in society -than that which attaches to his slave or his ox, and -a son has been known to wager his own mother -against a cow, we cannot be astonished at finding in -vogue proverbs strongly depreciatory of the worth of -the female sex. Thus a wise Kanuri is cautioned, -that if a woman shall speak to him two words, he -shall take one and leave the other; nor should he -give his heart to a woman, if he would live, for a -woman never brings a man into the right way. So, -too, Pashto proverbs say contemptuously, that a -woman’s wisdom is under her heel, and that she is -well only in the house or in the grave. The same -feeling is endorsed by the Persians, who declare that -both women and dragons are best out of the world, -classing the former with horses and swords among -their by-words of unfaithfulness.</p> - -<p>The literatures of all countries are strongly tinged -with sentiments of the same unjust nature. Even the -French say that a man of straw is worth a woman of -gold, though their proverb, ‘Ce que femme veut, Dieu -le veut,’ is as true as it is a witty variation of the well-known -democratic formula. The Italians have made -the shrewd observation, that, whilst with men every -mortal sin is venial, with women every venial sin is -mortal; but no language has anything worse than -this, that as both a good horse and a bad horse need<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_97" id="Page_97">[97]</a></span> -the spur, so both a good woman and a bad woman -need the stick.</p> - -<p>It is, however, in Germany that the character of -women has suffered most from the shafts of that other -half of the community, which (it might be complained) -has as unfair a monopoly of making proverbs as it -has of making laws. The humorous saying, that there -are only two good women in the world, one of whom -is dead and the other not to be found, contains the -key to the common national sentiment. A woman is -compared to good fortune in her partiality for fools, and -to wine in her power to make them. Like a glass, she is -in hourly danger; and, like a priest, she never forgets. -Her vengeance is boundless, and her mutability finds its -only parallel in nature in the uncertain skies of April. -Her affections change every moment, like luck at -cards, the favour of princes, or the leaves of a rose; -and though you will never find her wanting in words, -there is not a needle-point’s difference betwixt her -yea and her nay. She only keeps silence where she -is ignorant, and it is as fruitless to try to hold a woman -at her word as an eel by its tail. Her advice, like corn -sown in summer, may perhaps turn out well once in -seven years; but wherever there is mischief brewing -in the world, rest assured that there is a woman and -a priest at the bottom of it. Every daughter of Eve -would rather be beautiful than good, and may be -caught as surely by gold as a hare by dogs or a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_98" id="Page_98">[98]</a></span> -gentleman by flattery. Even in the house she should -be allowed no power, for where a woman rules the -devil is chief servant; whilst two women in the same -house will agree together like two cats over a mouse -or two dogs over a bone.</p> - -<p>Spanish experience on this subject coincides with -the Teutonic, but without the expenditure of nearly so -much spleen, and with several glimpses of a happier -experience. What can be worse than this: ‘Beware -of a bad woman, nor put any trust in a good one;’ or -sadder than this: ‘What is marriage, mother? Spinning, -childbirth, and crying, daughter’? Yet the -Spanish woman, as hard to know as a melon, as little -to be trusted as a magpie, as fickle as the wind or as -fortune, as ready to cry as a dog to limp, in labour as -patient as a mule, is not so destitute as the German -of any redeeming qualities for her failings. The -Spaniard is taught to believe that with a good wife he -may bear any adversity, and that he should believe -nothing against her unless absolutely proved. It is -also in remarkable contrast to the experiences of -other countries, that in Spain it should have passed into -a proverb, that whilst an unmarried man advocates -a daily beating for a wife, as soon as he marries he -takes care of his own.</p> - -<p>Female talkativeness appears also to be a subject -of lament all over the world, from our own island, where -a woman’s tongue proverbially wags like a lamb’s tail,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_99" id="Page_99">[99]</a></span> -to the Celestial Empire, where it is likened to a sword, -never suffered by its owner to rust. Regard not a -woman’s words, says the Hindoo; and the African -also is warned against trusting his secrets even to -his wife. The Spaniard believes that he has only to -tell a woman what he would wish to have published -in the market-place; and all languages have sayings -to the same effect. The Scotch divine who, before the -Session, defended his heresy that women would find no -place in heaven, by the text, ‘There was silence in heaven -for about the space of half an hour,’ only expressed -a sentiment of universal currency over the world.</p> - -<p>The proverbs collected from the lower races are -still very few, when compared with the immense mass -of those from nations with whose literature we are -more familiar. It is in the nature of things that -missionaries and travellers should have been first -struck by, and first given us information about, -matters more directly challenging their notice than -phrases in common use, for a real knowledge of which -the most favourable conditions of a prolonged intimacy -are obviously requisite. The large collection of such -proverbs from West Africa alone, revealing as they -do an elevation of feeling and a clearness of intelligence -which other facts of their social life would -never have led us to suspect, point at the possibility -of such collections elsewhere largely modifying -our present views concerning other savage tribes.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_100" id="Page_100">[100]</a></span> -They at least should teach us caution against accepting -the conclusions which some writers have drawn from -their study of savage languages, when, from the absence -or loss in a dialect of such words as ‘love’ or ‘gratitude,’ -they proceed to explain, on the hypothesis of degradation, -that rude state of existence which is denoted -by the word ‘savage,’ and which there are abundant -reasons for supposing was really the primitive germ, -out of which all subsequent civilisation has been unfolded. -‘Were,’ says Archbishop Trench, ‘the savage -the primitive man, we should then find savage tribes -furnished, scantily enough it might be, with the elements -of speech, yet, at the same time, with its fruitful -beginnings, its vigorous and healthful germs. But -what does their language on close inspection prove? -In every case what they are themselves, the remnant -and ruin of a better and a nobler past. Fearful indeed -is the impress of degradation which is stamped on the -language of the savage—more fearful, perhaps, even -than that which is stamped upon his form.’<a name="FNanchor_130" id="FNanchor_130"></a><a href="#Footnote_130" class="fnanchor">[130]</a> Yet, -whatever may be the case with some tribes, who may -be shown historically to have fallen from a higher state -(and such are the exceptions), at least the languages -spoken in Africa bear no such ‘fearful impress of degradation’ -as are declared to be traceable <i>in every case</i>, -if we may judge of a language by the thoughts which it -expresses rather than by the words which it contains.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_101" id="Page_101">[101]</a></span></p> - -<h2 id="CHAPTER_IV">IV.<br /> -<span class="smaller"><i>SAVAGE MORAL PHILOSOPHY.</i></span></h2> - -<p>Lucretius, in his retrospect of prehistoric times, -imagines primeval man as unpossessed of any moral -law, and is at pains to explain how, as men were once -ignorant of the property of either fire to warm or of -skins to cover them, so once there was a time when -no moral restraints affected the relations between -man and man.<a name="FNanchor_131" id="FNanchor_131"></a><a href="#Footnote_131" class="fnanchor">[131]</a> Across the Atlantic we find the same -strain of thought in the myths, common in many -different stages of progress, of those culture heroes -who had come long ago to teach men the arts and -virtues of life, and had left their names to be worshipped -by a grateful posterity. The Peruvian legend, -that moral law was unknown until the Sun -sent two of his children to raise humanity from their -animal condition, coincides with the modern hypothesis -that the morality of the cave-men resembled very<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_102" id="Page_102">[102]</a></span> -much that of the cave-bear; so that it becomes a -subject worthy of inquiry whether any human communities -ever have lived, or are actually living, with -no more idea of moral right and wrong than is -necessary for the social harmony of a wolf-pack or a -wasp’s nest; whether, in short, what to the Roman was -a matter of speculation, or to the American of legend, -can fairly become for us one of science.</p> - -<p>The Shoshones of North America, some of whom -are said to have built absolutely no dwellings, but to -have lived in caves and among the rocks, or burrowed -like reptiles in the ground; or the Cochinis, who -resorted at night for shelter to caverns and holes in -the ground, may be taken as the best representatives -of the ancient cave-dwellers, and the nearest known -approach to communities living in the state presupposed -by the legends of most latitudes.<a name="FNanchor_132" id="FNanchor_132"></a><a href="#Footnote_132" class="fnanchor">[132]</a> Californians -generally are said to have had ‘no morals, -nor any religion worth calling such;’ yet even the -Shoshones knew, like so many other American tribes, -how to ratify either a treaty or a bargain by the -ceremony of smoking, and used shell-money as an -instrument of barter. But some moral notions must -enter into the rudest kind of barter, and barter was -known to the ancient cave-dwellers of Périgord, just -as it is to the lowest contemporary savage tribes.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_103" id="Page_103">[103]</a></span> -Rock crystal and Atlantic shells, found among the -remains of men, tigers, and bears, in the caves of -Périgord, could, it is argued, only have got thither by -barter; so that the earliest human beings we have -record of must have possessed at least so much -morality as is necessary for commerce.<a name="FNanchor_133" id="FNanchor_133"></a><a href="#Footnote_133" class="fnanchor">[133]</a></p> - -<p>As regards existing savages, evidence as to their -moral ideas can only be sought in incidental allusion -to their customs, penalties, beliefs, or myths, never -in chapters expressly devoted to the delineation of -their moral character. Not only do such delineations -by different writers conflict hopelessly with one another, -but inconsistencies abound in the accounts of the same -writer, as, for instance, where Cranz describes Greenlanders -as mild and peaceable, and a few pages further -on as ‘naturally of a murderous disposition.’ The -value of Cranz’ evidence is marred by the fact that -he writes expressly to rebut the Deistic idea of a -natural morality existing by the light of reason and -independent of Revelation; and the evidence of other -writers, whenever a long residence among savages -entitles them to speak with any authority at all, is -spoilt by their several temptations to bias. Whether -the temptation be to enliven a book of travel, to inculcate -the need and enhance the merit of missionary -labours, or to illustrate the uniformity of moral perceptions<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_104" id="Page_104">[104]</a></span> -and the universality of certain moral laws, in -any case we are exposed to the error of mistaking for -habitual what is really peculiar, and of misunderstanding -the indications of facts which are as often -anomalous as they are illustrative.</p> - -<p>The way, also, in which the love of theory may -give rise to unjustifiable credulity or even to absolute -misstatement may be exemplified from the common -story of the Bushman who spoke with absolute unconcern -of having murdered his brother, or of the -other Bushman who gave as an instance of his idea of -a good action, stealing some one else’s wife, and of a -bad one, losing in the same way his own. According -to the original authority, the Bushmen who were -questioned, to test their intelligence, on a few moral -points, and especially on what they considered good -actions and what bad, belonged to a kraal of extremely -poor, half-starved Bushmen, seemingly ‘the outcasts of -the Bushmen race;’ the interpreter, through whom -Burchell made his inquiries, said he could not make -them understand what he said, and to the specific -question about good and bad actions <i>they made no reply</i>, -the missionary himself adding, as comment, that ‘their -not understanding it must have been either pretended -stupidity or a wilful misrepresentation by the interpreter.’ -This same interpreter is suspected by Burchell, -in the very same page, of such misrepresentation, -or of actual invention in respect of the story of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_105" id="Page_105">[105]</a></span> -murder—a story which, if true, adds the missionary, -would have justified him in saying, Here are men who -know not right from wrong. Yet both these stories -have been quoted to exemplify the state of the moral -destitution of the lower races.<a name="FNanchor_134" id="FNanchor_134"></a><a href="#Footnote_134" class="fnanchor">[134]</a></p> - -<p>The fear of incurring the ill-will of his fellow-beings -or of those invisible spirits disposed more or -less hostilely towards him and everywhere surrounding -him, must have sufficed, even for prehistoric man, -to have marked out certain acts as less advisable than -others, and so far as wrong. The instinct to repel or -revenge personal injuries, and the instinct to appease -the unknown forces of nature, neither of which, be it -assumed, acted less energetically in the past than the -present, must have always contributed to rank certain -sets of actions as better to be avoided. Personal or -tribal well-being has probably always supplied a -sufficiently defined moral standard, sufficiently defended -by real or fanciful sanctions. So suggests -theory; and in point of fact a savage tribe is as -difficult to find as it is to imagine, without a sense of -a difference in the quality of actions, arising from a -difference in their likely consequences to themselves.</p> - -<p>The fear of revenge from a man’s survivors or<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_106" id="Page_106">[106]</a></span> -from his ghost would at any time tend to make -homicide a prominent act of guilt. The vendetta, -sometimes carried out as much against a homicidal -tiger or tree as against a man, would scarcely ever be -not dreaded by a human murderer; and the associations -are obvious and few between homicide as merely -an act to be avenged and a crime to be avoided. -Even in instances where bloodshed seems to have -left but an external stain, affecting the hands not the -heart of the murderer, and calling simply for purification -by washing, the presence of a feeling of difference -may be detected between the killing of a man -and the killing of a bear. But the dread of vengeance -from a murdered man’s ghost, which is said to have -acted as a check on murder among the Sioux Indians, -or the dread of such vengeance from the tutelary gods -of the deceased, which is said to have acted as a check -on cannibalism in Samoa, points to the existence of -prudential restraints which are likely not to have -been limited in their operation to a tribe in America -nor to an island in the Pacific.</p> - -<p>But, besides spiritual terrors, secular punishment -has a well-defined place among savages, to check -the extreme indulgence of hatred or passion. It is -doubtful whether any savage tribe is so indifferent -to the criminality of murder as to be destitute of -customary penal laws to prevent or punish it. These -customs vary from the payment of a slight compensation,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_107" id="Page_107">[107]</a></span> -payable either to the dead man’s family or to -the tribal chief, down to actual capital punishment. -Among the Northern Californians a few strings of -shell-money compounded for the murder of a man, -and half a man’s price was paid for a woman; -banishment from the tribe being sometimes the -penalty, death never.<a name="FNanchor_135" id="FNanchor_135"></a><a href="#Footnote_135" class="fnanchor">[135]</a> Among the Kutchin tribes -human life was valued at forty beaver skins.<a name="FNanchor_136" id="FNanchor_136"></a><a href="#Footnote_136" class="fnanchor">[136]</a> Even the -Veddahs insist upon compensation to survivors. The -Tunguse Lapps, with whom homicide was a brave -rather than a shameful act, punished nevertheless a -murderer with blows, and compelled him to support -the dead man’s relations.<a name="FNanchor_137" id="FNanchor_137"></a><a href="#Footnote_137" class="fnanchor">[137]</a> In some cases a slight -penance was the only law against homicide. A -Yuma Indian, for instance, who killed a tribesman -had perforce to starve for a month on vegetables and -water, bathing frequently during the day; whilst a -Pima who killed an Apache had to fast for sixteen -days, living in the woods, careful meanwhile to keep -his eyes from the sight of a blazing fire and his -tongue from conversation.<a name="FNanchor_138" id="FNanchor_138"></a><a href="#Footnote_138" class="fnanchor">[138]</a></p> - -<p>The custom, moreover, of extending to a whole -family the guilt of an individual is an additional -protection to human life among savages. In the -same way as, till lately, English law avenged itself -on the suicide who had escaped its jurisdiction, by<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_108" id="Page_108">[108]</a></span> -punishing the criminal’s relations, savage custom -satisfies indignation by taking any member of a -family as a substitute for a fugitive criminal. The -Thlinkeet Indians, if they cannot kill the actual -murderer, kill one of his tribe or family instead.<a name="FNanchor_139" id="FNanchor_139"></a><a href="#Footnote_139" class="fnanchor">[139]</a> -‘An Indian,’ says Kane, ‘in taking revenge for the -death of a relative, does not, in all cases, seek the -actual offender; as, should the party be one of his -own tribe, any relative will do, however distant.’<a name="FNanchor_140" id="FNanchor_140"></a><a href="#Footnote_140" class="fnanchor">[140]</a> -Catlin tells the story how, when a great Sioux -warrior, the Little Bear, had been shot by the Dog, -the avengers of the former, failing to overtake the -Dog, caught and slew his brother instead, notwithstanding -that he was a man much esteemed by the -tribe.<a name="FNanchor_141" id="FNanchor_141"></a><a href="#Footnote_141" class="fnanchor">[141]</a> If a Californian criminal escaped to a sacred -refuge he was regarded as a coward, in that he -diverted to a relation a punishment he deserved himself.<a name="FNanchor_142" id="FNanchor_142"></a><a href="#Footnote_142" class="fnanchor">[142]</a> -In Samoa not only the murderer but all his -belongings would fly to another village as a city of -refuge, for in Samoan law a plaintiff might seek -redress from ‘the brother, son, or other relative of the -guilty party.’<a name="FNanchor_143" id="FNanchor_143"></a><a href="#Footnote_143" class="fnanchor">[143]</a> In Australia wide-spread consternation -followed the commission of a crime, especially if the -culprit escaped, for the brothers of the criminal held -themselves quite as guilty as he was, and only persons<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_109" id="Page_109">[109]</a></span> -unconnected with the family believed themselves safe.<a name="FNanchor_144" id="FNanchor_144"></a><a href="#Footnote_144" class="fnanchor">[144]</a> -In the Fiji Islands a warrior once left his musket in -such a position that it went off and killed two persons. -The owner of the musket was condemned to death; -but, as he fled away, the strangulation of his father -instead of him perfectly satisfied the ends of justice.<a name="FNanchor_145" id="FNanchor_145"></a><a href="#Footnote_145" class="fnanchor">[145]</a></p> - -<p>The Samoans, as far back as it was possible to -trace, had had customary laws for the prevention of -theft, adultery, assault, and murder, and the penalties -for such crimes appeared rather to have grown milder -than severer with time. Not only this, but they had -penal customs for such wrong acts as rude conduct to -strangers, pulling down of fences, spoiling fruit trees, -or calling chiefs by opprobrious epithets. It is open -to doubt whether other savage tribes had not equally -good safeguards for preventing at least those greater -social offences, whose immorality furnishes the first -principle of even the ethics of civilised communities.</p> - -<p>In Fiji the criminality of actions is said to have -varied with the social rank of the offender, murder -by a chief being accounted less heinous than a petty -larceny by a man of low rank. Theft, adultery, witchcraft, -violation of a <i>tabu</i>, arson, treason, and disrespect -to a chief were among the few crimes regarded as -serious. With regard to murder, we are told (and the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_110" id="Page_110">[110]</a></span> -passage is a favourite one for illustrating the extreme -variability of moral sentiment), that to a Fijian shedding -of blood was ‘no crime, but a glory,’ and that -to be an acknowledged murderer was ‘the object -of his restless ambition.’ In a similar strain it has -been said, that in New Zealand intentional murder -was either very meritorious or of no consequence; -the latter if the victim were a slave, the former if he -belonged to another tribe. The malicious destruction -of a man of the same tribe was, however, rare, the -<i>lex talionis</i> alone applying to or checking it;<a name="FNanchor_146" id="FNanchor_146"></a><a href="#Footnote_146" class="fnanchor">[146]</a> and it -is probable that this reservation in favour of native -New Zealand should be made for all cases where -murder is spoken of as a trivial matter. Whenever -murder is spoken of as no crime, reference seems -generally made to murder outside the tribe, so that -from the circumstances of savage life it resolves itself -into an act of ordinary hostility; or if the reference is -to murder within the tribe, it is to murder sanctioned -by necessity, custom, or superstition. The Carrier -Indians, who did not think murders worth confessing -when they confessed other crimes of their lives, yet -regarded the <i>murder of a fellow-tribesman as something -quite senseless</i>, and the man who committed such a -deed had to absent himself till he could pay the relatives, -since at home he was only safe if a chief lent him the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_111" id="Page_111">[111]</a></span> -refuge of his tent or of one of his garments.<a name="FNanchor_147" id="FNanchor_147"></a><a href="#Footnote_147" class="fnanchor">[147]</a> ‘A -murder,’ says Sproat, ‘<i>if not perpetrated on one of his -own tribe</i>, or on a particular friend, is no more to an -Indian than the killing of a dog.’ The sutteeism and -parenticide, which missionaries describe as murders, -are, from the savage point of view, rather acts of -mercy, being intimately connected with their ideas of -future existence, to which it is neither fair nor scientific -to apply the phraseology and associations of -Christian morality.<a name="FNanchor_148" id="FNanchor_148"></a><a href="#Footnote_148" class="fnanchor">[148]</a></p> - -<p>Different tribes have evolved different institutions -for the prevention of wrongs, which supplement to a -large extent the absence of fixed legal remedies.</p> - -<p>In Greenland there was the singing combat, in -which anyone aggrieved, dancing to the beat of a -drum and accompanied by his partisans, recited at -a public meeting a satirical poem, telling ludicrous -stories of his adversary, and obliged to listen afterwards -to similar abuse of himself, till, after a long -succession of charges and retorts, the assembled spectators -gave the victory to one of the combatants. -These combats, says Cranz, served to remind debtors -of the duty of repayment, to brand falsehood and -detraction with infamy, to punish fraud and injustice,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_112" id="Page_112">[112]</a></span> -and above all to overwhelm adultery with contempt. -The fear of incurring public disgrace at these combats -was, with the fear of retaliation for injury, the only -motive to virtue which the writer allows to the natives -of Greenland.</p> - -<p>In Samoa thieves could be scared from plantations -by cocoa-nut leaflets so plaited as to convey an -imprecation; and a man who saw an artificial sea-pike -suspended from a tree would fear, that, if he -accomplished his theft, the next time he went fishing -a real sea-pike would dart up and wound him mortally. -Images of a similar nature, conveying imprecations of -disease, death, lightning, or a plague of rats, seem -also to have been effective restraints upon thievish -propensities;<a name="FNanchor_149" id="FNanchor_149"></a><a href="#Footnote_149" class="fnanchor">[149]</a> and in the Tonga Islands fruits and -flowers were tabooed, that is, preserved, by plaited -representations of a lizard or a shark.<a name="FNanchor_150" id="FNanchor_150"></a><a href="#Footnote_150" class="fnanchor">[150]</a> It is likely -that a similar meaning attached in Africa to certain -branches of trees which, stuck into the ground in a -particular manner, with bits of broken pottery, were -enough to prevent the most determined robber from -crossing a threshold.<a name="FNanchor_151" id="FNanchor_151"></a><a href="#Footnote_151" class="fnanchor">[151]</a> Similar <i>tabu</i> marks were seen -on some rocks at Tahiti, placed there to prevent -people fishing or getting shells from the Queen’s preserves;<a name="FNanchor_152" id="FNanchor_152"></a><a href="#Footnote_152" class="fnanchor">[152]</a> -and it is possible that the origin of all <i>tabu</i><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_113" id="Page_113">[113]</a></span> -customs may have lain in the supposed efficacy of -symbolical imprecation.</p> - -<p>In New Zealand the institution of <i>muru</i>, or the -legalized enforcement of damages by plunder, extended -the idea of sinfulness even to involuntary -wrongs or accidental sufferings. Involuntary homicide -is said to have involved more serious consequences -than murder of malice prepense; and if a man’s -child fell into the fire, or his canoe was upset and -himself nearly drowned, he was not only cudgelled -and robbed, but he would have deemed it a personal -slight not to have been so treated.<a name="FNanchor_153" id="FNanchor_153"></a><a href="#Footnote_153" class="fnanchor">[153]</a> To escape from -drowning was indeed a common sin in savage life, for -was it not to escape the just wrath of the Water Spirit, -and perhaps to turn it upon some one else? In -Kamschatka so heinous was the sin of cheating the -Water Spirit of his prey, by escape from drowning, -that no one would receive such a sinner into his house, -speak to him, nor give him food: he became, in short, -socially dead. Fijians who escape shipwreck are supposed -to be saved in order to be eaten, and Williams -tells, how on one occasion fourteen of them who lost -their canoe at sea only escaped becoming food for -sharks to become food for their friends on shore. If the -Koossa Kafirs see a person drowning, or indeed in any -danger of his life, they either run away from the spot<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_114" id="Page_114">[114]</a></span> -or pelt the victim with stones as he dies.<a name="FNanchor_154" id="FNanchor_154"></a><a href="#Footnote_154" class="fnanchor">[154]</a> So also -with death by fire: if an Indian falls into the fire or -is partially burnt, it is believed that the spirits of his -ancestors pushed him into the flames owing to his -negligence in supplying them with food.<a name="FNanchor_155" id="FNanchor_155"></a><a href="#Footnote_155" class="fnanchor">[155]</a> The -custom of an African tribe to expel from their community -anyone bitten by a zebra or an alligator, or -even so much as splashed by the tail of the latter, is -evidently related to the same idea.<a name="FNanchor_156" id="FNanchor_156"></a><a href="#Footnote_156" class="fnanchor">[156]</a></p> - -<p>Again, however much Catlin’s assertion that self-denial, -torture, and immolation were constant modes -among North American Indians for appealing to the -Great Spirit for countenance and forgiveness, may -overstate the truth, it is remarkable that not only -penance by fasting and self-torture, but the practice -of confession, should occur in the lower culture as a -mode of moral purification. Confession was common -not only in Mexico and Peru, but among widely remote -savage tribes, being closely connected with the belief -in the power of sin to cause, and of priestcraft to cure, -dangerous sickness. The Carrier Indians of North -America thought, that the only chance of recovery -from sickness lay in a disclosure before a priest of -every secret crime committed in life, and that the concealment -of a single fact would meet with the punishment<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_115" id="Page_115">[115]</a></span> -of instantaneous death.<a name="FNanchor_157" id="FNanchor_157"></a><a href="#Footnote_157" class="fnanchor">[157]</a> The Samoan Islanders -believing that all disease was due to the wrath of -some deity, would inquire of the village priest the -cause of sickness, who would sometimes in such cases -command the family to assemble and confess. At -this confessional ceremony each member of the family -would confess his crimes, and any judgments he might -have invoked in anger on the family or the invalid -himself; long-concealed crimes being often thus -disclosed.<a name="FNanchor_158" id="FNanchor_158"></a><a href="#Footnote_158" class="fnanchor">[158]</a> In Yucatan, confession, introduced by -Cukulcan, the mythical author of their culture, was -much resorted to, ‘as death and disease were thought -to be direct punishments for sins committed.’ The -natives of Cerquin, in Honduras, confessed, not only -in sickness, but in immediate danger of any kind, or -to procure divine blessings on any important occasion. -So far did they carry it, that, if a travelling party -met a jaguar or puma, each would commend himself -to the gods, confessing loudly his sins, and imploring -pardon; if the beast still advanced they would cry -out, ‘We have committed as many more sins; do not -kill us.’<a name="FNanchor_159" id="FNanchor_159"></a><a href="#Footnote_159" class="fnanchor">[159]</a></p> - -<p>But over and above the wrong acts from which restraints -lie in the revenge of individuals, in punishment -by the community, or in artificial restrictions,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_116" id="Page_116">[116]</a></span> -there is a large class of acts, defended rather by spiritual -than secular sanctions, deriving their sinfulness -from pure misconceptions of things, and constituting -for savages by far the larger part of their field for -right and wrong. The consciousness of having -trodden in the footstep of a bear would be as -painful to a Kamschadal as the consciousness of -having stolen, the possible consequences of the former -being infinitely more dreadful. Such acts as -the experience of primitive times has thus generalized -into acts provocative of unpleasant expressions -of dissatisfaction from the spiritual world, and -so far as sinful, become in the folk-lore of later -date acts merely unlucky or ominous. The feeling -to this day prevalent in parts of England and Germany, -that if you transplant parsley you may cause -its guardian spirit to punish you or your relations -with death, fairly illustrates how the wrongful acts -of bygone times may even in civilised countries continue -to be guarded by the very same sanction that -gave them potency in the days of savagery.</p> - -<p>Of such regulations in restraint of the natural -liberty of savage tribes let it suffice to give some instances -of sinful acts which derive all their associations -of wrong from rude notions concerning the -nature of storms, of ancestors, of names, and of -animals. It will be seen that in some cases such -superstitions act as real checks to real wickedness;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_117" id="Page_117">[117]</a></span> -though the connection between them seems purely -accidental, rather than the result of any intuitive discrimination -of the qualities of actions.</p> - -<p>As English sailors will refrain from whistling at -sea, lest they should provoke a storm, so the Kamschadals -account many actions sinful on account of -their storm-breeding qualities. For this reason they -will never cut snow from off their shoes with a knife -out of doors, nor go barefooted outside their huts in -winter, nor sharpen an axe or a knife on a journey. -The Fuejian natives brought away by Captain -Fitzroy felt sure that anything wrong said or done -caused bad weather, especially the sin of shooting -young ducks. They declared their belief in an -omniscient Big Black Man, who had his living among -the woods and mountains, and influenced the weather -according to men’s conduct; in illustration of which -they told a story of a murderer, who ascribed to the -anger of this being a storm of wind and snow which -followed his crime.<a name="FNanchor_160" id="FNanchor_160"></a><a href="#Footnote_160" class="fnanchor">[160]</a> In Vancouver’s Island there -is a mountain, the sin of mentioning which in passing -may cause a storm to overturn the offender’s -canoe.<a name="FNanchor_161" id="FNanchor_161"></a><a href="#Footnote_161" class="fnanchor">[161]</a></p> - -<p>Prominent among the moral checks of savage life -is the fear of the anger of the dead. Among savages -the supposed wishes of their departed friends, or<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_118" id="Page_118">[118]</a></span> -deified forefathers, operate as real commands, girt -with all the sanction of superstitious terror, and clothing -the most fanciful customs with all the obligatory -feelings of morality. A New Zealand chief, for instance, -would expect his dead ancestors to visit him -with disease or other calamity if he let food touch -any part of his body, or if he entered a dwelling where -food hung from the ceiling.<a name="FNanchor_162" id="FNanchor_162"></a><a href="#Footnote_162" class="fnanchor">[162]</a> The wide prevalence of -the feeling that disease and death are due to the displeasure -of the dead, who may return to earth, to -reside in some part of a living person’s body, may be -illustrated by the Samoan custom of taking valuable -presents as a last expression of regard to the dying, or -by way of bribing them to forego their incorporeal -privilege of post-mortem revenge.<a name="FNanchor_163" id="FNanchor_163"></a><a href="#Footnote_163" class="fnanchor">[163]</a> On the Gold -Coast also friends make presents to the dead of gold, -brandy, or cloth, to be buried with them; just as in -ancient Mexico all classes of the population would beg -of their dead king to accept their offerings of food, -robes, or slaves, which they vied in giving him, or as -the Mayas would place precious gifts or ornaments -near or upon the corpse of a deceased lord of a province. -So the Bodos, presenting food at the graves -of their relations, would pray, saying, ‘Take and -eat ... we come no more to you, come no more to -us.’</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_119" id="Page_119">[119]</a></span></p> - -<p>Proper behaviour with regard to names is one of -the most important points of savage decorum. The -confusion, amounting almost to identification, between -a person and his name is one of the most signal proofs -of the power of language over thought. As Catlin’s -or Kane’s Indian pictures were thought to detract -from the originals something of their existence, giving -the painter such power over them that whilst living -their bodies would sympathise with every injury done -to their pictures, and when dead would not rest in -their graves, so the feeling among savages is strong -that the knowledge of a person’s name gives to -another a fatal control over his destiny. An Indian -once asked Kane ‘whether his wish to know his -name proceeded from a desire to steal it;’<a name="FNanchor_164" id="FNanchor_164"></a><a href="#Footnote_164" class="fnanchor">[164]</a> whilst -with the Abipones it was positively sinful for anyone -to pronounce his own name. Kane could only discover -Indians’ names through third parties; and it is -curious that the natives of one of the Fiji Islands will -never tell their names to an inquirer, if there should -be anyone else to answer the question.<a name="FNanchor_165" id="FNanchor_165"></a><a href="#Footnote_165" class="fnanchor">[165]</a> Hence it is -that the highest compliment a savage can pay a -person is to exchange names with him, a custom -which Cook found prevalent at Tahiti and in the -Society Islands, and which was also common in -North America.<a name="FNanchor_166" id="FNanchor_166"></a><a href="#Footnote_166" class="fnanchor">[166]</a> Warriors sometimes take the name<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_120" id="Page_120">[120]</a></span> -of a slain enemy, from the same motive apparently -which, in some instances, is an inducement to eat -their flesh, namely, to appropriate their courage. -The Lapps change a child’s baptismal name, if it falls -ill, rebaptizing it at every illness, as if they thought -to deceive the spirit that vexed it by the simple -stratagem of an <i>alias</i>;<a name="FNanchor_167" id="FNanchor_167"></a><a href="#Footnote_167" class="fnanchor">[167]</a> and the Californian Shoshones, -in changing their names after such feats as scalping -an enemy, stealing his horses, or killing a grizzly -bear, had, perhaps, some similar idea of avoiding retaliation. -Among the Chinook Indians near relations -often changed their names, lest the spirits of the -dead should be drawn back to earth by often hearing -familiar names used.</p> - -<p>With these ideas about names it is easy to understand -how especial reverence would become attached -to the names of kings or dead persons whose power -to punish a light use of their appellations might well -be deemed exceptional. On accessions to royalty in -the Society Islands all words resembling the king’s -name were changed, and any person bold enough to -continue the use of the superseded terms was put to -death, with all his relations.<a name="FNanchor_168" id="FNanchor_168"></a><a href="#Footnote_168" class="fnanchor">[168]</a> From a similar state -of thought the Abipones invented new words for all -things whose previous names recalled a dead person’s -memory, whilst to mention his name was ‘a nefarious<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_121" id="Page_121">[121]</a></span> -proceeding.’<a name="FNanchor_169" id="FNanchor_169"></a><a href="#Footnote_169" class="fnanchor">[169]</a> In Dahome the king’s name must be -pronounced with bated breath, and it is death to -utter it in his presence.<a name="FNanchor_170" id="FNanchor_170"></a><a href="#Footnote_170" class="fnanchor">[170]</a> The degrees of guilt, attached -to the mention of a dead person, arising from a belief -in the power of spoken names to call back their -owners, vary in sinfulness from its being a positive -crime, punishable by fine, to a mere rudeness, to be -checked in the young. Among the Northern Californians -it was one of the most strenuous laws that -whoever mentioned a dead person’s name should be -liable to a heavy fine, payable to the relatives.<a name="FNanchor_171" id="FNanchor_171"></a><a href="#Footnote_171" class="fnanchor">[171]</a> The -tribe of Ainos held it a great rudeness to speak of -the dead by their names; whilst young Ahts are instantly -checked, if they make an unthinking use of -the name of a chief that has been relinquished in -memory of some event of importance.<a name="FNanchor_172" id="FNanchor_172"></a><a href="#Footnote_172" class="fnanchor">[172]</a></p> - -<p>Several causes may have led to animal worship. -The tendency to call men by qualities or peculiarities -in them fancifully recalling those of some animal, and -the tendency to apotheosize distinguished ancestors, -thus named after the tiger or the bear, may have led -to a confusion of thought between the animal and -the man, till the divine attributes, once attached to -the individual, became transferred to the species of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_122" id="Page_122">[122]</a></span> -animal that survived him in constant existence. Or -the same fancy, which sees inspiration in an idiot -from his very lack of common reason, may have attributed -peculiar wisdom and looked with peculiar -awe on the animal world, by very reason of its -speechlessness. Then, again, the idea that the bodies -of animals may be the depositories of departed human -souls may have led to the worship of certain animals: -some Californians for this reason refraining from the -flesh of large game, because it is animated by the -souls of past generations, so that the term ‘eater of -venison’ is one of reproach among them. Or the -prohibitions of shamans may have produced the -result in some cases: the Thlinkeet Indians being -found, for this reason, abstinent from whale’s flesh or -blubber, whilst both are commonly eaten by surrounding -tribes. But, whatever the original causes may have -been, tribes are found all over the world beset with a -feeling of sinfulness with regard to the injuring, eating, -or in any way offending different species of animals; -of which, as no extreme instance, may be mentioned -the Fijian custom of presenting a string of new nuts, -gathered expressly, to a land crab, ‘to prevent the -deity leaving with an impression that he was -neglected, and visiting his remiss worshippers with -drought, dearth, or death.’</p> - -<p>Beyond, however, customs or ideas in prevention -of acts prejudicial to their real or supposed welfare,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_123" id="Page_123">[123]</a></span> -savage communities appear to have little idea of -any quality in actions rendering them good or bad independently -of consequences. Their prayers, their -beliefs, and their mythology, alike go to prove this. -That they will pray for such temporal blessings as -health, food, rain, or victory, but not for such moral -gains as the conquest of passion or a truthful disposition, -to some extent justifies the inference that -moral advancement forms no part of their code of -things desirable. Their good and evil spirit or spirits -are simply distinguished, where they are distinguished -at all, as the causes respectively of things agreeable or -disagreeable, as taking sides for or against struggling -humanity, so that tribes which pay and sacrifice to the -source of evil, to the neglect of that of good, cannot -be said not to conform to reason. Their mythology, -again, owes its very monotony mainly to the lack of -moral interest to relieve and sustain it. As Mr. Grote, -arguing from the mythology to the moral feeling of -legendary Greece, observes, that such a sentiment as -a feeling of moral obligation between man and man -was ‘neither operative in the real world nor present -to the imaginations of the poets,’ so it may be said -not less emphatically of extant savage mythology. -The Polynesian idea of a god, it has been well said, is -mere <i>power</i> without any reference to goodness. The -divine denizens of Avaiki (the Hades of the Hervey -Islands), as they marry, quarrel, build, and live just<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_124" id="Page_124">[124]</a></span> -like mortals, so they murder, drink, thieve, and lie -quite in accordance with terrestrial precedents.<a name="FNanchor_173" id="FNanchor_173"></a><a href="#Footnote_173" class="fnanchor">[173]</a> The -unethical nature, however, of savage prayer or mythology -is obviously not incompatible with the practical -recognition of certain moral distinctions; in the same -Hervey Islands, for instance, the greatest possible sin -was to kill a fellow-countryman by stealth, instead of -in battle.<a name="FNanchor_174" id="FNanchor_174"></a><a href="#Footnote_174" class="fnanchor">[174]</a></p> - -<p>Ideas, again, relating to a future state and the dependence -of future welfare on the mode of life spent on -earth, though they would seem to afford some insight -into the moral sentiments of those holding them, in -default of definition of the good or bad conduct so -rewarded or punished, do not really prove much. In -the following instances, which offer several shades of -variety, there is scarcely any attempt at moral definition, -and the native belief has, perhaps, been -adulterated by Christian influence. The Good Spirit -of the Mandans dwelt in a purgatory of cold and -frost, where he punished those who had offended him, -before he would admit them to that warmer and -happier place, where the Bad Spirit dwelt and sought -to seduce the happy occupants.<a name="FNanchor_175" id="FNanchor_175"></a><a href="#Footnote_175" class="fnanchor">[175]</a> For the Charocs of -California were two roads, one strewn with flowers, -and leading the good to the bright Western land, the -other bristling with thorns and briers, and leading<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_125" id="Page_125">[125]</a></span> -the wicked to a place full of serpents. The souls of -Chippewyans drifted in a stone canoe to an enchanted -island in a large lake; if the good actions of their life -predominated they were wafted safely ashore; but if -the bad, the canoe sank beneath their weight, leaving -the wretches to float for ever, in sight of their lost -and nearly won felicity. Wicked Okanagans, again, -a Columbian tribe (and by the wicked are here -specified murderers and thieves), went to a place -where an evil spirit, in human form, with equine ears -and tail, belaboured them with a stick.<a name="FNanchor_176" id="FNanchor_176"></a><a href="#Footnote_176" class="fnanchor">[176]</a> The Fijian -belief appears truer to savage thought; for whilst such -of their dead as succeeded in reaching Mbula were -happy or not, according as they had lived so as to -please the gods, mortals subjected to special punishment -were persons who had not their ears bored, -women who were not tattooed, and men who had not -slain an enemy.<a name="FNanchor_177" id="FNanchor_177"></a><a href="#Footnote_177" class="fnanchor">[177]</a></p> - -<p>Taking, however, these instances at their best, -there is nothing to show that the good or bad, rewarded -or punished as above described, were really -anything more than those who on earth had fought -and hunted with courage or cowardice. Writers -citing such beliefs do not always make allowance for -the difference between the savage and the civilised<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_126" id="Page_126">[126]</a></span> -moral standard. The code to be observed, says -Schoolcraft, in order for the soul to pass safely the -stream which leads to the land of bliss, ‘appears to -be, as drawn from their funeral addresses, fidelity -and success as a hunter in providing for his family, -and bravery as a warrior in defending the rights and -honour of his tribe. There is no moral code regulating -the duties and reciprocal intercourse between -man and man.’<a name="FNanchor_178" id="FNanchor_178"></a><a href="#Footnote_178" class="fnanchor">[178]</a> And if the good American Indians -above mentioned were distinguished by any higher -moral attributes than those of mere bravery and -activity, it is difficult to account for the fact that, -while Mexican civilisation consigned all who died -natural deaths, good and bad alike, to the dull repose -of Mictlan, reserving for the higher pleasures of futurity -those who met their deaths in war or water, or from -lightning, disease, or childbirth, tribes whose culture -stood to that of Mexico as far removed as that of -Polynesia from that of Europe, should have attained -to the moral belief of the influence of earthly conduct -reaching beyond the grave.<a name="FNanchor_179" id="FNanchor_179"></a><a href="#Footnote_179" class="fnanchor">[179]</a></p> - -<p>The foregoing brief review of some of the real -evidence on the subject would seem to indicate the -conclusion that, in matters of morals, savages are<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_127" id="Page_127">[127]</a></span> -neither so low as they have been painted by most -writers nor so blameless as they have been portrayed -by some. Their faults, such as their vindictiveness, -their ingratitude, or their mendacity, might be predicated -as easily of communities the most advanced -in the world; nor, in the face of the great neglect of -precision of language in all narratives of travel, can -any evidence of the utter ignorance of right and wrong -among any tribe lay claim to the smallest scientific -value. Of the African Yorubas, whilst one writer -asserts that they are not only covetous and cruel, but -‘wholly deficient in what the civilised man calls conscience,’ -of the same people another says that they -have several words in their language to express honour, -and ‘more proverbs against ingratitude than perhaps -any other people.’<a name="FNanchor_180" id="FNanchor_180"></a><a href="#Footnote_180" class="fnanchor">[180]</a></p> - -<p>Perhaps no description of savage character is fairer -than Mariner’s of the Tongan Islanders. ‘Their notions,’ -he says, ‘in respect to honour and justice are -tolerably well-defined, steady, and universal; but in -point of practice both the chiefs and the people, taking -them generally, are irregular and fickle, being in some -respects extremely honourable and just, and in others -the contrary, as a variety of causes may operate.’<a name="FNanchor_181" id="FNanchor_181"></a><a href="#Footnote_181" class="fnanchor">[181]</a> -But the justice of such remarks is lost in their vagueness, -and their impartial generality would render them<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_128" id="Page_128">[128]</a></span> -of world-wide rather than of merely local or insular -application.</p> - -<p>If, therefore, in consideration of the unsatisfactory -nature of the direct evidence, we resort to the indirect -for the materials of our judgment, we shall perhaps -not err widely from the truth if we say that average -savage morality coincides very much with that of any -contemporary remote village of the civilised world, -where the fear of retaliation and disgrace is the chief -preventive of great wickedness, and the natural play -of the social affections the main safeguard of good -order. The statement calls for but few limitations, -that wherever travellers have explored, or missionaries -taught, they have been able to detect -customary laws regulating the relations of civil life, -the orderly transference of property by exchange or -inheritance, no less than the fixed succession to titles -and dignities. They have found not only punishments -for the prevention, but judicial ordeals for the detection, -of crimes; nor is it possible to believe that such -penal laws can exist without ideas of wrongness -attaching to the deeds they prohibit. But, besides -the secular absolution involved in legal penalties, -they have found not unfrequently a kind of spiritual -purification by means of confession, penances, and -fasting; the practice of such confession alone proving -that feelings of remorse are not foreign to savage -races, difficult as it must always be to discriminate<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_129" id="Page_129">[129]</a></span> -between actual remorse for wickedness and the mere -dread of contingent punishment. The greater social -crimes, murder, theft, and adultery, though not recognized -as morally worse than many acts of purely -fanciful badness, are sufficiently prevented by the fear -of revenge or of tribal punishment; and statements -concerning indifference to the immorality of such -actions either do not rest on good evidence or apply -to extra-tribal, that is, to hostile relations. It seems, -therefore, that fundamentally the two extremities of -civilisation are ethically united; each having for its -standard of morality the idea of its own welfare, and -deriving a sense of moral obligation from a more or -less vague dread of consequences. The fundamental -identity of human emotions, of the operations of the -feelings of love, fear, hope, and shame, appear to have -produced, in different stages of culture, very similar -moral feelings; nor is it conceivable that such feelings, -howsoever much weaker, were ever radically -different in the most remote antiquity.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_130" id="Page_130">[130]</a></span></p> - -<h2 id="CHAPTER_V">V.<br /> -<span class="smaller"><i>SAVAGE POLITICAL LIFE.</i></span></h2> - -<p>From the accounts of travellers respecting the nature -of government among uncivilised tribes it would not -be a purely baseless theory to construct a scale of -successive developments, ranging from people entirely -destitute of political cohesion to people characterised -by a quite despotic form of government, and agreeing -in the main with the fishing or hunting and the agricultural -stages of human advancement respectively. -The savage idea of monarchy is represented by all -the possible gradations between the most limited and -the most absolute kind of government, and we should -naturally look for the best types of the latter among -tribes where geographical limitations or other causes -have necessitated a stationary and agricultural life. -We should expect to find the first germs of recognised -leadership among people taught by war and the chase -to appreciate superior strength or skill; and to see -such temporary leaders pass into definite political<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_131" id="Page_131">[131]</a></span> -chiefs, when a more settled mode of life has given -fixedness to ideas of property and made its defence -more desirable. We might infer <i>à priori</i> that as men -lived by hunting or fishing before they drove flocks, -and drove flocks before they tilled the ground, so they -lived in families before they lived in hordes, and in -hordes before they lived in larger social aggregates. -As representatives of the lowest stage of society, we -might instance the Esquimaux, whom Cranz found -‘destitute of the very shadow of a civil polity;’ and -we might pass from the hunting populations of -America, who only choose rulers for the temporary -purposes of war or the chase, to the despotic forms of -government characteristic of the agricultural communities -of Africa or Polynesia.</p> - -<p>It is not, however, worth insisting on an induction -which would be at the mercy of negative instances -drawn from so large a surface as the whole known -globe. To supply only one instance, in which the -hunting state co-exists with a somewhat advanced -political system. Most South American tribes, who -practised husbandry in addition to fishing and hunting -to a far greater extent than North American tribes, -were found, in point of social organisation, at a much -lower level than the Northern tribes, it being possible -to classify the latter into nations by words supplied -by themselves, whilst in the South there were merely -bands, and it was necessary to invent names for such<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_132" id="Page_132">[132]</a></span> -groups of bands as were allied together by language.<a name="FNanchor_182" id="FNanchor_182"></a><a href="#Footnote_182" class="fnanchor">[182]</a> -Facts are the test of theories, not theories of facts; -and to insist on fitting facts to a theory is to fall into -the error of the unskilful shoemaker, who transposes -the task of fitting shoes to feet for the easier one of -insisting that feet shall fit his shoes.</p> - -<p>Without, therefore, attempting to elaborate theories -about the development of political ideas from their -rudest beginnings to their expression in mature and -complex state-systems, it may not be labour lost to -collect, within readable compass, some estimate of -the notions of sovereignty, the political organisations, -the relations of classes, and the peculiar institutions -found among those communities of the earth who seem -the best representatives of primitive manners and -the least advanced from a state of primitive barbarism.</p> - -<p>Statements concerning the total absence of civil -government among savages, like statements concerning -their total ignorance of religion, should be received -with the reserve due to all propositions containing -terms of expansive signification. It is noteworthy -that it is generally tribes declared to be destitute of -all religious feelings who in the same sentence or -paragraph are described as also destitute of political -ties; the statement that a tribe is entirely destitute of -religion or of any civil polity being, in fact, often only -an hyperbolical expression, intended to convey an<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_133" id="Page_133">[133]</a></span> -extreme idea of their barbarity. Bushmen, Californians, -and Australians have severally been described -as not only not recognizing any gods, but as not recognizing -any chiefs; but subsequent research having -proved that Bushmen, at least, possess an elaborate -mythology, worshipping the ethereal bodies, and -having their own distinctive myths concerning the -Creation, suspicion is naturally aroused that all -broadly negative assertions of the same sort may be but -the results of insufficient observation.<a name="FNanchor_183" id="FNanchor_183"></a><a href="#Footnote_183" class="fnanchor">[183]</a> ‘The Caribs,’ -says one writer, ‘had no chiefs; every man obeyed the -dictates of his passions unrestrained by government -or laws;’ but according to another they lived in hordes -of from forty to fifty persons, under a patriarchal -form of government, and recognized a common chief -whenever they went to war with their neighbours.<a name="FNanchor_184" id="FNanchor_184"></a><a href="#Footnote_184" class="fnanchor">[184]</a></p> - -<p>Undoubtedly, however, in countries where excess -of numbers has not driven communities to improve -their condition by raids against their neighbours, and -where, consequently, military skill has attained no -importance nor authority, much looser social bonds -may be found than in places where a sense of property -and of its value has arisen. Among people like the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_134" id="Page_134">[134]</a></span> -Esquimaux, the Lapps, or the Kamschadals, who -live together in independent families, age is the only -title to authority; and if skill in seal-catching or in -weather-lore procure for a Greenlander the deference -of younger members of his race, he has no power to -compel any of them to follow his counsels, and the -only moral check to a refractory person is a possible -refusal on the part of his fellows to share the same hut -with him. If, in distant voyages, all the boatmen -submit their kajaks to the guidance of their countryman -who is best acquainted with the way, they are at -perfect liberty to separate from him at pleasure. -Beyond this slight tie they have, or had when Cranz -wrote, no political union, no system of taxation or -legislation of any kind, albeit they were not wanting -in methods for the enforcement of certain moral duties -and the prevention of certain moral wrongs. Of the -Kamschadals, Steller tells us that they had no chief, -but that everyone was allowed to live according to his -pleasure; yet that they chose leaders for their expeditions, -who were without even power to decide private -disputes, and that each <i>ostrog</i>, or family settlement, had -its ruler (generally the oldest male), whose power to -punish consisted solely in the right of verbal correction.<a name="FNanchor_185" id="FNanchor_185"></a><a href="#Footnote_185" class="fnanchor">[185]</a></p> - -<p>From the condition of the Kamschadals or -Esquimaux to the condition of Eastern Asia or -Polynesia, where a king’s name is often so sacred as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_135" id="Page_135">[135]</a></span> -to be avoided altogether, as many gradations of civil -authority exist as otherwise mark the difference of -their respective civilisations. As the progress of an -individual from infancy to old age is marked at each -stage by a strict equipoise of good and evil, varying -only in kind, so every upward step in the social -advancement of mankind seems attended with some -equivalent loss. Individual liberty is greatest where -the social bond is the loosest; and people like the -rude hunting tribes of Brazil, with only their hunting-grounds -to defend and only temporary leaders to -obey, undoubtedly enjoy greater freedom than is compatible -with an agricultural life. As soon as tribes -become settled and practise husbandry they are -naturally impelled to seek the labour of slaves, which -is a thing undesirable when a scanty subsistence is -gained by the exertions of the chase. And when -once the existence of slavery has established a difference -between bondsmen and free, a way is open for -all those artificial divisions of society into ranks and -castes which seem in later times to belong to, nay, to -constitute, the natural order of things.</p> - -<p>It is, however, even at lower levels of general -culture, often among tribes who are still in the hunting -stage, that we find all traces disappear of that -condition of freedom and equality once fondly -imagined to belong to a ‘state of nature.’ Savages -seldom constitute pure democracies, in the sense<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_136" id="Page_136">[136]</a></span> -either of all being equal or of all being free. Even -where the monarchical power is quite rudimentary -well-marked distinctions serve to sever them into aristocracy -and commonalty; for the natural differences -of capacity between men divide them, if less strongly, -not less definitely than slavery. Superiority in -courage, strength, sagacity, or experience, entitles a -savage to much the same privileges that, in more -civilised countries, are allotted to superiority in -wealth or lineage. The conditions, however, of savage -life cause merit, and not birth, to be the primary -qualification both for chieftainship and nobility. -Where military capacity is the sole basis of authority -it follows that such authority only descends to sons, -if they are as gifted as their parents with military -prowess; also, that any commoner may at any time -become a noble if duly qualified for a leader, and that -for the same reason even the female sex is not -excluded from a career of political ambition. Among -the Abipones women were often raised to the dignity -of cacique or captainship of a horde; nor is it rare to -find them capable of occupying positions of similar -dignity among tribes who, in other respects, treat -their women as little better than beasts of burthen. -The Iroquois women, for instance, on whom devolved -all daily labour, such as planting the corn, cutting -and carrying firewood, bearing all burdens when -marching, had their representatives in the public<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_137" id="Page_137">[137]</a></span> -councils, enjoyed a veto upon declarations of war, -and the right of interposing to bring about a peace.<a name="FNanchor_186" id="FNanchor_186"></a><a href="#Footnote_186" class="fnanchor">[186]</a> -Khond wives filled the same important post of -mediators and peace-makers in the wars between -the tribes of their husbands and their parents; and -in Africa, where the position of women is almost -uniformly one of slavery, they are ambassadors, -traders, warriors, sometimes queens, besides tilling -the ground, tending the herds, or working in mines.<a name="FNanchor_187" id="FNanchor_187"></a><a href="#Footnote_187" class="fnanchor">[187]</a></p> - -<p>As many savages surround the entrance to their -paradise with imaginary physical difficulties which -only the bravest can overcome, so they frequently -make admission to the rank of their nobility dependent -on the performance of certain rites and ceremonies -which sufficiently attest the endurance of -the aspirant to social elevation. An Indian tribe on -the Orinoco used to lay such a candidate on a hurdle, -place burning coals beneath, and then cover him with -palm-leaves all over, in order to make the heat more -suffocating. Or, they would perhaps anoint him -with honey, and leave him for hours tied to a tree at -the mercy of the insects of those latitudes. The -Abiponian plan was, to place a black bead on a -tribeman’s tongue and insist on his staying at home -for three days, abstaining all the while from the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_138" id="Page_138">[138]</a></span> -ordinary pleasures of food, drink, and speech. Then -on the eve of the day of his inauguration all the women -of the horde would come to his tent, in uncouth attire, -and lament loudly for the ancestors of the man who -would fain be a noble. The next day, after galloping -spear in hand on horses decorated with bells and -feathers to the four quarters of the wind, he had to -suffer the priestess of the ceremonies to shave a band -on his head, three inches wide from the forehead -backwards. A eulogy by the old woman, recording -his warlike character and noble actions, concluding -with a change of name befitting his change of rank, -completed the ceremony of his installation. In -ancient Mexico a candidate for the noble order of the -Tecuhtli had to remain impassive whilst the high -priest insulted him, whilst the assistant priests mocked -him as a coward and tore his clothes from his body, -and all this previous to a noviciate which lasted two -years, and ended with four days of severe penance, -fastings, and prayers.<a name="FNanchor_188" id="FNanchor_188"></a><a href="#Footnote_188" class="fnanchor">[188]</a></p> - -<p>The prevalence, indeed, of equality among savages -is one of those fictions which date from the time when -writers drew on their own minds for a knowledge of -anthropology: a fiction due to the same tendency -which created for the Greeks their Elysian Fields, or -for the Tongan islanders their Bolotu, leading them<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_139" id="Page_139">[139]</a></span> -to refer to the distant or the unknown the actualisation -of those longings and ideals which the immediate -surroundings of the world could not gratify. But the -truth is, that so firmly among most savages has the -idea become fixed of an essential difference in the -nature of nobles and commons, of governors and -governed, that the demarcations of their mundane -economy are transferred into their speculations about -the unseen world, and the inequalities of this life are -often perpetuated in the next. New Zealanders believed -that, whilst all spirits at death went as falling -stars to Reinga, or the lower world, those of chiefs -went first of all to heaven, where their left eye remained -as a star.<a name="FNanchor_189" id="FNanchor_189"></a><a href="#Footnote_189" class="fnanchor">[189]</a> Among the Zulus the snakes into -which departed chiefs turn are easily distinguishable -from those which embody commoner people.<a name="FNanchor_190" id="FNanchor_190"></a><a href="#Footnote_190" class="fnanchor">[190]</a> As -paupers and bondsmen were not admitted to Valhalla, -so the ‘masses’ of the Tongan islanders have neither -souls nor futurity. The Dahomans who call this -world their plantation and the next their home, believe -that in the latter ‘the king is a king and the slave a -slave for ever and ever.’<a name="FNanchor_191" id="FNanchor_191"></a><a href="#Footnote_191" class="fnanchor">[191]</a> In Samoa not only had chiefs -a larger hole than plebeians by which to descend to -the under world, but also a separate habitation, serving -as columns to support the temple of the underground -god, and enjoying the best of food and all other<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_140" id="Page_140">[140]</a></span> -pleasures.<a name="FNanchor_192" id="FNanchor_192"></a><a href="#Footnote_192" class="fnanchor">[192]</a> Whilst the Thlinkeets burnt most bodies, -that they might be warm in their new home, slaves -were buried, as only deserving to freeze there; and the -Ahts, allotting a plenteous and sunny land in the sky -to dead chiefs, relegate persons of low degree to a subterranean -abode, where the houses are poor, the deer -small, and the blankets thin.<a name="FNanchor_193" id="FNanchor_193"></a><a href="#Footnote_193" class="fnanchor">[193]</a></p> - -<p>Devices have varied all over the world for marking -the innate or acquired differences between men. The -Tibboos of Africa denote difference of rank by different -scars on the face; but distinctions in dress or in titles -have been the usual resort of the civilised and semi-civilised -world alike; and the highest Fijian chiefs, -who would style themselves the ‘subjects of Heaven -only,’ were prompted by the same natural vanity that -gave birth among ourselves to the ‘Knights of the -Lion and Sun’ or to the doctrine of the divine right -of kings. But the most striking device in the lower -grades of civilisation is the conscious invention and -use of a different form of speech, amounting almost to -the use of a different language, such as was the plan -adopted by the Abipones to mark the difference between -noble and plebeian. Persons advanced to the -rank of nobles, or the Hocheri, were not only distinguished -from their fellows by a change of name -(men adding the suffix <i>in</i>, women <i>en</i>, to their former<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_141" id="Page_141">[141]</a></span> -appellation), but the whole language spoken by the -Hocheri was, by the insertion or addition of syllables, -so altered from the vulgar tongue as to amount to a -distinct aristocratic dialect.<a name="FNanchor_194" id="FNanchor_194"></a><a href="#Footnote_194" class="fnanchor">[194]</a> It is remarkable how a -similar practice prevails in widely remote parts of the -globe. Among Circassians the language for the common -people is one, that for the princes and nobility -another; nor may the commonalty, though they -understand it, venture to speak in the secret or court -language.<a name="FNanchor_195" id="FNanchor_195"></a><a href="#Footnote_195" class="fnanchor">[195]</a> ‘As in the Malayan so in the Fijian language, -there exists an aristocratical dialect,’ and in -some places ‘not a member of a chiefs body or the -commonest acts of his life are mentioned in ordinary -phraseology, but are all hyperbolised.’<a name="FNanchor_196" id="FNanchor_196"></a><a href="#Footnote_196" class="fnanchor">[196]</a> In the Sandwich -Islands ‘the chiefs formed a conventional dialect, -or court language, understood only among themselves. -If any of its terms became known by the lower orders -they were immediately discarded and others substituted.’<a name="FNanchor_197" id="FNanchor_197"></a><a href="#Footnote_197" class="fnanchor">[197]</a> -So, too, it is said that the island Caribs held -their war councils in a secret dialect, known only to -the chiefs and elders, into which they were initiated -after attaining distinction in war.<a name="FNanchor_198" id="FNanchor_198"></a><a href="#Footnote_198" class="fnanchor">[198]</a> Of the Society -Islanders, Ellis tells us that ‘sounds in the language -composing the names of the king and queen could no<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_142" id="Page_142">[142]</a></span> -longer be applied to ordinary significations’—a rule, -he adds, which brought about many changes in the -words used for things.<a name="FNanchor_199" id="FNanchor_199"></a><a href="#Footnote_199" class="fnanchor">[199]</a> Lastly, in the Tongan islands -something of the same kind also prevailed, for there -we find that among the ways of paying special honour -to the Tooitonga, or divine chief, was the employment, -in speaking with him, of words devoted exclusively -to his use, as substitutes for words of ordinary -parlance.</p> - -<p>Another method by which savages seek to mark -the different grades of society is to signalise by an -excess of demonstration their sorrow for the departure -of persons of rank from among them. The custom of -cutting off finger-joints in token of grief, from its -prevalence among the Blackfeet Indians of North -America, the Hottentots of South Africa, some tribes -of Australia, and among the female portion of the -Charruas of South America, may be considered to -rank among the remarkable analogies of world-culture, -when we find that a similar custom prevailed also -among the Tongan Islanders whenever the death of a -chief or a superior relation left his survivors comfortless. -It is possible that the idea of propitiating angry -gods by self-inflicted pains may have originally underlain -many of the practices in after times regarded -as mere manifestations of grief; for Captain Cook, -speaking of the knocking out of front teeth at funerals,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_143" id="Page_143">[143]</a></span> -says that he always understood that this custom, -like that of cutting off finger-joints, was not inflicted -from any violence of grief so much as intended -for a propitiatory sacrifice to the Atoa, to avert -any possible danger or mischief from the survivors.<a name="FNanchor_200" id="FNanchor_200"></a><a href="#Footnote_200" class="fnanchor">[200]</a> -Thus Bushmen sacrifice the end joints of their fingers -in sickness; and during the illness of a Tooitonga his -countrymen would seek to appease the god whose -anger had caused the disease by the sacrifice daily of -the little finger of a young relation. Mariner mentions -two patriotic young Tonganers contesting with fist -and foot the right thus to testify their regard for the -lord of their country. It is easily conceivable how a -practice, begun with the idea of conciliating the -cause of a disease, might be continued for the purpose -of conciliating the cause of death, and thus how -(as in Fiji, where on the death of a king orders were -issued that one hundred fingers should be cut off) an -archaic superstition might pass into a meaningless -formality.</p> - -<p>There are, however, various other ways of exhibiting -regret for departed nobility. In the Sandwich -Islands, if a chief dies, the highest mark of respect -his survivors can show is to strike out one of their -front teeth with a stone. They also tattoo their -tongues, deprive themselves of an ear, or shave their -heads in fantastic designs. The latter is a world-wide<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_144" id="Page_144">[144]</a></span> -symbol of sorrow; more peculiar is the license to rob -and burn houses and commit other enormities, which -is, or was once, customary in Hawaii on the death of -a chief. In Tonga and Tahiti it was customary on -such occasions to cut the forehead and breast with -sharks’ teeth. Axes, clubs, knives, stones, or shells -were employed freely for self-mutilation, when Finow, -the King of Tonga, died; his disconsolate subjects -seeking to induce him, by the energy of their blows -and the loudness of their prayers, to lay aside those -suspicions of their loyalty which had prompted him -to depart from Tonga to Bolotu.<a name="FNanchor_201" id="FNanchor_201"></a><a href="#Footnote_201" class="fnanchor">[201]</a></p> - -<p>In modern civilised life such clear distinctions -exist no longer, but there is at least one symbol -of nobility which bears distinct traces of descent -from uncivilised conceptions and usages. From the -common practice of making a particular species of -animal the totem, or representative, of a particular -person, family, or tribe, arose probably the custom of -distinguishing persons or families by crests, figurative -of their patron animals. Both among the Kolushs, a -fishing North American tribe, and their neighbours, -the Haidahs, of Queen Charlotte’s Island, the existence -of an aristocracy of birth is proved from the -presence of family crests among them, derived from -figures of certain animals. Sir G. Grey noticed in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_145" id="Page_145">[145]</a></span> -Australia that each family adopted some animal or -vegetable for its crest or Kobong,<a name="FNanchor_202" id="FNanchor_202"></a><a href="#Footnote_202" class="fnanchor">[202]</a> and the hereditary -nobility of the rude Thlinkeet Indians paint or -carve the heraldic emblem of their clan on their -houses, boats, robes, shields, or wherever else they -can find room for it.<a name="FNanchor_203" id="FNanchor_203"></a><a href="#Footnote_203" class="fnanchor">[203]</a> These few instances from -the lower culture suffice to explain how animal -figures, supposed to be expressive of the character -of gods or warriors, came to be worn above their -helmets; and how in the case of warriors at least, -they gradually passed from their helmets to their -shields, till they became part of armorial bearings, so -highly prized and zealously transmitted from generation -to generation. Newton, the author of the -‘Display of Heraldry,’ expresses his belief that the -most ancient class of crests were taken from ferocious -animals, which were regarded as figuratively representing -the bearer and his pursuits. Certain it is that -a far larger proportion of crests are derived from the -animal world, from beasts, birds, fishes, reptiles, and -even insects, than from any other sublunary class of -things.<a name="FNanchor_204" id="FNanchor_204"></a><a href="#Footnote_204" class="fnanchor">[204]</a></p> - -<p>If now we turn to the savage conception of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_146" id="Page_146">[146]</a></span> -monarchy, we shall find that, wherever regal authority -exists, it is sustained by a more or less strong belief -in the divine origin of kings. The constitutional -power of a king varies with the amount of divinity -ascribed to him. As Russians of the sixteenth -century held the will of their Grand Duke to be the -will of God, and whatever he did to be done by the -will of God,<a name="FNanchor_205" id="FNanchor_205"></a><a href="#Footnote_205" class="fnanchor">[205]</a> so now in Africa the king of Loango is -not only honoured as a god, but known by the same -name as the Deity; namely, Samba. His subjects, -accrediting him with power over the elements, pray -to him for rain in times of drought. But as a king’s -divine origin means his divine right, or in other words -his despotic power, his subjects only enjoy their lives -and property on the tenure of his will, nor does there -seem any moral limitation to his regal rights, save an -obligation to make use of native products and dresses. -The king of Dahomey, also revered as a god, appears -to possess power over his countrymen which is only -so far limited, that he cannot behead princes of the -blood royal but must confine his vengeance against -them to strangulation or slavery. Without his leave -no caboceer may alter his house, wear European -shoes, or carry an umbrella. Many kings of the Fiji -Islands claimed a divine origin and asserted the rights -of deities, their persons indeed being so religiously<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_147" id="Page_147">[147]</a></span> -revered that even in battle their inferiors would fear -to strike them. In Tahiti, Oro, the chief god, was -called the king’s father, and the same homage that -was paid to the gods and their temples was paid also -to the king and his dwellings, the homage, namely, of -stripping to the waist. At his coronation the king -asserted his dominion over the sea, by being rowed in -Oro’s sacred canoe and receiving congratulation from -two divine sharks. So that it was no mere spirit of -bombastic adulation that caused the king’s houses to -be identified, in popular parlance, with the Clouds of -Heaven, the lights in them with the Lightning, or his -canoe with the Rainbow; and if his voice was described -as the Thunder, it doubtless was due to that -common association of electricity with divinity, such -as, for instance, prompted the savages of Chili to -employ the same name for Thunder and for God. -The ceremony of creating a Tahitian king consisted -in girding him with a girdle of red feathers, which, as -they were taken from the chief idols, were thought -to be capable of conferring on the monarch the divine -attributes of power and vengeance. That a human -sacrifice was essential, not only at the commencement -and completion of the girdle, but often for every -piece successively added to it, confirms the experience -of all ages and countries respecting the tendency -of monarchical governments in barbarous times, a -tendency which was never better appreciated than by<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_148" id="Page_148">[148]</a></span> -the ancient Japanese. For they used to make their -prince sit crowned on his throne for some hours -every morning, without suffering him to move his -hands or feet, his head or eyes, or indeed any part -of his body, believing that by this means alone could -peace and tranquillity be preserved; and ‘if unfortunately -he turned himself on one side or the other, -or if he looked a good while towards any part of his -dominions, it was apprehended that war, famine, fire, -or some other great misfortune was near at hand to -desolate the country.’<a name="FNanchor_206" id="FNanchor_206"></a><a href="#Footnote_206" class="fnanchor">[206]</a> The Samoans thought also -that some deadly influence radiated from the person -of a king which could only be broken by aspersion -with water.<a name="FNanchor_207" id="FNanchor_207"></a><a href="#Footnote_207" class="fnanchor">[207]</a></p> - -<p>Inasmuch, however, as government of any kind is -impossible without a subdivision of functions, and a -king needs ministers to execute his will, the limitation -of a council is almost inseparable from even the most -absolute monarchy. A perfectly pure despotism exists, -therefore, nowhere save in the definitions of the -science of politics. It is, indeed, difficult to conceive -an arbitrary government except as a synonym for -total anarchy. In Loango, where the king nominates -and displaces his officers at pleasure, and is absolute -disposer of his subjects’ lives and liberties, armed -resistance is said to be often made against him, and -his power to depend on his wealth and connections.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_149" id="Page_149">[149]</a></span> -Even a king of Dahomey said that he would imperil -his life if he attempted to put down slavery and -human sacrifices all at once, and it is said that whatever -despotic acts may be witnessed in Africa they -are all performed according to the common law of -the land.<a name="FNanchor_208" id="FNanchor_208"></a><a href="#Footnote_208" class="fnanchor">[208]</a> Among the Ashantees there are four men -at the head of the nobility who exert great influence -and serve to balance the monarchical power.<a name="FNanchor_209" id="FNanchor_209"></a><a href="#Footnote_209" class="fnanchor">[209]</a> Among -the Kaffirs, the chiefs of hordes, though with power -of life and death, are restrained by the councillors -they themselves nominate from attacking ancient -usages; and though the king is despotic, his despotism -must not transgress known laws. The right of -desertion also which practically belongs to every -member of a horde, acts as a most effectual moral -check upon tyrannical tendencies. Indeed, throughout -Africa, the differentiation of functions of government, -or the division of political labour, is carried to -an extent which proves how little necessary connection -there is between high political capacity and high -culture in other respects. In Dahomey, where a -man’s life is less sacred than that of a fox in England, -there are two chief ministers in constant attendance -on the king, a third who is commander-in-chief of -the army, and a fourth who superintends the due -punishment of crimes.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_150" id="Page_150">[150]</a></span></p> - -<p>The existence, again, of grades of society, clearly -marked by differences of functions and privileges, is -itself a proof of a political organisation which -implies limitations to the exercise of sovereignty. -Classes with distinct rights and relations prove the -constraint of a public law which even monarchs must -recognise and respect. In Fetu in Africa, where -frequently from four to five hundred slaves are killed -at a king’s funeral to serve him beyond the grave, -there is a distinct class of freemen, with specific rights, -sprung from the noble and slave classes. So, also, -wherever the Malay race has settled in the Pacific, -their feudal institutions and classes bear a striking -resemblance to those of mediæval Europe. In the -Fiji Islands, such classes are said to be so clearly -defined as to amount almost to a system of caste. -They are:—</p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>1. The kings and queens.</p> - -<p>2. Chiefs of large dependent islands or districts.</p> - -<p>3. Chiefs of towns, and priests.</p> - -<p>4. Warriors of low birth; chiefs of carpenters and -of turtle-fishers.</p> - -<p>5. The people.</p> - -<p>6. The slaves taken in war.</p> - -</div> - -<p>With which may be compared the Tongan social -scale:—</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_151" id="Page_151">[151]</a></span></p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>1. The Tooitonga and Veachi, chiefs of divine -descent.</p> - -<p>2. The king, or How.</p> - -<p>3. The Egi, or nobles; all persons in any way -related to the two former classes.</p> - -<p>4. The priests.</p> - -<p>5. The Matabooles, attendants on chiefs, managers -of ceremonies, preservers of records, &c.</p> - -<p>6. The Mooas, or younger sons or brothers of the -Matabooles.</p> - -<p>7. The Tooas, or common people, who practise -such arts as are not dignified enough to pass -from father to son, as cookery, club carving, -shaving, or tattooing.</p> - -</div> - -<p>These ranks are so fixed and unalterable that they -form a prominent feature in the Tongan conception -of a future world. Rank, not merit, constitutes the -title of admission to Bolotu. All <i>noble</i> souls arrive -there and enjoy a power similar but inferior to that -of the original deities, being capable, like the latter, -of inspiring priests living on earth. The Matabooles -also gain admittance to Bolotu, but are unable to -cause priestly inspirations. The souls of the Tooas -dissolve with the body, as too plebeian to find a place -in Paradise.</p> - -<p>In the Sandwich Islands, there were formerly -three aristocratic orders—the first consisting of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_152" id="Page_152">[152]</a></span> -king and queen, their relations, and the chief -councillors; the second of the chiefs of dependent -districts; the third of the chiefs of villages and of -priests. Servile homage from all the inferior classes -was paid to these three orders, but particularly to -the priests and higher chiefs, their very persons and -houses being accounted sacred, and the sight of them -a peremptory signal for prostration. The people, as -in mediæval Europe, were attached to the soil and -transferred with it: but a strong customary law is -said nevertheless to have regulated both the tenure of -land and personal security.<a name="FNanchor_210" id="FNanchor_210"></a><a href="#Footnote_210" class="fnanchor">[210]</a> If they had no voice in -the government, they sometimes took part in public -meetings, nor did the king ever resolve on matters of -weight without the counsel of his principal chiefs. -Yet government was more despotic in the Sandwich -than in either the Society or the Fiji Islands. In -Tahiti, public assemblies were held, in which the -speakers did not hesitate to compare the state to a -ship, of which the king was only the mast, but the -landed nobility the ropes that kept it upright.<a name="FNanchor_211" id="FNanchor_211"></a><a href="#Footnote_211" class="fnanchor">[211]</a></p> - -<p>Many savage tribes have succeeded, by speciously -devised forms and ceremonies, in clothing arbitrary -power with a cloak of legality, inviolably divine. The -most remarkable of these devices is the famous institution -of <i>tabu</i>, which, by transferring the divinity<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_153" id="Page_153">[153]</a></span> -inherent in a king or chief to everything that comes -in contact with him, early invested sovereign power -with a most facile and elastic weapon of government. -For the principle, that whatever a king touched -became sacred to his use, supplied regal power with -a most convenient immunity from the shackles of -ordinary morality. A Fijian king, by giving his -dress to an English sailor, enabled the latter to -appropriate whatever food he chose to envelope with -the train of his dress. Whatever house a Tahitian -king or queen enters is vacated by its owners; the -field they tread on becomes theirs; their clothes, -their canoes, the very men who carry them, are invested -with a sanctity the violation of which is death, -and are regarded as precisely as holy as objects -less, ostensibly associated with earthly necessities.</p> - -<p>But whether or not the institution of <i>tabu</i> was a -clever invention of kings for increasing their power, -its inevitable extension reacted in time as a limitation -to it. This may be illustrated from the Tongan -Islands, where the regal power, owing probably to a -long constitutional struggle between the rival claims -to sovereignty of birth and merit, stood in a most -anomalous position. For the king did not belong to -the highest rank of the people, his title depending in -part on birth, but principally on his reputation for personal -strength and military capacity. Tooitonga and -Veachi, the direct descendants of the gods who first<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_154" id="Page_154">[154]</a></span> -visited the island, or (as we may perhaps rationalistically -translate it) the direct descendants of the earliest -kings, occupied a higher status than the actual king, -and were honoured with acknowledgments of their -divinity which even the king himself had to pay. To -the posterity of bygone monarchs the actual king stood -in the relation of a peasant to a prince, being expected, -like anyone else, to sit down on the ground when they -passed, though they might be his inferiors in wealth -nor possessed of any direct power save over their -own families and attendants. The dignity of the -Tooitonga survived not only in his not being circumcised -nor tattooed as other men, and in peculiar -ceremonies attending his marriage or his burial, but -in the more substantial offerings of the firstfruits of -the year at stated periodical festivals. The king used -to consult him before undertaking a war or expedition, -though often regardless of the counsel offered; and -in reference to the person of either descendant of the -gods the king was subject to tabu, or even in reference -to ordinary chiefs in any way related to them. -If he but touched the body, the dress, or the sleeping -mat of a chief nearer related to Tooitonga and Veachi -than himself, he could only exempt himself from the -inconveniences incurred by the violation of tabu by -the dispensation attached to the ceremony of touching, -with both his hands, the feet of such supernatural -chief, or of some one his equal in rank.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_155" id="Page_155">[155]</a></span></p> - -<p>In the Society Islands, in consequence of the -regal attribute inseparable from royalty of tabooing -whatever ground it traversed, Tahitian kings became -in course of time either entirely restricted to walking -in their own domains, or subjected to the discomfort -of a progress on servile shoulders over whatever -district they wished to visit. So that tabu in both -these instances acted as a limitation to the despotism -of the king.</p> - -<p>In Tahiti, however, the king’s power was further -limited by a custom which, extending as it did to -all the noble classes, was perhaps the most anomalous -institution in the world, whether as regards the theory -or the practice of inherited rank. For the custom -compelling a king or a noble to transfer all his titles -and dignity to his firstborn son at the moment of his -birth, whether instituted originally for securing an -undisputed succession to the regency or due to a -similar rude confusion of ideas, such as associates the -sanctity of a man’s origin with the sanctity of all -he touches, carried the claims of primogeniture to a -degree unknown either by the Jewish or the English -law. ‘Whatever might be the age of the king, his -influence in the state, or the political aspect of affairs -in respect to other tribes, as soon as a son (of noble -birth) was born, the monarch became a subject; the -infant son was at once proclaimed sovereign of the -people; the royal name was conferred upon him, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_156" id="Page_156">[156]</a></span> -his father was the first to do him homage by saluting -his feet and declaring him king.’ The national herald, -sent round the island with the infant ruler’s flag, proclaimed -his name in every district, and, if it were -acknowledged by the aristocracy, edicts were thenceforth -issued in his name. Not only the homage of -his people, but the lands and other sources of his -father’s power, were transferred to the minor child, -the father only continuing to act as regent till his -child’s capacity for government was matured.</p> - -<p>The Fijians also have a peculiar custom, the institution -of Vasu, which serves as a barrier both to -regal and aristocratic oppression, and shows how, -even among savages, the caprice of individuals is held -in bondage by the traditions of the elders. Vasu -signifies the common-law right of a nephew to appropriate -to his own use anything he chooses belonging -to an uncle or to anyone under his uncle’s power. -The king often availed himself of Vasu for his own -benefit, it being customary for a nephew to surrender -as tribute most of the legal extortions which his title of -Vasu might enable him to levy. But the king himself -was liable to Vasu; for we are told that, ‘however high -a chief may rank, <i>however powerful a king may be</i>, if he -has a nephew he has a master;’ for, except his lands and -his wives, neither chief nor king possessed anything -which his nephew might not appropriate at any -moment. If, for instance, the uncle built a canoe for<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_157" id="Page_157">[157]</a></span> -himself, his nephew had only to come, mount the deck, -and sound his trumpet shell, to announce to all the world -a legitimate and indefeasible transfer of ownership. It -is even said that on one occasion a nephew at war with -his uncle actually supplied himself, unresisted, with -ammunition from his enemy’s stores. It is difficult -indeed to divine the origin of so singular an institution, -unless perhaps we regard it as surviving from a time -when as in so many parts of the world nephews and -not sons ranked as first in inheritance. In Loango the -nephews of a deceased king become princes, whilst -his sons descend to the commonalty; the throne of -Ashantee passes not to a man’s natural heir, but to -his brother’s or sister’s son, and the same rule of -descent prevails widely over the world.<a name="FNanchor_212" id="FNanchor_212"></a><a href="#Footnote_212" class="fnanchor">[212]</a></p> - -<p>In two respects especially, savages may be accredited -with having secured a certain stability for their -institutions and saved them from some of the dangers -which have been the bane of more civilised countries. -It entitles them to no slight praise that they have -generally so adjusted the relations of the temporal -and spiritual powers as to prevent their clashing, and -have taken its sting from taxation by making the -day of taxpaying a day of public rejoicing. In the -Tongan Islands (before the custom was abolished by<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_158" id="Page_158">[158]</a></span> -a revolutionary king) the tax of the annual payment -of firstfruits to the Tooitonga was almost forgotten in -the grand ceremonies with which it was associated, -and tributes received from inferiors by chiefs came -as much as possible in the way of presents, whilst -so far away as the Slave Coast, the feast of taxpaying -is the great recurring Saturnalia of the year. -In Dahomey income-tax is ‘paid under a polite disguise,’ -each man bringing a present to the king in -proportion to his rank, and at an annual festival.<a name="FNanchor_213" id="FNanchor_213"></a><a href="#Footnote_213" class="fnanchor">[213]</a> -The feast lasts a whole month; public plays take -place every four or five days; singers chant the king’s -praises and the historical traditions of the country; -and the whole concludes with the ever popular -African entertainment of human sacrifice, on an unlimited -scale. In Fiji also taxpaying was associated -with all that the people love; the time of its taking -place being ‘a high day, a day for the best attire, the -pleasantest looks, and the kindest words; a day for -display.’ The Fijian carried his tribute with every -demonstration of joyful excitement, paying it in with -songs and dances to a king who received it with smiles -and who provided a feast for the happy taxpayers. -So among the Kaffirs the presence of the four royal<a name="FNanchor_214" id="FNanchor_214"></a><a href="#Footnote_214" class="fnanchor">[214]</a> -taxgatherers in the town was the signal for feasting -and amusements, and when payment had been at last<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_159" id="Page_159">[159]</a></span> -demanded by them they were conducted out of the -town, as they had been welcomed into it, by dancers -and musicians.<a name="FNanchor_215" id="FNanchor_215"></a><a href="#Footnote_215" class="fnanchor">[215]</a></p> - -<p>In all the lower communities of the globe the -priest, as the Shaman who can invoke rain, who can -cause or cure diseases, who can detect the unknown -thief, or read the result of a coming battle, may be -revered for his power as a sorcerer, but he seldom -enters into the scheme of the body politic as an -efficient political force. In the Sandwich Islands, -where priestly power was more developed than elsewhere, -the priesthood, though not merely an hereditary -body and possessed of much property in men -and lands, but recipients of the same servile homage -that was paid to the highest chiefs, occupied, nevertheless, -a subordinate position to the governing class. -As the nation retained a chief priest who had charge -of the national god, so each chief retained his own -family priest, whose function it was to follow him to -the battle-field carrying his war-god and to direct the -sacred rites of his house. In New Zealand the tohunga -(or priest) was ‘not significative of a class separated -from the rest by certain distinctions of rank,’ but -was an office open to anyone.<a name="FNanchor_216" id="FNanchor_216"></a><a href="#Footnote_216" class="fnanchor">[216]</a> In the Tongan Islands, -a priest had no respect paid to him beyond what was -due to his family rank, owing to the fact that the title -to the priesthood was dependent on the accident of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_160" id="Page_160">[160]</a></span> -inspiration by some god. Whenever a priest invoked -the gods (and it was generally on a person of the -lower classes that such inspiration fell), the chiefs, nay, -even the king himself, would sit indiscriminately -with the common people in a circle round him, ‘on -account of the sacredness of the occasion, conceiving -that such modest demeanour must be acceptable to -the gods.’<a name="FNanchor_217" id="FNanchor_217"></a><a href="#Footnote_217" class="fnanchor">[217]</a> Whatever the priest then said was deemed -a declaration of the god, and, in accordance with a -confusion of the human voice and the divine, not -unknown elsewhere, the oracle, in speaking, actually -made use of the first person, as though the relation of -himself to the god were not merely one of delegated -authority, but of real and complete identification. -Except, however, on such special occasions, a Tongan -priest was distinguished by no particular dress, nor -invested with any official privileges. In Fiji, also, the -priests ranked below the principal chiefs; and the -chief priest, though, as in Tahiti, it was his office to -perform the ceremony which introduced the monarch -to regal dignity, seems in nowise to have interfered -afterwards with the sovereignty of his temporal lord. -It is remarkable that the power of priestcraft increases<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_161" id="Page_161">[161]</a></span> -with the increase of civilisation; ultimately serving to -arrest and retard the growth of which it is at once -a symptom and a measure.</p> - -<p>If from the foregoing data, collected from the best -accredited missionary sources, it is permissible to -speak in general terms of primitive political life, it -would appear that the social organisation of the lower -races stands at a far higher level than too rapid an -inspection would lead a critic to suspect. Their institutions -are such as to presuppose as much ingenuity -in their evolution as sagacity in their preservation. -Their despotism is never so unlimited but that it -recognises the existence of a customary code beside -and above it; nor is individual liberty ever so unchecked -as to outweigh the advantages or imperil the existence -of a life in common. In short, the subordination of -classes, the belief in the divine right of kings and in -differences ordained by nature between nobles and -populace, the principle of hereditary government -(often so firmly fixed that not even women are excluded -from the highest offices), the prevalence of -feudalism with its ever-recurring wars and revolutions, -not only prove an identity of social instinct which is -irrespective of latitude or race, but prove also among -the lower races the existence of a capacity for self-government, -which is disturbing to all preconceptions -derived from accounts of their manners and superstitions -in other relations of life.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_162" id="Page_162">[162]</a></span></p> - -<h2 id="CHAPTER_VI">VI.<br /> -<span class="smaller"><i>SAVAGE PENAL LAWS.</i></span></h2> - -<p>If, interpreting the present by the past, and taking as -our standard of the past contemporary savage life, we -endeavour to gain some insight into the origin of -those legal customs and ideas which are so interwoven -with our civilisation, the statements of travellers -relating to the judicial institutions of savage tribes -gain considerably in interest and value. For savage -modes of redressing injuries, of assessing punishment, -of discovering truth, reveal not a few striking points -of resemblance and of contrast to the practices prevalent -in civilised communities; whilst they serve at -the same time to illustrate the natural laws at work in -the evolution of society.</p> - -<p>The different stages of progress from the lowest -social state, where the redress of wrongs is left to -individual force or cunning, to the state where the -wrongs of individuals are regarded and punished as -wrongs to the community at large, may be all observed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_163" id="Page_163">[163]</a></span> -in the customs of modern or recent savage -tribes. Yet instances where the redress of wrongs is -purely a matter of personal retaliation are not really -numerous, occurring chiefly where the rulership of a -tribe is ill-defined and is an exercise of influence -rather than authority, as among the Esquimaux, -the Kamschadals, and some Californian and other -American tribes. In such states of society, though -some political sovereignty is vested in the heads of -the different families, they have but little power either -to make commands or to inflict punishments, so that -self-help is for individuals the first rule of existence. -But generally this deficiency in the legal protection -of life and property is made up for by a principle which -lies at the root of savage law—the principle, that is, -of collective responsibility, of including in the guilt of -an individual all his blood relations jointly or singly.</p> - -<p>This consideration of crimes as family or tribal -rather than as personal matters, (the duty of satisfying -the family or tribe of anyone injured devolving upon -the family or tribe of the wrongdoer,) must have -tended in the earliest times to withdraw attention from -the merely personal aspect of injuries and to direct it -to their more social relations. The common test of -likelihood is no bad guide in ethnology; and the -difficulty of conceiving any society of men, even the -most savage, living together absolutely unaffected -by, or uninterested in, wrongs done by one of their<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_164" id="Page_164">[164]</a></span> -members to another, is only equalled by the difficulty -of finding credible records of any such community. -Even in Kamschatka, where the head of an ostrog -had only the power to punish verbally, a man caught -stealing was held so infamous, that no one would befriend -him, and he had to live thenceforth alone without -help from anybody; whilst, if the habit seemed -inveterate, the thief was bound to a tree, and his -arms bound by a piece of birch-bark to a pole -stretched crosswise; the bark was then ignited, and -the man’s hands, thereby branded, marked his character -in future to all who might be interested in -knowing it.<a name="FNanchor_218" id="FNanchor_218"></a><a href="#Footnote_218" class="fnanchor">[218]</a> Even in so rude a tribe as the Brazilian -Topanazes, a murderer of a fellow-tribesman would -be conducted by his relations to those of the deceased, -to be by them forthwith strangled and buried, in -satisfaction of their rights; the two families eating -together for several days after the event as though -for the purpose of reconciliation.<a name="FNanchor_219" id="FNanchor_219"></a><a href="#Footnote_219" class="fnanchor">[219]</a> And several other -tribes, destitute of any chiefs possessing the power or -right to judge or punish, have fixed customs regulating -such offences as theft or murder. Thus the -Nootka Indians avenge or compound for punishable -acts, though their chiefs have little or no voice in the -matter. Where, as among the Haidahs of Columbia, -crime likewise has no legal punishment, murder being -simply an affair to be settled with the robbed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_165" id="Page_165">[165]</a></span> -family, we may detect the beginnings of later legal -practices in the occasional agreement among the -leading men to put to death disagreeable members -of the tribe, such as medicine-men, and other great -offenders.<a name="FNanchor_220" id="FNanchor_220"></a><a href="#Footnote_220" class="fnanchor">[220]</a> So that wherever, from causes of war or -otherwise, tribal chieftaincy has become at all fixed -and powerful, we may expect to find the chief or chiefs -called upon to settle disputes between individuals or -families; and thus gradually a way would be found for -the addition of judicial functions to the more primary -duties of government.</p> - -<p>From this natural tendency of submitting disputed -claims or the measure of redress to the decision of a -single chieftain or of several, the personal right of -retaliation would soon become a tribal one; and -though ignorant of the science of jurisprudence, most -savage tribes seem early to have learnt to treat torts -or offences against an individual as crimes or offences -against the community, taking as their standard of -punishment the measure of the wrong done to the individual. -The transfer of sovereignty from smaller -units to the tribe is clearly marked in instances where -the chiefs of a tribe try crimes and decide guilt, but -leave the punishment of the offender to the discretion -of the injured persons or family; of which the following -are characteristic illustrations.</p> - -<p>According to Catlin, every Indian tribe he visited<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_166" id="Page_166">[166]</a></span> -had a council-house in the middle of their village, -where the chiefs would assemble, as well for the investigation -of crimes as for public business, giving -decisions after trial concerning capital offences, but -leaving the punishment to the nearest of kin, to be inflicted -by him under the penalty of social disgrace, -but free from any control by them as to time, place, -or manner.<a name="FNanchor_221" id="FNanchor_221"></a><a href="#Footnote_221" class="fnanchor">[221]</a> So also on the Gold Coast, where suits -lay at the decision of the caboceros or chiefs, the -original conception of murder appears clearly, in the -practice for the murderer to get generally from the -relations of the deceased some abatement of the -pecuniary penalty affixed by law to his crime; they -being the only persons the criminal had to agree with, -and free to take from him as little as they pleased, -whilst the king had no pretence to any share of the -fine except what he might get for his trouble in -exacting it.<a name="FNanchor_222" id="FNanchor_222"></a><a href="#Footnote_222" class="fnanchor">[222]</a> In the Central African kingdom of -Bornou, a convicted murderer was handed over to -the discretional revenge of the murdered man’s -family.<a name="FNanchor_223" id="FNanchor_223"></a><a href="#Footnote_223" class="fnanchor">[223]</a> In Samoa, again, the chief of a village and -the heads of families, forming as they did the judicial -as well as legislative body, might condemn a culprit -to sit for hours naked in the sun, to be hung by -his head, to take five bites from a pungent root, or to -play at ball with a prickly sea-urchin, according to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_167" id="Page_167">[167]</a></span> -the nature of his offence. But one punishment was -especially remarkable, as showing how the right of -punishment originally belonging to the family may -survive in form long after it has in reality passed to -a wider political union. This was the punishment -of binding a criminal hand and foot and carrying -him suspended from a prickly pole run through -between his hands and feet, to the family of the -village against which he had transgressed, and there -depositing him before them, as if to signify that he lay -at their mercy.<a name="FNanchor_224" id="FNanchor_224"></a><a href="#Footnote_224" class="fnanchor">[224]</a> And in the villages of Afghanistan, -where an assembly of the elders act as the judges of -the people, a show is always made of delivering up -the criminal to the accuser and of giving the latter -the chance of retaliating, though it is perfectly understood -that he must comply with the wishes of the -assembly. This instance, therefore, illustrates the two -distinct methods of legal punishment in process of -actual transition from one to the other.<a name="FNanchor_225" id="FNanchor_225"></a><a href="#Footnote_225" class="fnanchor">[225]</a></p> - -<p>If then the original standard of punishment was -just that amount of severity which would suffice to -prevent individuals from seeking satisfaction by their -private efforts and avenging their own wrongs, it is -intelligible that penal customs should be cruel in proportion -to their primitiveness. It is distinctly stated -that in Samoa fines in food and property gradually<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_168" id="Page_168">[168]</a></span> -superseded more severe penalties. Yet, in -the face of the very varying penalties found in most -different conditions of culture, it is a subject on which -it is difficult to lay down any rule. Sometimes -murder alone is a capital crime, sometimes theft, -witchcraft, and adultery as well; sometimes all or -some of them are commutable by fine. Nor does it -seem that, wherever an offence is punishable by fine, -the penalty has been mitigated from one originally -more severe. In some cases the chief judges may -have found their interest in assessing a more humane, -and to themselves more profitable, forfeit than that of -life or limb; but savages, living in the most primitive -conditions, seem to have been led by their natural -reason alone to observe fitting proportions between -crime and retribution. For their punishments, in -default generally of imprisonment or banishment, are -not as a rule gratuitously cruel: though as occasional -punishments among the Caffres are mentioned the -application of hot stones to the naked body, or exposure -to the torments of ants;<a name="FNanchor_226" id="FNanchor_226"></a><a href="#Footnote_226" class="fnanchor">[226]</a> and slavery, so -common a punishment in Africa, far from being essentially -cruel, is rather a sign of an amelioration -of manners, of a reasonable willingness to take the -useful satisfaction of a man’s labour in lieu of the -useless one of his life. Severity of the penal code -would rather seem to be a concomitant of growth<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_169" id="Page_169">[169]</a></span> -in civilisation, of stronger and deeper moral feelings, -of a sense of the failure of milder means, than of a -really primitive savagery. On the whole continent -of America no savage tribe ever approached the -Aztecs in cruelty of punishment, nor is it among -people of a ruder type of culture that we should ever -look to find some form of death the penalty alike for -the lightest as for the gravest crimes, for slander no -less than for adultery, for intoxication as much as for -homicide.<a name="FNanchor_227" id="FNanchor_227"></a><a href="#Footnote_227" class="fnanchor">[227]</a></p> - -<p>It might naturally be inferred that, because the -laws of savages are unwritten and depend on usage -alone for their preservation, therefore they are entirely -uncertain and arbitrary. This, however, is not often -the case. On few points are the statements of travellers -less vague than on the details of native penal -customs; a fact which is only compatible with their -being both well known and regularly enforced. What -the Abbé Froyart says of the natives of Loango, -may be said of all but the lowest tribes: ‘There is no -one ignorant of the cases which incur the pain of -death, and of those for which the offender becomes -the slave of the person offended.’<a name="FNanchor_228" id="FNanchor_228"></a><a href="#Footnote_228" class="fnanchor">[228]</a> The laws of the -Caffre tribes are said to be a collection of precedents, -of decisions of bygone chiefs and councils, appealing -solely to what has been customary in the past, never to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_170" id="Page_170">[170]</a></span> -the abstract merits of the case. There appears, it is -said, to be no uncertainty whatever in their administration, -the criminality of different acts being measured -exactly by a fixed number of cattle payable in atonement. -And the customs reported from Ashantee -manifest a similar sense of the value of fixed penalties. -An Ashantee is at liberty to kill his slave, but is -punished if he kills his wife or child; only a chief can -sell his wife or put her to death for infidelity; whilst -a great man who kills his equal in rank is generally -suffered to die by his own hands. If a man brings -a frivolous accusation against another, he must give -an entertainment to the family and friends of the -accused; if he breaks an Aggry bead in a scuffle, he -must pay seven slaves to the owner. A wife who -betrays a secret forfeits her upper lip, an ear if she -listens to a private conversation of her husband.<a name="FNanchor_229" id="FNanchor_229"></a><a href="#Footnote_229" class="fnanchor">[229]</a> -Savage also as is the kingdom of Dahomey, arbitrary -power is so far limited, that no sentence of death -or slavery, adjudged by an assembly of chiefs, can -be carried out without confirmation from the throne; -and such a sentence ‘must be executed in the capital, -and notice given of it by the public crier in the -market.’ It is no paradox to say, that human life, even -in Dahomey, enjoys more efficient legal protection at -this day than it did in England in times long subsequent -to the signature of Magna Charta.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_171" id="Page_171">[171]</a></span></p> - -<p>The forms of legal procedure manifest often no -less regularity than the laws themselves. In Congo -the plaintiff opens his case on his knees to the judge, -who sits under a tree or in a great straw hut built on -purpose, holding a staff of authority in his hand. -When he has heard the plaintiff’s evidence he hears -the defendant, then calls the witnesses, and decides -accordingly. The successful suitor pays a sum to -the judge’s box, and stretches himself at full length -on the ground to testify his gratitude.<a name="FNanchor_230" id="FNanchor_230"></a><a href="#Footnote_230" class="fnanchor">[230]</a> In Loango, -the king, acting as judge, has several assessors to -consult in difficult cases, and the suit begins by both -parties making a present to the king, who then proceeds -to hear in turn plaintiff, defendant, and witnesses. -In default of witnesses the affair is deferred, -spies being sent to gather ampler information and -ground for judgment from the talk of the people. In -the public trials of Ashantee ‘the accused is always -heard fully, and is obliged either to commit or exculpate -himself on every point.’ On the Gold Coast a -plaintiff would sometimes defer his suit for thirty -years, letting it devolve on his heirs, if the judges, -the caboceros, from interested motives, delayed to -grant him a trial and thus obliged him to wait, in -hopes of finding less impartial or else more amenable -judges in the future.<a name="FNanchor_231" id="FNanchor_231"></a><a href="#Footnote_231" class="fnanchor">[231]</a></p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_172" id="Page_172">[172]</a></span></p> - -<p>Several rules of savage jurisprudence betray -curiously different notions of equity from those of -more civilised lands. The Abbé Froyart was shocked -that, on the complaint of the missionaries to the -King of Loango of nocturnal disturbances round -their dwellings, the king should have issued an ordinance -making the disturbance of the missionaries’ -repose a capital crime. The reason the natives gave -him for thus putting slight offences on an equality -with grave ones was, that, in proportion to the ease -of abstinence from anything forbidden, or of the -performance of anything commanded was the inexcusableness -of disobedience and the deserved -severity of punishment. Again, impartiality with -regard to rank or wealth, which is now regarded in -England as a self-evident principle of justice, as a -primary instinct of equity, is by no means so regarded -by savages; for not only is murder often atoned for -according to the rank of the murderer, as on the -Gold Coast or in old Anglo-Saxon law, on the basis, -apparently, of the value to the individual of his loss -in death, but such difference of rank sometimes enters -into the estimate of the due punishment for robbery. -Thus the Guinea Coast negroes thought it reasonable -to punish rich persons guilty of robbery more severely -than the poor, because, they said, the rich were not -urged to it by necessity, and could better spare the -money-fines laid on them. Caffre law distinguishes<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_173" id="Page_173">[173]</a></span> -broadly and clearly between injuries to a man’s -person and injuries to his property, accounting the -former as offences against the chief to whom he belongs, -and making such chief sole recipient of all -fines, allowing only personal redress where a man’s -property has been damaged. Thus Caffre law divides -itself into lines bearing some analogy to those of our -criminal and civil law: such offences as treason, -murder, assault, and witchcraft entering into the -criminal code, and constituting injuries to the actual -sufferer’s chief; whilst adultery, slander, and other -forms of theft, enter as it were into the civil law, as -injuries for which there are direct personal remedies.<a name="FNanchor_232" id="FNanchor_232"></a><a href="#Footnote_232" class="fnanchor">[232]</a></p> - -<p>The almost universal test among savages of guilt -or innocence, where there is a want or conflict of -evidence, is the ordeal. At first sight it would appear -that such a practice presupposes a belief in a -personal supernatural deity—that it is, in fact, as it -was in the middle ages, a judgment of God, an -appeal to His decision. If so, a theistic belief would -be of wide extent, for the ordeal is common to very -low strata of culture; but, in consideration of the -savage belief in the personality and consciousness of -natural objects or in spirits animating them, it would -seem best to regard the ordeal simply as a direct -appeal to the decision of such objects or spirits themselves, -or through such objects to the decision of dead<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_174" id="Page_174">[174]</a></span> -ancestors, a means for the discovery of truth that -would naturally suggest itself to the shamanic class. -For it is at the peril of his life that a shaman, or -priest, asserts a title to superior power and wisdom; -and as his skill is tested in every need or peril that -occurs, he is naturally as often called upon to detect -hidden guilt as to bring rain from the clouds, or drive -sickness from the body. Driven, therefore, to his -inventive resources by the demands made upon him, -he thinks out a test which he may really consider just, -or which, by proving fatal to the suspected, may -place alike his ingenuity and the verdict beyond the -reach of challenge. Such ordeals not only often elicit -true confessions of guilt by the very terror they -inspire, so that, according to Merolla, it sufficed for -the Congo wizards to issue proclamations for a -restitution of stolen property under the threat of -otherwise resorting to their arts of detection, but they -are valuable in themselves to the shamanic class from -being easily adapted to the destruction of an enemy -and offering a ready channel for the influx of wealth. -A comparison of some of these tests, which decide -guilt not by an appeal to the fear of falsehood, as an -oath does, but by what is really an appeal to the -verdict of chance, will display so strong a family -resemblance, together with so many local peculiarities, -as to make the origin suggested appear not improbable.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_175" id="Page_175">[175]</a></span></p> - -<p>Bosman mentions the following ordeals as customary -on the Gold Coast in offences of a trivial -character:</p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>1. Stroking a red-hot copper arm-ring over the -tongue of the suspected person.</p> - -<p>2. Squirting a vegetable juice into his eye.</p> - -<p>3. Drawing a greased fowl’s feather through his -tongue.</p> - -<p>4. Making him draw cocks’ quills from a clod of -earth.</p> - -</div> - -<p>Innocence was staked on the innocuousness of the -two former proceedings, on the facility of the execution -of the two latter. For great crimes the water -ordeal was employed, a certain river being endowed -with the quality of wafting innocent persons across it, -how little soever they could swim, and of only drowning -the guilty.<a name="FNanchor_233" id="FNanchor_233"></a><a href="#Footnote_233" class="fnanchor">[233]</a></p> - -<p>Livingstone mentions the anxiety of negro women, -suspected by their husbands of having bewitched -them, to drink a poisonous infusion prepared by the -shaman, and to submit their lives to the effect of this -drink on their bodies; a judicial method strikingly -similar to the test of bitter waters ordained in the -Book of Numbers to decide the guilt of Jewish wives -whom their husbands had reason to suspect of infidelity. -The Barotse tribe, in Africa, who judge of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_176" id="Page_176">[176]</a></span> -the guilt of an accused person by the effect of medicine -poured down the throat of a dog or cock, manifest -more humanity in their system of detection.<a name="FNanchor_234" id="FNanchor_234"></a><a href="#Footnote_234" class="fnanchor">[234]</a></p> - -<p>But perhaps the best collection of African ordeals -is that given in the voyage of the Capuchin Merolla -to Congo in 1682. In case of treason a shaman -would present a compound of vegetable juices, serpents’ -flesh, and such things to the delinquent, who would -die if he were guilty, but not otherwise; it being of -course open to the administrator to omit at will the -poisonous ingredients. Innocence was further proved, -if a man suffered nothing from a red-hot iron passed -over his leg, if he felt no bad effects from chewing the -root of the banana, from eating the poisoned fruit of -a certain palm, from drinking water in which a torch -of bitumen or a red-hot iron had been quenched, or -from drawing a stone out of boiling water. The crime -of theft was proved by the ignition or the non-ignition -of a long thread held at either end by the shaman -and the accused, on the application of a red-hot iron -to the middle. Among the Bongo tribe a murder is -often traced to its source, by making plastic representations -so closely resembling the victim, that at a -feast given with dances and songs the criminal will -generally manifest a desire to leave the company.<a name="FNanchor_235" id="FNanchor_235"></a><a href="#Footnote_235" class="fnanchor">[235]</a></p> - -<p>So great in general is the dread of such ordeals,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_177" id="Page_177">[177]</a></span> -that they often actually serve as the most potent -instruments for the discovery of crimes. In the kingdom -of Loango was kept a fetich in a large basket -before which all cases of theft and murder were -tried; and when any great man died, a whole town -would be compelled to offer themselves for trial for his -murder by kissing and embracing the image, in the -fear of falling down dead if they fancied themselves -guilty. In the space of one year Andrew Battel witnessed -the death of many natives in this way.</p> - -<p>In the Tongan Islands the king would call the -people together, and, after washing his hands in a -wooden bowl, command everyone to touch it. From -a firm belief that touching the bowl, in case of guilt, -would cause instantaneous death, refusal to touch it -amounted to conviction.<a name="FNanchor_236" id="FNanchor_236"></a><a href="#Footnote_236" class="fnanchor">[236]</a></p> - -<p>Among the Fijians, distinguished in so many -points from other savages by originality of conception, -the ordeal of the scarf was the one of greatest dread, -extorting confession, it is said, as effectually as a -threat of the rack might have done. The chief or -judge, having called for a scarf, would proceed, if the -culprit did not confess at the sight of it, to wave it above -his head, till he had caught the man’s soul, bereft of -which the culprit would be sure ultimately to pine -away and die.<a name="FNanchor_237" id="FNanchor_237"></a><a href="#Footnote_237" class="fnanchor">[237]</a></p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_178" id="Page_178">[178]</a></span></p> - -<p>Among the ordeals of the Sandwich Islanders was -one called the ‘shaking-water.’ The accused persons, -sitting round a calabash full of water, were required -in turns to hold their hands above it, that the priest, -by watching the water, might detect, when it trembled, -the presence of guilt. On the Society Islands the -ordeal only differed slightly, the priest reading in the -water the reflected image of the thief, after prayer to -the gods to cause his spirit to be present. The mere -report that such a measure had been resorted to often -led to timely restitutions of stolen goods.<a name="FNanchor_238" id="FNanchor_238"></a><a href="#Footnote_238" class="fnanchor">[238]</a></p> - -<p>In Sardinia there is, or was, a well, the waters of -which were supposed to blind a person suspected of -robbery or lying, if he were guilty; otherwise to -strengthen and improve his sight.<a name="FNanchor_239" id="FNanchor_239"></a><a href="#Footnote_239" class="fnanchor">[239]</a></p> - -<p>The above instances, remarkable for their practical -efficiency no less than for their puerile ingenuity, -suffice to illustrate the nature of savage judicial ordeals -and the extreme variety displayed in their invention. -The identity of many ordeals among different people, -such as that by fire or water, is probably due to the -readiness with which such tests would suggest themselves -to the imagination. ‘He who, holding fire in -his hand,’ said the Indian law, ‘is not burnt, or who, -diving under water, is not soon forced up by it, must -be held veracious in his testimony upon oath;’ and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_179" id="Page_179">[179]</a></span> -the same was the idea in China and Africa as well -as in Europe. That these ordeals, like others, were -originated by the class of shamans, and were traditionally -preserved by them as one of the sources of their -power, derives probability from their close analogy -to the judicial ordeals invented and administered by -the priests of early Europe. The trial by the hallowed -morsel, which decided guilt by the effects of -swallowing a piece of hallowed bread or cheese; the -trial by the cross, when both accuser and accused -were placed under a cross with their arms extended, -and the wrong adjudged to him who first let his hands -fall; or the trial by the two dice, when innocence -was proved if the first dice taken at hazard bore the -sign of the cross—though they may have been metamorphosed -heathen ordeals, seem rather to have been -of pure Christian invention; nor are they distinguished -in any point above corresponding practices on the -coast of Guinea, except in this, that they were called -the judgments of God, and implied some belief in a -personal spirit, who could and would control the verdict -of chance to prove guilt or innocence.<a name="FNanchor_240" id="FNanchor_240"></a><a href="#Footnote_240" class="fnanchor">[240]</a></p> - -<p>As in Europe after the fifteenth century the oath -of canonical purgation gradually displaced the older<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_180" id="Page_180">[180]</a></span> -system of ordeals, so it would seem that in savage life -too the judicial oath succeeds in order of time the -judicial ordeal. An oath implies a prayer, an invocation -of punishment in case of perjury; and a man’s -conscience is evidently more directly appealed to -where his guilt is tested to some extent by his own -confession, than where it is decided by something -quite external to himself.</p> - -<p>The witness in a modern English law court, invoking -upon himself divine wrath if he swear falsely by -the book he kisses, preserves with curious exactitude -the judicial oath of savage times and lands. Our -English judicial oath, in use though no longer compulsory, -has withstood all attacks upon it, for the insuperable -practical reason that the majority of men -are more afraid of swearing falsely than of speaking -falsely, and that the fewer scruples a man feels about -lying, the more he is likely to feel about perjury. -The notion that one is morally worse than the other -is probably due to the imaginary terrors which, associated -time out of mind with perjury, have given it a -legal existence apart, and made it, so to speak, a kind -of lying-extraordinary, a crime outside the jurisdiction -of humanity.</p> - -<p>In Samoa, as at Westminster, physical contact -with a thing adds vast weight to the value of a man’s -evidence. Turner relates how in turn each person -suspected of a theft was obliged before the chiefs to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_181" id="Page_181">[181]</a></span> -touch a sacred drinking-cup, made of cocoa-nut, and -to invoke destruction upon himself if he were the -thief. The formula ran: ‘With my hand on this cup, -may the god look upon me and send swift destruction -if I took the thing which has been stolen.’ ‘Before -this ordeal the truth was rarely concealed,’ it being -firmly believed that death would ensue, were the cup -touched and a lie told. Or the suspected would first -place a handful of grass on the stone or other representative -of the village god, and laying his hands on -it, say, ‘In the presence of our chiefs now assembled, -I lay my hand on the stone; if I stole the thing, may -I speedily die,’ the grass being a symbolical curse of -the destruction he invoked on all his family, of the -<i>grass</i> that might grow over their dwellings. The -older ordeal of fixing the guilt upon a person to whom -the face of a spun cocoa-nut pointed when it rested, -shows how ordeals may survive in use after the attainment -of judicial oaths and contemporaneously with -them.<a name="FNanchor_241" id="FNanchor_241"></a><a href="#Footnote_241" class="fnanchor">[241]</a></p> - -<p>To understand the binding force of oaths among -savages it is necessary to observe how closely connected -they are with savage ideas of fetichism and -their belief in witchcraft as a really active natural -force. The hair or food of a man, which a savage -burns to rid himself of an enemy, is no mere symbol -of that enemy so much as in some sense that enemy<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_182" id="Page_182">[182]</a></span> -himself. The physical act of touching the thing -invoked has reference to feelings of casual connection -between things, as in Samoa, where a man, to attest -his veracity, would touch his eyes, to indicate a wish -that blindness might strike him if he lied, or would -dig a hole in the ground, to indicate a wish that he -might be buried in the event of falsehood. In Kamschatka, -if a thief remained undetected, the elders -would summon all the ostrog together, young and -old, and, forming a circle round the fire, cause certain -incantations to be employed. After the incantations -the sinews of the back and feet of a wild sheep were -thrown into the fire with magical words, and the wish -expressed that the hands and feet of the culprit might -grow crooked; there being apparently a connection -assumed between the action of the fire on the animal’s -sinews and on the limbs of the man. And in Sweden -there are still cunning men who can deprive a real -thief of his eye, by cutting a human figure on the bark -of a tree and driving nails and arrows into the representative -feature. But perhaps the best illustration -of this feeling is the practice of the Ostiaks, who offer -their wives, if they suspect them of infidelity, a handful -of bear’s hairs, believing that, if they touch them -and are guilty, they will be bitten by a bear within -the space of three days. It would seem that oaths -appeal to the same idea of vicarious or representative -influence, a real but invisible connection being<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_183" id="Page_183">[183]</a></span> -imagined between the actual thing touched and the -calamity invoked in touching it.</p> - -<p>Instances from the oaths of other tribes will manifest -the operation of the same feeling as that which -makes grass a symbol of utter ruin in Samoa, or some -bear’s hairs of a bear’s bite among the Ostiaks.</p> - -<p>North Asiatic tribes have in use three kinds of -oaths, the first and least solemn one being for the -accused to face the sun with a knife, pretending to fight -against it, and to cry aloud, ‘If I am guilty, may the -sun cause sickness to rage in my body like this knife!’ -The second form of oath is to cry aloud from the tops -of certain mountains, invoking death, loss of children -and cattle, or bad luck in hunting, in the case of guilt -being real. But the most solemn oath of all is to -exclaim, in drinking some of the blood of a dog, -killed expressly by the elders and burnt or thrown -away, ‘If I die, may I perish, decay, or burn -away like this dog.’<a name="FNanchor_242" id="FNanchor_242"></a><a href="#Footnote_242" class="fnanchor">[242]</a> Very similar is the oath in Sumatra, -where, a beast having been slain, the swearer -says, ‘If I break my oath, may I be slaughtered as -this beast, and swallowed as this heart I now consume.’<a name="FNanchor_243" id="FNanchor_243"></a><a href="#Footnote_243" class="fnanchor">[243]</a> -The most solemn oath of the Bedouins, that of the cross-lines, -is also characterised by the same belief which -appears in the case of the slain beast affecting with -sympathetic decay anyone guilty of perjury. If a -Bedouin cannot convict a man he suspects of theft it<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_184" id="Page_184">[184]</a></span> -is usual for him to take the suspected before a sheikh -or kady, and there to call upon him to swear any oath -he may demand. If the defendant agrees, he is led -to a certain distance from the camp, ‘because the -magical nature of the oath might prove pernicious to -the general body of Arabs were it to take place in -their vicinity.’ Then the plaintiff draws with his -sekin, or crooked knife, a large circle in the sand with -many cross-lines inside it, places his right foot inside -it, causes the defendant to do the same, and makes -him say after himself, ‘By God, and in God, and -through God, I swear I did not take the thing, nor is -it in my possession.’ To make the oath still more -solemn, the accused often puts also in the circle an -ant and a bit of camel’s skin, the one expressive of a -hope that he may never be destitute of camel’s milk, -the other of a hope that he may never lack the winter -substance of an ant.<a name="FNanchor_244" id="FNanchor_244"></a><a href="#Footnote_244" class="fnanchor">[244]</a></p> - -<p>Firm, however, as is the savage belief that the -consequences of perjury are death or disease, a belief -which shows itself not unfrequently in actually inferring -the fact of perjury from the fact of death, -escape from the obligation of an oath is not unknown -among savages. On the Guinea Coast recourse was -had to the common expedient of priestly absolution, -so that when a man took a draught-oath, imprecating -death on himself if he failed in his promise, the priests<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_185" id="Page_185">[185]</a></span> -were sometimes compelled to take an oath too, to the -effect that they would not employ their absolving -powers to release him. In Abyssinia a simpler process -seems to be in vogue; for the king, on one occasion -having sworn by a cross, thus addressed his servants: -‘You see the oath I have taken; I scrape it clean -away from my tongue that made it.’ Thereupon he -scraped his tongue and spat away his oath, thus validly -releasing himself from it.<a name="FNanchor_245" id="FNanchor_245"></a><a href="#Footnote_245" class="fnanchor">[245]</a></p> - -<p>It does not appear that savages refine on their -motives for punishment, the sum of their political -philosophy in this respect being rather to inflict -penalties that accord with their ideas of retribution -deserved for each case or crime, than to deter other -criminals by warning examples. The statement that -New Zealanders beat thieves to death, and then hung -them on a cross on the top of a hill, as a warning -example, conflicts with another account which says -that thieves were punished by banishment.<a name="FNanchor_246" id="FNanchor_246"></a><a href="#Footnote_246" class="fnanchor">[246]</a> But, -subject to the influence of collateral circumstances, -savage penal laws appear to be as fixed, regular, and -well-known, as inflexibly bound by precedent, as often -improved by the intelligence of individual chiefs, as -penal laws are in more advanced societies. The case -of an Ashantee king, who, limiting the number of lives -to be sacrificed at his mother’s funeral, resisted all -importunities and appeals to precedent for a greater<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_186" id="Page_186">[186]</a></span> -number, is not without parallel in reforms of law. -Thus we may read of one Caffre chief who abolished in -his tribe the fine payable for the crime of approaching -a chief’s krall with the head covered by a blanket; -whilst another chief made the homicide of a man taken -in adultery a capital offence, thus transferring the -punishment for the crime from the individual to the -tribe.<a name="FNanchor_247" id="FNanchor_247"></a><a href="#Footnote_247" class="fnanchor">[247]</a></p> - -<p>In legal customs analogous to those of the savage -or rather semi-civilized world, the legal institutions of -civilized countries, their methods of procedure, of -extorting truth, of punishing crimes, seem to have -their root and explanation. For this reason the same -interest attaches to the legal institutions of modern -savages as attaches to the laws of the ancient -Germanic tribes or to the ordinances of Menu, the interest, -that is, of descent or relationship. The oath, -for instance, of our law courts presupposes in the -past, if not in the present, precisely the same state -of thought as the oath customary in Samoa; and -the same virtue inherent in touching and kissing the -Bible in England, or the cross in Russia, leads the -Tunguse Lapp to touch and then kiss the cannon, -gun, or sword, by which he swears allegiance to -the Russian crown.<a name="FNanchor_248" id="FNanchor_248"></a><a href="#Footnote_248" class="fnanchor">[248]</a> The Highlander of olden time, -kissing his dirk, to invoke death by it if he lied, is -a similar instance of the survival of the primitive<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_187" id="Page_187">[187]</a></span> -conception, that physical contact with a thing creates -a spiritual dependence upon it. The ordeal, so lately -the judicial test of witchcraft, still retains a foothold -of faith among our country people, as is proved by the -fact that not longer ago than 1863 an octogenarian -died in consequence of having been ‘swum’ as a -wizard at Little Hedingham, in Essex. And, lastly, -the English law that no person could inherit an estate -from anyone convicted of treason, or from a suicide, -shows how naturally the savage law of collective -responsibility, in reality so unjust, may survive into -times of civilisation, whilst the ignominy still attached -to the blood-relations of a criminal shows with what -difficulty the feeling is eradicated.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_188" id="Page_188">[188]</a></span></p> - -<h2 id="CHAPTER_VII">VII.<br /> -<span class="smaller"><i>EARLY WEDDING CUSTOMS.</i></span></h2> - -<p>Amid the wonderful uniformity which pervades the -thoughts and customs of the world some strange reversals -here and there occur, as where white is the colour -significative of grief, or where to turn one’s back on a -person is a sign of reverence. But perhaps few such -reversals are more curious than the custom of the -Garos, in India, who consider any infringement of the -rule that all proposals of marriage must come from -the female side as an insult to the <i>mahári</i> to which -the lady belongs, only to be atoned for by liberal donations -of beer and pigs from the man’s <i>mahári</i> to that of -the ‘proposee.’ More curious, however, than even this -is their marriage ceremony; at which, after the bride -has been bathed in the nearest stream, the wedding -party proceed to the house of the bridegroom, ‘<i>who -pretends to be unwilling and runs away, but is caught</i> -and subjected to a similar ablution, and <i>then taken, in -spite of the resistance and counterfeited grief and lamentations -of his parents, to the bride’s house</i>.’<a name="FNanchor_249" id="FNanchor_249"></a><a href="#Footnote_249" class="fnanchor">[249]</a></p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_189" id="Page_189">[189]</a></span></p> - -<p>An exactly analogous custom as regards the bride’s -behaviour at her wedding is sufficiently well known; -and if it has been correctly interpreted as the survival, -in form and symbol, of a system of capturing wives -from a neighbouring tribe, there must have been a -time when among the Garos a husband could only -have been obtained in a similar way. The improbability -of this suggests the possibility of some other -explanation underlying the reluctance, feigned or real, -with which it is common in savage life for a girl to -enter upon the paths of matrimony, and for the show -of resistance with which her friends oppose her departure -with her husband.</p> - -<p>In many instances this peculiar feature of primitive -life appears as simply the outcome of feelings and -affections which are the same, howsoever different in -expression, in savage as in civilised lands. The conviction -that there is an utter absence of anything like -love between children and their parents, or between -men and women, in the ruder social communities, is -so strong and has been so often dwelt upon, that in -speculations on this subject there is a tendency and -danger of altogether overlooking the influence of -natural affection in the formation of customs. It -is needful, therefore, to preface the present chapter -with a brief reference to the express statements -of missionaries and travellers; for if it can be shown -that there is such a thing as affection between<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_190" id="Page_190">[190]</a></span> -parents and children, the inference is fair that neither -would parents part with their children nor children -leave their parents without mutual regret, when the -children are married.</p> - -<p>Of the Fijians, so famous for their cannibalism -and their parenticide, it is declared to be ‘truly touching -to see how parents are attached to their children -and children to their parents.’<a name="FNanchor_250" id="FNanchor_250"></a><a href="#Footnote_250" class="fnanchor">[250]</a> Among the Tongans, -who would sacrifice their children cruelly for the -recovery of the sick, children were ‘taken the utmost -care of.’<a name="FNanchor_251" id="FNanchor_251"></a><a href="#Footnote_251" class="fnanchor">[251]</a> The New Zealanders were not guiltless -of infanticide, yet ‘some of them, and especially -the fathers, seemed fond of their children.’<a name="FNanchor_252" id="FNanchor_252"></a><a href="#Footnote_252" class="fnanchor">[252]</a> The -Papuans of New Guinea manifested ‘respect for the -aged, love for their children, and fidelity to their wives.’<a name="FNanchor_253" id="FNanchor_253"></a><a href="#Footnote_253" class="fnanchor">[253]</a> -In Africa, Mungo Park says of the Mandingoes: ‘The -maternal affection is everywhere conspicuous among -them, and creates a corresponding return of tenderness -in the child.’<a name="FNanchor_254" id="FNanchor_254"></a><a href="#Footnote_254" class="fnanchor">[254]</a> Among the Eastern Ethiopians were -women who lived a wild life in the woods; yet the -testimony is the same: ‘However barbarous these -people be by nature, they yet are not devoid of feeling -for their children; these they rear with nicest care, -and for their provision strive to amass what property -they can.’<a name="FNanchor_255" id="FNanchor_255"></a><a href="#Footnote_255" class="fnanchor">[255]</a> Yoruba ‘children are much beloved by<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_191" id="Page_191">[191]</a></span> -both parents.’<a name="FNanchor_256" id="FNanchor_256"></a><a href="#Footnote_256" class="fnanchor">[256]</a> Love for their children unites the -greater number of the Bushmen for their whole lives.<a name="FNanchor_257" id="FNanchor_257"></a><a href="#Footnote_257" class="fnanchor">[257]</a> -In North America the Thlinkeet Indians ‘treat their -wives and children with much affection and kindness.’<a name="FNanchor_258" id="FNanchor_258"></a><a href="#Footnote_258" class="fnanchor">[258]</a> -Among the Greenlanders, says Cranz, ‘the bonds of -filial and parental love seem stronger than amongst -any other nations.’ Their fondness for their children -is great; parents seldom let them out of their sight, -and mothers often throw themselves in the water to -save a child from drowning. In return ingratitude towards -their aged parents is ‘scarcely ever exemplified -among them.’<a name="FNanchor_259" id="FNanchor_259"></a><a href="#Footnote_259" class="fnanchor">[259]</a> Of the natives of Australia, Sir G. -Grey says that they ‘are always ardently attached to -their children,’ and similar testimony has been borne -to the parental affection even of the Tasmanians.<a name="FNanchor_260" id="FNanchor_260"></a><a href="#Footnote_260" class="fnanchor">[260]</a></p> - -<p>But, lest it should be thought that these evidences -are drawn from the higher savagery, let appeal be -made to the case of savages who confessedly belong -to the lowest known types of mankind, the Andaman -Islanders, the Veddahs, and the Fuejians.</p> - -<p>In reference to the first it is said that ‘the parents are -fond of their children, and the affection is reciprocal.’<a name="FNanchor_261" id="FNanchor_261"></a><a href="#Footnote_261" class="fnanchor">[261]</a> -The Veddahs are not only ‘kind and constant to their<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_192" id="Page_192">[192]</a></span> -wives,’ but ‘fond of their children;’<a name="FNanchor_262" id="FNanchor_262"></a><a href="#Footnote_262" class="fnanchor">[262]</a> whilst Mr. Parker -Snow saw among the Fuejians ‘many instances of -warm love and affection for their children;’<a name="FNanchor_263" id="FNanchor_263"></a><a href="#Footnote_263" class="fnanchor">[263]</a> so that -if in the sequel we find daughters at their marriage -displaying a real or simulated repugnance to their -fate, the fact need not appear to us of such extreme -mystery as it otherwise might, nor as one in which -natural affection can play no part.</p> - -<p>A recent Italian writer on the primitive domestic -state says that ‘la passione viva d’amore che suole -attribuirsi ai popoli primitivi ... é una pura illusione.’<a name="FNanchor_264" id="FNanchor_264"></a><a href="#Footnote_264" class="fnanchor">[264]</a> -But happily for the primitive populations, their -lot is far from being really thus unbrightened by love, -though with them, as with the rest of the world, it is -a frequent cause of wars and quarrels, interfering especially -with the savage custom of infant betrothal, -and leading to elopements in defeat of parental contracts. -It is peculiar to neither sex. A Tahitian girl, -love-stricken, but not encouraged, led her friends, by -her threats of suicide, to persuade the object of her -affections to make her his wife.<a name="FNanchor_265" id="FNanchor_265"></a><a href="#Footnote_265" class="fnanchor">[265]</a> The Tongans had a -pretty legend of a young chief, who, having fallen in -love with a maiden already betrothed to a superior, -saved her, when she was condemned to be killed with -the other relations of a rebel, by hiding her in a cavern -he had found, whence they finally effected their joint<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_193" id="Page_193">[193]</a></span> -escape to Fiji.<a name="FNanchor_266" id="FNanchor_266"></a><a href="#Footnote_266" class="fnanchor">[266]</a> New Zealand mythology abounds in -love-tales. There is the tale of Hinemoa and Tutanekai, -which begins with stolen glances, and ends in -a nocturnal swim on the part of Hinemoa to the -island, whither the music of her lover guided her. -There is the tale also of Takaranji and Raumahora—of -Takaranji, who, though besieging her father in his -fortress, consented to present both of them with water -in their distress. ‘And Takaranji gazed eagerly at -the young girl, and she too looked eagerly at Takaranji -... and as the warriors of the army of Takaranji -looked on, lo, he had climbed up and was sitting at -the young maiden’s side; and they said among themselves, -“O comrades, our lord Takaranji loves war, -but one would think he likes Raumahora almost as -well.’”<a name="FNanchor_267" id="FNanchor_267"></a><a href="#Footnote_267" class="fnanchor">[267]</a></p> - -<p>Nor would it be fair to argue, because in most -savage tribes the hard work of life devolves upon the -women, that therefore there is an entire absence of -affection in savage households, whether polygamous -or otherwise, during their continuance. It is scarcely a -hundred years ago that in Caithness ‘the hard work -was chiefly done, and the burdens borne, by the women; -and if a cottier lost a horse, it was not unusual for him<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_194" id="Page_194">[194]</a></span> -to marry a wife as the cheapest substitute.’<a name="FNanchor_268" id="FNanchor_268"></a><a href="#Footnote_268" class="fnanchor">[268]</a> The -Fuejians, whose condition Captain Weddell felt compelled -to describe as that of the lowest of mankind, -and whose women did all the work, gathering the shellfish, -managing the canoes, and building the wigwams, -are said to have shown ‘a good deal of affection for -their wives,’ and care for their offspring.<a name="FNanchor_269" id="FNanchor_269"></a><a href="#Footnote_269" class="fnanchor">[269]</a> Among the -Fijians, who made their women carry all the heavy -loads and do all the field-work, and who remonstrated -with the Tongans for their more humane treatment -of them, not only have widows been known to kill -themselves if their relatives refused to do the duty -which custom laid upon them—namely, of killing -them at their husbands’ burial—but ‘even widowers, -in the depth of their grief, have frequently terminated -their existence when deprived of a dearly beloved -wife.’<a name="FNanchor_270" id="FNanchor_270"></a><a href="#Footnote_270" class="fnanchor">[270]</a> In India, Abor husbands treated their wives -with a consideration that appeared ‘singular in so rude -a race.’<a name="FNanchor_271" id="FNanchor_271"></a><a href="#Footnote_271" class="fnanchor">[271]</a> In America the lot of a woman was generally -one of hardship; yet, says Schoolcraft, ‘the gentler -affections have a much more extensive and powerful -exercise among the Indians than is generally believed.’<a name="FNanchor_272" id="FNanchor_272"></a><a href="#Footnote_272" class="fnanchor">[272]</a> -Carib husbands are said to have had much -love for their wives, like as it was to a straw fire,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_195" id="Page_195">[195]</a></span> -except with respect to the first wife they married.<a name="FNanchor_273" id="FNanchor_273"></a><a href="#Footnote_273" class="fnanchor">[273]</a> -Of the Thlinkeet Indians, characterised by great -cruelty to prisoners and other marks of much barbarity, -it is said that ‘there are few savage nations in which -the women have greater influence or command greater -respect.’<a name="FNanchor_274" id="FNanchor_274"></a><a href="#Footnote_274" class="fnanchor">[274]</a> ‘It is one of the fine traits,’ says Schweinfurth -of the cannibal Niam-Niam, ‘that they display -an affection for their wives which is unparalleled -among natives of so low a grade ... a husband will -spare no sacrifice to redeem an imprisoned wife.’<a name="FNanchor_275" id="FNanchor_275"></a><a href="#Footnote_275" class="fnanchor">[275]</a> -Though against this evidence there is much of a darker -character to be set, the above instances will suffice to -demonstrate the real existence, the real operation, -among some of the rudest representatives of our species, -of ordinary feelings of love and affection. As in -geology so in ethnology it holds true, that the action of -known existing causes is sufficient to account for much -that is obscure in the past and for all that is strange in -the present.</p> - -<p>Having so far cleared the ground as to be justified -in postulating the existence of ordinary feelings of -affection between parents and children, and between -men and women, as <i>veræ causæ</i>, or real forces, even -in the lowest known savage life, let us pass to the inference -that at no time are those feelings more likely -to be called into play than at a time when the daughter<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_196" id="Page_196">[196]</a></span> -of a family is about to leave her parents, and perhaps -her clan, to live henceforth with a man whom she may -not even know, or knows only to dislike.<a name="FNanchor_276" id="FNanchor_276"></a><a href="#Footnote_276" class="fnanchor">[276]</a> In China, -where on the wedding-day the bride is locked up in a -sedan-chair, and the key and chair consigned to the -bridegroom, who may not see her before that day, a -traveller once witnessed a separation between the -bride and her family. ‘All the family appeared much -affected, particularly the women, who sobbed aloud; -the father shed tears, and the daughter <i>was with -difficulty torn from the embraces of her parents</i> and -placed in the sedan-chair.’<a name="FNanchor_277" id="FNanchor_277"></a><a href="#Footnote_277" class="fnanchor">[277]</a> It seems more likely in -this case that the reluctance and resistance were real, -than that they were merely the symbols, conventionally -observed, of a system of wife-capture. But in -many instances it is impossible to distinguish a real -from a feigned grief. A witness of the marriage ceremonies -among the Tartars, who describes the bride -and her girl friends as raising piteous lamentations -beforehand, says that the poor girl either was or -appeared to be a most unwilling victim.<a name="FNanchor_278" id="FNanchor_278"></a><a href="#Footnote_278" class="fnanchor">[278]</a></p> - -<p>Jenkinson, one of the earliest English travellers in -Russia, noticed the same custom there, but thought -it affectation. On the day of marriage the bride<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_197" id="Page_197">[197]</a></span> -would in nowise consent to leave the house to go to -church, but would resist, strive, and weep, only suffering -herself to be led there by force, with her face -covered, to hide her simulated grief, and making a -great noise, as though she were sobbing and weeping, -all the way to the scene of her wedding.<a name="FNanchor_279" id="FNanchor_279"></a><a href="#Footnote_279" class="fnanchor">[279]</a> But a -modern French writer ascribes some reality to the -custom, mentioning that traditional songs are still -sung in which the young bride addresses words of -regret and sorrow to her parents in the midst of -her preparations for the nuptial feast.<a name="FNanchor_280" id="FNanchor_280"></a><a href="#Footnote_280" class="fnanchor">[280]</a> Before this -last ceremony she is accustomed to go the round -of her village, with a woman who calls for the sympathy -of her hearers for the young girl whose carefree -existence is about to be exchanged for the -troubles and anxieties of married life.<a name="FNanchor_281" id="FNanchor_281"></a><a href="#Footnote_281" class="fnanchor">[281]</a></p> - -<p>Yet, if in China and Russia, much more among -uncivilized tribes, would the life in prospect for a -bride, unless perchance her wishes coincided with her -parents’ interest, cause her to leave the home of her -youth with something more than those ‘light regrets’<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_198" id="Page_198">[198]</a></span> -which cause tears to commingle with smiles even -in England. Greenland girls, says Cranz, do nothing -till they are fourteen but sing, dance, and romp about; -but a life of slavery is in store for them as soon as -they are fit for it; ‘while they remain with their -parents they are well off, but from twenty years of -age till death their life is one series of anxieties, -wretchedness, and toil.’<a name="FNanchor_282" id="FNanchor_282"></a><a href="#Footnote_282" class="fnanchor">[282]</a> Marriage is a fate they -would not seek, but cannot avoid. Should they, -however, not oppose it, they must enter upon it with -reluctance, not with alacrity.</p> - -<p>It is worth noticing the reason Cranz gives for -this reluctance, because, in so far as modern savages -may be taken to represent primitive life, it proves -the existence, in that condition, of notions, howsoever -they may have arisen, which are exactly analogous to -those we connote by the word ‘modesty.’ When the -two old women, commissioned to negotiate with a girl’s -parents on behalf of a young man, first give a hint of -their purpose by praise of him and of his family, ‘the -damsel directly falls into the greatest apparent consternation -and runs out of doors, tearing her bunch of -hair; for <i>single women always affect the utmost bashfulness -and aversion to any proposal of marriage, lest -they should lose their reputation for modesty</i>, though -their destined husbands be previously well assured -of their acquiescence.’<a name="FNanchor_283" id="FNanchor_283"></a><a href="#Footnote_283" class="fnanchor">[283]</a> Not, indeed, that the reluctance<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_199" id="Page_199">[199]</a></span> -is always feigned, for sometimes the name of her -proposed husband causes her to swoon, to elope to a -desert place, or to effectually free herself from further -addresses, by cutting off her hair in token of grief. -Should, however, her parents consent to the match, -the usual course is for the old women to go in search -of her, ‘and <i>drag her forcibly into the suitor’s house</i>, -where she sits for several days quite disconsolate, -with dishevelled hair, and refuses nourishment. -When friendly exhortations are unavailing she is -compelled by force, and even blows, to receive her -husband.’</p> - -<p>In Greenland, then, as in China, the form of -capture resolves itself either into a most unequivocal -reluctance to leave home or to a reluctance so to do -feigned from feelings of bashfulness. Nor about this -bashfulness does it appear that Cranz was in error, for -Egede agrees substantially with him, telling how the -bridegroom, when he has obtained her parents’ and -relations’ consent, sends some old women <i>to carry -away the bride by force</i>; ‘for though she ever so much -approves of the match, yet <i>out of modesty she must -make as if it went against the grain, and as if she were -much ruffled at it; else she will be blamed and get an -ill name</i>.’ When brought to his hut, therefore, she sits -in a corner with dishevelled hair, ‘covering her face, -being bashful and ashamed.’ For ‘<i>a new-married -woman is ashamed of having changed her condition for<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_200" id="Page_200">[200]</a></span> -a married state</i>;’<a name="FNanchor_284" id="FNanchor_284"></a><a href="#Footnote_284" class="fnanchor">[284]</a> and this feeling occurs again plainly -in South-Eastern Russia, where, on the eve of marriage, -the bride goes round the village, throwing herself -on her knees before the head of each house and -<i>begging his pardon</i>.<a name="FNanchor_285" id="FNanchor_285"></a><a href="#Footnote_285" class="fnanchor">[285]</a></p> - -<p>This last statement of Egede is most important, -since it proves the existence of feelings which seem -really to contain the keynote of the symbol of capture, -however slight the reasons for suspecting their -presence in particular cases. The sentiment prevalent -in Greenland has also been noticed among the Tartars, -for an authentic witness writes, ‘that if one tells -a Tartar girl that it is said she is about to be married, -she runs immediately out of the room and will never -speak to a stranger on that subject.’<a name="FNanchor_286" id="FNanchor_286"></a><a href="#Footnote_286" class="fnanchor">[286]</a> It has been -justly observed that it is unlikely feminine delicacy -should diminish with civilization. But the principle -<i>impuris omnia impura</i> will meet the difficulty. The -Aleutian Islander, says a Russian writer, ‘knows nothing -of what civilized nations call modesty. He has -his own ideas of what is modest and proper, while we -should consider them foolish.’<a name="FNanchor_287" id="FNanchor_287"></a><a href="#Footnote_287" class="fnanchor">[287]</a> For, addicted though -he is to the worst vices of the Northern nations, he will -yet blush to address his wife or ask her for anything -in the presence of strangers, and will be bashful if<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_201" id="Page_201">[201]</a></span> -he be caught doing anything unusual, as, for instance, -buying or selling directly for himself without -the agency of an intermediary.</p> - -<p>Characteristic as it is of savages to express all the -feelings they share with us with an energy intensified -a hundredfold, as is shown abundantly in our different -manner of grieving for the dead, it is not surprising -if we find their feelings of the kind in question -display themselves in extraordinary and often ludicrous -rules of social intercourse. The same rule, that an -Aleutian husband and wife might not be seen speaking -together, led Kolbe to think that no such thing as affection -existed among the Hottentots. But this was -simply for the same reason that prohibited the Hottentot -wife from ever setting foot in her husband’s apartment -in the hut, or the latter from ever entering hers -except by stealth.<a name="FNanchor_288" id="FNanchor_288"></a><a href="#Footnote_288" class="fnanchor">[288]</a> Among the Yorubas a woman -betrothed by her parents is so far a wife that prematrimonial -unfaithfulness is accounted adultery; -‘yet conventional modesty forbids her to speak to her -husband, or even to see him, if it can be avoided.’<a name="FNanchor_289" id="FNanchor_289"></a><a href="#Footnote_289" class="fnanchor">[289]</a> A -minority of the Afghan tribes are careful to keep up a -similar reserve between the time of betrothal and marriage, -so that, as among the warlike Eusofyzes, no man -can see his wife till the completion of the marriage<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_202" id="Page_202">[202]</a></span> -ceremony.<a name="FNanchor_290" id="FNanchor_290"></a><a href="#Footnote_290" class="fnanchor">[290]</a> Among the Mongols not only may bride -and bridegroom not see each other within the same -period, but the bride is not allowed to see his parents.<a name="FNanchor_291" id="FNanchor_291"></a><a href="#Footnote_291" class="fnanchor">[291]</a> -In Russia it was once a disgrace for a young man to -propose directly to a lady, and between the day of -settling the dowry with her parents and the day of -marriage he was strictly forbidden the house of his -betrothed.<a name="FNanchor_292" id="FNanchor_292"></a><a href="#Footnote_292" class="fnanchor">[292]</a> But many tribes continue such reserve -even after marriage. A Circassian bridegroom must -not see his wife or live with her without the greatest -mystery: ‘this reserve continues during life. A Circassian -will sometimes permit a stranger to see his -wife, but he must not accompany him.’<a name="FNanchor_293" id="FNanchor_293"></a><a href="#Footnote_293" class="fnanchor">[293]</a> In parts of -Fiji which are still unmodified by Christian teaching -it is ‘quite contrary to ideas of delicacy that a man ever -remains under the same roof with his wife or wives at -night.’ If they wish to meet, they must appoint a -secret rendezvous.<a name="FNanchor_294" id="FNanchor_294"></a><a href="#Footnote_294" class="fnanchor">[294]</a> And a similar law of social decorum -prevails, or prevailed, among the Spartans, -Lycians, Turcomans, and some tribes of America,<a name="FNanchor_295" id="FNanchor_295"></a><a href="#Footnote_295" class="fnanchor">[295]</a> -though the processes of thought which led to such customs -lie lost, perhaps hopelessly, behind the darkness -of a thousand ages.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_203" id="Page_203">[203]</a></span></p> - -<p>The custom, again, of deserting a husband and -returning home for a longer or shorter period, as -found among the Votyaks of Russia and the Mezeyne -Arabs, may possibly be traced to feelings of the same -description, for we read that among the Hos, ‘after -remaining with her husband for three days only, it is -<i>the correct thing for the wife to run away</i> from him -and tell all her friends that she loves him not, and -will see him no more;’ it is also <i>correct</i> for the husband -to manifest great anxiety for his loss, and diligently -to seek his wife, and ‘when he finds her <i>he -carries her off by main force</i>.’<a name="FNanchor_296" id="FNanchor_296"></a><a href="#Footnote_296" class="fnanchor">[296]</a> This second show -of resistance, customary also among the Votyaks, -seems difficult to explain as a traditional symbol of -a system of capture.</p> - -<p>It is possible that in similar primitive ideas originated -the curious restrictions on the intercourse between -a man and his mother-in-law, or between a -woman and her father-in-law. On the theory that -these are remnants of the real anger shown by parents -when capture was real, it is not easy to account for -the fact that in Fiji the restriction as to eating or -speaking together existed not only between parents -and children-in-law, or brothers and sisters-in-law, but -between brothers and sisters of the same family, and -also between first cousins.<a name="FNanchor_297" id="FNanchor_297"></a><a href="#Footnote_297" class="fnanchor">[297]</a> In Suffolk ‘it is (or was) -very remarkable that neither father nor mother of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_204" id="Page_204">[204]</a></span> -bride or bridegroom come with them to church’ at the -weddings of agricultural labourers; and it is said that -at Russian weddings also the parents are forbidden -to be present, though the priest sometimes waives -the prohibition in favour of persons of the higher -classes.<a name="FNanchor_298" id="FNanchor_298"></a><a href="#Footnote_298" class="fnanchor">[298]</a></p> - -<p>There is, therefore, no <i>à priori</i> inconceivability -against the theory that kicking and screaming at -weddings, where they do not arise from genuine reluctance, -are really a tribute to conventional propriety; -that, at the marriages of the uncivilized, just as at -their burials, shrieks and violence take the place of -tears, and a vigorous struggle argues a modest deportment. -The evidence of quite independent eye-witnesses -confirms this interpretation. The Thlinkeet -Indian, on his wedding-day, goes to the bride’s house -and sits with his back to her door. All her relations -then ‘raise a song, to allure the coy bride out of the -corner where she has been sitting;’ after which she -goes to sit by her husband’s side; but ‘<i>all this time -she must keep her head bowed down</i>,’ nor is she allowed -to take part in the festivities of the day.<a name="FNanchor_299" id="FNanchor_299"></a><a href="#Footnote_299" class="fnanchor">[299]</a></p> - -<p>Atkinson, who was witness of the first visit of a -Kirghiz bridegroom to his wife, declares that the -latter could only be persuaded by the pressure of her -female relations to see him at all; ‘after a display of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_205" id="Page_205">[205]</a></span> -much coyness she consented, and was led by her -friends to his dwelling.’<a name="FNanchor_300" id="FNanchor_300"></a><a href="#Footnote_300" class="fnanchor">[300]</a></p> - -<p>In Kamschatka the original etiquette was for -women to cover their faces with some kind of veil -when they went out, and if they met any man on the -road whom they could not avoid, to stand with their -backs to him until he had passed. They would also, -if a stranger entered their huts, turn their face to the -wall or else hide behind a curtain of nettles.<a name="FNanchor_301" id="FNanchor_301"></a><a href="#Footnote_301" class="fnanchor">[301]</a> Kamschatka, -however, being the last place where one would -have looked for such prudery, it is possible that the -feelings of the Greenlanders were also operative in -the marriage customs of the Kamschadals. These -were rather extraordinary, the form of capture being -anything but a mere symbol for an aspirant to matrimony. -Such an one, having looked for a bride in some -neighbouring village (seldom in his own), would offer -his services to the parent for a fixed term, and after some -time would ask for leave to seize the daughter for his -bride. This obtained, he would seek to find her alone or -ill-attended, the marriage being complete on his tearing -from her some of the coats, fish-nets, and straps -with which from the day of proposal she was constantly -enveloped. This was never an easy matter, for she -was never left alone a single instant, her mother and -a number of old women accompanying her everywhere,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_206" id="Page_206">[206]</a></span> -sleeping with her, and never losing her out of -sight upon any pretext whatever. Any attempt to execute -his task entailed upon the suitor such kicking, -hair-pulling, and face-scratching, at the hands of this -female body-guard, that sometimes a year or more -would elapse before he was entitled to call himself a -husband; nay, there is record of one pertinacious -bachelor who found himself at the end of seven years, -in consequence of such treatment, not a husband, -but a cripple. If he were disheartened by repeated -failures he incurred great disgrace and lost all claim -to the alliance; and if the bride continued obdurate -from real dislike, he was ultimately expelled from the -village.<a name="FNanchor_302" id="FNanchor_302"></a><a href="#Footnote_302" class="fnanchor">[302]</a> But, however well-disposed towards him -she might be, she had always to simulate refusal as a -point of honour, and proof was always required ‘that -she was taken by surprise and made fruitless efforts -to defend herself.’<a name="FNanchor_303" id="FNanchor_303"></a><a href="#Footnote_303" class="fnanchor">[303]</a></p> - -<p>The Bushmen, again, generally betroth their -daughters as children without consulting them; but -should a girl grow up unbetrothed her consent to be -married is as necessary as that of her parents to her<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_207" id="Page_207">[207]</a></span> -lover’s suit, ‘and on this occasion his attentions are -received with an affectation of great alarm and disinclination -on her part.’<a name="FNanchor_304" id="FNanchor_304"></a><a href="#Footnote_304" class="fnanchor">[304]</a></p> - -<p>If, then, Greenlanders, Kamschadals, Thlinkeet -Indians, and even Bushmen, carry their notions of -propriety to the extent asserted by eye-witnesses, it -is scarcely surprising to find very similar rules of -etiquette among the more advanced Zulus of Africa -or Bedouins of Arabia in their wedding ceremonials; -especially when we are told that in some parts Bedouin -women sit down and turn their backs to any -man they cannot avoid on the road, and refuse to -take anything from the hands of a stranger.<a name="FNanchor_305" id="FNanchor_305"></a><a href="#Footnote_305" class="fnanchor">[305]</a> ‘The -principal idea of a Kaffir wedding seems to be to -show the great unwillingness of the girl to be transformed -into a wife,’ for which reason a Zulu wife -simulates several attempts to escape.<a name="FNanchor_306" id="FNanchor_306"></a><a href="#Footnote_306" class="fnanchor">[306]</a> Both the -Arabs of Sinai and the Aenezes enact the form of -capture to the greatest perfection; among the latter -‘the bashful girl’ runs from the tent of one friend -to another till she is caught at last, whilst among the -former she acquires permanent repute in proportion -to her struggles of resistance. And if a Sinai Arab -marries a bride belonging to a distant tribe, she is -placed on a camel and led to her husband’s camp -escorted by women: during which procession ‘<i>decency<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_208" id="Page_208">[208]</a></span> -obliges her to cry and sob most bitterly</i>.’<a name="FNanchor_307" id="FNanchor_307"></a><a href="#Footnote_307" class="fnanchor">[307]</a> Also, among -the modern Egyptians, ‘if the bridegroom is young, -one of his friends has to <i>carry him</i> part of the way to -the hareem, to <i>show his bashfulness</i>.’<a name="FNanchor_308" id="FNanchor_308"></a><a href="#Footnote_308" class="fnanchor">[308]</a> So that where -the carrying of the bride or bridegroom is not merely -due to the same feelings that caused our own ancestors -to add solemnity to their weddings by such -singular sights as blue postilions, it appears in many -cases to be nothing more than a prudish way of saying, -that matrimony is and ought to be an estate -forced upon reluctant victims, not entered upon by -voluntary agents. The early Christian Church said -the same; but where the saint and the savage meet -in sentiment they differ in expression.</p> - -<p>Were it not for some of the concomitant and incidental -signs, the bowed or veiled head, the dishevelled -hair, it might be said that the positive statements of -Cranz, Egede, Burchell, and other writers arose from -malobservation or from pure mistake. This objection, -therefore, is of little avail; and however difficult it -may be to account for the presence of such sentiments -among tribes of so rude a type as the Esquimaux, the -Kamschadals, and the Bushmen, the fact remains, -that in the cases above cited the ‘form of capture’ is -explicable as having its origin in primitive conceptions -of what is due to delicacy; as being, in fact,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_209" id="Page_209">[209]</a></span> -the original expression of them in the language of -pantomime so common to savages.<a name="FNanchor_309" id="FNanchor_309"></a><a href="#Footnote_309" class="fnanchor">[309]</a> And the presence -of such feelings of delicacy may be often suspected, -even where they are not directly mentioned, -in the ceremony of capture; as, for instance, in the -African kingdom of Futa, where the form of capture -prevails in the usual way, but where we have the indirect -evidence that for months after marriage the -bride never stirs abroad without a veil, and that Futa -wives are ‘so bashful that they never permit their husbands -to see them unveiled for three years after their -marriage.’<a name="FNanchor_310" id="FNanchor_310"></a><a href="#Footnote_310" class="fnanchor">[310]</a></p> - -<p>There is, however, no reason to press this explanation -too far, nor to account it the only efficient cause. -Quite as potent, and perhaps a more natural one, is -dislike and disinclination on the part of the bride, -which compels the bridegroom to resort to force. The -conditions of savage life are a sufficient explanation of -this, irrespective of any old custom of capturing wives -out of a tribe by reason of a prejudice against marrying -within it. A man proposes personally or mediately<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_210" id="Page_210">[210]</a></span> -to the parents or relations of the woman he fancies -for a wife; if they consent to accept him as a son-in-law -and they agree as to a price, there is a reserved -stipulation on the part of the vendor: ‘<i>If you can get -her.</i>’ In Tartary, in the thirteenth century, after such -a bargain, the daughter would flee to one of her kinsfolk -to hide; the father would say to the husband, -‘My daughter is yours; take her wheresoever you can -find her.’ The suitor, seeking with his friends till he -found her, would then take her by force and carry her -home.<a name="FNanchor_311" id="FNanchor_311"></a><a href="#Footnote_311" class="fnanchor">[311]</a> Here the girl’s reluctance is not so much -feigned as overridden, and is only so far formal in that -it is entirely disregarded. Often it is no mere ceremony -on her part, but a natural and genuine protest—a -protest against being treated as a chattel, not as -an individual—but a protest which, opposed as it is to -parental persuasion and marital force, tends, as far as -the husband is concerned, to pass into the region of -the merest ceremony.</p> - -<p>A few instances will suffice to illustrate the co-operation -of dislike and force in savage matrimony. -In some Californian tribes the consent of the girl -is necessary, although ‘if she violently opposes the -match she is seldom compelled to marry or to be sold.’ -Among the Neshenam tribe of the same people ‘the -girl has no voice whatever in the matter, and resistance<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_211" id="Page_211">[211]</a></span> -on her part merely occasions brute force to be used -by her purchaser.’<a name="FNanchor_312" id="FNanchor_312"></a><a href="#Footnote_312" class="fnanchor">[312]</a> So in the Utah country, where -‘families and tribes living at peace would steal each -others’ wives and children and sell them as slaves,’ a -wife is usually bought of her parents; but should -she refuse, ‘the warrior collects his friends, <i>carries off -the recusant fair</i>,’ and thus espouses her.<a name="FNanchor_313" id="FNanchor_313"></a><a href="#Footnote_313" class="fnanchor">[313]</a> So among -the Navajoes ‘the consent of the father is absolute, -and the one so purchased assents <i>or is taken away by -force</i>.’<a name="FNanchor_314" id="FNanchor_314"></a><a href="#Footnote_314" class="fnanchor">[314]</a> It is the same with the Horse Indians of -Patagonia. There, as elsewhere, it is common for a -cacique to have several wives, and poor men only -one, marriages being ‘made by sale more frequently -than by mutual agreement.’ The price is often -high, and girls are betrothed without their knowledge -in infancy and married without their consent -at maturity. But ‘if a girl dislikes a match -made for her she resists; and although <i>dragged -forcibly to the tent of her lawful owner</i>, plagues him so -much by her contumacy that he at last turns her -away, and sells her to the person on whom she has -fixed her affections.’<a name="FNanchor_315" id="FNanchor_315"></a><a href="#Footnote_315" class="fnanchor">[315]</a> In Africa, Yorubas, Mandingoes, -and Koossa Kafirs follow the custom of infant betrothal -(and it is worth notice as being quite in accordance<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_212" id="Page_212">[212]</a></span> -with the theory that kinship was originally traced -through mothers, that Yoruba, Mandingo, and Loango -Africans, and some Esquimaux tribes, regard the -mother’s consent only as necessary to an engagement);<a name="FNanchor_316" id="FNanchor_316"></a><a href="#Footnote_316" class="fnanchor">[316]</a> -but sometimes a Yoruba girl, when the time -comes for her to fulfil her mother’s engagement, -preferring some other than the intended husband, -absolutely refuses to co-operate. ‘Then she is either -teased and worried into submission or the husband -agrees to receive back her dowry and release her.’<a name="FNanchor_317" id="FNanchor_317"></a><a href="#Footnote_317" class="fnanchor">[317]</a> -A Mandingo girl must either marry a suitor chosen -for her or remain ever afterwards unmarried. Should -she refuse, the lover is authorized by the parents ‘by -the laws of the country to seize on the girl as his -slave.’<a name="FNanchor_318" id="FNanchor_318"></a><a href="#Footnote_318" class="fnanchor">[318]</a> If a Koossa girl, bound by the contract of her -parents, ‘makes any attempt at resisting the union, -corporal punishment is even resorted to, in order to -compel her submission.’<a name="FNanchor_319" id="FNanchor_319"></a><a href="#Footnote_319" class="fnanchor">[319]</a></p> - -<p>It appears, therefore, that resistance on the part -of the bride in many cases procures her ultimate release, -so that her wishes in the matter are always an -element to be considered. In all contracts of marriage, -to which she is seldom a party, there is accordingly, -in the nature of things, an implied covenant that a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_213" id="Page_213">[213]</a></span> -daughter shall be so far allowed a voice in the matter -that if she can make good her resistance she shall not -become the property of the intending purchaser. The -frequency with which it must have occurred that a -girl would defeat a match she disliked by flight, elopement, -or resistance, would tend to create a sort of -common law right, for all daughters sold in marriage -to a certain ‘run’ for their independence;<a name="FNanchor_320" id="FNanchor_320"></a><a href="#Footnote_320" class="fnanchor">[320]</a> and the -amusement naturally connected with the exercise of -such a right would help to preserve the custom in a -modified form; so that, however slight in some cases -might be the modesty of the bride or her dislike of -her suitor, her friends, if only for the sport of the thing, -would gladly enact the fiction of an outrage to be -resented, of a woman to be defended. In all the interesting -cases of the form of capture cited by Sir -John Lubbock it appears that in eight (that is, among -the Mantras, the Kalmucks, the Fuejians, the Fijians, -the New Zealanders, the Papuans of New Guinea, the -Philippine Islanders, and the African Kafirs and -Futas), the ceremony affords the bride a chance of an -effectual escape from a match she dislikes. Should -she fly, should she hide successfully, or should her -friends defend her successfully, the contract between<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_214" id="Page_214">[214]</a></span> -her parents and suitor becomes null and void; or sometimes, -as among the Zulus and Bassutos, the price for -her is raised.<a name="FNanchor_321" id="FNanchor_321"></a><a href="#Footnote_321" class="fnanchor">[321]</a> And it is remarkable with what precision -the rules of the chase have been elaborated in -many instances; as by the Oleepas of Central California, -among whom, if a bride is found twice out of -three times, she is legally the seeker’s; and the bridegroom, -if he fails the first time, is allowed a second -and final attempt a few weeks later. ‘The simple -result is, that if the girl likes him she hides where she -is easily found; but if she disapproves of the match a -dozen Indians cannot find her.’<a name="FNanchor_322" id="FNanchor_322"></a><a href="#Footnote_322" class="fnanchor">[322]</a></p> - -<p>Other feelings would also be present to sustain the -pretence of wife-capture. For the savage parent, in -parting with his daughter for a favourable settlement, -does not act from gratuitous cruelty; he provides for -her future as best he can, sometimes in accordance -with her wishes, sometimes against them. As a rule -marriage for her is a change for the worse; but if -she does not dislike the bridegroom to the extent of -availing herself of her prescriptive and real chance of -escape, her natural feelings for her parents and relations<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_215" id="Page_215">[215]</a></span> -would make it incumbent on her at least to affect -a dutiful regret at leaving them (in cases where she -does), by a half-bashful, half-serious resistance. It -would be difficult to find a case of capture, whether -in form or in fact, which is not readily explicable as -simply the outcome of the natural affections and their -protest against so artificial an arrangement as marriage -by purchase; for with marriage by purchase the form -of capture always co-exists, so that capture was not -necessarily an earlier mode of marriage than that by -purchase or agreement. The mock fights between -the party of the bride and that of the bridegroom -among so many Indian tribes;<a name="FNanchor_323" id="FNanchor_323"></a><a href="#Footnote_323" class="fnanchor">[323]</a> the dances, lasting -several days, during which it is the business of the -squaws to keep the bridegroom at a distance from his -bride, among the Tucanas of South America;<a name="FNanchor_324" id="FNanchor_324"></a><a href="#Footnote_324" class="fnanchor">[324]</a> the similar -duty which devolves on the matrons of the tribe -at Sumatran weddings;<a name="FNanchor_325" id="FNanchor_325"></a><a href="#Footnote_325" class="fnanchor">[325]</a> the mock skirmishes at Arab -weddings, and the efforts of the negresses to keep the -bridegroom away from the camel of the bride;<a name="FNanchor_326" id="FNanchor_326"></a><a href="#Footnote_326" class="fnanchor">[326]</a> these -are surely more intelligible, as arising from the rude -ideas and customs of savage life, than as being survivals, -artificially preserved, of a time when the bride -was really fought for or stolen; and if such explanation<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_216" id="Page_216">[216]</a></span> -is sufficient, should it not logically be admitted -before resorting to the hypothesis of a practice whose -very existence is rather an inference from such ceremonies -than a cause observable in actual operation?</p> - -<p>To pass to a third and quite distinct class of marriages -by capture, in which the essential element is -not maidenly bashfulness nor real repugnance, but the -voluntary elopement of a girl with her lover, in defeat -of a prior contract of betrothal. The large part which -questions of profit and property play in savage betrothals -can never be lost sight of, in estimating the -causes of real wife abduction, either within or without -the tribe. The primary conception of a daughter is a -saleable possession, a source of profit, to her clan in -marketings with other clans or to her parents in their -bargains in her own clan. This fact alone militates -against the supposition of the wide prevalence of -female infanticide in primitive communities, the prejudice -being rather in favour of killing the boys than -the girls; not solely for the use of the latter as slaves -and labourers, but for the price which even among -Fuejians or Bushmen is payable in some form or -another for their companionship as wives. Abiponian -mothers spared their girls oftener than their boys, -because their sons when grown up would want wherewithal -to purchase a wife, and so tend to impoverish -them; whilst their daughters would bring them in -money by their sale in that capacity.<a name="FNanchor_327" id="FNanchor_327"></a><a href="#Footnote_327" class="fnanchor">[327]</a> To raise the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_217" id="Page_217">[217]</a></span> -price by limiting the supply was also the reason why -the Guanas of America preferred to bury their girls -alive rather than their boys.<a name="FNanchor_328" id="FNanchor_328"></a><a href="#Footnote_328" class="fnanchor">[328]</a></p> - -<p>From this view of daughters as saleable commodities -comes polygamy for the rich, polyandry, or -illicit elopement, for the poor. Among the Hos of -India so high at one time was the price in cattle placed -by parents on their daughters that the large number of -adult unmarried girls became a ‘very peculiar feature -in the social state of every considerable village of the -Kohlán.’ What, then, was the result? That ‘young -men counteracted the machinations of avaricious -parents against the course of true love by <i>forcibly -carrying off the girl</i>,’ thus avoiding extortion by running -away with her. The parents in such cases had -to submit to terms proposed by arbitrators; but at -last wife-abduction became so common that it could -only be checked by the limitation by general consent -of the number of cattle payable at marriage.<a name="FNanchor_329" id="FNanchor_329"></a><a href="#Footnote_329" class="fnanchor">[329]</a></p> - -<p>‘A very singular scene,’ it is said, ‘may sometimes -be noticed in the markets of Singbhoom. A -young man suddenly makes a pounce on a girl and -carries her off bodily, his friends covering the retreat -(like a group from the picture of the Rape of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_218" id="Page_218">[218]</a></span> -Sabines). This is generally a <i>summary method of -surmounting the obstacles that cruel parents may have -placed in the lovers’ path</i>; but though it is sometimes -done in anticipation of the favourable inclination of -the girl herself, and in spite of her struggles and -tears, no disinterested person interferes, and the girls, -late companions of the abducted maiden, often applaud -the exploit.’<a name="FNanchor_330" id="FNanchor_330"></a><a href="#Footnote_330" class="fnanchor">[330]</a></p> - -<p>In Afghanistan the pecuniary value of women has -given rise to the curious custom of assessing part of -the fines in criminal cases in a certain number of -young women payable in atonement as wives to the -plaintiff or to his relations from the family of the -defendant. Thus murder is or was expiated by the -payment of twelve young women; the cutting off a -hand, an ear, or a nose by that of six; the breaking -of a tooth by that of three; a wound above the forehead -by that of one. This was the logical result of -the state of thought which produces wife-purchase; -but there was also another. For in the country parts, -where matches generally begin in attachment, an -enterprising lover may avoid the obstacle of parental -consent by a form of capture, which has a legal -sanction, though it does not exempt the captor from -subsequent payment. This consists in a man’s ‘seizing -an opportunity of cutting off a lock of her (the woman’s)<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_219" id="Page_219">[219]</a></span> -hair, snatching away her veil, or throwing a sheet -over her, and claiming her as his affianced wife.’ But -the most common expedient is an ordinary elopement; -though this is held an outrage to a family -equivalent to the murder of one of its members; and -being pursued with the same rancour, is often the -cause of long and bloody wars between the clans; -for as the fugitive couple are never refused an -asylum, ‘the seduction of a woman of one Oolooss -by a man of another, or a man’s eloping with a girl -of his own Oolooss,’ is the commonest cause of -feuds between the clans.<a name="FNanchor_331" id="FNanchor_331"></a><a href="#Footnote_331" class="fnanchor">[331]</a></p> - -<p>Love attachments, in defeat of parental plans, -lead to very similar results in Bokhara. For ‘the -daughter of a Turcoman has a high price; and the -swain, in despair of making a legitimate purchase, -seizes his sweetheart, seats her behind him on the -same horse, and gallops off to the nearest camp, -where the parties are united, and separation is impossible. -The parents and relations pursue the lovers, -and the marriage is adjusted by an intermarriage -with some female relation of the bridegroom, while -he himself becomes bound to pay so many camels and -horses as the price of his bride.’<a name="FNanchor_332" id="FNanchor_332"></a><a href="#Footnote_332" class="fnanchor">[332]</a></p> - -<p>There is, therefore, evidence to justify the theory -that the form of capture may often be explained as<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_220" id="Page_220">[220]</a></span> -an attempt to regulate by law the danger to a tribe -arising from too frequent elopements, naturally resulting -from the abuse of the parental right of selling -daughters. In Sumatra the defeat of matrimonial -plans by an elopement with a preferred suitor is so -common as to be sanctioned and regulated by law, -being known as the system of marriage by <i>telari -gadis</i>; the father in such a case having to pay the -fine to which he would have been liable for bestowing -his daughter after engagement to another suitor, and -only being allowed to recover her, if he catches her in -immediate pursuit. ‘When the parties,’ says Mr. -McLennan, ‘cannot agree about the price, nothing is -more common among the Kalmucks, Kirghiz, Nogais, -and Circassians than to carry the lady off by actual -force of arms. The wooer having once got the lady -into his <i>yurt</i>, she is his wife by the law, and peace is -established by her relations coming to terms as to the -price.’ So too in England, elopements have often -preceded and promoted more definite marriage settlements, -or, with some slight observances, have stood -legally as a substitute for them.</p> - -<p>Considering, then, that the affections and wishes -do not count for nothing even among savages; -considering that among savages, more even than in -civilized life, marriage is a question of property and -of means, so that, whilst the richest members of a -tribe almost universally have several wives, it is often<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_221" id="Page_221">[221]</a></span> -all that the poorer can do to get a wife at all, we -have a set of circumstances leading naturally sometimes -to voluntary elopement on the part of the girl, -in defeat of her parents, sometimes to literal wife-capture -by a man otherwise unable to become a -husband. This condition of things leads of necessity -to polyandry and wife-robbery. In some Australian -tribes, owing to a disproportion between the sexes, -many men have to steal a wife from a neighbouring -horde. But it is not their normal recognized mode -of marriage. On the contrary, their laws on this -subject are somewhat elaborate; and as it appears -that before that state of society in which a daughter -belongs to her father there is one in which she -belongs to her mother, and perhaps a still prior state -in which she belongs to her tribe, so from their birth -Australian girls are appropriated to certain males of -the tribe, nor can the parents annul the obligation. -If the male dies the mother may then bestow her -daughter on whom she will, for by the death of her -legal owner the girl becomes to some extent the -property of her relations, who have certain claims on -her services for the procurement of food. But to the -surrender of a girl by her mother the full consent of -the whole tribe is necessary; and if, as sometimes -happens, ‘the young people, listening rather to the -dictates of inclination than those of law, improvise -a marriage by absconding together,’ they incur the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_222" id="Page_222">[222]</a></span> -fatal enmity of the whole tribe.<a name="FNanchor_333" id="FNanchor_333"></a><a href="#Footnote_333" class="fnanchor">[333]</a> According to Bonwick, -a Tasmanian or Australian woman was never -stolen contrary to her expectations or wishes. Only if -all other schemes to have her own way failed, would a -girl face the penalty of having ‘the spear of the disappointed, -the spear of the guardian, and the spears of the -tribe’ thrown at her, for her breach of tribal law.<a name="FNanchor_334" id="FNanchor_334"></a><a href="#Footnote_334" class="fnanchor">[334]</a></p> - -<p>The conception of the daughters of a clan as its -property, as a source of contingent wealth to it, of -additional income to it in sheep, dogs, or whatever -the medium of exchange, tends to keep up in many -cases that prohibition to marry in the same clan or -subdivision of a tribe which is known as exogamy. -Among the Hindu Kafirs it is said to be uncertain -why a man may not sell his girls to his own tribe, -and why a man must always buy his wife from -another; but it is certain that for this reason the -more girls a man has born to him the better he is -pleased and the richer his tribe becomes.<a name="FNanchor_335" id="FNanchor_335"></a><a href="#Footnote_335" class="fnanchor">[335]</a> A Khond -father distributes among the heads of the families, -belonging to his branch of a tribe, the sum raised on -behalf of a son-in-law by subscription from the son-in-law’s -branch. But, supposing a great inequality of -wealth to arise between different clans, originally -united by profitable intermarriages, it might become<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_223" id="Page_223">[223]</a></span> -more profitable to sell within the clan than outside it, -so that the same motives of interest which, under some -circumstances, would tend to encourage exogamy -would under others lead to the opposite principle, a -rich bridegroom of the same clan being preferable to -a poor one of another, whether the gain accrued to a -girl’s parents or her clan. It is, perhaps, for this reason -that a Hindu Kooch incurs a fine if he marries a -woman of another clan, becoming a bondsman till his -wife redeems him; that is, till she pays back to his clan -or its chief what the bridegroom, by purchasing her, -has alienated from the use of the tribe.<a name="FNanchor_336" id="FNanchor_336"></a><a href="#Footnote_336" class="fnanchor">[336]</a> On the other -hand, the reason given by the Khonds for marrying -women from distant places was, that they gave much -smaller sums than for women of their own tribe.<a name="FNanchor_337" id="FNanchor_337"></a><a href="#Footnote_337" class="fnanchor">[337]</a></p> - -<p>Exogamy and endogamy would thus co-exist, as -the customs of tribes that have attained to a more -or less complete recognition of the rights of property, -and are so far advanced as to be capable -of preserving complex rules of social organization. -Marriages, therefore, under either <i>régime</i> are matters -generally of friendly settlement, of ordinary contract; -and where such arrangements are defeated by the -perversity of the principal parties—namely, the bride -or the bridegroom—what more natural than the -device of giving legal sanction to an elopement by -settling a subsequent compensation with the parent?</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_224" id="Page_224">[224]</a></span></p> - -<p>The custom of exogamy is so widely spread over -the world that its origin must be sought in conditions -as prevalent as itself, and it is possible that it arose -out of the same condition which certainly sustains it -and is co-extensive with itself, namely, from the -marketable position of women. That female infanticide -should have led to it is improbable, not only from -the comparative rarity of the practice among the -<i>rudest</i> tribes, but from the negative instance of the -Todas, a wild Indian hill-tribe, who, notwithstanding -the scarcity of their women, and a scarcity actually -attributed to former female infanticide, ‘never contract -marriage with the other tribes, though living -together on most friendly terms.’<a name="FNanchor_338" id="FNanchor_338"></a><a href="#Footnote_338" class="fnanchor">[338]</a> Judging <i>à priori</i>, -we should expect to find as of earlier date a prejudice -in favour of tribal exclusiveness, of strict endogamy. -The idea of the Abors that marriage out of the clan is -a sin only to be washed out by sacrifice—a sin so -great as to cause war among the elements, and even -obscuration of the sun and moon—has a more archaic -appearance than the contrary principle; and the -confinement of marriages to a few families of known -purity of descent is characteristic of some of the -lowest Hindu castes.<a name="FNanchor_339" id="FNanchor_339"></a><a href="#Footnote_339" class="fnanchor">[339]</a> The prejudice against foreign -women is so strong that there is often a tendency to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_225" id="Page_225">[225]</a></span> -regard female prisoners of war as merely slaves, as -not of the same rank with the real wives of their -captors. Thus, ‘though the different tribes of the -Aht nation are frequently at war with one another, -women are not captured from other tribes for -marriage, but only to be kept as slaves. The idea of -slavery connected with capture is so common that a -free-born Aht would hesitate to marry a woman -taken in war, whatever her rank had been in her own -tribe.’<a name="FNanchor_340" id="FNanchor_340"></a><a href="#Footnote_340" class="fnanchor">[340]</a> The Caribs, too, if they kept female prisoners -as wives always regarded them as slaves, as standing -on a lower level than their legitimate wives.<a name="FNanchor_341" id="FNanchor_341"></a><a href="#Footnote_341" class="fnanchor">[341]</a></p> - -<p>Leaving, however, the obscure problem of the origin -of exogamy, there is a point of view from which both -that and endogamy are one. For exogamy as regards -the subdivisions of a tribe is endogamy as regards -the tribe itself, tending in fact to preserve tribal -unity and to check an indefinite divergency of interests -and dialects. For example, where a Hindoo caste or -tribe is composed of several Gotrams, no person of -whom may marry an individual of the same Gotram, -it is evident that the unity of the tribe is actually -sustained by the exogamy of its constituent parts. -Such a custom therefore, howsoever originated, would, -as serviceable in maintaining tribal unity against -hostile neighbouring people, tend to survive from -motives of common expediency, from its adaptation<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_226" id="Page_226">[226]</a></span> -to the interests of peace; a beneficial result of the -system which in Mr. Bancroft’s account of the Thlinkeet -and Kutchin Indians clearly appears.<a name="FNanchor_342" id="FNanchor_342"></a><a href="#Footnote_342" class="fnanchor">[342]</a> The -Thlinkeets are nationally divided into two great clans, -under the totems of the Wolf and the Raven, and -these two are again subdivided into numerous sub-totems. -‘In this clanship some singular social facts -present themselves. People are at once thrust widely -apart and yet drawn together. Tribes of the same -clan may not war on each other, but at the same time -members of the same clan may not marry each other. -Thus the young Wolf warrior must seek his mate -among the Ravens.... <i>Obviously this singular -social fancy tends greatly to keep the various tribes of -the nation at peace.</i>’ The Kutchins, again, are divided -into three castes, resident in different territories, no -two persons of the same caste being allowed to marry. -‘<i>This system operates strongly against war between -the tribes</i>, as in war it is caste against caste, not -tribe against tribe. As the father is never of the -same caste as the son, who receives clanship from the -mother, there can never be international war without -ranging fathers and sons against each other.’ So -among the Khonds, who punish intermarriage between -persons of the same tribe with death, the intervention -of the women was always essential to peace, -as they were neutral between the tribe of their fathers<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_227" id="Page_227">[227]</a></span> -and that of their husbands.<a name="FNanchor_343" id="FNanchor_343"></a><a href="#Footnote_343" class="fnanchor">[343]</a> But it is difficult to -think that, if hostile relations between exogamous -clans became permanent, the several clans would still -insist on exogamous marriages as the only marriages -legally valid, and consequently regard the use of force -or fraud as the only legitimate title to a wife.</p> - -<p>It seems indeed certain that wherever the rule of -exogamy exists it may be analysed into a prohibition -to marry within the divisions of a larger group; that -larger group being consciously recognised as uniting -the divergent families by resemblance of dialect, -common political ties, or a traditional common -descent. The Kalmucks, for instance, call themselves -‘the peculiar people,’ or ‘the four allies,’ and any -danger of their national dissolution is obviously -diminished by the very fact of the exogamy of their -four clans. The Circassians, whose constituent brotherhoods -are exogamous, by the occasional assemblies of -the brotherhoods for the settlement of disputes, show -a consciousness of their political unity, which by the -exogamy of the brotherhoods they help to maintain. -The Hindu castes preserve their mutual exclusiveness -by the very fact of compelling all their constituent -families to intermingle in marriage, and so preventing -any one of them from dissolving the common relationship -by absolute separation or independent growth. -So that exogamy rather sustains than prevents a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_228" id="Page_228">[228]</a></span> -system of marriages within the same stock, and is a -mark of a higher conception of social organisation, -when people have learned to classify themselves with -respect to their neighbours, when tribal and personal -property is well established, and when, consequently, -marriages between the groups can be effected by -purchase better than by violence. Exogamy therefore -as the product or concomitant of a somewhat -advanced state of thought, not of utter barbarism, -would never make marriages by capture a necessity -of existence; but, if it did, it would argue so much -culture in a tribe capable of maintaining such rules, as -would equally justify us in ascribing to them moral -feelings, not less advanced and refined than those -involved in their adherence to so restrictive a political -system.</p> - -<p>South Australia supplies a typical illustration of -the confusion relating to intertribal marriages which -arises from the vague use of the word <i>tribe</i>. For -wherever there is reason to suspect that the word clan -or family should stand for the word tribe, it is probable -that the exogamy predicated of the tribe only -prevails between its constituent elements; in other -words, that it is only, as among the Kalmucks, Circassians, -or Hindu castes, an extended form of the -principle of endogamy. Thus, Collins, describing -wife-capture in New South Wales, says that ‘it is -believed’ the women so taken are always selected<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_229" id="Page_229">[229]</a></span> -from women of a different tribe from that of the -males, and from one with whom they are at enmity; -that as wives ‘they are incorporated into the tribes -to which their husbands belong, and but seldom quit -them for others.’ But he uses the word tribe as convertible -with the word family, as when he speaks of -the natives near Port Jackson being distributed into -families, each under the government of its own head, -and deriving its name from its place of residence.<a name="FNanchor_344" id="FNanchor_344"></a><a href="#Footnote_344" class="fnanchor">[344]</a> -And the statements of Captain Hunter, a previous -writer, that the natives are associated ‘in tribes of -many families together,’ living apparently without -a fixed residence; that ‘the tribe takes its name, -from the place of their general residence;’ and that, -the different families wander in different directions -for food, but unite on occasion of disputes with another -tribe, make it still more probable that when -Collins spoke of different tribes he meant merely, -different families, or groups, which with all their -separate wanderings united sometimes in cases of -common danger. So when Captain Hunter himself -says that ‘there is some reason to suppose that most -of their wives are taken by force from the tribes with -whom they are at variance, as the females bear no -proportion to the males,’ we may take it that by tribes -he means families, and families who recognise their -community of blood when a really different tribe<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_230" id="Page_230">[230]</a></span> -provokes their hostility by assembling as a tribe -themselves.<a name="FNanchor_345" id="FNanchor_345"></a><a href="#Footnote_345" class="fnanchor">[345]</a> Mr. Stanbridge, who spent eighteen -years in the wilds of Victoria, corroborates this view; -for, according to him, each tribe has its own boundaries, -the land of which is parcelled out amongst -families and carefully transmitted by direct descent; -these boundaries being so sacredly maintained that -the member of no one family will venture on the -lands of a neighbouring one without invitation. The -several families (or tribes) unite for mutual purposes -under a chief. The women often, but not always, -marry into distant tribes; they are generally betrothed -in their infancy, but if they grow up unbetrothed the -father’s consent must be solicited; failing him, the -brother’s; then the uncle’s; and last of all that of a -council or a chief of a tribe.<a name="FNanchor_346" id="FNanchor_346"></a><a href="#Footnote_346" class="fnanchor">[346]</a> That force was ever -the normal method by which marriages were effected -in Australia, there is no proof; that, on the contrary, -mutual likings often set the law, is proved by the -story of the native captive girl, who, after living among -the colonists for some time, expressed a desire to go -away and be married to a young native of her acquaintance; -albeit that she left him after three days, returning -sadly beaten and jealous of the other wife.<a name="FNanchor_347" id="FNanchor_347"></a><a href="#Footnote_347" class="fnanchor">[347]</a></p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_231" id="Page_231">[231]</a></span></p> - -<p>Quite distinct, again, either from the real or pretended -reluctance of a savage girl to become a bride, -or from the custom of forcing an avaricious parent to -a settlement by the shorter process of taking first and -paying afterwards, is the custom of stealing women -from the same or a neighbouring clan, a custom which -prevailed widely in Ireland and Scotland in the seventeenth -and eighteenth centuries, and which in the -latter country has been ‘glorified in a whole literature -of songs and ballads.’<a name="FNanchor_348" id="FNanchor_348"></a><a href="#Footnote_348" class="fnanchor">[348]</a></p> - -<p>That polygamy and wife-purchase and artificial -tribal regulations often lead to such a result cannot -be denied; but that it is anywhere a system, sustained -by prejudices, whencesoever derived, seems completely -unwarranted by the evidence hitherto collected. The -Coinmen of Patagonia, who made annual inroads on -the Tekeenica tribe, killing the men and carrying off -not only the women but the children, dogs, arrows, -spears, and canoes, seem to have been actuated rather -by the ordinary motives of freebooters (by such -motives, for instance, as induced our early convict -settlers in Tasmania to set off with their bullock-chains -to make captives of the native women<a name="FNanchor_349" id="FNanchor_349"></a><a href="#Footnote_349" class="fnanchor">[349]</a>) than -by any scruples of marrying relations at home. Carib -wives taken in war were accounted slaves; and so far -were the Caribs from being dependent on aggression<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_232" id="Page_232">[232]</a></span> -for their wives, that before their customs were modified -by acquaintance with the Christians their only legitimate -wives were their cousins.<a name="FNanchor_350" id="FNanchor_350"></a><a href="#Footnote_350" class="fnanchor">[350]</a> If a man had no -cousin to marry, or put off doing so till it was too -late, he might then marry some non-relative, with the -consent of her parents. At the festival that followed -a successful war the parents vied with one another -in offering their daughters as wives to those who -were praised by their captains as having fought with -bravery. The Caribs of the continent differed from -those of the islands in that men and women spoke -the same language, not having corrupted their native -tongue by marriages with foreign women.<a name="FNanchor_351" id="FNanchor_351"></a><a href="#Footnote_351" class="fnanchor">[351]</a> According -to Humboldt, the language of the Caribs of the -continent was the same, from the source of the Rio -Branco to the steppes of Cumana; and the pride -of race which led them to withdraw from every other -people, and was the cause of the failure of all missionary -efforts that tried to combine them with villages -containing people of another nation and speaking -another idiom, would surely have militated against<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_233" id="Page_233">[233]</a></span> -making exogamy a preliminary condition of matrimony.<a name="FNanchor_352" id="FNanchor_352"></a><a href="#Footnote_352" class="fnanchor">[352]</a> -Humboldt, indeed, says that polygamy was -more extensively practised by the Caribs and other -nations that ‘preserved the custom of carrying off -young girls from the neighbouring tribe;’ but it -would be contrary to all previous accounts of the -people to suppose these were their only wives, such a -supplement to domestic felicity being everywhere the -common reward, though seldom the chief object, of -successful war. The curious difference in the language -of the men and of the women found to exist among -the Caribs of the West Indian Archipelago, and -attributed by tradition to the conquest of a former -people on the islands, whose wives the conquerors -appropriated, has perhaps been rather exaggerated, for -in a list of 488 words and phrases employed by both -sexes, in only 36 is there any difference marked -between the language of the men and that of the -women. The origin of the difference may be doubted, -as there were also words and phrases used by the -old men of the people which the younger ones might -not use; and there was a war-dialect of which neither -women, girls, or boys had any knowledge.<a name="FNanchor_353" id="FNanchor_353"></a><a href="#Footnote_353" class="fnanchor">[353]</a> But -probably the difference arose from a custom similar<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_234" id="Page_234">[234]</a></span> -to that of the Zulus, which makes it unlawful for a -woman to use any word containing the sound of her -father-in-law’s name or of the names of her husband’s -male relations. ‘Whenever the emphatic syllable of -either of their proper names occurs in any other word, -she must avoid it, by either substituting an entirely new -word, or at least another syllable in its place. Hence -<i>this custom has given rise to an almost distinct language -among the women</i>.’<a name="FNanchor_354" id="FNanchor_354"></a><a href="#Footnote_354" class="fnanchor">[354]</a> In consequence of this <i>Hlonipa</i> -custom, according to another witness, ‘<i>the language at -this present time almost presents the phenomenon of a -double one</i>.’<a name="FNanchor_355" id="FNanchor_355"></a><a href="#Footnote_355" class="fnanchor">[355]</a> That the Caribs maintained the common -etiquette of reserve between parents and children-in-law,<a name="FNanchor_356" id="FNanchor_356"></a><a href="#Footnote_356" class="fnanchor">[356]</a> -makes it not improbable that the reserve extended -itself to their language, and thus produced the -same phenomenon that we find in South Africa.</p> - -<p>In the same way other cases of wife-capture appear -simply in the light of savage lawlessness, which may -have been more common among quite primitive tribes -than it is in their nearest modern representatives; but -which, if it ever was widely prevalent, is most unlikely -to have been perpetuated in symbol, by a form of capture. -If then the form is easily explicable on other -grounds, such as have been suggested, we have a reason -the less for supposing in the past a state of things<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_235" id="Page_235">[235]</a></span> -which would exclude from the relations between male -and female the happy influence of that mutual affection -which has been shown not to have been entirely absent -even among, perhaps, the rudest of our species, the -aborigines of Australia or the Veddahs of Ceylon, and -which is certainly disseminated more or less widely, -outside the human race, through a large part of the -animal creation.</p> - -<p>It is probably impossible to resuscitate in imagination -a picture of primitive times. It is with the lower -societies of the world as with the lower animal organisms: -the more they are studied, the more wonderful -is the complexity of structure they unfold. Tribal -and subtribal divisions of communities, tribal and -subtribal divisions of territory, strong distinctions of -rank, stringent rules of etiquette, are found on all -sides to characterise populations in other circumstances -of life scarcely less rude than the brute creation around -them. The first beginnings of social evolution are -lost, nor can they be observed in any known races -that appear to have advanced the least distance from -the starting-point of progress. But, as there is no -reason to suppose that the external conditions of -primitive man were ever very different from those of -existing tribes; that those, for instance, of the shell-mound -builders or the cave-dwellers differed widely -from those of existing Ahts or Bushmen, so there is -nothing unreasonable in believing, that the earliest<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_236" id="Page_236">[236]</a></span> -human denizens of the globe were endowed with the -same rudiments of feelings that prevail among them, -and that these should, even in very early times, have -produced very similar social institutions. That Greeks -and Egyptians, Chinese and Hindus, had legends -ascribing marriage to the invention of a particular -legislator, thereby implying there was a time when -marriage was not, no more proves that there was ever -a time when some sort of marriage was unrecognised -than the many legends of the origin of fire prove that -mankind were ever destitute of the blessing of its -warmth. A minimum of reflection on the subject -would produce the legend, just as reflections on the -world’s origin have produced countless legends of its -creation, of a time when it too was nonexistent. And -it will be found, wherever any known savage tribe -really practises no wedding customs, that the fact of -the marriage is distinctly recognised, either by payment -in kind or labour by the bridegroom or by -some symbolical act notifying the union to all fellow-tribesmen. -The Veddahs, for instance, according to -Tennant, used no marriage rites; but another writer -mentions, that on the day of marriage the husband -received from his bride a cord twisted by herself, which -he had to wear round his waist till his death, as a -symbol of the lastingness of the union between them. -The Kherias of India, who have no word for marriage -in their language, give public recognition to the fact<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_237" id="Page_237">[237]</a></span> -by certain rites and festivities, closely analogous to -those in vogue in neighbouring tribes. The Coroadas -of Brazil have no marriage solemnity, but the suitor -presents the bride’s parents with fruit or game, as a -tacit engagement to support her by the chase. Such -a tacit expression of willingness and ability to take -good care of his wife is a common symbolical act -among savages, even the rudest; whilst the fact that -for the married pair henceforth there will be a union -of life and fortune is indicated by many a wedding -custom, of no doubtful meaning, as by the eating of -a cake together, or by the Dyak custom of making -the married couple sit together on two bars of iron, -‘to intimate the wish of the bystanders that blessings -as lasting and health as vigorous as that metal may -attend the pair.’</p> - -<p>But symbolical acts like these—and they might -be multiplied indefinitely—presuppose an advanced -state of thought and feeling, behind which we cannot -get in the observation of any existing savage tribes; -and since they are common wherever the pretence of -capture is common, that pretence may well be symbolical -too; but symbolical, not of an earlier system -of marriage, but of a conventional regard for good -manners. Wherever the pretence of capture exists, it -exists amid conditions of life so far removed from -what might naturally be conceived as the most archaic, -that it is quite legitimate to attribute the decorous<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_238" id="Page_238">[238]</a></span> -reluctance of the bride and the resistance of her relations -at weddings to such feelings as have been proved -to prevail upon such occasions, and so to consider the -bride’s behaviour as something quite unconnected -with the lawless practice of wife-abduction, a practice -which undoubtedly prevails to a certain extent in the -savage world (chiefly in consequence of artificial social -arrangements), which may have prevailed to a still -greater extent when men lived in the caves of Périgord -or upon former continents, but which it is incredible -should ever have survived by transmission as a symbol, -as a custom worthy of religious preservation.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_239" id="Page_239">[239]</a></span></p> - -<h2 id="CHAPTER_VIII">VIII.<br /> -<span class="smaller"><i>THE FAIRY-LORE OF SAVAGES.</i></span></h2> - -<p>A comparison of some of the fancies of the rudest -known tribes of the earth concerning the nature of -the sun, the moon, and the stars, proves abundantly -not only that the demand for a reason for things is a -principle operative in every stage of human development, -but that the primitive explanation of things is -sought in the occurrences of daily experience and -given in terms and figures originally applied to terrestrial -objects. From a philosophy of nature of so -rude a type and so humble an origin spring many of -those marvellous traditions, which in after times rank -as the mythology, or perhaps serve as the religion, of -the people among whom they had birth.</p> - -<p>To begin with some of the astro-mythological -ideas of the Australians. Mr. Stanbridge mentions -the astonishment with which, as he sat by his camp -fire, he listened for the first time to the remarks of -two Australian natives as they pointed to the beautiful<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_240" id="Page_240">[240]</a></span> -constellations of Castor and Pollux, of the Pleiades -and Orion. These men belonged to a race who had -‘the reputation of being lowest in the scale of mankind,’ -who were ‘cannibals of the lowest description,’ -and ‘who had no name for numerals above two;’ yet -they could explain the wanderings of the moon, by -the story that, being once discovered trying to persuade -the wife of a certain star in Canis Major to -elope with him, he was beaten and put to flight by -the angry husband. As so frequently elsewhere, -most of the stars were bound by the ties of human -relationship, being wives, brothers, sisters, or mothers -to one another. The stars in the belt of Orion were -believed to be a group of young men dancing, whilst -the Pleiades were girls who played to them as they -danced. Two large stars in the fore legs of Centaurus -were two brave brothers who speared Tchingal -to death, and the east stars of Crux were the points -of the spears that pierced his body.<a name="FNanchor_357" id="FNanchor_357"></a><a href="#Footnote_357" class="fnanchor">[357]</a></p> - -<p>Few tribes of known savages appear to be without -conceptions of a similar nature. The Tasmanians, -according to Bonwick, were no exception to the -connection of theology with astronomy. To them -Capella was a kangaroo pursued by Castor and -Pollux, whose smoke as it was roasted might be seen -till the autumn. The Pleiades were maidens who<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_241" id="Page_241">[241]</a></span> -courted the kangaroo hunters of Orion and dug up -roots for their suppers. Two other stars were two -black men who of old appeared suddenly on a hill -and threw fire down to earth for the use of its -inhabitants; whilst two other luminaries were two -women whom a sting-ray had killed as they dived for -cray-fish, but whom these same fire-bringers restored -to life, by placing stinging ants on their breasts; then -escorting them to heaven, after they had first killed -the sting-ray.<a name="FNanchor_358" id="FNanchor_358"></a><a href="#Footnote_358" class="fnanchor">[358]</a></p> - -<p>Bushman star-lore is framed in exactly the same -way, the planets of distant solar systems sinking into -the insignificance of daily African surroundings. -What is the moon but a man who, having incurred -the wrath of the sun, is pierced by his knife till he is -nearly destroyed, and who, having implored mercy, -grows from the small piece left him, till he is again -large enough for the stabbing process to recommence? -What is the Milky Way but some wood ashes long -ago thrown up into the sky by a girl, that her people -might be able to see their way home at night? -Other stars are reduced to mortal origin, or identified -with certain lions, tortoises, or clouds, that have place<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_242" id="Page_242">[242]</a></span> -in Bushman mythology; nor does it lie beyond their -limits of belief that the sun should once have been seen -sitting by the wayside as he travelled on earth, and -that the jackal’s back is black to this day because he -carried that burning substance on his back.<a name="FNanchor_359" id="FNanchor_359"></a><a href="#Footnote_359" class="fnanchor">[359]</a> This -sun they believe was once a mortal on earth who -radiated light from his body, but only for a short -space round his house; till some children were sent -to throw him as he slept into the sky, whence he has -ever since shone over the earth.<a name="FNanchor_360" id="FNanchor_360"></a><a href="#Footnote_360" class="fnanchor">[360]</a> These children -belonged to an earlier race of Bushmen; and it is an -odd coincidence that in Victoria as in South Africa -the belief about the sun is associated with the tradition -of a race that preceded both Bushmen and Australians -in their present homes. In the Australian creed, -the earth lay in darkness, till one of the former race -threw an emu’s egg into space, where it became the -sun. That former race was translated in various -forms to the heavens, where they made all the -celestial bodies, and where they continue to cause -all the good and evil that happens on earth. Such -traditions may point to a fact; for both Australians -and Bushmen may be degenerate from a better social -type than they now present; but the fact that, even -if degenerate, they should preserve such tales and -fictions, makes it not inconceivable that such tales<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_243" id="Page_243">[243]</a></span> -should arise, as spontaneous products of the mind, -among tribes that seem neither to have lapsed from -a higher condition, nor ever to have emerged from -their primeval state of barbarism.</p> - -<p>Of the Esquimaux, Egede observes that ‘their -notion about the stars is that some of them have -been men and others different sorts of animals or -fishes.’<a name="FNanchor_361" id="FNanchor_361"></a><a href="#Footnote_361" class="fnanchor">[361]</a> Here two stars are two persons at a singing -combat, or two rival women taking each other by the -hair; those other three are certain Greenlanders who, -when once out seal-catching, failed to find their way -home again and were taken to heaven. It is true -such fancies, taken primarily from Cranz, must be -received with the reservation that he makes, namely, -that they were only harboured by the weaker heads -of Greenland, and that the natives had art enough -to play off on the Europeans quite as marvellous -stories as any they received.<a name="FNanchor_362" id="FNanchor_362"></a><a href="#Footnote_362" class="fnanchor">[362]</a> But the possible reality -of such belief is vouched for by other testimony from -all parts of the globe, of which two instances, taken -from the Hervey Islanders and the Thlinkeet Indians, -will suffice to illustrate the general character. According -to the former, a twin boy and girl were badly -treated by their mother; so they left their home and -leapt into the sky, whither they were also followed by -their parents, and where all four may still be seen<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_244" id="Page_244">[244]</a></span> -shining; ‘brother and dearly-loved sister, still linked -together, pursue their never-ceasing flight, resolved -never again to meet their justly-enraged parents.’<a name="FNanchor_363" id="FNanchor_363"></a><a href="#Footnote_363" class="fnanchor">[363]</a> -The Thlinkeet Indians ascribe to a being called Yehl -the liberation of the world from its pristine darkness; -for, amid the many conflicting stories told of him, it -is agreed that he it was who obtained light for men -at a time when ‘sun, moon, and stars were kept by a -rich chief in separate boxes which he allowed no one -to touch.’ Yehl, having become grandson to this -chief, cried one day so much for these boxes that his -grandfather let him have one. ‘He opened it, and -lo! there were stars in the sky.’ The grandparent -was next cheated out of the moon in the same way; -but to get the sunbox Yehl had to refuse food and -become really ill, and then its owner only parted with -it on condition that it should not be opened. The -prohibition, however, was unheeded. Yehl turned into -a raven, flew off with the box, and blessed mankind -with the light of the sun.<a name="FNanchor_364" id="FNanchor_364"></a><a href="#Footnote_364" class="fnanchor">[364]</a></p> - -<p>From these samples of the fairy tales of savages, -it is clear that, in addition to the myths which arise -from forgotten etymologies, there are many others -which are not formed at all by this process of gradual -forgetfulness, but spring directly from the use of the -intellect and the imagination, in obedience to the impulse<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_245" id="Page_245">[245]</a></span> -to find a reason for everything. To observe -peculiarities in nature is the beginning of science; to -account for them in any way is science itself, true or -false. The science of savages is not limited to the -skies, but is directed to everything that calls for notice -on earth; nor in the stories invented by them to -answer the various problems of existence, are they a -whit behind the traditions of European folk-lore on -similar subjects, their explanations of natural peculiarities -disclosing quite as vivid imaginative powers -as the stories of the white race concerning birds or -beasts.</p> - -<p>Let us take, for instance, as a parallel to the -German reason for the owl flying in solitude by night -(namely, that when set to watch the wren, imprisoned -in a mousehole, he fell asleep, and was so ashamed at -letting him thus escape that he has never since dared -show himself by day), the story of the rude Ahts, -made to account for the melancholy note of the loon -as it is heard flying about the wild lakes of Vancouver’s -Island; and as a good instance of the resemblance -in construction of plot often found in very -distant regions, let us place side by side with it a story -of the Basutos in the south of Africa:—</p> - -<div class="lang1"> - -<p class="center"><i>THE AHT STORY.</i></p> - -<p>Two fishermen went one day in -two canoes to catch halibut. But -while one of them caught many,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_246" id="Page_246">[246]</a></span> -the other caught none. So the -latter, angered by the taunts of his -more fortunate but physically -weaker companion, bethought himself -how he might take all his fish -from him by force, and cause him to -return home fishless and ashamed. -Suddenly, whilst his friend was -pulling up a fish, he knocked -him on the head with the wooden -club he used for killing halibut, -and, to prevent the tale ever being -told, cut out his companion’s -tongue, and took the fish home to -his own wife. When the tongueless -man arrived at the village, -and his friends came to enquire of -his sport, he could only answer by -a noise resembling the note of the -loon. ‘The great spirit, Quawteaht, -was so angry at all this, that -he changed the injured Indian into -a loon, and the other into a crow; -and the loon’s plaintive cry now -is the voice of the fisherman trying -to make himself understood.’<a name="FNanchor_365" id="FNanchor_365"></a><a href="#Footnote_365" class="fnanchor">[365]</a></p> - -</div> - -<div class="lang2"> - -<p class="center"><i>THE BASUTO STORY.</i></p> - -<p>Two brothers, having gone in -different directions to make their -fortunes, met again, after sundry -adventures, the elder enriched by -a pack of dogs, the younger by a -large number of cows. The -younger offered his brother as -many of these cows as he pleased, -with the exception of a certain -white one. This he would not -part with; so as they went home, -and the younger brother was -drinking from a pool, Macilo, the -elder, seized his brother’s head -and held it under the water till -he was dead. Then he buried the -body, and covered it with a stone, -and proceeded to drive back the -whole flock as his own. He had -not, however, gone far, before a -small bird perched itself on the -horn of the white cow and exclaimed: -‘Macilo has killed Maciloniane -for the sake of the white -cow he coveted.’ Twice did Macilo -kill the bird with a stone, but each -time it reappeared and uttered the -same words. So the third time -he killed it he burnt it, and threw -its ashes to the winds. Then -proudly he entered his village, and -when they all enquired for his -brother, he said that they had -taken different roads, and that he -was ignorant where he was. The -white cow was greatly admired, -but suddenly a small bird perched -itself on its horns and exclaimed: -‘Macilo has killed Maciloniane -for the sake of the white cow he -coveted.’ Thus, through a bird<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_247" id="Page_247">[247]</a></span> -into which the heart of the murdered -man had been transformed, -did the truth become known, and -everyone departed with horror from -the presence of the murderer.<a name="FNanchor_366" id="FNanchor_366"></a><a href="#Footnote_366" class="fnanchor">[366]</a></p> - -</div> - -<p>European folk-lore accounts for the redness of the -robin’s breast, either by the theory that he extracted -a thorn from the thorn-crown of Christ, or by the -theory that he daily bears a drop of water to quench -the flames of hell. For either reason he might be -justly called the friend of man; but for the bird’s friendliness -the Chippewya Indians give a more poetical -explanation than either of the above. There was once, -they say, a hunter so ambitious that his only son -should signalise himself by endurance, when he came -to the time of life to undergo the fast preparatory to -his choosing his guardian spirit, that after the lad had -fasted for eight days, his father still pressed him to -persevere. But next day, when the father entered the -hut, his son had paid the penalty of violated nature, -and in the form of a robin had just flown to the top -of the lodge. There, before he flew away to the woods, -he entreated his father not to mourn his transformation. -‘I shall be happier,’ he said, ‘in my present -state than I could have been as a man. I shall -always be the friend of men and keep near their -dwellings; I could not gratify your pride as a warrior,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_248" id="Page_248">[248]</a></span> -but I will cheer you by my songs.... I am now -free from cares and pains, my food is furnished by -the fields and mountains, and my path is in the -bright air.’<a name="FNanchor_367" id="FNanchor_367"></a><a href="#Footnote_367" class="fnanchor">[367]</a></p> - -<p>Not less poetical is the Hervey Islanders’ account -of the origin of some peculiarities among fishes, and -notably of the well-known conformation of the head -of the common sole. They relate how Ina, leaving -the house of her rich parents because she had been -beaten and scolded for suffering the arch-thief, Nyana, -to steal certain treasures left in her charge, resolved to -make her way to the sea beach, and from thence to -the Sacred Isle that lay across the sea at the place -where the sun set. Arrived at the shore, she first -asked the small fish, the <i>avini</i>, to bear her across the -sea; but the avini, unable to support her weight, soon -let her fall into the water, for which Ina in her anger -struck it repeatedly with her foot, thereby causing -those beautiful stripes on its sides which are called to -this day ‘Ina’s tattooing.’ Trying next the <i>paoro</i>, -and meeting with the same mischance, she caused it -in the same way to bear ever after those blue marks -which are now its glory; and it is said to be historically -true that tattooing on that island ‘was simply -an imitation of the stripes on the avini and the paoro.’ -Then the <i>api</i>, a white fish, incurring the same displeasure,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_249" id="Page_249">[249]</a></span> -became at once and for ever of an intensely -black hue. The sole, indeed, carried Ina farther than -the others, but no farther than the breakers by the -reef; and Ina, now wild with rage, stamped with such -fury on its head that its underneath eye was removed -to the upper side, and thus it was condemned ever -afterwards to swim flatwise, unlike other fish, because -one side of its face had no eye. How Ina then caused -a protuberance on the forehead of all sharks, known -to this day as Ina’s bump, by cracking a cocoa-nut -she wished to drink out of on the forehead of a shark -that bore her, how the shark then left her, and how -she finally reached the Sacred Isle on the back of the -king of sharks, and became the wife of Timirau, the -king of all fish, may be read in further detail in Mr. -Gill’s interesting collection of Myths and Songs from -the South Pacific.<a name="FNanchor_368" id="FNanchor_368"></a><a href="#Footnote_368" class="fnanchor">[368]</a></p> - -<p>The necessity for a reason for everything, exemplified -in these traditions, exercises its influence on -mythology itself, reasons being invented for inexplicable -customs or beliefs just as they are for strange -phenomena in nature. The custom, for instance, of -hunting a wren to death once a year, which has been -observed in Ireland, the isle of Man, and the South -of France, has for its general explanation a belief that -the wren is a fairy who, after having decoyed many<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_250" id="Page_250">[250]</a></span> -men to meet their deaths in the sea, took the form of -a wren to escape the plot laid for her by a certain -knight-errant. But the Irish have found quite another -reason for the custom, having invented the story, that -on the eve of the battle of the Boyne the Irish had -stolen up to King William’s sleeping camp and were -on the point of putting an end to the heretics, when a -wren hopped upon the drum of a Protestant drummer, -and by thus waking him caused their defeat; a defeat -which they avenge on every anniversary of the day by -the persecution of that unhappy bird.<a name="FNanchor_369" id="FNanchor_369"></a><a href="#Footnote_369" class="fnanchor">[369]</a></p> - -<p>The story of the wren is well known; how, when -the birds were competing for the kingship by the test -of the greatest height attained in flying, the wren hid -in the eagle’s feathers, and, when the eagle had flown -far beyond the other birds, darted himself yet a little -above it. It is said that the first appearance of this -story is in a collection of beast-fables, composed by a -rabbi in the 13th century.<a name="FNanchor_370" id="FNanchor_370"></a><a href="#Footnote_370" class="fnanchor">[370]</a> But the resemblance -between the wren-story as it is told in Germany or -Ireland, and a story of a linnet as told by the Odjibwas -of North America, is so striking a testimony of the -way in which closely similar tales are framed independently, -that the two stories are worth comparing.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_251" id="Page_251">[251]</a></span></p> - -<div class="lang1"> - -<p class="center"><i>THE ODJIBWA STORY.</i></p> - -<p>‘The birds met together one -day to try which could fly the -highest. Some flew up very swift, -but soon got tired, and were -passed by others of stronger wing. -But the eagle went up beyond -them all, and was ready to claim -the victory, when the grey linnet, -a very small bird, flew from the -eagle’s back, where it had perched -unperceived, and being fresh and -unexhausted, succeeded in going -the highest. When the birds came -down and met in council to award -the prize, it was given to the eagle, -because that bird had not only -gone up nearer to the sun than -any of the larger birds, but it had -carried the linnet on its back.’</p> - -<p>For this reason the eagle’s -feathers became the most honourable -marks of distinction a man -could bear.<a name="FNanchor_371" id="FNanchor_371"></a><a href="#Footnote_371" class="fnanchor">[371]</a></p> - -</div> - -<div class="lang2"> - -<p class="center"><i>THE IRISH STORY.</i></p> - -<p>‘The birds all met together -one day, and settled among themselves -that whichever of them -could fly highest was to be the -king of all. Well, just as they -were on the hinges of being off, -what does the little rogue of a -wren do, but hop up and perch -himself unbeknown on the eagle’s -tail. So they flew and flew ever so -high, till the eagle was miles above -all the rest, and could not fly -another stroke, he was so tired. -“Then,” says he, “I’m king of -the birds....” “You lie,” says -the wren, darting up a perch and -a half above the big fellow. Well, -the eagle was so mad to think how -he was done, that when the wren -was coming down, he gave him -a stroke of his wing, and from -that day to this the wren was -never able to fly further than a -hawthorn bush.’<a name="FNanchor_372" id="FNanchor_372"></a><a href="#Footnote_372" class="fnanchor">[372]</a></p> - -</div> - -<p>It is impossible to assign limits either to the vitality -or to the range of a story. If the commerce -which has ever prevailed between the different tribes -of the world, as it prevails to this day, either by conquest -or by barter, has caused so wide a dispersion of -the races and products of the earth, the wonder would<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_252" id="Page_252">[252]</a></span> -rather be if the products of men’s thoughts and fancies -had not prevailed so widely, had not taken so deep -root in man’s memory, seeing that they cost nothing -either to carry or to keep. For many stories therefore -of wide range, agreeing in such minute particulars -as to render difficult the theory of their independent -origin, the mystery of their resemblance is amply -solved by the theory of their gradual dispersion, -without their proving anything as to the common -origin of those who tell them. The story, for instance, -of Faithful John, the central idea of which is, that a -friend can only apprise some one of a danger he -will incur on his wedding night, by himself incurring -suspicion and being turned into stone, is told with -little variation in Bohemia, Greece, Italy, and Spain; -and the discovery of the leading thought in a story in -India makes it possible that it was there originated.<a name="FNanchor_373" id="FNanchor_373"></a><a href="#Footnote_373" class="fnanchor">[373]</a> -In Polynesia, again, the story of stopping the motion -of the sun is widely spread; in New Zealand, Maui -makes ropes of flax, goes with his brothers to the -point where the sun rises, hides from it by day, and -when it rises next day succeeds in his purpose before -letting it go further. In Tahiti, Maui is a priest, or -chief of olden time, who builds a marae which must -be finished by the evening, and who therefore seizes -the sun by its rays and binds him to a tree till his<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_253" id="Page_253">[253]</a></span> -work is finished. In Hawaii Maui stops the sun till -evening, because his wife has to finish a certain dress -by twilight. In Samoa, Maui appears as Itu, a man -who is anxious to build a house of great stones, but -is unable to do so because the sun goes too fast; he -therefore takes a boat and lays nets in the sun’s path, -but as these are broken through, he makes a noose, -catches the sun, and only lets it free when his house -is finished.<a name="FNanchor_374" id="FNanchor_374"></a><a href="#Footnote_374" class="fnanchor">[374]</a> Obviously, these stories are all related, -but it is impossible to say whether they spread from -any one place to the others, or whether they are -remnants, retained in altered form, from the primitive -mythology of a common Polynesian home. It is, -however, worthy of notice that in Wallachian fairy -lore also a cow pushes back the sun to the hour of -mid-day, to enable a youth who had fallen asleep to -accomplish his task,<a name="FNanchor_375" id="FNanchor_375"></a><a href="#Footnote_375" class="fnanchor">[375]</a> and that the idea of catching -the sun is not unknown to the mythology of America.</p> - -<p>There is, however, a large class of stories which -arise independently, and owe their remarkable family -likeness neither to a common descent nor to importation, -but to the natural promptings of the imagination. -Thus, the idea of a tree so high that it reaches the -heavens, and consequently of the heavens as thereby -attainable, naturally produces such a story as Jack -and the Beanstalk, a story which is said to be found<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_254" id="Page_254">[254]</a></span> -all over the world, but the versions of which agree in -no other single point than in the admission to the sky -by dint of climbing.<a name="FNanchor_376" id="FNanchor_376"></a><a href="#Footnote_376" class="fnanchor">[376]</a> In the same way many of the -ideas common to the Indo-European nations, and so -often explained as originally derived from the fanciful -meteorology of the primitive Aryans, find startling -analogues outside the Aryan family, where there is -no reason to suppose them anything more than the -direct offspring of the dreamer or the story-teller. -If the constancy of Penelope to Ulysses, tormented -by her suitors, is simply that of the evening light, -assailed by the powers of darkness, till the return of -her husband the sun in the morning,<a name="FNanchor_377" id="FNanchor_377"></a><a href="#Footnote_377" class="fnanchor">[377]</a> shall we apply -the same interpretation to the story of the wife of the -Red Swan, of the Odjibwas, who, when he returns -from the discovery of his magic arrows from the -abode of the departed spirits, finds that his two -brothers have been quarrelling for the possession of -his wife, but been quarrelling in vain?<a name="FNanchor_378" id="FNanchor_378"></a><a href="#Footnote_378" class="fnanchor">[378]</a> If the legend -of Cadmus recovering Europa, after she has been -carried away by the white bull, the spotless cloud, -means that ‘the sun must journey westward until he -sees again the beautiful tints which greeted his eyes -in the morning,’<a name="FNanchor_379" id="FNanchor_379"></a><a href="#Footnote_379" class="fnanchor">[379]</a> shall we say the same of a story<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_255" id="Page_255">[255]</a></span> -current in North America, to the effect that a man once -had a beautiful daughter whom he forbade to leave the -lodge lest she should be carried off by the king of the -buffaloes; and that as she sat, notwithstanding, outside -the house, combing her hair, ‘all of a sudden the -king of the buffaloes came dashing on, with his herd -of followers, and taking her between his horns, away -he cantered over plains, plunged into a river which -bounded his land, and carried her safely to his lodge -on the other side,’ whence she was finally recovered -by her father?<a name="FNanchor_380" id="FNanchor_380"></a><a href="#Footnote_380" class="fnanchor">[380]</a></p> - -<p>Again, in Hindu mythology, Urvasi came down -from heaven and became the wife of the son of Budha, -only on condition that two pet rams should never -be taken from her bedside and that she should never -behold her lord undressed. The immortals, however, -wishing Urvasi back in heaven, contrived to steal the -rams; and as the king pursued the robbers with his -sword in the dark, the lightning revealed his person, -the compact was broken, and Urvasi disappeared.<a name="FNanchor_381" id="FNanchor_381"></a><a href="#Footnote_381" class="fnanchor">[381]</a> -This same story is found in different forms among -many people of Aryan and Turanian descent, the -central idea being that of a man marrying someone -of aerial or aquatic origin, and living happily with -her till he breaks the condition on which her residence -with him depends. Thus there is the story of Raymond<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_256" id="Page_256">[256]</a></span> -of Toulouse, who chances in the hunt upon the -beautiful Melusina at a fountain and lives with her -happily till he discovers her fish-nature and she -vanishes; but exactly parallel stories come no less -from Borneo, the Celebes, or North America than from -Ireland or Germany; for which reason it seems sufficient -to receive them simply as they stand, as fairy -tales natural to every tribe of mankind that has a -fixed belief in supernatural beings, rather than to -explain these wonderful wives as the ‘bright fleecy -clouds of early morning, which vanish as the splendour -of the sun is unveiled.’<a name="FNanchor_382" id="FNanchor_382"></a><a href="#Footnote_382" class="fnanchor">[382]</a> Let us compare the story -as it is told in America and Bornoese tradition.</p> - -<div class="lang1"> - -<p class="center"><i>THE BORNOESE STORY.</i></p> - -<p>A certain Bornoese, when far -from home, once climbed a tree -to rest, and whilst there ‘was attracted -by the most ravishing -music, which ever and anon came -nearer and nearer, until it seemingly -approached the very roots of -the tree, when a pure well of -water burst out, at the bottom of -which were seven beautiful virgins. -Ravished at the sight, and determined -to make one of them his -son’s wife, he made a lasso of his -rattan, and drew her up.’ One -day, however, her husband hit her<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_257" id="Page_257">[257]</a></span> -in anger, and she was taken up to -the sky.<a name="FNanchor_383" id="FNanchor_383"></a><a href="#Footnote_383" class="fnanchor">[383]</a></p> - -</div> - -<div class="lang2"> - -<p class="center"><i>THE AMERICAN STORY.</i></p> - -<p>Wampee, a great hunter, once -came to a strange prairie, where -he heard faint sounds of music, -and looking up saw a speck in the -sky, which proved itself to be a -basket containing twelve most -beautiful maidens, who, on reaching -the earth, forthwith set themselves -to dance. He tried to catch -the youngest, but in vain; ultimately -he succeeded by assuming -the disguise of a mouse. He was -very attentive to his new wife, -who was really a daughter of one -of the stars, but she wished to -return home, so she made a wicker -basket secretly, and by help of a -charm she remembered, ascended -to her father.<a name="FNanchor_384" id="FNanchor_384"></a><a href="#Footnote_384" class="fnanchor">[384]</a></p> - -</div> - -<p>It has been imagined that all the fairy tales of the -world may be reduced to certain fundamental story -roots; but these story roots we should look for not -in the clouds, but upon the earth, not in the various -aspects of nature, but in the daily occurrences and -surroundings of savage life. The uniformity which -appears in so many of the myths or fairy tales of the -world would thus simply arise from a uniformity of the -experiences of existence. The evidence concerning -savage astro-mythology is conclusive, that nothing is -conceived of the heavenly bodies that has not its -prototype on earth; that the skies do but mirror the -events or objects of earth, where the memorable incidents -of the chase or the battle are told of the stars: -nor is it strange if in a few years such tales should -have so gained in the telling, that it is often impossible -to separate the fact from the fiction, or to -distinguish a crude supposition from the creation of -a fanciful myth.</p> - -<p>For although it is difficult to lay down the -boundaries between the language of metaphor and the -language of fact, inasmuch as what is faith to one man -is often but fancy to another, there is reason to believe<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_258" id="Page_258">[258]</a></span> -that savages really do very often confuse celestial with -terrestrial phenomena, that, for instance, the Zulus, -when they speak of the stars as the children of the -sky and of the sun as their father, are expressing -rather a real belief than a poetical fancy, and that the -conception of the sun and moon as physically related -is an actual belief quite as much as a merely figurative -explanation. If this be true, a large part of mythology -must be regarded not as a poetical explanation -of things, suggested by the grammatical form of words -or by roots that lend similar names to the most diverse -conceptions, but as the direct effect of primitive -thought in its application to the phenomena of nature. -It is more likely that the early thoughts of men -should have framed their language than that the form -of their language should have preceded their form of -thought. And if it be shown (by those who hold that -the personification of impersonal things is consequent -on the grammatical structure of a language) that the -Kafirs and other tribes of South Africa, whose language -does not denote sex, are almost destitute of -myths and fables, whilst tribes who employ a sex-denoting -language have many,<a name="FNanchor_385" id="FNanchor_385"></a><a href="#Footnote_385" class="fnanchor">[385]</a> it is noticeable that -such personification has been shown to exist among -the natives of Australia, between the different dialects -of whose language it is said to have been one of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_259" id="Page_259">[259]</a></span> -points of resemblance, that they recognised no distinctions -of gender.<a name="FNanchor_386" id="FNanchor_386"></a><a href="#Footnote_386" class="fnanchor">[386]</a></p> - -<p>A story of the Ottawa Indians (by internal -evidence posterior in date to their acquaintance with -guns and ships) may be taken as a sample of savage -traditions, which prove that the convertibility of mankind -with sun, moon, or stars, is as natural a belief to -a savage, as that his next-door neighbour may turn -at pleasure into a wolf or a snake. Six young men -finding themselves on a hill-top in close proximity to -the sun, resolved to travel to it. Two of them finally -reached a beautiful plain, lighted by the moon, which, -as they advanced, appeared as an aged woman with -a white face, who spoke to them and promised to conduct -them to her brother, then absent on his daily -course through the sky. This woman ‘they knew -from her first appearance’ to be the moon. When -she introduced them to her brother, ‘the sun motioned -them with his hand to follow him,’ and they accompanied -him with some difficulty till they were restored -safe and sound to the earth.<a name="FNanchor_387" id="FNanchor_387"></a><a href="#Footnote_387" class="fnanchor">[387]</a> So Sir G. Grey, collecting -native legends concerning a cave in Australia, -found that the only point of agreement was -‘that originally <i>the moon who was a man</i> had lived -there.’<a name="FNanchor_388" id="FNanchor_388"></a><a href="#Footnote_388" class="fnanchor">[388]</a></p> - -<p>But, except on the assumption that savages are<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_260" id="Page_260">[260]</a></span> -idiots, it is impossible that such legends should not only -obtain currency, but enjoy the vitality of traditions, -unless they conform to certain canons of belief, unless -they contain nothing inherently incredible. A fairy -tale pleases a child, not because it is known to be impossible, -but because it carries the mind further afield -than actual experience does into the realms of the -possible; and a tale understood to be impossible -would be as insipid to a savage as it would be to a -child. Schoolcraft, in reference to Indian popular -tales, speaks of the ‘belief of the narrators and listeners -in every wild and improbable thing told;’ and says, -‘Nothing is too capacious for Indian belief.’<a name="FNanchor_389" id="FNanchor_389"></a><a href="#Footnote_389" class="fnanchor">[389]</a> If, as -their stories abundantly show, they feel no difficulty in -conceiving the instantaneous transformation of men not -merely into something living, but into stones or stumps, -the fact ceases to be strange, that in Indian faith -‘many of the planets are transformed adventurers.’<a name="FNanchor_390" id="FNanchor_390"></a><a href="#Footnote_390" class="fnanchor">[390]</a> -What, then, more natural than that all over the world -the deeds of great tribesmen should be transferred to -the skies, and, under the action of uniform laws of -fancy, should in time become so overgrown with -fiction as to pass into the domain of the purest mythology, -till at last they appear as mere figurative -expressions of the daily life of nature, of the struggle<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_261" id="Page_261">[261]</a></span> -between the day and the night, of the dispersion of the -clouds by the sun?</p> - -<p>The condition of things which makes such conceptions -of the heavens the natural outcome of primitive -speculation may perhaps, to a certain extent, be recovered -by observation of the laws conditioning the -actually existent thoughts of the savage world.</p> - -<p>The first entrance into Wonderland lies through -Dreamland. Schoolcraft’s testimony that ‘a dream -or a fact is alike potent in the Indian mind’ accords -with much other evidence to the effect that, with -savages, the sensations of the sleeping or waking life -are equally real or but vaguely distinguished. A -native of Zululand will leave his work and travel to -his home, perhaps a hundred miles away, to test the -truth of a dream,<a name="FNanchor_391" id="FNanchor_391"></a><a href="#Footnote_391" class="fnanchor">[391]</a> and so great is the importance the -Zulus attach to such monitions, that ‘he who dreams -is the great man of the village;’ whilst the gift to them -of ‘<i>sight by night in dreams</i>’ is ascribed to their first -ancestor, the great Unkulunkulu.<a name="FNanchor_392" id="FNanchor_392"></a><a href="#Footnote_392" class="fnanchor">[392]</a> But how far surpassing -even the normal experiences of sleep must be -the dreams of men in the hunting or nomad state, -the law of whose lives is either a want or an excess of -food! What richer fund for story-material can be -imagined than the dreams of a savage, or what more -likely to introduce him to the mysteries of romance<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_262" id="Page_262">[262]</a></span> -than recollections of those sudden transformations or -those weird images, which have haunted the repose of -his slumbering hours? And into what strange lands -of beauty and plenty, into what secrets of the skies, -would not the flights of his sleep give him an insight! -In all fairy tales and all mythology a remarkable conformity -to the deranged ideas of sleep does thus occur; -and especially do the stories of the lower races, as for -instance those of Schoolcraft’s ‘Algic Researches,’ -read far more like the recollections of bad dreams -than like the worn ideas of a once pure religion, or -of a poetical interpretation of nature. The most -beautiful of the Indian legends, that of the origin of -Indian corn, was in native tradition actually referred -to a dream, and to a dream purposely resorted to, to -gain a clearer insight into the mysteries of nature.<a name="FNanchor_393" id="FNanchor_393"></a><a href="#Footnote_393" class="fnanchor">[393]</a> -And as dreams do but deal with the incidents of the -waking life, exaggerating them and contorting them, -but never passing beyond them, may not the somewhat -uniform incidents of savage life, whether of -hunting, fishing, fighting, or travelling, offer some -explanation of that general similarity, which is so -conspicuous an element in the comparative mythology -or the fairy-lore of the world?</p> - -<p>Then the fact that the dead reappear in dreams at -that season of the night in which also the stars are<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_263" id="Page_263">[263]</a></span> -seen, would tend to confirm the idea of some community -of nature between the dead and the stars, such -community as is indeed not unfrequently found, as -where the Aurora Borealis or the Milky Way are -identified with the souls of the departed. So, too, a -Californian tribe is mentioned as having believed that -chiefs and medicine-men became heavenly bodies after -their death,<a name="FNanchor_394" id="FNanchor_394"></a><a href="#Footnote_394" class="fnanchor">[394]</a> and even Tasmanians could point to the -stars they would go to at death.<a name="FNanchor_395" id="FNanchor_395"></a><a href="#Footnote_395" class="fnanchor">[395]</a></p> - -<p>But there is another reason which would still -further create a mental confusion between the deeds -of a mortal on earth and the motions of some luminary -in heaven, and that is the language of adulation, which, -from ascribing the possession of the sky to a chief, in -order to gratify him, becomes imperceptibly the language -of belief. It is common for the Zulus to say -of a chief, ‘That man is the owner of heaven and -everything is his,’ and a native once expressed his -gratitude to a missionary by pointing to the heaven -and saying, ‘Sir, the sun is yours.’ ‘It does not suffice -them to honour a great man unless they place the -heaven on his shoulders; they do not believe what -they say, they merely wish to ascribe all greatness to -him.’ If when a chief goes to war the sky becomes -overcast, they say, ‘The heaven of the chief feels that -the chief is suffering.’ Nor was any chief known to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_264" id="Page_264">[264]</a></span> -deprecate the use of such language; he ‘expected to -have it said always that the heaven was his.’<a name="FNanchor_396" id="FNanchor_396"></a><a href="#Footnote_396" class="fnanchor">[396]</a></p> - -<p>Obviously, however, there is no fast line between -the language of flattery and the language of fact. -From the Tahitians, who would speak of their kings’ -houses as the clouds of heaven, or the Kafirs of Ethiopia, -who called their kings lords of the sun and moon, -it is easy to trace the progress of thought which actually -led the latter people to pray to their kings for -rain, fine weather, or the cessation of storms.<a name="FNanchor_397" id="FNanchor_397"></a><a href="#Footnote_397" class="fnanchor">[397]</a> The -Zulus, like many other savages, think of the sky as at -no great distance from the earth, and thus as the roof of -their king’s palace in the same way that the earth is its -floor. ‘Utshaka claimed to be king of heaven as well as -earth, and ordered the rain-doctors to be killed, because -in assuming power to control the weather they -were interfering with his royal prerogative.’<a name="FNanchor_398" id="FNanchor_398"></a><a href="#Footnote_398" class="fnanchor">[398]</a> But if -such confusion between royalty and divinity can exist -in the savage mind whilst the king is on earth, how -natural is it that a man, associated for so long in his -lifetime with power over the elements, should, after his -removal from earth and from sight, become still more -mixed up with elemental forces, or perhaps even localised -in some point of space! The word Zulu actually -means the Heavens, and in Zululand King of the Zulus<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_265" id="Page_265">[265]</a></span> -means king of the heavens,<a name="FNanchor_399" id="FNanchor_399"></a><a href="#Footnote_399" class="fnanchor">[399]</a> so that when the king is -drawn in his waggon to the centre of the kraal, it is -not surprising that, among the other acclamations, -such as ‘Lion, King of the World,’ with which his -creeping subjects salute him, they should actually -salute him as Zulu, Heaven.<a name="FNanchor_400" id="FNanchor_400"></a><a href="#Footnote_400" class="fnanchor">[400]</a> It can only be from -the use of such language that among the Zulus ‘rain, -storm, sunshine, earthquakes, and all else which we -ascribe to natural causes are brought about or retarded -by <i>various people</i> to whom this power is ascribed. -Every rain that comes is spoken of as belonging to -somebody, and in a drought they say that the owners -of rain are at variance among themselves.’<a name="FNanchor_401" id="FNanchor_401"></a><a href="#Footnote_401" class="fnanchor">[401]</a></p> - -<p>That in aftertime, from these modes of thinking -and speaking, the attributes of a Zulu or Tahitian -chief might become those of a heaven-supporter, such -as Atlas, or of a cloud-gatherer, such as Zeus, or that, -according as his body was consigned to the earth or -the sea, such a chief might become the earth-shaker -or the ocean-ruler, is not only what might be expected -<i>à priori</i>, but what is to some extent justified by facts. -In South Africa the word which the missionaries have -adopted for both Hottentots and Kafirs as the name -for the Deity, from its being the nearest approach to -the Christian conception, is believed to be derived -from two words signifying Wounded Knee, a term -applied generations back to a Hottentot sorcerer of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_266" id="Page_266">[266]</a></span> -great fame and skill, who happened to have sustained -some injury to his knees. ‘Having been held in high -repute for extraordinary powers during life, he (Utixo) -continued to be invoked even after death as one who -could still relieve and protect; and hence in process -of time he became nearest to their first conceptions -of God.’<a name="FNanchor_402" id="FNanchor_402"></a><a href="#Footnote_402" class="fnanchor">[402]</a> And the legend of Mannan Mac -Lear, mythical first inhabitant and first legislator of -the Isle of Man, discloses a germ of similar origin -underlying the myth of a culture-hero, as his story -preserved in the following lines will show:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"> -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="verse">‘This merchant Manxman of the solemn smile,</div> -<div class="verse">First legislator of our rock-throned isle,</div> -<div class="verse">Dwelt in a fort (withdrawn from vulgar sight),</div> -<div class="verse">Cloud-capped Baroole, upon thy lofty height.</div> -<div class="verse">From New Year tide round to the Ides of Yule,</div> -<div class="verse">Nature submitted to his wizard rule.</div> -<div class="verse">Her secret force he could with charms compel</div> -<div class="verse">To brew a storm or raging tempests quell;</div> -<div class="verse">Make one man seem like twenty in a fray,</div> -<div class="verse">And drive the stranger (<i>i.e.</i> Scotch invaders) over seas away.’<a name="FNanchor_403" id="FNanchor_403"></a><a href="#Footnote_403" class="fnanchor">[403]</a></div> -</div> -</div> - -<p>In other words, he was a great sorcerer and a -great warrior, whose deeds lived after him in story, -and whose name lent itself as a nucleus, like that -of Charlemagne or of Alfred, for every adventure -that was strange, for every imagination that was wonderful.</p> - -<p>There seems, indeed, no reason to seek for any<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_267" id="Page_267">[267]</a></span> -higher genesis than this for any of the culture-heroes -of any mythology, notwithstanding that they have -with so much unanimity been forced into identification -with the sun. Zeus himself means but the same -thing as Zulu, namely, the Sky or Heaven, so that it -is only natural that nothing that could be told of the -sky ‘was not in some form or other ascribed to Zeus,’<a name="FNanchor_404" id="FNanchor_404"></a><a href="#Footnote_404" class="fnanchor">[404]</a> -just as we see that modern Zulus ascribe to their -chiefs all atmospheric phenomena, and actually confer -on them the appellation, Zulu. There is indeed -nothing in which Zeus differs essentially from Manabozho -of North American mythology, from Krishna -of the Hindus, from Maui of the Polynesians, from -Quawteaht of the rude Ahts, or from Kutka of the -still ruder Kamschadals. The stories told of one -may be more refined than those told of another, -but in no case are these divinities more than names, -which serve as convenient centres for the grouping -of memorable feats or fictions. Such names serve -also, when once men have begun to reflect on the arts -or customs of their lives, as sufficient explanations of -their origin; and just as we find the institution of -marriage attributed in China, or Greece, or India to -some mythical hero, so we find the discovery of fire -and light, or the invention of remarkable arts, duly -ascribed to some hypothetical originator. In Polynesian -mythology, Maui, in Thlinkeet Indian mythology,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_268" id="Page_268">[268]</a></span> -Yehl, played the part of Prometheus in procuring -fire for the use of men. From seeing a spider make -its web, Manabozho invented the art of making -fishing nets; and Kutka (who, like Manabozho, is -also in some sense the maker of all things) taught the -Kamschadals how to build huts, how to catch birds, -and beasts, and fish.<a name="FNanchor_405" id="FNanchor_405"></a><a href="#Footnote_405" class="fnanchor">[405]</a> The supreme deity of Finnish -mythology not only brought fire for men from heaven -but was the inventor of music; yet like the other gods -he was but a magician, able to destroy the world at -pleasure, to hold the sun captive in a box, to conquer -all monsters and heal all diseases.<a name="FNanchor_406" id="FNanchor_406"></a><a href="#Footnote_406" class="fnanchor">[406]</a></p> - -<p>American mythology abounds in culture-heroes, -mythical personages who taught men useful arts and -laws, and left, in the reverence attached to their -memory, a quasi-religious system for their posterity.<a name="FNanchor_407" id="FNanchor_407"></a><a href="#Footnote_407" class="fnanchor">[407]</a> -These too have been resolved into observation of the -phenomena of the sun or the dawn. Manabozho or -Michabo, the ancestor of the Algonquins, whose name -literally means the Great Hare, and conferred peculiar -respect on the clan who bore it as their totem, means -in reality (according to this theory) the Great Light, -the Spirit of Dawn, or under another aspect the -North-west Wind; the confusion between the hare and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_269" id="Page_269">[269]</a></span> -the dawn being supposed to have arisen from a root -<i>wab</i>, which gave two words, one meaning <i>white</i> and -the other <i>hare</i>, so that what was originally told of the -White Light came to be told of a Hare, and what -was at first but a personification of natural phenomena -became a tissue of inconsistent absurdities.<a name="FNanchor_408" id="FNanchor_408"></a><a href="#Footnote_408" class="fnanchor">[408]</a> Ingenious, -however, as such a solution undoubtedly is, it -is easier to believe that the stories of the Great Hare -have grown round a man, called, in complete accordance -with American custom, after the hare, and -once a famous sorcerer or warrior like Mannan Mac -Lear; for in all the more recent traditions of him, -there is much more of the magician or shaman than -of the wind or the dawn. He turns at will into a -wolf or an oak stump, he converses with all creation, -he outwits serpents by his cunning, he has a lodge -from which he utters oracles; as brother of the -winds, by reason of his swiftness, there is no incongruity -in the idea that since his death he is the -director of storms, and resides in the region of his -brother, the North Wind. It is curious that he is -swallowed up by the king of the fish, in this resembling -in Aryan mythology Pradyumna, the son of -Vishnu, who after being swallowed by a fish is ultimately -restored to life,<a name="FNanchor_409" id="FNanchor_409"></a><a href="#Footnote_409" class="fnanchor">[409]</a> or in Polynesian mythology -Maui, who is rescued by the sky from the embrace of -the jelly fish. Maui, like Tell, Sigurd, Hercules, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_270" id="Page_270">[270]</a></span> -others, has recently been discovered to be the sun, -the fish which swallows him signifying really the -earth; for does not the earth swallow the sun every -night, and is not the sun only freed by the eastern -sky in the morning?<a name="FNanchor_410" id="FNanchor_410"></a><a href="#Footnote_410" class="fnanchor">[410]</a> Doubtless, on such a reading -of his life, Manabozho has as just a claim as Mani to -a place in the solar system; but then—who that has -ever lived and died but has the same?</p> - -<p>Samé, the great name of Brazilian legend, came -across the ocean from the rising sun; he had power -over the elements and tempests; the trees of the -forests would recede to make room for him, the animals -used to crouch before him; lakes and rivers became -solid for him; and he taught the use of agriculture -and magic. Like him, Bochica, the great lawgiver of -the Muyscas and son of the sun, he who invented for -them their calendar and regulated their festivals, had -a white beard, a detail in which all the American -culture-heroes agree.<a name="FNanchor_411" id="FNanchor_411"></a><a href="#Footnote_411" class="fnanchor">[411]</a> It is not, however, on this -particular feature, so much as on their <i>whiteness</i> in -general that stress has been laid to identify them with -the great White Light of Dawn. Of the Mexican Quetzalcoatl, -Dr. Brinton says, ‘Like all the dawn heroes -he, too, was represented of white complexion, clothed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_271" id="Page_271">[271]</a></span> -in long white robes.’ The white is the emphatic thing -about them. So the name Viracocha of the Peruvians, -translated by Oviedo, ‘the foam of the sea,’ is, we are -to believe, a metaphor: ‘the dawn rises above the -horizon as the snowy foam on the surface of the lake.’<a name="FNanchor_412" id="FNanchor_412"></a><a href="#Footnote_412" class="fnanchor">[412]</a> -But Peruvian tradition was confused as to whether -Viracocha was the highest god and creator of the -world, or only the first Inca; and such confusion between -humanity and divinity, which is everywhere the -normal result of the deification of the dead, is at least -a more natural account of the origin of his worship -than a fancied resemblance between the sea-foam -and the dawn.<a name="FNanchor_413" id="FNanchor_413"></a><a href="#Footnote_413" class="fnanchor">[413]</a> Heitsi Eibip, whom the Namaqua -Hottentots call their Great Father, and on whose -graves they throw stones for luck, so far resembles a -solar hero that he is believed to have come like Samé -from the East; yet, though much that is wonderful -already attaches to his memory, he has not yet -thrown off his human personality, but is known to -have been merely a sorcerer of great fame;<a name="FNanchor_414" id="FNanchor_414"></a><a href="#Footnote_414" class="fnanchor">[414]</a> so that -in his deification we have almost living evidence of -the process here assumed to have operated widely in -the formation of the world’s mythology.</p> - -<p>To the influence of the language of adulation in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_272" id="Page_272">[272]</a></span> -the formation of mythology, may also be added that -of the language of affection or of ridicule. Nicknames, -taken at hazard from the animal world, or from any -object of earth, air, or water, would be obvious sources -of improbable stories, tending to the completest confusion -between the doings of a man and the attributes -of the thing after which he was named. Nicknames -of affection would produce the same result; and if, -as is likely, other people besides the Finns call their -daughters Moon, Sunshine, or Water-glimmer, it is -easy to see how, for instance, the departure of Sunshine -as a bride might come afterwards to be explained -as a myth of the dawn or of twilight, and in -the same way anything else that happened to her.<a name="FNanchor_415" id="FNanchor_415"></a><a href="#Footnote_415" class="fnanchor">[415]</a></p> - -<p>An elemental explanation has been applied with -such uniform effect, first to Aryan and then to Polynesian -and American mythology, that in the resort -to a more natural, albeit less poetical hypothesis, -there may be danger of carrying opposing theories -too far. There are, however, certain obvious limits; -nor, if we doubt whether man in a primitive state -really had the poetical views of nature so generally -claimed for him, need we deny to him all poetical -origination in the construction of his mythology.<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_273" id="Page_273">[273]</a></span> -Take, for instance, this typical Aryan passage, ‘By -the early Aryan mind the howling wind was conceived -as a great dog or wolf. As the fearful beast -was heard speeding by the windows or over the house-top, -the inmates trembled, for none knew but his -own soul might forthwith be required of him. Hence -to this day, among ignorant people, the howling of -a dog is supposed to portend a death in the family.’<a name="FNanchor_416" id="FNanchor_416"></a><a href="#Footnote_416" class="fnanchor">[416]</a> -When we find that a dog’s howling portends the -death of its master among the Nubians,<a name="FNanchor_417" id="FNanchor_417"></a><a href="#Footnote_417" class="fnanchor">[417]</a> and is regarded -as a dreaded omen by the Kamschadals,<a name="FNanchor_418" id="FNanchor_418"></a><a href="#Footnote_418" class="fnanchor">[418]</a> as -well as by the Fijians,<a name="FNanchor_419" id="FNanchor_419"></a><a href="#Footnote_419" class="fnanchor">[419]</a> and that the Esquimaux -lay a dog’s head by the grave of a child to show it -the way to the land of souls, we may safely reject -the Aryan pedigree of the superstition, nor go any -farther for its explanation than the nature of the -sound itself. But though Aryan mythology may be -taken to have grown, like any other, round human -personalities, and though popular superstitions are in -many instances the primary products of the laws of -psychology, ranking rather among the sources than -the <i>débris</i> of mythology, there is proof from the fairy-lore -of savages that some of them have so far advanced -in thought as to be not incapable of personifying abstract -ideas. Dr. Rink alludes to the tendency of the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_274" id="Page_274">[274]</a></span> -Esquimaux to give figurative explanations of things, -to personify, for instance, human qualities, just as -they are personified in the ‘Pilgrim’s Progress.’<a name="FNanchor_420" id="FNanchor_420"></a><a href="#Footnote_420" class="fnanchor">[420]</a> The -Chippewya Indians personified sleep as Weeng, a giant -insect that was once seen on a tree in a wood, where -it made a murmuring sound with its wings; and it -was generally conceived to cause sleep by sending a -number of little fairies to beat drowsy foreheads with -their tiny clubs.<a name="FNanchor_421" id="FNanchor_421"></a><a href="#Footnote_421" class="fnanchor">[421]</a> And the Odjibwas, with a fancy -which has been so poetically preserved by Longfellow, -identified Winter with an old hoary-headed man -called Peboan, Spring with a young man of quick -step and rosy face called Segwun.<a name="FNanchor_422" id="FNanchor_422"></a><a href="#Footnote_422" class="fnanchor">[422]</a></p> - -<p>The testimony, therefore, afforded by the observation -of modern savage races as to the growth of -mythology discloses several ways in which, as it is -being formed now, we may infer that it was formed -thousands of years ago. The evidence of Steller -that the Kamschadals explained everything to themselves -according to the liveliness of their fancy, -letting nothing escape their examination,<a name="FNanchor_423" id="FNanchor_423"></a><a href="#Footnote_423" class="fnanchor">[423]</a> accords with -evidence concerning other races to the effect that some -intellectual curiosity enters as a constituent into the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_275" id="Page_275">[275]</a></span> -lowest human intelligence, giving birth to explanations -which are as absurd to us as they are natural to -their original framers. A ready capacity for invention -is no rare trait of the savage character. Sir G. -Grey found that the capability of Australian natives -to invent marvels and wonders was proportioned to -the quantity of food he offered them, and that rather -than confess ignorance of a thing they would <i>invent</i> -a tradition;<a name="FNanchor_424" id="FNanchor_424"></a><a href="#Footnote_424" class="fnanchor">[424]</a> whilst in the fondness of the Koranna -Hottentots, as they sit round their evening fires, -of relating fictitious adventures, lies a source of -legendary lore which is not likely to be limited to -South Africa, and is probably aided elsewhere as it -is there by the knowledge, common to so many -savage tribes, of the preparation of intoxicating -drinks.<a name="FNanchor_425" id="FNanchor_425"></a><a href="#Footnote_425" class="fnanchor">[425]</a> If to these sources of mythology be added -the help supplied by dreams to the elaboration of -fiction; the misconceptions effected in traditions by -the language of flattery, of affection, or of ridicule; -and, lastly, the tendency, probably consequent on -such confusion, to personify things or even abstract -ideas; the wonder will no longer be that the mythology -of the different races of the world displays so -much uniformity, but that uniformity within limited -ranges should ever have been taken as a proof of a -common ethnological origin.</p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_276" id="Page_276">[276]</a></span></p> - -<h2 id="CHAPTER_IX">IX.<br /> -<span class="smaller"><i>COMPARATIVE FOLK-LORE.</i></span></h2> - -<p>Folk-lore is often explained as the remains of -ancient mythology, but the explanation, though -perhaps true of some traditional lore still surviving in -legends and fairy tales, seems of doubtful application -to those popular superstitions yet so prevalent among -us, of which our kitchens, our cottages, and our -nurseries are the chief depositories. Beliefs, fancies, -and customs, however trivial in themselves, and -locally absurd, gain an interest from the area they -cover and the races they connect; suggesting past -unions between nations now remote, in the same -way as the smallest weeds are capable of telling, -by their geographical dispersion, of lands that once -stretched where seas now roll. To take some instances. -The English tradition that a swallow’s -nest is lucky, and its life protected by imaginary -penalties, is one that in isolation we should naturally -and rightly disregard. But when we find that the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_277" id="Page_277">[277]</a></span> -belief belongs to Germany, and that the supposed -penalties are the same in Yorkshire as they are in -Swabia, our wonder is aroused; and when we further -learn that in China, too, the swallow’s nest is lucky -and its life inviolate, we become aware of a possible -history and antiquity attaching to the superstition, -which offer an inviting field for speculation and study. -The belief, that the first appearance of mice in a -house betokens death, becomes of interest when we -find it in Russia as well as in Devonshire. Mothers -there are both in Germany and in England who fear -their children may grow up to be thieves if their nails -are cut before their first year is over. Such superstitions, -as we call them, had, without doubt, once a -reason; in some cases still to be traced, in others -effaced by the wear and tear of time. By the -application to them of the comparative method not -only may we hope to explain and connect ideas -otherwise inexplicable, but also to come to conclusions -not uninteresting from an archæological point -of view. For if it can be shown that they are the -remains of ancient barbarism rather than of ancient -mythology, their testimony may be added to that, -long since given by the more material relics and -witnesses of early times, concerning the general history -of civilisation.</p> - -<p>For the existence of similar traditions as of similar -fairy-tales in widely remote districts there are three<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_278" id="Page_278">[278]</a></span> -possible hypotheses. These are, migration, community -of origin, or similarity of development. Either they -have spread from one place to another, or they are the -legacies of times when the people possessing them were -actually united, or they have sprung up independently -in different localities, in virtue of the natural laws of -mental growth. It may be difficult of any given -belief to say to which of these three classes it belongs; -but there are many beliefs, so alike in general -features, yet so divergent in detail, as best to accord -with the theory of a common descent or a common -development. Some, for instance, may be so common -to the different nations of one stock, as to be traceable -to periods anterior to their dispersion; whilst -others, yet more widely spread than these, suggest -relationships between races of men more fundamental -and remote than can be detected in language, and -point to an affinity that is older and stronger than -mere affinity of blood, an affinity, that is, in the conceptions -and fancies of primitive thought. For -where actual relationship is not proved by language, -analogies in tradition are better accounted for by -supposing similar grooves of mental development -than by any other theory. Philology may prove -a relationship between, let us say, the Nixens of -Germany and the Nisses of Scandinavia: but -there is no relationship beyond similarity of conception -between the Nereids of antiquity and the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_279" id="Page_279">[279]</a></span> -mermaids of the North, or between the Brownies of -Scotland and the Lares of Latium. Children, of -whatever race or country they may be, dislike the -dark, nor is it thought necessary to account for this -common trait by any theory of connection or descent. -So it is with nations. They are or were, in the face -of nature, but as children in the dark, and the nearly -similar phenomena of sun and storm, breeze and calm, -have sufficed to create for them, in their several homes, -many of those fears and fancies we find common to -them all.</p> - -<p>No one who has not turned special attention -to the subject, can form any conception of the mass -of purely pagan ideas, which, varnished over by -Christianity, but barely hidden by it, grow in rank -profusion in our very midst and exercise a living -hold, which it is impossible either to realise or to -fathom, on the popular mind. Like old Roman or -British remains, buried under subsequent accumulations -of earth and stones, or superficially concealed -by an overgrowth of herbage, uninjured during all -the length of time they have lain unobserved, there -they lie just beneath the surface of nineteenth-century -life, as indelible records of our mental history -and origin. Only in the higher social strata can they -be deemed extinct; but if it can no longer be said, -as it was in the seventeenth century, that most -houses of the West-end of London have the horse-shoe<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_280" id="Page_280">[280]</a></span> -on the threshold,<a name="FNanchor_426" id="FNanchor_426"></a><a href="#Footnote_426" class="fnanchor">[426]</a> yet it may still be said of -many a farm or cottage in the country. The -astronomer Tycho Brahe, if he met an old woman or -hare on leaving home, would take the hint to turn -back: but it seems to be only the working population -of England, Scotland, or Germany who still do -the same. Statistics show that the receipts of -omnibus and railway companies in France are less on -Friday than on any other day; and many a German -that lay dead on the carnage fields of the late war -was found to have carried his word-charm as his safest -shield against sword or bullet. Most English villages -still have their wise men or women, whose powers -range, like those of the shamans in savage tribes, from -ruling the planets to curing rheumatics or detecting -thieves; and witchcraft still has its believers, occasionally -its victims, as of yore.<a name="FNanchor_427" id="FNanchor_427"></a><a href="#Footnote_427" class="fnanchor">[427]</a></p> - -<p>We who have been brought up to look upon the -classification of things into animal, vegetable, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_281" id="Page_281">[281]</a></span> -mineral, as primary, or indeed intuitive, are apt to -forget that savages never classify, and that animate -and inanimate to them are both alike. Sir John -Lubbock has collected conclusive evidence that so -inconceivable a confusion of thought exists.<a name="FNanchor_428" id="FNanchor_428"></a><a href="#Footnote_428" class="fnanchor">[428]</a> The -Tahitians, who sowed some iron nails that young -ones might grow from them; the Esquimaux, who -thought a musical-box the child of a small hand-organ; -the Bushmen, who mistook a large waggon -for the mother of some smaller ones, show the -tendency of savages to identify motion with life, and -to attribute feelings and relations such as actuate or -connect themselves to everything that moves of itself -or is capable of being moved. A native sent by one -missionary to another with some loaves, and a letter -stating the number, having eaten two of them and -been detected through the letter, took the precaution -the next time to put the letter under a stone that it -might not <i>see</i> the theft committed.<a name="FNanchor_429" id="FNanchor_429"></a><a href="#Footnote_429" class="fnanchor">[429]</a> Now there are -numerous superstitions, which there is reason to -think are relics of this savage state of thought, -when all that existed existed under the same conditions -as man himself, capable of the same feelings, -and subject to the same wants and sorrows. Take, -for example, bees. Bees are credited with a perfect -comprehension of all that men do and utter, and, as -members themselves of the family they belong to,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_282" id="Page_282">[282]</a></span> -they must be treated in every way as human in their -emotions. On the day of the Purification in France -it is customary in some parts for women to read the -Gospel of the day to the bees.<a name="FNanchor_430" id="FNanchor_430"></a><a href="#Footnote_430" class="fnanchor">[430]</a> French children are -taught that the inmates of the hive will come out to -sting them for any bad language uttered within their -hearing; and in South Russia it is believed ‘that if -any robbery be committed where a number of hives -are kept, the whole stock will gradually diminish, and -in a short time die; for bees, they say, will not suffer -thieving.’<a name="FNanchor_431" id="FNanchor_431"></a><a href="#Footnote_431" class="fnanchor">[431]</a> Many persons have probably at some time -of their lives, on seeing a crape-covered hive, learnt on -inquiry that the bees were in mourning for some -member of their owner’s family. In Suffolk, when a -death occurs in a house, the inmates immediately tell -the bees, ask them formally to the funeral, and fix crape -on their hives; otherwise it is believed they would -die or desert. And the same custom, for the same -reason, prevails, with local modifications, not only in -nearly every English county, but very widely over -the continent. In Normandy and Brittany may be -seen, as in England, the crape-set hives; in Yorkshire -some of the funeral bread, in Lincolnshire some -cake and sugar, may be seen at the hive door; and -a Devonshire nurse on her way to a funeral has been -known to send back a child to perform the duty she<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_283" id="Page_283">[283]</a></span> -herself had forgotten, of telling the bees. The usual -explanation of these customs and ideas is that they -originated long ago with the death or flight of some -bees, consequent on the neglect they incurred when -the hand that once tended them could do so no -longer. Yet a wider survey of analogous facts leads -to the explanation above suggested; for, not to dwell -on the fact that in some places in England they are -informed of weddings as well as of funerals, and -their hives are decorated with favours as well as with -crape, the practice of giving information of deaths -extends in some parts not only to other animals as -well, but, in addition, to inanimate things. In -Lithuania, deaths are announced, not only to the -bees, but to horses and cattle, by the rattling of a -bunch of keys, and the same custom is reported from -Dartford in Kent. In the North Riding, not long -since, a farmer gravely attributed the loss of a cow to -his not having told it of his wife’s death. In Cornwall, -the indoor plants are often put into mourning as -well as the hives; and at Rauen, in North Germany, -not only are the bees informed of their master’s death, -but the trees also, by means of shaking them. Near -Speier, not only must the bees be moved, but the -wine and vinegar must be shaken, if it is wished that -they shall not turn bad. Near Würtemburg, the -vinegar must be shaken, the bird-cage hung differently, -the cattle tied up differently, and the beehive<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_284" id="Page_284">[284]</a></span> -transposed. Near Ausbach the flower-pots must also -be moved, and the wine-casks knocked three times; -while at Gernsheim, not only must the wine in the -cellar be shaken, to prevent it turning sour, but the -corn in the loft must be moved if the sown corn is to -sprout.<a name="FNanchor_432" id="FNanchor_432"></a><a href="#Footnote_432" class="fnanchor">[432]</a> But all these customs, being too much alike -to be unrelated, and too widely spread to have sprung -up without some reason, by some mere caprice or -coincidence, it is difficult to suggest any other reason -for them than that they go back to a time when not -only bees and cattle, but trees and flowers, vinegar -and wine, were, like human beings, considered liable -to take offence, and capable also of being pacified -by kind treatment, since, according as their several -temperaments predisposed them, they were able, by -deserting, dying, turning sour, or other untoward -conduct, to resent neglect or disrespect on the part -of their owners. Such beliefs belong to the lowest -state of mental development, to a time when the most -obvious marks of natural differentiation were as yet -insufficient to produce corresponding distinctions in -the minds of their beholders.</p> - -<p>Other popular traditions strengthen this interpretation. -In Normandy and Brittany it is thought that -bees will not suffer themselves to be bought or sold;<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_285" id="Page_285">[285]</a></span> -in other words, that they would take offence if made -the subjects of sale and barter.<a name="FNanchor_433" id="FNanchor_433"></a><a href="#Footnote_433" class="fnanchor">[433]</a> The same belief prevails -in Cheshire, Suffolk, Hampshire, Cornwall, and -Devonshire, like the old Russian rule that sacred -images might not be spoken of as ‘bought’ but only -as ‘exchanged for money.’<a name="FNanchor_434" id="FNanchor_434"></a><a href="#Footnote_434" class="fnanchor">[434]</a> The value of bees is -measured, not by money, but by corn, hay, or some -other exchangeable commodity; in Sussex, if any -money is given for bees, it must be gold. Connected -with this idea of the quasi-humanity of bees is the -world-wide fear of slighting dangerous animals by -calling them by their customary names. Mahometan -women dare not call a snake a snake lest they should -be bitten by one; Swedish women avert the wrath of -bears by speaking of them as old men. Livonian fishermen, -when at sea, fear to endanger their nets by calling -any animal by its common name. At Mecklenburg, -in the twelve days after Christmas, the fox goes by the -appellation of the ‘Long Tail;’ even the timid mouse -by that of the ‘Floor-runner.’ The Esthonians at all -times call the fox ‘Gray Coat,’ the bear ‘Broad-foot,’ -and should they take the liberty of too often mentioning -the hare, their flax crops, they fear, would be in -peril. In Sweden people dare not mention to anyone -in the course of the day the number of fish they have -caught, if they would catch any more; a feeling to<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_286" id="Page_286">[286]</a></span> -which is probably related the North-Country prejudice -against counting one’s fish before the day’s sport is over.</p> - -<p>Witchcraft, although it represents a very low stage -of religious conception, yet in its primary idea of a -sympathy or identity existing between an original and -its image, manifests some degree of intellectual advancement. -For the idea of vicarious or representative -influence, that if you wish to injure a man you -can do so by an injury to a bit of his clothing or a -lock of his hair, is, so far as it goes, a spiritual idea, -presupposing notions about the interdependence of -nature, and as far as possible removed from what we -understand by mere materialism. Materialism indeed -is one of the latest growths of the human mind, whilst -spiritualism is one of its earliest. For to a savage, -everything that exists lives and feels like himself, and -the unseen spirits that surround and affect him are as -the motes in a sunbeam for variety and number. The -native Indian speaks of the earth as ‘the big plate -where all the spirits eat.’<a name="FNanchor_435" id="FNanchor_435"></a><a href="#Footnote_435" class="fnanchor">[435]</a> Yet the fetichistic -mode of thought is undoubtedly a low, and to us an -absurd one. Burnings in effigy may probably be -traced to it, and the stories so common in the annals -of witchcraft of waxen images stuck with pins or -burned, in order to injure the person they represented, -undoubtedly belong to it. In America Kane found<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_287" id="Page_287">[287]</a></span> -an Indian tribe who believed that the hair of an -enemy confined with a frog in a hole would cause -the owner of the hair to suffer the torments of the -frog.<a name="FNanchor_436" id="FNanchor_436"></a><a href="#Footnote_436" class="fnanchor">[436]</a> In the Fiji Islands the health of a person can -be made to fail with the decay of a cocoa-nut buried -under a temple.<a name="FNanchor_437" id="FNanchor_437"></a><a href="#Footnote_437" class="fnanchor">[437]</a> The Finns are said to this day to -shoot in the water at images of their absent enemies. -But our own country has its analogies. In Suffolk, in -the last century, if an animal was thought to be bewitched, -it was burned over a large fire, under the -idea that as it consumed away the author of its bewitchment -would consume away too. In Anglesey it -is still believed that the name of a person inscribed on -a pipkin, containing a live frog stuck full of pins, will -injuriously affect the bearer of the name.</p> - -<p>There are a numerous set of popular traditions -which clearly relate to the same state of thought. -There is a feeling so wide that it may be called -European, that cut hair should always be burned, -never thrown away: the reason given in France, in -the Netherlands, in Denmark, and near Saalfeld in -Germany, being, that its discovery by a witch would -subject its owner to sorcery; that generally given in -England and also in Swabia being, that if a bird took -any of it for its nest the bearer would suffer from -headache or lose the rest of his hair. A similar idea<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_288" id="Page_288">[288]</a></span> -prevails about teeth: all over England children are -taught to throw extracted teeth into the fire, lest a -dog by swallowing them should induce the toothache. -So with the nail that has scratched you, or the knife -that has cut you,—keep the nail or knife free from -rust, and the wound will not fester. But all such ideas -are explained by those actually existent in savage -parts, by the custom, for instance, of the Fijians of -hiding their cut hair in the thatch of the house, that it -may not be used against them in witchcraft, or by the -practice of Zulu sorcerers to destroy their victims by -burying some of his hair, his nails, or his dress in a -secret place, that the decay of the one may ensure that -of the other. And a similar philosophy lies at the -root of most popular charms for certain complaints. -The remedies for warts, for instance, are all vicarious. -Both at home and abroad the most usual method is -to rub a black snail on the wart, and then to hang it -on a hedge, trusting to the sympathetic decay of the -wart and snail. But a piece of stolen raw meat, a -stalk of wheat or a hair with as many knots in them -as there are warts on the hand, or two apple halves -tied together, will, if applied to the part and then -buried, cause effectual relief. The essential thing is to -ensure the decay of the representative object. In -Somersetshire a good ague cure is to shut up a large -black spider in a box and leave it to perish, that spider -and ague may disappear together. In many places,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_289" id="Page_289">[289]</a></span> -it is thought that the whooping-cough may be transferred -to a hairy caterpillar tied in a bag round the -neck: as the insect dies the cough will go. And in -Devonshire some of the patient’s hair is given to a -dog between two slices of buttered bread, that the dog -may take the hair and the cough together; whilst in -Sunderland the head is shaved and the hair (risking -we must suppose a headache) left on a bush for the -birds to carry off, that the cough itself may pass to -them. May it not be said that such customs and -fancies betray a mental constitution radically different -from our present one, taking us back and ever reminding -us of the savagery of our lineage as surely as do -flint-flakes or bone-needles, and teaching us that only -by the slowest degrees can emancipation be achieved -from the superstitions, or, as some think, from the -poetry, of ignorance?</p> - -<p>Again, trees, stones, waters, stars, serpents, or -animals, are all to this day worshipped far and wide -by uncivilised races, and the marks of a similar object-worship -by our own race still survive in many a -popular tradition. A law of Canute earnestly forbade -the heathenship of reverencing ‘the sun or moon, -fire or flood, waterwhylls, or stones, or trees of the -wood of any sort;’ yet, if such things are no longer -worshipped, it may be certainly said that some of them -are still reverenced. To take, for instance, tree-worship. -Both in Guiana and Africa the natives have so<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_290" id="Page_290">[290]</a></span> -superstitious a reverence for the silk cotton tree that -they fear to cut it down lest death should ensue.<a name="FNanchor_438" id="FNanchor_438"></a><a href="#Footnote_438" class="fnanchor">[438]</a> In -New Zealand mythology, Rata was rebuked and put -to shame by the spirits of the forest for cutting down -a tall tree-divinity for making his canoe.<a name="FNanchor_439" id="FNanchor_439"></a><a href="#Footnote_439" class="fnanchor">[439]</a> The trees -which occupy the most prominent place in European -folk-lore are the elder, the thorn, and the rowan or -mountain ash. In Denmark a twig of elder placed -silently in the ground is a popular cure for toothache -or ague, whilst no furniture, least of all a cradle, may -be made of its wood; for the tree is protected by the -Elder-mother, without whose consent not a leaf may -be touched, and who would strangle the baby as it lay -asleep. So also about Chemnitz, elder boughs fixed -before stalls keep witchcraft from the cattle; and -wreaths of it hung up in houses on Good Friday, after -sunset, are believed to confer immunity from the -ravages of caterpillars. In Suffolk, it is the safest tree -to stand under in a thunderstorm, and misfortune will -ensue if ever it is burned. The legend that the cross -was made of its wood is evidently an aftergrowth, an -attempt, of which we have so many examples, to give a -Christian colour to a heathen practice; for the elder -was the tree under which, in pre-Christian times, the -old Prussian Earth-god was fabled to dwell. Like -the elder, the whitethorn was once an object of worship,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_291" id="Page_291">[291]</a></span> -for it too is held to be scatheless in storms; and -how else can we account for the fact that in Switzerland, -as in the Eastern counties of England, to bring -its flowers into a house is thought to bring death, -than by supposing it was once a tree too sacred to -be touched, and likely to avenge in some way the -profanation that was done to it? Too deeply rooted -in popular veneration for its sacred character to disappear, -the Church, in course of time, wound its own -legend round it, and by the fiction that its wood had -composed the Crown of Thorns, deprived the worship -of its heathen sting. But if round the elder and the -thorn feelings of reverence once gathered and still -linger, yet more is it true of the rowan. In England, -Germany, and Sweden its leaves are still the most -potent instrument against the darker powers: Highlanders -still insert crosses of it with red thread in the -lining of their clothes, and Cornish peasants still carry -some in their pocket and wind it round the horns of -their cattle in order to keep off evil eyes. In Lancashire -sprigs of it are for the same reason hung up at -bedheads, and the churn staff is generally made of its -wood. It used to stand in nearly every churchyard -in Wales, and crosses of it were regularly distributed -on Christian festivals as sure preservatives against -evil spirits. But this is another attempt to Christianise -what was heathen, for the ancient Danes always -used some of it for their ships, to secure them against<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_292" id="Page_292">[292]</a></span> -the storms which Rân, the great Ocean God’s wife, -with her net for capsized mariners, was ever ready and -desirous to raise. The rowan in heathen mythology -was called Thor’s Helper, because it bent to his grasp -in his passage over a flooded river on his way to the -land of the Frost Giants; and it has been thought that -the later sanctity of the tree may be due to the place -it occupied in mythological fancy. Yet it seems more -reasonable to trace the myth to a yet older superstition -than to trace the superstition to the myth. For -from the exceeding beauty of their berries the rowan -and the elder and the thorn would naturally impress -the savage mind with the feelings of actual divinity, -and would consequently lend themselves to the earliest -imaginings about the universe of things. It is more -likely that they progressed from a divinity on earth -to their position in mythology than from their position -in mythology to a divinity on earth, for the mind is -capable of employing things for worship long before -it is capable of employing them for fable. Worship -is the product of fear, and fable of fancy; and before -men can indulge in fancy they must to some extent -have cast off fear.</p> - -<p>Certain traditions relating to birds and beasts are -only explicable on the supposition that they were once -objects of divination or worship. The old Germans, -we know from Tacitus, used white horses, as the -Romans used chickens, for purposes of augury, and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_293" id="Page_293">[293]</a></span> -divined future events from different intonations of -neighings. Hence it probably is that the discovery -of a horse-shoe is so universally thought lucky, some -of the feelings that once attached to the animal still -surviving round the iron of its hoof. For horses, like -dogs or birds, were invariably accredited with a -greater insight into futurity than man himself; and -the many superstitions connected with the flight or -voice of birds resolve themselves into the fancy, -not inconceivable among men surrounded on all sides -by unintelligible tongues, that birds were the bearers -of messages and warnings to men, which skill and -observation might hope to interpret. Why is the -robin’s life and nest sacred, and why does an injury -to either bring about bloody milk, lightning, or rain? -It has been suggested that the robin, on account of -its colour, was once sacred to Thor, the god of lightning; -but it is possible that its red breast singled it -out for worship from among birds, just as its red berries -the rowan from among trees, long before its worshippers -had arrived at any ideas of abstract divinities. -All over the world there is a regard for things red. -Captain Cook noticed a predilection for red feathers -throughout all the islands of the Pacific.<a name="FNanchor_440" id="FNanchor_440"></a><a href="#Footnote_440" class="fnanchor">[440]</a> In the -Highlands women tie some red thread round the -cows’ tails before turning them out to grass in spring, -and tie red silk round their own fingers to keep off<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_294" id="Page_294">[294]</a></span> -the witches: and just as in Esthonia, mothers put -some red thread in their babies’ cradles, so in China -they tie some round their children’s wrists, and teach -them to regard red as the best known safeguard -against evil spirits.</p> - -<p>One, indeed, of the chief lessons of Comparative -Folk-Lore is a caution against the theory which -deduces popular traditions from Aryan or other mythology. -The fact has been already alluded to, that -in parts of China the same feelings prevail about the -swallow as in England or Germany. But there are -yet other analogies between the East and the West. -A crowing hen is an object of universal dislike in -England and Brittany; and few families in China -will keep a crowing hen.<a name="FNanchor_441" id="FNanchor_441"></a><a href="#Footnote_441" class="fnanchor">[441]</a> The owl’s voice is ominous -of death or other calamity in England and Germany, -as it was in Greece (except at Athens); but in the -Celestial Empire also it presages death, and is regarded -as the bird which calls for the soul. And the -crow also is in China a bird of ill omen. Is it not -therefore likely that all popular fancies about birds -and animals have begun in the same way, among the -same or different races of the globe, and were subsequently -adopted but never originated by mythology? -May it not be that certain birds or animals became -prominent in mythology because they had already been<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_295" id="Page_295">[295]</a></span> -prominent in superstition, rather than that they became -prominent in superstition because they previously -had been prominent in mythology? For instance, -instead of tracing a dog’s howling as a death omen to -an Aryan belief that the dog guided the soul from its -earthly tenement to its abode in heaven, may we not -suppose that the myth arose from an already existing -omen, and that the latter arose, as omens still do, from -a coincidence which suggested a connection, subsequently -sustained by superficial observation? The -St. Swithin fallacy, which arose within historical -memory and still holds its ground in an age of scientific -observation, well illustrates how one striking coincidence -may grow into a belief, which no amount of later -evidence can weaken or destroy. Just so, if it happened -that a dog howled shortly before some calamity -occurred to our Aryan forefathers, thousands and -thousands of years ago, long before they had attained -to any thoughts of soul or heaven, we can well -imagine that the dog, thus thought to betoken death, -should, when they came to frame the myth, be conceived -as the guide which was waiting for the soul to -take it to heaven, and that the belief thus perpetuated -by the myth might survive to the latest ages.</p> - -<p>There is abundant evidence in the practices to -this very day, or till lately, prevalent in England and -Europe, that the worship of the sun or of fire fills -a large part in primitive religion. The passing of<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_296" id="Page_296">[296]</a></span> -children through the fire is not only a Semitic custom, -but extends wherever the human mind has attained -to the idea of purification and sacrifice. Some North -American tribes used to burn to the sun a man-offering -in the spring, to the moon a woman-offering in -the autumn, expressing thereby their sense of the -blessings of light and a desire for their continuance. -And traces of such fire-worship and of its accompanying -human sacrifices lasted in Europe into the very -heart of this century, and in many places still survive. -The similarity that exists between them, both in their -seasons and mode of observance, illustrates the marvellous -sameness of ideas which may so often be found -among people in widely remote districts of the globe.</p> - -<p>The three great festivals of the Druids took place -on Mayday Eve, on Midsummer Eve, and on All -Hallow-e’en. On those days went up from cairns, -foothills, and Belenian heights fires and sacrifices to -the sun-god Beal: and from such fires the lord of the -neighbourhood would take the entrails of the sacrificed -animal, and, walking barefoot over the ashes, -carry them to the Druid who presided over the ceremonies. -These fires have descended to us as the -famous Beltane fires, lit still, or till lately, in Ireland, -Scotland, Northern England, and Cornwall, on the eve -of the summer solstice and at the equinoxes, usually -on hill tops, with rejoicing and merriment and leaping -through the flames on the part of all ages and<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_297" id="Page_297">[297]</a></span> -sexes of the population.<a name="FNanchor_442" id="FNanchor_442"></a><a href="#Footnote_442" class="fnanchor">[442]</a> It is possible that this -leaping through the flames is a relic of the time -when men fell victims to them, a modification of -the more barbarous custom. In the Highlands, where -at the Beltane feast an oatmeal cake is toasted and -portions of it drawn for blindfold by the company as -they sit in a trench round a grass table, whosoever -is the drawer of that portion which has been purposely -toasted black is devoted to Baal to be sacrificed, and -must leap perforce three times through the flames. -In the same country it is, or was, customary on Yeule -or Christmas Eve to burn in a cartload of lighted -peat the stump of an old tree, which went by the -name of Callac Nollic, or Christmas Old Wife. And -in several Continental traditions we find the memory<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_298" id="Page_298">[298]</a></span> -of a sacrifice still adhering to Midsummer Eve, or St. -John the Baptist’s Vigil. On that day, in Livonia, -one or two old boats were burned to the songs and -dances of young and old; whilst at Reichenbach, in -the Voightland, a May-pole, planted on the green, -was, after similar festivities, thrown into the water. -On the same day many watermen still refrain from -committing themselves to the Elbe, the Unstrut, or -the Elster, from the belief that upon that day those -rivers require a sacrifice; and the Saale is avoided -for the same reason on Walpurgis, or Mayday Eve, as -well. From the latter cases we may infer that, where -rivers flowed near, a sacrifice by water was as usual -as one by fire, which possibly explains the custom so -common in many places in connection with these -Beltane fires of rolling something lighted down a hill, -and, if possible, into a river. At Conz, on the Moselle, -a burning wheel was rolled down the hill into the river, -and Scotch children at the Beltane feast used to roll -their bannocks three times down a hill before consuming -them round a good fire of heath and brushwood. -So in Swabia, wheels of lighted straw were rolled down -the Frauenberg, and on Scheiblen-Sonntag the young -people still go by night to a hill, and after dancing -and singing round a fire, swing wooden wheels by -means of a stick round and round till they are -thoroughly alight, and then fling them down the hill. -In North Germany, where the fires take place at<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_299" id="Page_299">[299]</a></span> -Easter instead of at Midsummer, lighted tar-barrels -are rolled down the Osterberge. The Church, to -sanctify these fires, made the day of John the -Baptist coincident with Midsummer-day, and taught -that the heathen customs were symbolical of Christian -doctrine. The fires themselves signified the Baptist, -that burning and shining light who was to precede -the true light; whilst the rolling wheels, as they represented -the gradual descent of the sun in heaven -after it had reached the highest point, so they illustrated -the diminution of the fame of John, who was -at first thought to be the real Messiah, till on his own -testimony he said, ‘He must increase, but I must -decrease.’ It has even been attempted in recent -times to show that the Midsummer fires, in spite of -all their heathen surroundings, were really of Christian -origin, and in some way connected with John the -Baptist. The two chief objections to this theory are, -the survival of heathen names for the fires, as for -instance, among others, the name Himmelsfeuer, and -not the usual Johannisfeuer, in one of the districts of -Upper Swabia, and also the close analogy, both in -the idea and mode of purification, which exists -between the Midsummer fire for men and the Needfires -for cattle.</p> - -<p>Needfires were fires through which cattle were -driven if any disease broke out amongst them. Such -a fire was lit in Mull in 1767, and was not only the<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_300" id="Page_300">[300]</a></span> -method lately employed in Lower Saxony, but is said -to be still actually prevalent in Caithness. It would -thus appear that after the sacrifice to fire had been -modified into the custom of passing through or over -it, the newer mode of cure gradually found its explanation -in the idea, that fire was a healing or purifying -agent on account of its power to drive away those evil -spirits, which in savage estimation cause or constitute -natural disease. The essential thing was that all fires -in the neighbourhood should be first extinguished and -new ones relit by means of friction for the cattle to go -through. The virtue lay in the new virgin fire uncontaminated -by previous use for any purpose whatsoever; -and the Forlorn Fires, which are said to be still lighted -in Scotland when any <i>man</i> thinks himself the victim -of witchcraft,<a name="FNanchor_443" id="FNanchor_443"></a><a href="#Footnote_443" class="fnanchor">[443]</a> agree closely in ceremonial with the -Needfires for cattle. A notice having been given to -all the householders within the two nearest streams -to extinguish all lights and fires on a given morning, -the sufferer and his friends on the day cause the -emission of new fire by a spinning-wheel or other -means of friction, and having spread it from some -tow to a candle, thence to a torch, and from the -torch to a peatload, send it by messengers to the -expectant houses. But exactly similar purificatory -effects were attributed to the Midsummer fires. As -far as their light reached, crops enjoyed immunity from<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_301" id="Page_301">[301]</a></span> -sorcery for a year, and the ashes collected from them -were a constant insurance against calamities of all -sorts. Leaping through them was held to avert -malignant spirits for a year, and in many places not -only did men leap, but cattle were driven, through -the flames. Both America and Africa supply -curious analogues to the Needfires of Scotland. In -the former the Mayas at a festivity in honour of their -gods of agriculture danced about the ashes of a burnt -pile of wood, and passed barefooted over the coals -with or without injury, believing that thus they would -avert misfortune and appease the anger of the gods.<a name="FNanchor_444" id="FNanchor_444"></a><a href="#Footnote_444" class="fnanchor">[444]</a> -And among the Hottentots Kolbe attests the custom -of driving sheep through a fire, and though the -reason told to him for it was, the warding off the -attacks of wild dogs by the smell of smoke, the other -ceremonies usual on the occasion suggest the interpretation -applicable to the Scotch custom.<a name="FNanchor_445" id="FNanchor_445"></a><a href="#Footnote_445" class="fnanchor">[445]</a> Purification -by passing between two fires was also a custom of -the Tartars.<a name="FNanchor_446" id="FNanchor_446"></a><a href="#Footnote_446" class="fnanchor">[446]</a></p> - -<p>Hence there is reason to think that the Midsummer -fires were simply annual and public Needfires, -resembling the yearly harvest feasts of the -Creeks of North America, among whom, as among<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_302" id="Page_302">[302]</a></span> -the ancients who annually imported fresh fire from -Delos to Lemnos, there was an idea of a new and -purified life commencing with a new and pure flame, -after all fires, debased by their subservience to human -needs, had been first extinguished. The Minnetarees -at their feast of the new corn made a new fire by -drilling the end of a stick into a piece of hard wood;<a name="FNanchor_447" id="FNanchor_447"></a><a href="#Footnote_447" class="fnanchor">[447]</a> -and the Sioux at their sacred feasts were wont to -remove all fire from the lodge and rekindle a fresh -fire before cooking the food, in order to have nothing -unclean at the feast.<a name="FNanchor_448" id="FNanchor_448"></a><a href="#Footnote_448" class="fnanchor">[448]</a> In India the Nagas, when -they clear a fresh piece of jungle, first put out their -old fires, and produce a new fire by friction, that of -ordinary domestic use not being considered pure -enough for the purpose.<a name="FNanchor_449" id="FNanchor_449"></a><a href="#Footnote_449" class="fnanchor">[449]</a></p> - -<p>The same idea has been found among the Indian -tribes of South America. There it was the duty of -the high-priests ‘to guard the Eternal Fire in the -Rotunda; and, in the solemn, annual festival of the -Busque, when all the fires of the nation were extinguished, -the high-priest alone was commissioned, in -the temple, to reproduce the celestial spark and give -new fire to the community.’<a name="FNanchor_450" id="FNanchor_450"></a><a href="#Footnote_450" class="fnanchor">[450]</a> So that from this most -remarkable identity of conception between our forefathers<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_303" id="Page_303">[303]</a></span> -and the native tribes of America, it is -evident there is nothing exclusively Indo-Germanic in -the holiness ascribed to virgin-fire, and that there is -no need to ascribe to Phœnician influence customs -which occur where such influence is at most uncertain. -The wheel ignited by friction of its axle was, it has -been suggested, an emblem of the sun, and the old -Aryan belief, that when the sun was hidden by clouds -its light was extinguished and needed renewing, -which could only take place by some god working a -‘pramantha’ in its cold wheel till it glowed again, -has been referred to as the possible root of the custom. -But such an origin being of difficult application outside -the geographical limits of Aryanism, it is obviously -better to refer the myth to the custom than the custom -to the myth, and to a custom moreover which is as -wide as the world.</p> - -<p>It may here be noticed in connection with the -sacrificial customs which were once a part of the -heathen worship, that the idea of a sacrifice to -appease an angry spirit that has caused a disease is -still far from extinct. The burial of a live animal is -still believed in Wärend and North Sweden to -prevent the cattle-plague, and an instance of such a -sacrifice to the earth spirits is said to have occurred -in Jönköping so recently as 1843. In Moray not -long ago, whenever a herd of cattle was seized with -the murrain, one of them was buried alive, just as in<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_304" id="Page_304">[304]</a></span> -the North-west Highlands and in Cornwall a black -cock is buried alive on the spot where a person is -first attacked by epilepsy; or as, in Algeria, one is -drowned in a sacred well for a similar purpose. A -case is even cited in this century of an Englishman -who burned a live calf to counteract the attacks of -evil spirits.<a name="FNanchor_451" id="FNanchor_451"></a><a href="#Footnote_451" class="fnanchor">[451]</a> Near Speier in Germany, if many hens -or pigs or ducks died in quick succession, one of -their kind was thrown into the fire, and the Esthonians, -if a fire broke out, were wont to throw in a black -living fowl to appease the flames.</p> - -<p>English country boys, when on the sight of a new -moon they turn the money in their pockets to ensure -a constant supply there, have no idea of the reason -that once underlay the practice. But a wide comparison -of customs supplies us with a key; for we find -everywhere a prevalent mental association between -the increase or wane of the moon and the increase or -wane of things on earth. Maladies, it is thought, will -wane more readily if the medicine be taken in the -moon’s wane, and wood cut at that time will burn -better, just as, on the other hand, crops are more -likely to be plentiful if sown whilst the moon is -young, and marriages more likely to be happy. In -some English counties pigs must be killed at the -same season, lest the pork should waste in boiling. -In Germany it is the best time for the father of a<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_305" id="Page_305">[305]</a></span> -family to die, for in the latter half of the month -his death would portend the decrease of his whole -family; it is also the best time for counting money -which it is desired may increase. An invalid in face -of a waning moon should pray that his pains may -diminish with it. Hence, too, the French idea that -hair cut in the moon’s wane will never grow again, or -the similar one in Devonshire and Iceland, that the -rest will fall off; and hence probably the popular -English belief that the weather of the new moon foreshadows -the weather for the month. But are all -these fancies relics of an old moon-worship, of the -existence of which we have other evidence, or simply -expressions of that feeling, once so prevalent, that -there existed an intimate sympathy between man -and nature, and that everything which affected the -former was in some way or another typified by the -latter? Analogy seems to favour the latter hypothesis. -For instance, all along the East coast of -England it is thought that most deaths occur at the -fall of the tide, a sympathy being imagined between -the ebbing of the water and the ebbing of life; and -it is curious that Aristotle and Pliny entertained a -similar idea, the former with respect to all animals, -the latter only about man; and though Pliny’s -observation of the fact was instigated by the statement -of his predecessor, it is likely that the latter -was led to the inquiry by the notoriety of a popular<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_306" id="Page_306">[306]</a></span> -belief. The Cornish idea that deaths are delayed till -the ebb-tide, or the Icelandic one that more blood -flows from sheep killed while the sea is running out, -or that chimneys smoke more if built when the sea is -running in, may be cited as similar instances. The -inhabitants of Esthonia, if a wolf runs away with a -lamb, think, by a kind of sympathy, to cause the -wolf to drop it by themselves dropping something out -of their pockets. And in parts of England to this -day, the bloodstone is a remedy for a bleeding nose, -and nettle-tea for a nettle-rash; just as turmeric was -once accounted a cure for the jaundice on account of -its yellow colour, and the lungs of a fox were held -good for asthma on account of that animal’s respiratory -powers.</p> - -<p>Water-worship, whether as river, lake, or spring, -seems as widely spread as that of trees or other -natural objects, and the numerous traditions connected -with it form yet another link between our -civilised present and our barbarous past. ‘There is -scarcely,’ says a writer on Lancashire Folk-Lore, ‘a -stream of any magnitude in either Lancashire or -Yorkshire, which does not possess a presiding spirit in -some part of its course.’ A water-spirit that haunts -some stepping-stones near Clitheroe is still believed -once in every seven years to require a human life; -nor is it long since a farmer in Anglesea had to drain -a well belonging to him, on account of the damage<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_307" id="Page_307">[307]</a></span> -done by persons resorting thither, under the belief -that if they cursed the disease they suffered from and -dropped pins about the well, they would shortly be -cured. There is still a pin-well in Northumberland, -and another in Westmoreland, wherein country girls -in passing throw an offering of pins to the resident -spirits. So in Ireland, votive rags may be seen on -trees and hedges that surround sacred wells, whither -people travel great distances in order to crawl an -uneven number of times in the sun’s direction round -the water, hoping thereby to propitiate the fairies and -to avert sorceries.<a name="FNanchor_452" id="FNanchor_452"></a><a href="#Footnote_452" class="fnanchor">[452]</a> St. Gowen’s well on the coast of -Pembroke was lately or is still frequented for the -cure of paralysis and other maladies, and there are -few counties in England where the dedication of curative -wells to Christian saints does not betray the -attempt to hallow and hide a heathen practice under -a Christian name. In Northampton alone we find -St. Lawrence’s at Peterborough, St. John’s at -Boughton, St. Rumbald’s at Brackley, St. Loy’s at -Weedon-Loys, St. Dennis’ at Naseby, St. Mary’s at -Hardwick, and St. Thomas’ at Northampton. So in -Normandy, people still resort from all parts of the -province, on the eve of the first of June, to the fountain<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_308" id="Page_308">[308]</a></span> -of St. Clotilde, near Andelys, and there are other -French wells of no inferior celebrity. As English -peasants propitiate bad water-spirits by presents of -pins, so do the Bretons by slices of bread and butter; -and the Livonians, before starting on a voyage, calm -the sea-mother by a libation of brandy.<a name="FNanchor_453" id="FNanchor_453"></a><a href="#Footnote_453" class="fnanchor">[453]</a> But water, -in addition to its dangerous and curative properties, -is supposed to contain prophetic ones as well. The -Castalian fountain in Greece was prophetic; and as -the Laconians, by cakes thrown into a pool sacred -to Juno, used to augur good or bad to themselves -according as their cakes sank or floated, so do our -Cornish countrymen by dropping pins or pebbles -into wells read futurity in the signs of the bubbles.</p> - -<p>The belief in unseen spirits, which underlies many -of the foregoing superstitions, as it is one of the -earliest beliefs of the human mind, so it is one of the -most persistent. The worship of water, fire, and other -natural objects probably arose from a dread of spirits -thought to be resident within them, whom it was as -well to cajole by gifts and prayers. Earth and air, -like fire and water, were peopled respectively with -invisible demons, which survive in still current traditions -of the Gabriel Hounds, the Seven Whistlers, -fairies, elves, and all their tribe. Our countrymen in -Cornwall, if the breeze fail while they are winnowing,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_309" id="Page_309">[309]</a></span> -whistle to the Spriggian, or air-spirits, to bring it -back; and the Esthonians on the Gulf of Finland do, -or did, precisely the same. In Northamptonshire, till -lately, women used to sweep the hearth before they -went to bed, and leave vessels of water for the ablutions -of the fairies or spirits of the earth, just as in -Siberia food is placed daily in the cellar for the -benefit of the Domavoi or house-spirits. In Scotland -green patches may still be seen on field or moor left -uncultivated as ‘the gudeman’s croft,’ by which it has -been hoped to buy the goodwill of the otherwise evil-disposed -Devil or earth-spirit; and it is doubtless from -a similar fear of showing neglect or disrespect that -Esthonian peasants dislike parting with any earth -from their fields, and in drinking beer or eating bread -recognise the existence and wants of the earth-spirit -by letting some drops of the one and some crumbs of -the other find their way to the floor.<a name="FNanchor_454" id="FNanchor_454"></a><a href="#Footnote_454" class="fnanchor">[454]</a></p> - -<p>The foregoing instances of actual Folk-Lore, many -of them now mere meaningless survivals, seem only -intelligible on the ground that they have descended -to us either from the earliest inhabitants of Western -Europe, or from times when our Aryan progenitors -were perhaps not unlike modern Fuejians. The<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_310" id="Page_310">[310]</a></span> -existence has been proved, not only in England but -throughout Europe, of phases of thought and modes -of worship closely similar to those still found among -actual savages. There is no nation that we know in -the present or read of in the past so cultivated as not -to retain many spots from the dark ages of its infancy -and ignorance; but these, absurd as they may seem, -hold the rank and claim the interest of prehistoric -antiquities. The fact that there still survive among -civilised people ideas and practices, corresponding in -structure to those found in the various stages of the -lower races, is of the same force to prove that we once -went through those several stages, as the survival of -traits in the growth of the individual, similar to those -actually found in lower animals, point to our gradual -ascent from a lower scale of being. The belief in, -and dread of, evil spirits; the endeavour to affect -them by acting on their fetishes or substitutes; the -worship of natural objects, as trees, animals, water or -even stones; the mistaking of mere sequence in time -for causal connection and the consequent importance -attached to such occurrences as have been observed -to precede remarkable phenomena,—these and many -other characteristics of modern savages find abundant -representation in modern civilisation, and it is more -likely they are there as survivals than as importations.</p> - -<p>But it may be urged that no necessary antiquity<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_311" id="Page_311">[311]</a></span> -can be asserted of traditions simply on account of the -wide area they range over, and instances may be cited -of Christian superstitions no less widely extended -than many above mentioned. The belief, for instance, -that about midnight on Christmas Eve, cattle rise on -their knees to salute the Nativity, is found with slight -modifications in England, Brittany, the Netherlands, -and Denmark. In Cornwall a strong prejudice exists -against burying on the north side of a church, and -precisely the same feeling is found in Esthonia, for -the reason there given that at the end of the world -all churches will fall on that side. So, too, the custom -of opening all doors and windows at a death, to -give free outlet to the departing soul, prevails no less -in the south of Spain than in England or in parts of -Germany.</p> - -<p>To this objection there are two answers: first, that -the capacity of superstitions to spread widely and -rapidly is by no means denied; secondly, that many -Christian traditions are really heathen, though their -origin and meaning may now be lost. For the policy -of the Church towards paganism, though at times one -of radical opposition, was generally one better calculated -for success. It learned to prefer gradual triumphs -to speedy conquests, aware that the former were more -likely to last, and was pleased to satisfy its conscience -and hide its impotence under connivance and compromise. -It assimilated beliefs which it could not destroy,<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_312" id="Page_312">[312]</a></span> -and glossed over what it could not erase, substituting -simply its saints and angels for the gods and spirits -of older cults. On Monte Casino, near Rome, there -existed down to the sixth century a temple sacred to -Apollo, till St. Benedict came and, like another Josiah, -broke the idols and overthrew the altar and burned -the grove, but set up a temple to St. Martin in its -stead. And this case is typical of the way in which -obstinate heathen rites were diverted and customs -consecrated. Some illustrations may be added to -those already incidentally alluded to, since they serve -to explain how so many relics of heathenism have resisted -centuries of Christian teaching. The Scandinavian -water-spirit, Nikur, inhabitant of lakes and -rivers and raiser of storms, whose favour could only -be won by sacrifices, became in the middle ages St. -Nicholas, the patron of sailors and sole refuge in danger; -and near St. Nicholas’ church at Liverpool there -stood a statue of the Christian saint, to whom sailors -used to present a peace-offering when they went to -sea, and a wave-offering when they returned. So it -was with sacred trees and flowers and waters. Their -sanctity was transferred, not destroyed. St. Boniface, -with the wood of the oak he so miraculously felled, -raised an oratory to St. Peter, to whom were thenceforth -paid the honours of Thor. Nobody ventured -the more to touch the famous oak at Kenmare when -blown down by a storm, because it had been handed<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_313" id="Page_313">[313]</a></span> -over to the protection of St. Columba, nor did a fragment -of St. Colman’s oak held in the mouth the less -avert death by hanging because it had been sanctified -by the name of a saint. The Breton princes, before -they entered the church at Vretou, offered prayers -under a yew outside, which was said to have sprung -from St. Martin’s staff and to have been so replete -with holiness that the very birds of the air left its -berries untouched. The great goddess Freja could -only be banished from men’s thoughts by transferring -what had been sacred to her to the Virgin Mary; and -the names of such common plants as Lady’s Grass, -Lady’s Smock, Lady’s Slipper, Lady’s Mantle, and -others, attest to this day the wrong that was done to -the Northern goddess. Bits of seaweed called Lady’s -Trees still decorate many a Cornish chimney-piece, -and protect the house from fire and other evils. The -Ladybird was once Freja’s bird; and Orion’s belt, -which in Sweden is still called Freja’s spindle, in -Zealand now belongs to her successor Mary. In the -same way Christmas has supplanted the old Yule -festival, and the Yule log still testifies to the rites of -fire-worship once connected with the season. So we -now keep Easter at the time when our pagan forefathers -used to sacrifice to the goddess Eostre, and -hot cross-buns are perhaps the descendants of cakes -once eaten in her honour, on which the mark of -Christianity has taken the place of some heathen sign.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_314" id="Page_314">[314]</a></span></p> - -<p>Such then is the evidence which Comparative -Folk-Lore affords in confirmation of the teaching of -history, that the people from whom we inherit our -popular traditions were once as miserable and savage -as those we now place in the lowest scale of the -human family. The evidence that the nations now -highest in culture were once in the position of those -now the lowest is ever increasing, and the study of -Folk-Lore corroborates the conclusions long since -arrived at by archæological science. For, just as -stone monuments, flint knives, lake-piles, or shell-mounds -point to a time when Europeans resembled -races where such things are still part of actual life, -so do the traces in our social organism of fetishism, -totemism, and other low forms of thought, connect -our past with people where such forms of thought are -still predominant. The analogies with barbarism -which still flourish in civilised communities seem only -explicable on the theory of a slow and more or less -uniform metamorphosis to higher types and modes -of life, whilst they enforce the belief that before long -it will appear a law of development, as firmly established -on the inconceivability of the contrary, that -civilisation should emerge from barbarism, as that -butterflies should first be caterpillars, or that ignorance -should precede knowledge. In this way superstition -itself turns to the service of science, confirming -its teaching, that the history of humanity<span class="pagenum"><a name="Page_315" id="Page_315">[315]</a></span> -has been a rise, not a fall, not a degradation from -completeness to imperfection, but a constantly accelerating -progress from savagery to culture; that, in -short, the iron age of the world belongs to the past, -its golden one to the future.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="footnotes"> - -<h2>FOOTNOTES</h2> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_1" id="Footnote_1"></a><a href="#FNanchor_1"><span class="label">[1]</span></a> The justification of the use of the word <i>force</i> is not far to seek. -One of the demands in the ultimatum addressed to Cetewayo, which -helped to bring about the present unhappy Zulu war, was for the -reinstatement of missionaries in Zululand. A Natal correspondent of the -<i>Times</i>, January 28, 1879, justly observes about this: ‘If the Zulus object -to missionaries—<i>who certainly in many cases have acted as spies</i>—why -<i>force</i> missionaries upon them?’ The italics are not the correspondent’s.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_2" id="Footnote_2"></a><a href="#FNanchor_2"><span class="label">[2]</span></a> See on this subject Mr. Wallace’s <i>Tropical Nature</i>, pp. 290-300.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_3" id="Footnote_3"></a><a href="#FNanchor_3"><span class="label">[3]</span></a> Tylor, <i>Primitive Culture</i>, ii. 312, 313, 333.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_4" id="Footnote_4"></a><a href="#FNanchor_4"><span class="label">[4]</span></a> Sproat, <i>Savage Life</i>, 178, 179, 209, 210.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_5" id="Footnote_5"></a><a href="#FNanchor_5"><span class="label">[5]</span></a> Schoolcraft, <i>Indian Tribes</i>, v. 173; and Bancroft, iii. 105.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_6" id="Footnote_6"></a><a href="#FNanchor_6"><span class="label">[6]</span></a> Mariner, <i>Tonga Islands</i>, ii. 121-4.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_7" id="Footnote_7"></a><a href="#FNanchor_7"><span class="label">[7]</span></a> Schoolcraft, <i>I. T.</i>, v. p. 155.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_8" id="Footnote_8"></a><a href="#FNanchor_8"><span class="label">[8]</span></a> Schoolcraft, <i>I. T.</i>, iv. 496. See Dr. Brinton’s explanation of the -story in his <i>Myths of the New World</i>, pp. 170-3.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_9" id="Footnote_9"></a><a href="#FNanchor_9"><span class="label">[9]</span></a> Humboldt, <i>Personal Narrative</i>, v. 595-7.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_10" id="Footnote_10"></a><a href="#FNanchor_10"><span class="label">[10]</span></a> Forbes Leslie, <i>Early Races in Scotland</i>, i. 177.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_11" id="Footnote_11"></a><a href="#FNanchor_11"><span class="label">[11]</span></a> Klemm, <i>Cultur-Geschichte</i>, ii. 155-7, where the beliefs are referred -to. Franklin’s <i>Second Journey</i>, p. 308. They are so remarkable as to -arouse suspicion that European influence has affected the native -imagination; but the influence, if any, seems beyond the reach of -criticism in this as in other striking cases of analogy.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_12" id="Footnote_12"></a><a href="#FNanchor_12"><span class="label">[12]</span></a> Schoolcraft, <i>I. T.</i>, iv. 255.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_13" id="Footnote_13"></a><a href="#FNanchor_13"><span class="label">[13]</span></a> Hutton, <i>Voyage to Africa</i>, p. 320; and Bosman in Pinkerton, xvi. -396.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_14" id="Footnote_14"></a><a href="#FNanchor_14"><span class="label">[14]</span></a> Schoolcraft, iv. 90.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_15" id="Footnote_15"></a><a href="#FNanchor_15"><span class="label">[15]</span></a> Klemm, <i>Cultur-Geschichte</i>, vii. 368.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_16" id="Footnote_16"></a><a href="#FNanchor_16"><span class="label">[16]</span></a> <i>Trans. Eth. Soc.</i> iii. 233, 234; Oldfield’s <i>Aborigines of Australia</i>.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_17" id="Footnote_17"></a><a href="#FNanchor_17"><span class="label">[17]</span></a> Bancroft, <i>Native Races of the Pacific States</i>, iii. 112.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_18" id="Footnote_18"></a><a href="#FNanchor_18"><span class="label">[18]</span></a> Brinton, pp. 198, 199.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_19" id="Footnote_19"></a><a href="#FNanchor_19"><span class="label">[19]</span></a> Brinton, p. 210.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_20" id="Footnote_20"></a><a href="#FNanchor_20"><span class="label">[20]</span></a> Catlin, ii. 127. For some other deluge-myths of a similar kind -see Bancroft, iii. 46, 47, 64, 75, 76, 88, 100; Turner’s <i>Polynesia</i>, p. 249; -Ellis, <i>Polynesian Researches</i>, i. 386; Franklin, i. 113; Sir G. Grey, -<i>Polynesian Mythology</i>, 61; Brett, <i>Indian Tribes of Guiana</i>, pp. 381, -385, 398, 399; Dall, <i>Alaska</i>, p. 423.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_21" id="Footnote_21"></a><a href="#FNanchor_21"><span class="label">[21]</span></a> Koehler, <i>Volksbrauch im Voightland</i>, p. 444. ‘Dem Verstorbenen -giebt man die Gegenstände mit in das Grab, welche er im Leben am -liebsten hatte: so ist es geschehen, dass man selbst Regenschirm und -Gummischühe mitgab. (Reichenbach.) ... In Schweden hat man -dem Todten Tabakspfeife, Tabaksbeutel, Geld und Feuerzeug mitgegeben, -damit er nicht spuke.... In einem Grabe des Gottesackers -zu Elsterberg wurde eine Anzahl Kupfermünzen gefunden.’</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_22" id="Footnote_22"></a><a href="#FNanchor_22"><span class="label">[22]</span></a> This fact has been denied in King’s <i>Greek Church</i>, p. 358, but it is -mentioned by most of the earliest English travellers in Russia; by -Chancelor, in <i>Hackluyt’s Voyages</i>, i. 283; Jenkinson, ibid., p. 361; and -Fletcher, <i>Russe Commonwealth</i>, 106; as well as by later ones.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_23" id="Footnote_23"></a><a href="#FNanchor_23"><span class="label">[23]</span></a> Klemm, <i>Cultur-Geschichte</i>, ii. 165.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_24" id="Footnote_24"></a><a href="#FNanchor_24"><span class="label">[24]</span></a> Stevenson, <i>Travels in South America</i>, i. 58.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_25" id="Footnote_25"></a><a href="#FNanchor_25"><span class="label">[25]</span></a> Klemm, <i>Cultur-Geschichte</i>, ii. 166.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_26" id="Footnote_26"></a><a href="#FNanchor_26"><span class="label">[26]</span></a> See Brinton, p. 242. ‘Nowhere (in the New World) was any well-defined -doctrine that moral turpitude was judged and punished in the -next world. No contrast is discoverable between a place of torments -and a realm of joy; at the worst but a negative castigation awaited the -liar, the coward, and the niggard.’</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_27" id="Footnote_27"></a><a href="#FNanchor_27"><span class="label">[27]</span></a> For other instances of the myth of the heaven-bridge, and its -wide range, see Mr. Tylor’s <i>Early History of Mankind</i>, p. 348.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_28" id="Footnote_28"></a><a href="#FNanchor_28"><span class="label">[28]</span></a> Williams, <i>Fiji</i>, i. 244.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_29" id="Footnote_29"></a><a href="#FNanchor_29"><span class="label">[29]</span></a> Klemm, <i>Cultur-Geschichte</i>, iii. 71-77.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_30" id="Footnote_30"></a><a href="#FNanchor_30"><span class="label">[30]</span></a> Mariner, ii. 137.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_31" id="Footnote_31"></a><a href="#FNanchor_31"><span class="label">[31]</span></a> Klemm, <i>Cultur-Geschichte</i>, ii. 315. ‘Jedes Thier, auch die -kleinste Fliege, ersteht sofort nach ihrem Tode und lebt unter der -Erde.’</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_32" id="Footnote_32"></a><a href="#FNanchor_32"><span class="label">[32]</span></a> Klemm, <i>Cultur-Geschichte</i>, iii. 83. ‘Endlich wurden die besonderten -Theile nebst den Knochen in der Kiste begraben. Man glaubte, das -Opferthier werde von den Göttern wieder belebt und in den Saiwo -versetzt.’</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_33" id="Footnote_33"></a><a href="#FNanchor_33"><span class="label">[33]</span></a> Dall, <i>Alaska</i>, p. 89.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_34" id="Footnote_34"></a><a href="#FNanchor_34"><span class="label">[34]</span></a> Schoolcraft, <i>I. T.</i>, v. 91, 403; ii. 68.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_35" id="Footnote_35"></a><a href="#FNanchor_35"><span class="label">[35]</span></a> Schoolcraft, <i>Indian Tribes</i>, iii. 268.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_36" id="Footnote_36"></a><a href="#FNanchor_36"><span class="label">[36]</span></a> Ellis, <i>Polynesian Researches</i>, i. 350.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_37" id="Footnote_37"></a><a href="#FNanchor_37"><span class="label">[37]</span></a> Reade, <i>Savage Africa</i>, p. 536.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_38" id="Footnote_38"></a><a href="#FNanchor_38"><span class="label">[38]</span></a> <i>Cape Monthly Magazine</i>, July 1874.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_39" id="Footnote_39"></a><a href="#FNanchor_39"><span class="label">[39]</span></a> Bleek, <i>Bushman Folk-lore</i>, pp. 15, 18.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_40" id="Footnote_40"></a><a href="#FNanchor_40"><span class="label">[40]</span></a> Steller, <i>Kamschatka</i>, p. 280.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_41" id="Footnote_41"></a><a href="#FNanchor_41"><span class="label">[41]</span></a> Waitz, <i>Anthropologie der Naturvölker</i>, ii. 170.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_42" id="Footnote_42"></a><a href="#FNanchor_42"><span class="label">[42]</span></a> Callaway, <i>Religious System of the Amazulu</i>, pt. ii. 182.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_43" id="Footnote_43"></a><a href="#FNanchor_43"><span class="label">[43]</span></a> Latham, <i>Descriptive Ethnology</i>, ii. 437-444.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_44" id="Footnote_44"></a><a href="#FNanchor_44"><span class="label">[44]</span></a> Waitz, ii. 169.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_45" id="Footnote_45"></a><a href="#FNanchor_45"><span class="label">[45]</span></a> Ellis, i. 402.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_46" id="Footnote_46"></a><a href="#FNanchor_46"><span class="label">[46]</span></a> Brinton, <i>Myths of the New World</i>, p. 297.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_47" id="Footnote_47"></a><a href="#FNanchor_47"><span class="label">[47]</span></a> Page 150.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_48" id="Footnote_48"></a><a href="#FNanchor_48"><span class="label">[48]</span></a> Pinkerton, xvi. 304.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_49" id="Footnote_49"></a><a href="#FNanchor_49"><span class="label">[49]</span></a> Pinkerton, xvi. 388, 874.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_50" id="Footnote_50"></a><a href="#FNanchor_50"><span class="label">[50]</span></a> Williams, <i>Fiji</i>, p. 176.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_51" id="Footnote_51"></a><a href="#FNanchor_51"><span class="label">[51]</span></a> Dieffenbach, p. 28.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_52" id="Footnote_52"></a><a href="#FNanchor_52"><span class="label">[52]</span></a> Gill, p. 36.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_53" id="Footnote_53"></a><a href="#FNanchor_53"><span class="label">[53]</span></a> Brett, <i>Indian Tribes of Guiana</i>, p. 370.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_54" id="Footnote_54"></a><a href="#FNanchor_54"><span class="label">[54]</span></a> Harmon, <i>Journal of Voyages, &c.</i>, p. 345.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_55" id="Footnote_55"></a><a href="#FNanchor_55"><span class="label">[55]</span></a> Brinton, p. 126.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_56" id="Footnote_56"></a><a href="#FNanchor_56"><span class="label">[56]</span></a> Bancroft, iii. 370-3. For baptismal rites in Northern Europe -before Christianity, see Mallet, <i>Northern Antiquities</i>, p. 205.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_57" id="Footnote_57"></a><a href="#FNanchor_57"><span class="label">[57]</span></a> Franklin, <i>Journey to the Polar Sea</i>, p. 255.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_58" id="Footnote_58"></a><a href="#FNanchor_58"><span class="label">[58]</span></a> Tylor, <i>Primitive Culture</i>, ii. 299.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_59" id="Footnote_59"></a><a href="#FNanchor_59"><span class="label">[59]</span></a> Schoolcraft, <i>Indian Tribes</i>, iii. 237.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_60" id="Footnote_60"></a><a href="#FNanchor_60"><span class="label">[60]</span></a> Callaway, i. 33.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_61" id="Footnote_61"></a><a href="#FNanchor_61"><span class="label">[61]</span></a> Latham, <i>Descriptive Ethnology</i>, ii. 187.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_62" id="Footnote_62"></a><a href="#FNanchor_62"><span class="label">[62]</span></a> Reade, <i>Savage Africa</i>, p. 250.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_63" id="Footnote_63"></a><a href="#FNanchor_63"><span class="label">[63]</span></a> Harmon, <i>Journal of Voyages</i>, p. 363.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_64" id="Footnote_64"></a><a href="#FNanchor_64"><span class="label">[64]</span></a> Lord Kames, <i>History of Man</i>, vol. iv., asserts this of many tribes, -the Tahitians, Hottentots, and others. See also pp. 234, 238, 297.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_65" id="Footnote_65"></a><a href="#FNanchor_65"><span class="label">[65]</span></a> Latham, <i>Descriptive Ethnology</i>, i. 480.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_66" id="Footnote_66"></a><a href="#FNanchor_66"><span class="label">[66]</span></a> Cf. Reade, <i>Savage Africa</i>, p. 250, and Du Chaillu’s <i>Explorations</i>, -pp. 202-3.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_67" id="Footnote_67"></a><a href="#FNanchor_67"><span class="label">[67]</span></a> Lichtenstein, ii. 332; Callaway, i. 111.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_68" id="Footnote_68"></a><a href="#FNanchor_68"><span class="label">[68]</span></a> Pinkerton, xvi. 402, 530.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_69" id="Footnote_69"></a><a href="#FNanchor_69"><span class="label">[69]</span></a> Schoolcraft, <i>Indian Tribes</i>, iv. 635-7. The admission quoted -seems to cancel the statements repeated clearly and positively in i. 16, -17, 32, 35, 38, and iii. 60, of a dualism as decided as that between -Ahriman and Ormuzd. In i. 32 it is said that the <i>first</i> notice of such -a doctrine occurs in Charlevoix, <i>Voyage to North America in 1721</i>.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_70" id="Footnote_70"></a><a href="#FNanchor_70"><span class="label">[70]</span></a> Schoolcraft, iv. 642-3.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_71" id="Footnote_71"></a><a href="#FNanchor_71"><span class="label">[71]</span></a> <i>Ibid.</i>, ii. 195, 197; iii. 231.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_72" id="Footnote_72"></a><a href="#FNanchor_72"><span class="label">[72]</span></a> Schoolcraft, ii. 131.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_73" id="Footnote_73"></a><a href="#FNanchor_73"><span class="label">[73]</span></a> Franklin, i. 114-15.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_74" id="Footnote_74"></a><a href="#FNanchor_74"><span class="label">[74]</span></a> Ellis, i. 350.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_75" id="Footnote_75"></a><a href="#FNanchor_75"><span class="label">[75]</span></a> Klemm, iii. 120.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_76" id="Footnote_76"></a><a href="#FNanchor_76"><span class="label">[76]</span></a> Kames, <i>History of Man</i>, iv. 327.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_77" id="Footnote_77"></a><a href="#FNanchor_77"><span class="label">[77]</span></a> Kames, <i>History of Man</i>, iv. 321.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_78" id="Footnote_78"></a><a href="#FNanchor_78"><span class="label">[78]</span></a> Klemm, vi. 423.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_79" id="Footnote_79"></a><a href="#FNanchor_79"><span class="label">[79]</span></a> Brinton, p. 298.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_80" id="Footnote_80"></a><a href="#FNanchor_80"><span class="label">[80]</span></a> Schoolcraft, iii. 226.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_81" id="Footnote_81"></a><a href="#FNanchor_81"><span class="label">[81]</span></a> Brinton, p. 297.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_82" id="Footnote_82"></a><a href="#FNanchor_82"><span class="label">[82]</span></a> Turner, <i>Nineteen Years in Polynesia</i>, pp. 88, 200, 239.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_83" id="Footnote_83"></a><a href="#FNanchor_83"><span class="label">[83]</span></a> Williams, p. 144.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_84" id="Footnote_84"></a><a href="#FNanchor_84"><span class="label">[84]</span></a> Ellis, i. 349.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_85" id="Footnote_85"></a><a href="#FNanchor_85"><span class="label">[85]</span></a> Catlin, i. 133; ii. 247. Cf. Schoolcraft, iii. 243.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_86" id="Footnote_86"></a><a href="#FNanchor_86"><span class="label">[86]</span></a> Bancroft, <i>Native Races, &c.</i>, ii. 705.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_87" id="Footnote_87"></a><a href="#FNanchor_87"><span class="label">[87]</span></a> Bancroft, <i>Native Races, &c.</i>, iii. 428; Burton, <i>Mission to Gelele</i>, -ii. 18-25.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_88" id="Footnote_88"></a><a href="#FNanchor_88"><span class="label">[88]</span></a> Klemm, ii. 216, from Langsdorf, ii. 261.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_89" id="Footnote_89"></a><a href="#FNanchor_89"><span class="label">[89]</span></a> Sproat, p. 66. The Juangs of Bengal practise a bear dance, a -pigeon dance, a pig dance, a tortoise dance, a quail dance, a vulture -dance. Dalton, <i>Desc. Eth. of Bengal</i>, p. 156; and see <i>New Encyc. Brit.</i> -for similar cases: article, ‘Dance.’</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_90" id="Footnote_90"></a><a href="#FNanchor_90"><span class="label">[90]</span></a> Reade, <i>Savage Africa</i>, p. 200.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_91" id="Footnote_91"></a><a href="#FNanchor_91"><span class="label">[91]</span></a> Sproat, p. 208.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_92" id="Footnote_92"></a><a href="#FNanchor_92"><span class="label">[92]</span></a> Bancroft, <i>Native Races</i>, iii. 167.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_93" id="Footnote_93"></a><a href="#FNanchor_93"><span class="label">[93]</span></a> Ellis, i. 348.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_94" id="Footnote_94"></a><a href="#FNanchor_94"><span class="label">[94]</span></a> Latham, <i>Desc. Eth.</i>, i. 459.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_95" id="Footnote_95"></a><a href="#FNanchor_95"><span class="label">[95]</span></a> Catlin, i. 127, 164, 182.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_96" id="Footnote_96"></a><a href="#FNanchor_96"><span class="label">[96]</span></a> Klemm, ii. 120. ‘Ahmten die knarrende röchelnde Stimme des -Bisonthiers in grosser Vollkommenheit nach.’</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_97" id="Footnote_97"></a><a href="#FNanchor_97"><span class="label">[97]</span></a> Catlin, i. 244-5.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_98" id="Footnote_98"></a><a href="#FNanchor_98"><span class="label">[98]</span></a> Schoolcraft, iii. 487.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_99" id="Footnote_99"></a><a href="#FNanchor_99"><span class="label">[99]</span></a> ‘Ein wunderbares Spiel, das zum glücklichen Erfolg des Untermehmens -<i>durchaus nothwendig</i> gehalten wird.’</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_100" id="Footnote_100"></a><a href="#FNanchor_100"><span class="label">[100]</span></a> Lichtenstein, i. 444.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_101" id="Footnote_101"></a><a href="#FNanchor_101"><span class="label">[101]</span></a> Mrs. Eastman, <i>Dahcotah</i>, p. 77.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_102" id="Footnote_102"></a><a href="#FNanchor_102"><span class="label">[102]</span></a> Sproat, p. 146.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_103" id="Footnote_103"></a><a href="#FNanchor_103"><span class="label">[103]</span></a> Collins, <i>New South Wales</i>, p. 368.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_104" id="Footnote_104"></a><a href="#FNanchor_104"><span class="label">[104]</span></a> Callaway, i. 125.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_105" id="Footnote_105"></a><a href="#FNanchor_105"><span class="label">[105]</span></a> Schoolcraft, iv. 80.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_106" id="Footnote_106"></a><a href="#FNanchor_106"><span class="label">[106]</span></a> <i>Ibid.</i>, iii. 285.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_107" id="Footnote_107"></a><a href="#FNanchor_107"><span class="label">[107]</span></a> Isert, <i>Guinea</i>, in French translation, p. 204: ‘L’action de ramer -voulait dire que leurs maris allaient passer la rivière Volta pour se -battre avec les Augéens et les noyer; la truelle et le travail de maçon -indiquait l’érection de fort Konigstein.’</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_108" id="Footnote_108"></a><a href="#FNanchor_108"><span class="label">[108]</span></a> Casalis, p. 265.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_109" id="Footnote_109"></a><a href="#FNanchor_109"><span class="label">[109]</span></a> Schoolcraft (Prescott), iii. 230.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_110" id="Footnote_110"></a><a href="#FNanchor_110"><span class="label">[110]</span></a> Schoolcraft, iii. 273, 231.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_111" id="Footnote_111"></a><a href="#FNanchor_111"><span class="label">[111]</span></a> Gill, 312.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_112" id="Footnote_112"></a><a href="#FNanchor_112"><span class="label">[112]</span></a> Pinkerton, xvi. 875.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_113" id="Footnote_113"></a><a href="#FNanchor_113"><span class="label">[113]</span></a> Pinkerton, xvi. 875.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_114" id="Footnote_114"></a><a href="#FNanchor_114"><span class="label">[114]</span></a> Livingstone, <i>South Africa</i>, p. 235.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_115" id="Footnote_115"></a><a href="#FNanchor_115"><span class="label">[115]</span></a> Franklin, <i>First Journey</i>, i. 160.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_116" id="Footnote_116"></a><a href="#FNanchor_116"><span class="label">[116]</span></a> Wuttke, <i>Deutsche Volksaberglaube</i>, p. 14.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_117" id="Footnote_117"></a><a href="#FNanchor_117"><span class="label">[117]</span></a> Polwhele, <i>History of Cornwall</i>, p. 48.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_118" id="Footnote_118"></a><a href="#FNanchor_118"><span class="label">[118]</span></a> ‘Da Dios alas á la hormiga para que se pierda mas aina,’ is the -Spanish version.—<i>Polyglot of Foreign Proverbs</i>, 210. Compare with -Roebuck’s <i>Persian and Hindoostanee Proverbs</i>, i. 365, and ii. 283; -Thornburn’s <i>Afghan Frontier</i>, 279; and Burckhardt’s <i>Arabic Proverbs</i>.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_119" id="Footnote_119"></a><a href="#FNanchor_119"><span class="label">[119]</span></a> Most of the African proverbs here referred to are taken from -Captain Burton’s collection from various sources in his <i>Wit and Wisdom -of West Africa</i>.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_120" id="Footnote_120"></a><a href="#FNanchor_120"><span class="label">[120]</span></a> <i>Central Africa</i>, p. 289.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_121" id="Footnote_121"></a><a href="#FNanchor_121"><span class="label">[121]</span></a> Oscar Peschel, <i>The Races of Mankind</i>, translation, p. 150.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_122" id="Footnote_122"></a><a href="#FNanchor_122"><span class="label">[122]</span></a> Casalis, <i>Les Basutos</i>, pp. 324-8.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_123" id="Footnote_123"></a><a href="#FNanchor_123"><span class="label">[123]</span></a> Captain Burton justly calls attention to the possibility of many -Yoruban proverbs being relics of the Moslems, who, in the tenth -century, overran the Soudan.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_124" id="Footnote_124"></a><a href="#FNanchor_124"><span class="label">[124]</span></a> For a collection of Pashto proverbs see Thornburn’s <i>Afghan -Frontier</i>, 1876.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_125" id="Footnote_125"></a><a href="#FNanchor_125"><span class="label">[125]</span></a> Sir G. Grey, <i>Polynesian Mythology</i>, p. 21.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_126" id="Footnote_126"></a><a href="#FNanchor_126"><span class="label">[126]</span></a> Williams, <i>Fiji</i>, p. 97.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_127" id="Footnote_127"></a><a href="#FNanchor_127"><span class="label">[127]</span></a> Callaway, ii. 171.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_128" id="Footnote_128"></a><a href="#FNanchor_128"><span class="label">[128]</span></a> Burton, <i>Mission to Dahome</i>, ii.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_129" id="Footnote_129"></a><a href="#FNanchor_129"><span class="label">[129]</span></a> Tylor, <i>Primitive Culture</i>, i. 333.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_130" id="Footnote_130"></a><a href="#FNanchor_130"><span class="label">[130]</span></a> Trench, <i>On the Study of Words</i>, p. 17.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_131" id="Footnote_131"></a><a href="#FNanchor_131"><span class="label">[131]</span></a></p> - -<div class="poetry-container"> -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="verse">‘Nec commune bonum poterant spectare nec ullis</div> -<div class="verse">Moribus inter se scierant nec legibus uti.’—V. 956.</div> -</div> -</div> - -<p>So Virgil, <i>Æn.</i>, viii. 317.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_132" id="Footnote_132"></a><a href="#FNanchor_132"><span class="label">[132]</span></a> Bancroft, <i>Native Races of the Pacific States of North America</i>, i. -426, 560.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_133" id="Footnote_133"></a><a href="#FNanchor_133"><span class="label">[133]</span></a> Peschel, <i>Races of Man</i>, pp. 39, 209.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_134" id="Footnote_134"></a><a href="#FNanchor_134"><span class="label">[134]</span></a> Burchell, <i>Travels in Southern Africa</i>, i. 456-62. Compare -Waitz, <i>Anthropologie der Naturvölker</i>, i. 376. Also Wuttke, <i>Geschichte -des Heidenthums</i>, p. 164. <i>Ein Brudermord wurde von ihnen als etwas -ganz Harmloses erzählt.</i></p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_135" id="Footnote_135"></a><a href="#FNanchor_135"><span class="label">[135]</span></a> Bancroft, <i>Native Races</i>, i. 348.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_136" id="Footnote_136"></a><a href="#FNanchor_136"><span class="label">[136]</span></a> <i>Ibid.</i>, i. 130.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_137" id="Footnote_137"></a><a href="#FNanchor_137"><span class="label">[137]</span></a> Klemm, <i>Culturgeschichte</i>, iii. 69.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_138" id="Footnote_138"></a><a href="#FNanchor_138"><span class="label">[138]</span></a> Bancroft, i. 520, 553.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_139" id="Footnote_139"></a><a href="#FNanchor_139"><span class="label">[139]</span></a> Dall, <i>Alaska</i>, p. 416.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_140" id="Footnote_140"></a><a href="#FNanchor_140"><span class="label">[140]</span></a> Kane, <i>Wanderings of an Artist</i>, p. 115.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_141" id="Footnote_141"></a><a href="#FNanchor_141"><span class="label">[141]</span></a> Catlin, <i>North American Indians</i>, ii. 192.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_142" id="Footnote_142"></a><a href="#FNanchor_142"><span class="label">[142]</span></a> Bancroft, iii. 167.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_143" id="Footnote_143"></a><a href="#FNanchor_143"><span class="label">[143]</span></a> Turner, <i>Nineteen Years in Polynesia</i>, p. 285.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_144" id="Footnote_144"></a><a href="#FNanchor_144"><span class="label">[144]</span></a> Sir G. Grey, <i>Journals in Australia</i>, ii. 239.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_145" id="Footnote_145"></a><a href="#FNanchor_145"><span class="label">[145]</span></a> Williams, <i>Fiji</i>.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_146" id="Footnote_146"></a><a href="#FNanchor_146"><span class="label">[146]</span></a> <i>Old New Zealand.</i> By a Pakeha Maori, p. 105.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_147" id="Footnote_147"></a><a href="#FNanchor_147"><span class="label">[147]</span></a> Harmon’s <i>Journal</i>, pp. 299, 300.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_148" id="Footnote_148"></a><a href="#FNanchor_148"><span class="label">[148]</span></a> Seemann says of Fijian cruelty (<i>Viti</i>, p. 192): ‘Affection for the -departed—of course mistaken affection—prompted their relatives or -friends to dispatch widows at the time of their husband’s burial,’ &c.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_149" id="Footnote_149"></a><a href="#FNanchor_149"><span class="label">[149]</span></a> Turner, <i>Polynesia</i>, pp. 294-5.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_150" id="Footnote_150"></a><a href="#FNanchor_150"><span class="label">[150]</span></a> Mariner, ii. 233.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_151" id="Footnote_151"></a><a href="#FNanchor_151"><span class="label">[151]</span></a> Pinkerton, xvi. 595, from Froyart’s <i>Loango</i>.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_152" id="Footnote_152"></a><a href="#FNanchor_152"><span class="label">[152]</span></a> Fitzroy, <i>Voyages of ‘Adventure’ and ‘Beagle,’</i> ii. 574.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_153" id="Footnote_153"></a><a href="#FNanchor_153"><span class="label">[153]</span></a> <i>Old New Zealand</i>, pp. 96-100.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_154" id="Footnote_154"></a><a href="#FNanchor_154"><span class="label">[154]</span></a> Lichtenstein, i. 259.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_155" id="Footnote_155"></a><a href="#FNanchor_155"><span class="label">[155]</span></a> Schoolcraft, <i>I. T.</i>, i. 39.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_156" id="Footnote_156"></a><a href="#FNanchor_156"><span class="label">[156]</span></a> Livingstone, <i>Missionary Travels in South Africa</i>, p. 255.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_157" id="Footnote_157"></a><a href="#FNanchor_157"><span class="label">[157]</span></a> Harmon, <i>Journal</i>, p. 300.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_158" id="Footnote_158"></a><a href="#FNanchor_158"><span class="label">[158]</span></a> Turner, <i>Polynesia</i>, p. 224.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_159" id="Footnote_159"></a><a href="#FNanchor_159"><span class="label">[159]</span></a> Bancroft, iii. 486.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_160" id="Footnote_160"></a><a href="#FNanchor_160"><span class="label">[160]</span></a> Fitzroy, <i>Voyages</i>, ii. 180.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_161" id="Footnote_161"></a><a href="#FNanchor_161"><span class="label">[161]</span></a> Sproat, <i>Scenes and Studies of Savage Life</i>, p. 265.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_162" id="Footnote_162"></a><a href="#FNanchor_162"><span class="label">[162]</span></a> Shortland, <i>Southern Districts of New Zealand</i>, p. 30.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_163" id="Footnote_163"></a><a href="#FNanchor_163"><span class="label">[163]</span></a> Turner, <i>Polynesia</i>, pp. 225, 236.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_164" id="Footnote_164"></a><a href="#FNanchor_164"><span class="label">[164]</span></a> Kane, p. 205.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_165" id="Footnote_165"></a><a href="#FNanchor_165"><span class="label">[165]</span></a> <i>Ibid.</i>; Seemann, p. 190.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_166" id="Footnote_166"></a><a href="#FNanchor_166"><span class="label">[166]</span></a> Bancroft, i. 245, 285, 438.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_167" id="Footnote_167"></a><a href="#FNanchor_167"><span class="label">[167]</span></a> Klemm, <i>Culturgeschichte</i>, iii. 78.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_168" id="Footnote_168"></a><a href="#FNanchor_168"><span class="label">[168]</span></a> Cook, <i>Voyages</i>, iii. 158.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_169" id="Footnote_169"></a><a href="#FNanchor_169"><span class="label">[169]</span></a> Dobritzhoffer, <i>Abipones</i>, ii. 203, 274.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_170" id="Footnote_170"></a><a href="#FNanchor_170"><span class="label">[170]</span></a> Burton, <i>Mission</i>, i. 231.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_171" id="Footnote_171"></a><a href="#FNanchor_171"><span class="label">[171]</span></a> Bancroft, ii. 357.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_172" id="Footnote_172"></a><a href="#FNanchor_172"><span class="label">[172]</span></a> Dali, <i>Alaska</i>, 524. For instances of the feeling in North America -see Bancroft, i. 205, 288, 544, 745; iii. 521, 522.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_173" id="Footnote_173"></a><a href="#FNanchor_173"><span class="label">[173]</span></a> Gill, <i>Myths and Songs of the South Pacific</i>, p. 154.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_174" id="Footnote_174"></a><a href="#FNanchor_174"><span class="label">[174]</span></a> <i>Ibid.</i>, p. 38.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_175" id="Footnote_175"></a><a href="#FNanchor_175"><span class="label">[175]</span></a> Catlin, <i>North American Indians</i>, i. 157.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_176" id="Footnote_176"></a><a href="#FNanchor_176"><span class="label">[176]</span></a> Bancroft, iii. 519; and other instances in the same work, chapter -xii.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_177" id="Footnote_177"></a><a href="#FNanchor_177"><span class="label">[177]</span></a> Williams, <i>Fiji</i>, p. 247.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_178" id="Footnote_178"></a><a href="#FNanchor_178"><span class="label">[178]</span></a> Schoolcraft, <i>Indian Tribes</i>, v. 403, 404.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_179" id="Footnote_179"></a><a href="#FNanchor_179"><span class="label">[179]</span></a> Dr. Brinton (p. 250) says that no ethical bearing was assigned to the -myth of the future by the red race till they were taught by Europeans, -and that all Father Brebeuf could find was, that the souls of suicides -and persons killed in war lived apart from others after death.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_180" id="Footnote_180"></a><a href="#FNanchor_180"><span class="label">[180]</span></a> Bowen, <i>Central Africa</i>, p. 285.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_181" id="Footnote_181"></a><a href="#FNanchor_181"><span class="label">[181]</span></a> Mariner, <i>Tongan Islands</i>, ii. 154.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_182" id="Footnote_182"></a><a href="#FNanchor_182"><span class="label">[182]</span></a> Peschel, 428-31.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_183" id="Footnote_183"></a><a href="#FNanchor_183"><span class="label">[183]</span></a> The collection of native Bushman literature is said to have -reached eighty-four volumes! In Dr. Bleek’s <i>Brief Account of -Bushman Folk-lore</i>, and in the <i>Cape Monthly Magazine</i> for July 1874, -some account is given of their mythology.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_184" id="Footnote_184"></a><a href="#FNanchor_184"><span class="label">[184]</span></a> Comp. Bancroft, i. 771, and Humboldt, <i>Personal Narrative</i>, v. -269.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_185" id="Footnote_185"></a><a href="#FNanchor_185"><span class="label">[185]</span></a> Steller, <i>Kamschatka</i>, pp. 234, 355.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_186" id="Footnote_186"></a><a href="#FNanchor_186"><span class="label">[186]</span></a> Schoolcraft, <i>I. T.</i>, iii. 191.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_187" id="Footnote_187"></a><a href="#FNanchor_187"><span class="label">[187]</span></a> Reade, <i>Savage Africa</i>, p. 51; Burton, <i>Dahome</i>, ii. 76; Pinkerton, -xvi. 492.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_188" id="Footnote_188"></a><a href="#FNanchor_188"><span class="label">[188]</span></a> Bancroft, ii. 194, and i. 414, 280. Compare Catlin, i. 170; and -Grote’s <i>Greece</i>, for an ordeal at Sparta.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_189" id="Footnote_189"></a><a href="#FNanchor_189"><span class="label">[189]</span></a> Dieffenbach, p. 667.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_190" id="Footnote_190"></a><a href="#FNanchor_190"><span class="label">[190]</span></a> Callaway, ii. 196.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_191" id="Footnote_191"></a><a href="#FNanchor_191"><span class="label">[191]</span></a> Burton, <i>Mission</i>, ii. 157.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_192" id="Footnote_192"></a><a href="#FNanchor_192"><span class="label">[192]</span></a> Turner, p. 236.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_193" id="Footnote_193"></a><a href="#FNanchor_193"><span class="label">[193]</span></a> Sproat, p. 213.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_194" id="Footnote_194"></a><a href="#FNanchor_194"><span class="label">[194]</span></a> Dobritzhoffer, <i>Abipones</i>, ii. 204, 441.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_195" id="Footnote_195"></a><a href="#FNanchor_195"><span class="label">[195]</span></a> Klemm, <i>Culturgeschichte</i>, iv. 101.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_196" id="Footnote_196"></a><a href="#FNanchor_196"><span class="label">[196]</span></a> Williams, <i>Fiji</i>, p. 29.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_197" id="Footnote_197"></a><a href="#FNanchor_197"><span class="label">[197]</span></a> Jarves, <i>History of Hawaii</i>, p. 23.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_198" id="Footnote_198"></a><a href="#FNanchor_198"><span class="label">[198]</span></a> Brett, <i>Wild Tribes of Guiana</i>, p. 131.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_199" id="Footnote_199"></a><a href="#FNanchor_199"><span class="label">[199]</span></a> Ellis, <i>Polynesian Researches</i>, iii. 104.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_200" id="Footnote_200"></a><a href="#FNanchor_200"><span class="label">[200]</span></a> Cook, <i>Voyages</i>, vii. 149.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_201" id="Footnote_201"></a><a href="#FNanchor_201"><span class="label">[201]</span></a> Mariner, <i>Tongan Islands</i>, i. 380, 403.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_202" id="Footnote_202"></a><a href="#FNanchor_202"><span class="label">[202]</span></a> <i>Travels in Australia</i>, ii. 228.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_203" id="Footnote_203"></a><a href="#FNanchor_203"><span class="label">[203]</span></a> Bancroft, i. 109</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_204" id="Footnote_204"></a><a href="#FNanchor_204"><span class="label">[204]</span></a> In Papworth’s <i>Ordinary of British Armorials</i>, no less than 124 -pages are filled with the names of families who take their crest from -some animal; 34 pages of families take their crests from the lion -alone.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_205" id="Footnote_205"></a><a href="#FNanchor_205"><span class="label">[205]</span></a> Herberstein, i. 32.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_206" id="Footnote_206"></a><a href="#FNanchor_206"><span class="label">[206]</span></a> Kempper, <i>Japan</i>; Pinkerton, vii. 718.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_207" id="Footnote_207"></a><a href="#FNanchor_207"><span class="label">[207]</span></a> Turner, p. 343.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_208" id="Footnote_208"></a><a href="#FNanchor_208"><span class="label">[208]</span></a> Reade, <i>Savage Africa</i>, p. 43.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_209" id="Footnote_209"></a><a href="#FNanchor_209"><span class="label">[209]</span></a> Burton, <i>Mission</i>, ii. 367; and Bowen, <i>Central Africa</i>, p. 318.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_210" id="Footnote_210"></a><a href="#FNanchor_210"><span class="label">[210]</span></a> Jarves, <i>History of Hawaii</i>, pp. 21, 23.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_211" id="Footnote_211"></a><a href="#FNanchor_211"><span class="label">[211]</span></a> Ellis, <i>Polynesian Researches</i>, iii. 97.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_212" id="Footnote_212"></a><a href="#FNanchor_212"><span class="label">[212]</span></a> <i>See</i> Klemm, iii. 330, for the custom in Loango; Reade, <i>Savage -Africa</i>, p. 43, for that in Ashantee; and Peschel, <i>Races of Man</i>, p. 235, -for other instances.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_213" id="Footnote_213"></a><a href="#FNanchor_213"><span class="label">[213]</span></a> <i>Savage Africa</i>, p. 48.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_214" id="Footnote_214"></a><a href="#FNanchor_214"><span class="label">[214]</span></a> Williams, p. 40.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_215" id="Footnote_215"></a><a href="#FNanchor_215"><span class="label">[215]</span></a> Santo, <i>Eastern Ethiopia</i>. Pink, xvi. 698.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_216" id="Footnote_216"></a><a href="#FNanchor_216"><span class="label">[216]</span></a> Dieffenbach, ii. 100.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_217" id="Footnote_217"></a><a href="#FNanchor_217"><span class="label">[217]</span></a> Mariner, <i>Tonga Islands</i>, i. 100. It has generally been thought best, -in referring to books written some time ago, to employ the past tense -where possibly the present would still be applicable. Wherever the -present is used, it must be taken to refer not necessarily to the actual -present but to the present of the original authority for the fact.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_218" id="Footnote_218"></a><a href="#FNanchor_218"><span class="label">[218]</span></a> Steller, <i>Kamschatka</i>, p. 356.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_219" id="Footnote_219"></a><a href="#FNanchor_219"><span class="label">[219]</span></a> Eschwege, <i>Brazilien</i>, i. 221.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_220" id="Footnote_220"></a><a href="#FNanchor_220"><span class="label">[220]</span></a> Bancroft, <i>Native Races of Pacific States</i>, i. 168.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_221" id="Footnote_221"></a><a href="#FNanchor_221"><span class="label">[221]</span></a> Catlin, ii. 240.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_222" id="Footnote_222"></a><a href="#FNanchor_222"><span class="label">[222]</span></a> Pinkerton. Bosnian, <i>Guinea</i>, xvi. 406.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_223" id="Footnote_223"></a><a href="#FNanchor_223"><span class="label">[223]</span></a> Denham, <i>Discoveries in Africa</i>, i. 167.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_224" id="Footnote_224"></a><a href="#FNanchor_224"><span class="label">[224]</span></a> Turner, <i>Polynesia</i>, p. 286.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_225" id="Footnote_225"></a><a href="#FNanchor_225"><span class="label">[225]</span></a> Elphinstone, <i>Caubul</i>, ii. 223.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_226" id="Footnote_226"></a><a href="#FNanchor_226"><span class="label">[226]</span></a> Thompson, <i>South Africa</i>, ii. 351.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_227" id="Footnote_227"></a><a href="#FNanchor_227"><span class="label">[227]</span></a> <i>See</i> Bancroft, ii. 454-472, for the penal code of the Aztecs.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_228" id="Footnote_228"></a><a href="#FNanchor_228"><span class="label">[228]</span></a> Pinkerton. Froyart, <i>History of Loango</i>, xvi. 581.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_229" id="Footnote_229"></a><a href="#FNanchor_229"><span class="label">[229]</span></a> Hutton, <i>Voyage to Africa</i>, p. 319.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_230" id="Footnote_230"></a><a href="#FNanchor_230"><span class="label">[230]</span></a> Pinkerton, xvi. 242, in Merolla’s <i>Voyage to Congo</i>.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_231" id="Footnote_231"></a><a href="#FNanchor_231"><span class="label">[231]</span></a> Pinkerton. Bosman, <i>Guinea</i>, xvi. 405. For an account of a -savage law suit, see Maclean’s <i>Caffre Laws and Customs</i>, pp. 38-43.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_232" id="Footnote_232"></a><a href="#FNanchor_232"><span class="label">[232]</span></a> Maclean, <i>Caffre Laws</i>, p. 34.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_233" id="Footnote_233"></a><a href="#FNanchor_233"><span class="label">[233]</span></a> Pinkerton, xvi. 259.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_234" id="Footnote_234"></a><a href="#FNanchor_234"><span class="label">[234]</span></a> Livingstone, <i>South Africa</i>, pp. 621, 642.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_235" id="Footnote_235"></a><a href="#FNanchor_235"><span class="label">[235]</span></a> Schweinfurth, <i>Heart of Africa</i>, i. 285.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_236" id="Footnote_236"></a><a href="#FNanchor_236"><span class="label">[236]</span></a> Klemm, <i>Culturgeschichte</i>, iii. 334.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_237" id="Footnote_237"></a><a href="#FNanchor_237"><span class="label">[237]</span></a> Williams, <i>Fiji</i>, p. 250.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_238" id="Footnote_238"></a><a href="#FNanchor_238"><span class="label">[238]</span></a> Ellis, <i>Polynesian Researches</i>, i. 378; iv. 423.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_239" id="Footnote_239"></a><a href="#FNanchor_239"><span class="label">[239]</span></a> Pinkerton, xvi. 690.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_240" id="Footnote_240"></a><a href="#FNanchor_240"><span class="label">[240]</span></a> Wuttke, <i>Geschichte des Heidenthums</i>, p. 102, speaking of savage -ordeals, says: ‘Wir können nicht sagen, dass ein monotheistischer -Gedanke hier vorhanden sei; die Menschen glauben an die Gerechtigkeit -des Schicksals noch nicht an einen gerechten Gott.’</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_241" id="Footnote_241"></a><a href="#FNanchor_241"><span class="label">[241]</span></a> Turner, <i>Polynesia</i>, pp. 215, 241, 293.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_242" id="Footnote_242"></a><a href="#FNanchor_242"><span class="label">[242]</span></a> Klemm, iii. 68.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_243" id="Footnote_243"></a><a href="#FNanchor_243"><span class="label">[243]</span></a> Wuttke, <i>Geschichte des Heidenthums</i>, p. 103.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_244" id="Footnote_244"></a><a href="#FNanchor_244"><span class="label">[244]</span></a> Burckhardt, <i>Notes on the Bedouins</i>, p. 73.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_245" id="Footnote_245"></a><a href="#FNanchor_245"><span class="label">[245]</span></a> Latham, <i>Descriptive Ethnology</i>, ii. 98.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_246" id="Footnote_246"></a><a href="#FNanchor_246"><span class="label">[246]</span></a> Klemm, iv. 334.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_247" id="Footnote_247"></a><a href="#FNanchor_247"><span class="label">[247]</span></a> Maclean, pp. 124, 110.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_248" id="Footnote_248"></a><a href="#FNanchor_248"><span class="label">[248]</span></a> Klemm, iii. 69.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_249" id="Footnote_249"></a><a href="#FNanchor_249"><span class="label">[249]</span></a> Dalton, <i>Descriptive Ethnology of Bengal</i>, p. 64.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_250" id="Footnote_250"></a><a href="#FNanchor_250"><span class="label">[250]</span></a> Seemann, <i>Mission to Viti</i>, p. 192.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_251" id="Footnote_251"></a><a href="#FNanchor_251"><span class="label">[251]</span></a> Mariner, ii. 302.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_252" id="Footnote_252"></a><a href="#FNanchor_252"><span class="label">[252]</span></a> Ellis, iii. 349.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_253" id="Footnote_253"></a><a href="#FNanchor_253"><span class="label">[253]</span></a> Earle, <i>Indian Archipelago</i>, p. 81.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_254" id="Footnote_254"></a><a href="#FNanchor_254"><span class="label">[254]</span></a> Pinkerton, xvi. 872.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_255" id="Footnote_255"></a><a href="#FNanchor_255"><span class="label">[255]</span></a> <i>Ibid.</i>, p. 697.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_256" id="Footnote_256"></a><a href="#FNanchor_256"><span class="label">[256]</span></a> Bowen, <i>Central Africa</i>, p. 305.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_257" id="Footnote_257"></a><a href="#FNanchor_257"><span class="label">[257]</span></a> Lichtenstein, ii. 48.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_258" id="Footnote_258"></a><a href="#FNanchor_258"><span class="label">[258]</span></a> Portlock’s <i>Voyage</i>, p. 260, in Bancroft, i. 110.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_259" id="Footnote_259"></a><a href="#FNanchor_259"><span class="label">[259]</span></a> Cranz, i. 149, 150, 174, 218.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_260" id="Footnote_260"></a><a href="#FNanchor_260"><span class="label">[260]</span></a> <i>Travels in Australia</i>, ii. 355; and Bonwick, <i>Daily Life of the -Tasmanians</i>, pp. 10, 78-98.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_261" id="Footnote_261"></a><a href="#FNanchor_261"><span class="label">[261]</span></a> <i>Transactions of Ethnological Society</i>, Prof. Owen, ii. 36.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_262" id="Footnote_262"></a><a href="#FNanchor_262"><span class="label">[262]</span></a> <i>Transactions of Ethnological Society</i>, ii. 291.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_263" id="Footnote_263"></a><a href="#FNanchor_263"><span class="label">[263]</span></a> <i>Ibid.</i>, i. 264.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_264" id="Footnote_264"></a><a href="#FNanchor_264"><span class="label">[264]</span></a> <i>Nuova Antologia</i>, Jan. 1876.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_265" id="Footnote_265"></a><a href="#FNanchor_265"><span class="label">[265]</span></a> Ellis, i. 268.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_266" id="Footnote_266"></a><a href="#FNanchor_266"><span class="label">[266]</span></a> Mariner, i. 271-7.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_267" id="Footnote_267"></a><a href="#FNanchor_267"><span class="label">[267]</span></a> These stories are worth reading at length in Grey’s <i>Polynesian -Mythology</i>, pp. 233-246, 296-301. See also pp. 246-273, 301-313. For -a good Zulu love-story see Leslie’s <i>Among the Zulus</i>, pp. 275-284; and, -for a Tasmanian love-legend, Bonwick, p. 34.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_268" id="Footnote_268"></a><a href="#FNanchor_268"><span class="label">[268]</span></a> Smiles, <i>Self-help</i>, p. 325; Pennant’s <i>Tour</i>, in Pinkerton, iii. 89: -‘Their tender sex are their only animals of burden.’</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_269" id="Footnote_269"></a><a href="#FNanchor_269"><span class="label">[269]</span></a> Weddell, <i>Voyage to South Pole</i>, 1825, p. 156.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_270" id="Footnote_270"></a><a href="#FNanchor_270"><span class="label">[270]</span></a> Seemann, p. 192.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_271" id="Footnote_271"></a><a href="#FNanchor_271"><span class="label">[271]</span></a> Dalton, <i>Bengal</i>, p. 28.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_272" id="Footnote_272"></a><a href="#FNanchor_272"><span class="label">[272]</span></a> <i>Indian Tribes</i>, v. 131-2.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_273" id="Footnote_273"></a><a href="#FNanchor_273"><span class="label">[273]</span></a> Rochefort, <i>Les Îles Antilles</i>, p. 544.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_274" id="Footnote_274"></a><a href="#FNanchor_274"><span class="label">[274]</span></a> Bancroft, i. 110.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_275" id="Footnote_275"></a><a href="#FNanchor_275"><span class="label">[275]</span></a> <i>Heart of Africa</i>, i. 472; ii. 28.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_276" id="Footnote_276"></a><a href="#FNanchor_276"><span class="label">[276]</span></a> The best illustration of this side of savage life, of the sorrow felt -by a bride on leaving her home, occurs in the <i>Finnish Kalewala</i>, in -Schiefner’s German translation, pp. 126-132, 147-150.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_277" id="Footnote_277"></a><a href="#FNanchor_277"><span class="label">[277]</span></a> Dobell, <i>Travels in Kamtschatka</i>, &c., ii. 293.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_278" id="Footnote_278"></a><a href="#FNanchor_278"><span class="label">[278]</span></a> Holderness, <i>Journey from Riga</i>, p. 233.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_279" id="Footnote_279"></a><a href="#FNanchor_279"><span class="label">[279]</span></a> Hakluyt, i. 360; Pierson, <i>Russlands Vergangenheit</i>, pp. 202, 208.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_280" id="Footnote_280"></a><a href="#FNanchor_280"><span class="label">[280]</span></a> Marmier, <i>Sur la Russie</i>, ii. 154. ‘Au moment de se mettre en -marche pour l’église, elle soupire, pleure, refuse de sortir. Tous ses -parents essayent de la consoler,’ &c.</p> - -<p>P. 149: ‘Rien ne donne une idée plus touchante du caractère du -peuple russe que ces paroles de regret et de douleur que la jeune fiancée -adresse à ses parents au milieu des joyeux préparatifs de la fête nuptiale.’</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_281" id="Footnote_281"></a><a href="#FNanchor_281"><span class="label">[281]</span></a> Marmier, i. 127, 229.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_282" id="Footnote_282"></a><a href="#FNanchor_282"><span class="label">[282]</span></a> Cranz, i. 151.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_283" id="Footnote_283"></a><a href="#FNanchor_283"><span class="label">[283]</span></a> <i>Ibid.</i>, i. 146.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_284" id="Footnote_284"></a><a href="#FNanchor_284"><span class="label">[284]</span></a> Egede, pp. 143-145.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_285" id="Footnote_285"></a><a href="#FNanchor_285"><span class="label">[285]</span></a> Chambers, <i>Book of Days</i>, ii. 721.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_286" id="Footnote_286"></a><a href="#FNanchor_286"><span class="label">[286]</span></a> Holderness, p. 234.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_287" id="Footnote_287"></a><a href="#FNanchor_287"><span class="label">[287]</span></a> Dall, <i>Alaska</i>, pp. 396, 399.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_288" id="Footnote_288"></a><a href="#FNanchor_288"><span class="label">[288]</span></a> Kolbe, in Medley’s translation, i. 161.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_289" id="Footnote_289"></a><a href="#FNanchor_289"><span class="label">[289]</span></a> Bowen, <i>Central Africa</i>, p. 303.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_290" id="Footnote_290"></a><a href="#FNanchor_290"><span class="label">[290]</span></a> Elphinstone, <i>Caubul</i>, i. 240.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_291" id="Footnote_291"></a><a href="#FNanchor_291"><span class="label">[291]</span></a> Latham, <i>Descriptive Ethnology</i>, i. 313.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_292" id="Footnote_292"></a><a href="#FNanchor_292"><span class="label">[292]</span></a> Herberstein, i. 92.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_293" id="Footnote_293"></a><a href="#FNanchor_293"><span class="label">[293]</span></a> Pinkerton, <i>Modern Geography</i>, ii. 524.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_294" id="Footnote_294"></a><a href="#FNanchor_294"><span class="label">[294]</span></a> Seemann, <i>Mission to Fiji</i>, p. 190.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_295" id="Footnote_295"></a><a href="#FNanchor_295"><span class="label">[295]</span></a> Si J. Lubbock, <i>Origin of Civilization</i>, pp. 75-76.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_296" id="Footnote_296"></a><a href="#FNanchor_296"><span class="label">[296]</span></a> Dalton, <i>Bengal</i>, p. 193.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_297" id="Footnote_297"></a><a href="#FNanchor_297"><span class="label">[297]</span></a> Williams, <i>Fiji</i>, p. 136.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_298" id="Footnote_298"></a><a href="#FNanchor_298"><span class="label">[298]</span></a> Chambers, <i>Book of Days</i>, ii. 733; Holman, <i>Travels</i>, i. 153.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_299" id="Footnote_299"></a><a href="#FNanchor_299"><span class="label">[299]</span></a> Dall, <i>Alaska</i>, p. 415.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_300" id="Footnote_300"></a><a href="#FNanchor_300"><span class="label">[300]</span></a> <i>Trans. Eth. Soc.</i>, i. 98.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_301" id="Footnote_301"></a><a href="#FNanchor_301"><span class="label">[301]</span></a> Krashenninonikov, <i>Kamtshatka</i>, p. 215.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_302" id="Footnote_302"></a><a href="#FNanchor_302"><span class="label">[302]</span></a> ‘Beschwerte sich aber die Braut, dass sie den Brautigam durchaus -nicht haben noch sich von ihm erobern lassen wollte, so musste er aus -dem Ostrog fort.’—Steller, <i>Kamtschatka</i>, p. 345.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_303" id="Footnote_303"></a><a href="#FNanchor_303"><span class="label">[303]</span></a> Lesseps, <i>Travels in Kamtschatka</i> (translated), ii. 93. The account -here given of the Kamschadal marriage customs is from Krashenninonikov -(translated by Grieve), <i>Travels in Kamtshatka</i>, pp. 212-214 (1764); -Steller, pp. 343-349 (1774); Lesseps, ii. 93 (1790). They differ in -some minor details.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_304" id="Footnote_304"></a><a href="#FNanchor_304"><span class="label">[304]</span></a> Burchell, ii. 56.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_305" id="Footnote_305"></a><a href="#FNanchor_305"><span class="label">[305]</span></a> Burckhardt, <i>Notes on the Bedouins</i>, p. 200.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_306" id="Footnote_306"></a><a href="#FNanchor_306"><span class="label">[306]</span></a> Leslie, pp. 117, 196.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_307" id="Footnote_307"></a><a href="#FNanchor_307"><span class="label">[307]</span></a> Burckhardt, <i>Notes</i>, p. 151.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_308" id="Footnote_308"></a><a href="#FNanchor_308"><span class="label">[308]</span></a> Lane, <i>Modern Egyptians</i>, i. 217.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_309" id="Footnote_309"></a><a href="#FNanchor_309"><span class="label">[309]</span></a> Gaya, <i>Marriage Ceremonies</i> (pp. 30, 48, 81), for similar old customs, -interpreted in the same way, formerly in vogue in France, Germany, -and Turkey.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_310" id="Footnote_310"></a><a href="#FNanchor_310"><span class="label">[310]</span></a> Astley, <i>Collection of Voyages</i>, ii. 240, 273. It is a common rule -of etiquette that, when a proposal of marriage is made, the purport of the -visit shall only be approached indirectly and cursorily. It is curious to -find such a rule among the Red Indians (<i>Algic Researches</i>, ii. 24; i. 130), -the Kafirs (Maclean, p. 47), the Esquimaux (Cranz, i. 146), even the -Hottentots (Kolbe, i. 149).</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_311" id="Footnote_311"></a><a href="#FNanchor_311"><span class="label">[311]</span></a> Pinkerton, vii. 34.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_312" id="Footnote_312"></a><a href="#FNanchor_312"><span class="label">[312]</span></a> Bancroft, <i>Native Races</i>, &c., i. 389.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_313" id="Footnote_313"></a><a href="#FNanchor_313"><span class="label">[313]</span></a> <i>Ibid.</i>, i. 436.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_314" id="Footnote_314"></a><a href="#FNanchor_314"><span class="label">[314]</span></a> <i>Ibid.</i>, i. 512.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_315" id="Footnote_315"></a><a href="#FNanchor_315"><span class="label">[315]</span></a> Fitzroy, <i>Voyage of ‘Beagle,’</i> ii. 152.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_316" id="Footnote_316"></a><a href="#FNanchor_316"><span class="label">[316]</span></a> Compare Bowen’s <i>Central Africa</i>, pp. 303-304; Gray’s <i>Travels in -South Africa</i>, p. 56; Pinkerton, xvi. 568-569; and Bancroft, i. 66.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_317" id="Footnote_317"></a><a href="#FNanchor_317"><span class="label">[317]</span></a> Bowen, p. 104.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_318" id="Footnote_318"></a><a href="#FNanchor_318"><span class="label">[318]</span></a> Pinkerton, xvi. 873.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_319" id="Footnote_319"></a><a href="#FNanchor_319"><span class="label">[319]</span></a> Lichtenstein, i. 263.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_320" id="Footnote_320"></a><a href="#FNanchor_320"><span class="label">[320]</span></a> Thus Bonwick mentions a custom whereby a woman ‘was allowed -some chance in her life-settlement. The applicant for her hand -was permitted on a certain day to <i>run</i> for her;’ if she passed three -appointed trees without being caught she was free.—<i>Daily Life, &c.</i>, -p. 70.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_321" id="Footnote_321"></a><a href="#FNanchor_321"><span class="label">[321]</span></a> It is also an old custom in Finland, that, when a suitor tells a girl -he has settled matters with her parents, she should ask him what he -has given, and then, declaring it to be too little, should proceed to run -away from him.—<i>Marmier</i>, i. 176.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_322" id="Footnote_322"></a><a href="#FNanchor_322"><span class="label">[322]</span></a> Delano, <i>Life on the Plains</i>, p. 346. In <i>Notes and Queries</i>, 1861, -vol. xii. 414, it is said that in Wales a girl would often escape a disliked -suitor through the custom of the pursuit on horseback—by taking a -line of country of her own.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_323" id="Footnote_323"></a><a href="#FNanchor_323"><span class="label">[323]</span></a> Dalton, <i>Descriptive Ethnology of Bengal</i>, pp. 16, 194, 234, 252, -319.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_324" id="Footnote_324"></a><a href="#FNanchor_324"><span class="label">[324]</span></a> Bates, <i>Naturalist on the River Amazon</i>, p. 382.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_325" id="Footnote_325"></a><a href="#FNanchor_325"><span class="label">[325]</span></a> Marsden, <i>Sumatra</i>, p. 269.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_326" id="Footnote_326"></a><a href="#FNanchor_326"><span class="label">[326]</span></a> Denham, <i>Discoveries in Africa</i>, i. 32-35.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_327" id="Footnote_327"></a><a href="#FNanchor_327"><span class="label">[327]</span></a> Dobritzhoffer, ii. 97.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_328" id="Footnote_328"></a><a href="#FNanchor_328"><span class="label">[328]</span></a> Wuttke, <i>Heidenthum</i>, i. 185. ‘Die Guanas in Amerika begraben -ihre Kinder lebendig, besonders die Mädchen, um diese <i>seltner -und gesuchter zu machen</i>.’</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_329" id="Footnote_329"></a><a href="#FNanchor_329"><span class="label">[329]</span></a> Dalton, p. 192.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_330" id="Footnote_330"></a><a href="#FNanchor_330"><span class="label">[330]</span></a> Colonel Dalton, in <i>Trans. Eth. Soc.</i>, vi. 27.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_331" id="Footnote_331"></a><a href="#FNanchor_331"><span class="label">[331]</span></a> Elphinstone, <i>Cabul</i>, i. 239; ii. 23.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_332" id="Footnote_332"></a><a href="#FNanchor_332"><span class="label">[332]</span></a> Burnes, <i>Travels to Bokhara</i>, iii. 47.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_333" id="Footnote_333"></a><a href="#FNanchor_333"><span class="label">[333]</span></a> <i>Trans. Eth. Soc.</i>, iii. 348-351, in Oldfield’s <i>Aborigines of Australia</i>, -1864.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_334" id="Footnote_334"></a><a href="#FNanchor_334"><span class="label">[334]</span></a> Bonwick, pp. 65-68.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_335" id="Footnote_335"></a><a href="#FNanchor_335"><span class="label">[335]</span></a> Latham, <i>Desc. Ethn.</i>, ii. 159.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_336" id="Footnote_336"></a><a href="#FNanchor_336"><span class="label">[336]</span></a> Latham, <i>Desc. Ethn.</i>, i. 96.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_337" id="Footnote_337"></a><a href="#FNanchor_337"><span class="label">[337]</span></a> Campbell, <i>Indian Journal</i>, 142.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_338" id="Footnote_338"></a><a href="#FNanchor_338"><span class="label">[338]</span></a> <i>Journal of Anthropology</i> (July 1870), p. 33; <i>Trans. Eth. Soc.</i>, vii. -236, 242.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_339" id="Footnote_339"></a><a href="#FNanchor_339"><span class="label">[339]</span></a> Buchanan, <i>Travels</i>, i. 251, 273, 321, 358, 394; iii. 100.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_340" id="Footnote_340"></a><a href="#FNanchor_340"><span class="label">[340]</span></a> Sproat, p. 98.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_341" id="Footnote_341"></a><a href="#FNanchor_341"><span class="label">[341]</span></a> Rochefort, <i>Les Îles Antilles</i>, 545.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_342" id="Footnote_342"></a><a href="#FNanchor_342"><span class="label">[342]</span></a> Bancroft, <i>Native Races</i>, i. 109, 132.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_343" id="Footnote_343"></a><a href="#FNanchor_343"><span class="label">[343]</span></a> Macpherson, 65.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_344" id="Footnote_344"></a><a href="#FNanchor_344"><span class="label">[344]</span></a> Collins (1796), <i>New South Wales</i>, 362, 351-3.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_345" id="Footnote_345"></a><a href="#FNanchor_345"><span class="label">[345]</span></a> Hunter (1790), <i>Voyage to New South Wales</i>, 62, 494.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_346" id="Footnote_346"></a><a href="#FNanchor_346"><span class="label">[346]</span></a> <i>Trans. Eth. Soc.</i>, i. 217-8, and compare Sir G. Grey, <i>Travels, -&c.</i>, ii. 224.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_347" id="Footnote_347"></a><a href="#FNanchor_347"><span class="label">[347]</span></a> Hunter, 466, 479.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_348" id="Footnote_348"></a><a href="#FNanchor_348"><span class="label">[348]</span></a> Lecky, <i>Hist. of England in Eighteenth Century</i>, ii. 366.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_349" id="Footnote_349"></a><a href="#FNanchor_349"><span class="label">[349]</span></a> Bonwick, <i>Daily Life of the Tasmanians</i>, 60.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_350" id="Footnote_350"></a><a href="#FNanchor_350"><span class="label">[350]</span></a> Rochefort, <i>Les Îles Antilles</i>, 545. ‘Ils ne prenaient pour femmes -légitimes que leurs cousines, qui leur étoyent aquises de droit naturel.’ -Compare Burckhardt’s <i>Notes on the Bedouins</i>, 64: ‘A man has an exclusive -right to the hand of his cousin;’ not that he was obliged to -marry her, but without his consent she could marry no one else.’</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_351" id="Footnote_351"></a><a href="#FNanchor_351"><span class="label">[351]</span></a> Rochefort, <i>Les Îles Antilles</i>, 460. ‘Il est à remarquer que les Caraibes -du continent, hommes et femmes, parlent un même langage, n’ayant -point corrumpu leur langue naturelle par des mariages avec des femmes -étrangères.’ (1511.)</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_352" id="Footnote_352"></a><a href="#FNanchor_352"><span class="label">[352]</span></a> Humboldt, personal narrative, vi. 40-43.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_353" id="Footnote_353"></a><a href="#FNanchor_353"><span class="label">[353]</span></a> See chapter on Carib language in <i>Les Îles Antilles</i>, 449, and collection -of words, where those used exclusively by either sex are marked -with an H and F (<i>Hommes et Femmes</i>) respectively.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_354" id="Footnote_354"></a><a href="#FNanchor_354"><span class="label">[354]</span></a> Maclean, 95.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_355" id="Footnote_355"></a><a href="#FNanchor_355"><span class="label">[355]</span></a> Leslie, 177.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_356" id="Footnote_356"></a><a href="#FNanchor_356"><span class="label">[356]</span></a> Du Tertre, <i>Hist. Gén. des Antilles</i>, 378.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_357" id="Footnote_357"></a><a href="#FNanchor_357"><span class="label">[357]</span></a> <i>Transactions of Ethnological Society</i>, i. 301-3.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_358" id="Footnote_358"></a><a href="#FNanchor_358"><span class="label">[358]</span></a> Bonwick, <i>Daily Life of the Tasmanians</i>, 188, 206. The author -suggestively calls attention to the similarity of this legend to the Hindu -legend of Indra, who delivers the lovely Apas from the monster -Vitra in the dark cavern of Ahi, a legend which has been taken to -mean the fire-god who destroys the dark storm cloud that chases and -maltreats the fleecy maidens of the sky.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_359" id="Footnote_359"></a><a href="#FNanchor_359"><span class="label">[359]</span></a> Bleek, <i>Hottentot Fables</i>, 67.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_360" id="Footnote_360"></a><a href="#FNanchor_360"><span class="label">[360]</span></a> Bleek, <i>Bushman Folk-lore</i>.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_361" id="Footnote_361"></a><a href="#FNanchor_361"><span class="label">[361]</span></a> Egede, 209.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_362" id="Footnote_362"></a><a href="#FNanchor_362"><span class="label">[362]</span></a> Cranz, i. 213.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_363" id="Footnote_363"></a><a href="#FNanchor_363"><span class="label">[363]</span></a> Gill, 40-2.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_364" id="Footnote_364"></a><a href="#FNanchor_364"><span class="label">[364]</span></a> Dall, <i>Alaska</i>.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_365" id="Footnote_365"></a><a href="#FNanchor_365"><span class="label">[365]</span></a> Sproat, p. 182.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_366" id="Footnote_366"></a><a href="#FNanchor_366"><span class="label">[366]</span></a> Casalis, <i>Les Basutos</i>. With this story Grimm compares a German -one, <i>Kinder und Hausmärchen</i>, i. 172.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_367" id="Footnote_367"></a><a href="#FNanchor_367"><span class="label">[367]</span></a> Schoolcraft, <i>Indian Tribes</i>, ii. 229-30.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_368" id="Footnote_368"></a><a href="#FNanchor_368"><span class="label">[368]</span></a> Gill, 88-98.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_369" id="Footnote_369"></a><a href="#FNanchor_369"><span class="label">[369]</span></a> Mrs. Cookson, <i>Legends of the Manx</i>, 27-30.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_370" id="Footnote_370"></a><a href="#FNanchor_370"><span class="label">[370]</span></a> Wolf, <i>Zeitschrift für deutsche Mythologie</i>, i. 2.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_371" id="Footnote_371"></a><a href="#FNanchor_371"><span class="label">[371]</span></a> <i>Algic Researches</i>, ii. 216.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_372" id="Footnote_372"></a><a href="#FNanchor_372"><span class="label">[372]</span></a> Kelly, <i>Indo-European Traditions</i>, 78. See the German version -of the tale in Grimm’s <i>Hausmärchen</i>, ii. 394.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_373" id="Footnote_373"></a><a href="#FNanchor_373"><span class="label">[373]</span></a> Köhler, <i>Weimarische Beiträge zur Literatur</i>, Jan. 1865.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_374" id="Footnote_374"></a><a href="#FNanchor_374"><span class="label">[374]</span></a> Schirren, <i>Wandersagen der Neuseeländer</i>, 31, 37-39.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_375" id="Footnote_375"></a><a href="#FNanchor_375"><span class="label">[375]</span></a> Grimm, <i>Hausmärchen</i>, i. Pref. 53.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_376" id="Footnote_376"></a><a href="#FNanchor_376"><span class="label">[376]</span></a> See the different versions in Mr. Tylor’s <i>Early History of Mankind</i>, -344.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_377" id="Footnote_377"></a><a href="#FNanchor_377"><span class="label">[377]</span></a> Cox, <i>Aryan Mythology</i>, ii. 173.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_378" id="Footnote_378"></a><a href="#FNanchor_378"><span class="label">[378]</span></a> <i>Algic Researches</i>, ii. 1-33.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_379" id="Footnote_379"></a><a href="#FNanchor_379"><span class="label">[379]</span></a> <i>Aryan Mythology</i>, ii. 85.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_380" id="Footnote_380"></a><a href="#FNanchor_380"><span class="label">[380]</span></a> <i>Algic Researches</i>, ii. 34.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_381" id="Footnote_381"></a><a href="#FNanchor_381"><span class="label">[381]</span></a> Wilson, <i>Vishnu Purana</i>, 394-5.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_382" id="Footnote_382"></a><a href="#FNanchor_382"><span class="label">[382]</span></a> Fiske, <i>Myths and Myth Makers</i>, 97, and Cox, <i>Aryan Mythology</i>, -ii. 282.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_383" id="Footnote_383"></a><a href="#FNanchor_383"><span class="label">[383]</span></a> <i>Transactions of Ethnological Society</i>, ii. 27.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_384" id="Footnote_384"></a><a href="#FNanchor_384"><span class="label">[384]</span></a> <i>Algic Researches</i>, i. 67.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_385" id="Footnote_385"></a><a href="#FNanchor_385"><span class="label">[385]</span></a> Bleek, <i>Hottentot Fables</i>, Pref. xxv.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_386" id="Footnote_386"></a><a href="#FNanchor_386"><span class="label">[386]</span></a> Bonwick, <i>Daily Life of the Tasmanians</i>, 148.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_387" id="Footnote_387"></a><a href="#FNanchor_387"><span class="label">[387]</span></a> <i>Algic Researches</i>, ii. 40.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_388" id="Footnote_388"></a><a href="#FNanchor_388"><span class="label">[388]</span></a> <i>Travels in Australia</i>, i. 261.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_389" id="Footnote_389"></a><a href="#FNanchor_389"><span class="label">[389]</span></a> Schoolcraft, <i>Algic Researches</i>, i. 41.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_390" id="Footnote_390"></a><a href="#FNanchor_390"><span class="label">[390]</span></a> Schoolcraft, <i>Indian Tribes</i>, v. 409.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_391" id="Footnote_391"></a><a href="#FNanchor_391"><span class="label">[391]</span></a> D. Leslie, <i>Among the Zulus</i>, 168.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_392" id="Footnote_392"></a><a href="#FNanchor_392"><span class="label">[392]</span></a> Callaway, <i>Religious System of the Amazulu</i>, Part i. 5.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_393" id="Footnote_393"></a><a href="#FNanchor_393"><span class="label">[393]</span></a> <i>Algic Researches</i>, i. 122-8.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_394" id="Footnote_394"></a><a href="#FNanchor_394"><span class="label">[394]</span></a> Bancroft, <i>Native Races</i>, iii. 526.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_395" id="Footnote_395"></a><a href="#FNanchor_395"><span class="label">[395]</span></a> Bonwick, <i>Daily Life of the Tasmanians</i>, 182.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_396" id="Footnote_396"></a><a href="#FNanchor_396"><span class="label">[396]</span></a> Callaway, <i>Religious System of the Amazulu</i>, Part i. 122-3.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_397" id="Footnote_397"></a><a href="#FNanchor_397"><span class="label">[397]</span></a> Pinkerton, xvi. 689.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_398" id="Footnote_398"></a><a href="#FNanchor_398"><span class="label">[398]</span></a> Callaway, <i>Zulu Nursery Tales</i>, i. 152.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_399" id="Footnote_399"></a><a href="#FNanchor_399"><span class="label">[399]</span></a> Leslie, 81, 98.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_400" id="Footnote_400"></a><a href="#FNanchor_400"><span class="label">[400]</span></a> <i>Ibid.</i> 79.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_401" id="Footnote_401"></a><a href="#FNanchor_401"><span class="label">[401]</span></a> <i>Ibid.</i> 169.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_402" id="Footnote_402"></a><a href="#FNanchor_402"><span class="label">[402]</span></a> Appleyard, <i>Kafir Grammar</i>, 13.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_403" id="Footnote_403"></a><a href="#FNanchor_403"><span class="label">[403]</span></a> Mrs. Cookson, <i>Legends of the Manx</i>, 23.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_404" id="Footnote_404"></a><a href="#FNanchor_404"><span class="label">[404]</span></a> Prof. Max Müller, <i>Science of Language</i>, ii. 444.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_405" id="Footnote_405"></a><a href="#FNanchor_405"><span class="label">[405]</span></a> Steller, 253-4.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_406" id="Footnote_406"></a><a href="#FNanchor_406"><span class="label">[406]</span></a> Léouzon le Duc, <i>La Finlande</i>, 51, 87. ‘À dire vrai, <i>tous les -dieux de la mythologie finnoise ne sont que les magiciens</i>.’</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_407" id="Footnote_407"></a><a href="#FNanchor_407"><span class="label">[407]</span></a> Bancroft, v. 23.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_408" id="Footnote_408"></a><a href="#FNanchor_408"><span class="label">[408]</span></a> Brinton, <i>Myths of the New World</i>, 164.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_409" id="Footnote_409"></a><a href="#FNanchor_409"><span class="label">[409]</span></a> Vishnu Purana, 575.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_410" id="Footnote_410"></a><a href="#FNanchor_410"><span class="label">[410]</span></a> Schirren, 144. Maui wird im Meere geformt, von einem Fisch -verschluckt, mit diesem ans Land geworfen und herausgeschnitten. -<i>Der Fisch ist die Erde welche die Sonne zur Nacht verschlingt; der -Himmel im Osten befreit die Sonne aus der Erde.</i></p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_411" id="Footnote_411"></a><a href="#FNanchor_411"><span class="label">[411]</span></a> Bancroft, v. 23.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_412" id="Footnote_412"></a><a href="#FNanchor_412"><span class="label">[412]</span></a> Brinton, 180.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_413" id="Footnote_413"></a><a href="#FNanchor_413"><span class="label">[413]</span></a> Waitz (<i>Anthropologie</i>, iv. 394, 448, 455) adopts the view of the -human origin of Viracocha.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_414" id="Footnote_414"></a><a href="#FNanchor_414"><span class="label">[414]</span></a> Bleek, <i>Hottentot Fables</i>, 75.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_415" id="Footnote_415"></a><a href="#FNanchor_415"><span class="label">[415]</span></a> Schiefner, <i>Kalewala</i>, 129. In the lamentations over an approaching -marriage, an old man says to the bride:</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"> -<div class="poetry"> -<div class="verse">‘<i>Seinen Mond nannt’ dich der Vater,</i></div> -<div class="verse"><i>Sonnenschein nannt’ dich die Mutter,</i></div> -<div class="verse"><i>Wasserschimmer dich der Bruder,</i>’ &c.</div> -</div> -</div> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_416" id="Footnote_416"></a><a href="#FNanchor_416"><span class="label">[416]</span></a> Fiske, 35, 76.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_417" id="Footnote_417"></a><a href="#FNanchor_417"><span class="label">[417]</span></a> Schweinfurth, <i>Heart of Africa</i>, ii. 326.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_418" id="Footnote_418"></a><a href="#FNanchor_418"><span class="label">[418]</span></a> Steller, 279.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_419" id="Footnote_419"></a><a href="#FNanchor_419"><span class="label">[419]</span></a> Williams, <i>Fiji</i>, 204.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_420" id="Footnote_420"></a><a href="#FNanchor_420"><span class="label">[420]</span></a> Rink, <i>Tales, &c. of the Esquimaux</i>, 90.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_421" id="Footnote_421"></a><a href="#FNanchor_421"><span class="label">[421]</span></a> <i>Algic Researches</i>, ii. 226.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_422" id="Footnote_422"></a><a href="#FNanchor_422"><span class="label">[422]</span></a> <i>Hiawatha</i>, Canto xxi.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_423" id="Footnote_423"></a><a href="#FNanchor_423"><span class="label">[423]</span></a> Steller, 267. ‘Die Italmanes geben nach ihrer <i>ungemein lebhaften -Phantasie</i> von allen Dingen Raison, und lassen nicht das geringste ohne -Critic vorbei.’ Yet they had neither reverence nor names for the stars, -calling only the Great Bear the moving star, 281.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_424" id="Footnote_424"></a><a href="#FNanchor_424"><span class="label">[424]</span></a> <i>Travels in Australia</i>, i. 261, 297.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_425" id="Footnote_425"></a><a href="#FNanchor_425"><span class="label">[425]</span></a> Thompson, <i>South Africa</i>, ii. 34.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_426" id="Footnote_426"></a><a href="#FNanchor_426"><span class="label">[426]</span></a> Aubrey’s <i>Miscellanies</i>, 197.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_427" id="Footnote_427"></a><a href="#FNanchor_427"><span class="label">[427]</span></a> Those who doubt the existence of much popular superstition in -this century may judge of the amount and value of the evidence by referring -to the following books: 1. All the volumes of <i>Notes and -Queries</i>, Index, Folk-Lore. 2. Harland and Wilkinson, <i>Lancashire -Folk-Lore</i>, 1867. 3. Henderson’s <i>Notes on the Folk-Lore of the Northern -Counties of England and the Borders</i>, 1866. 4. Kelly’s <i>Curiosities -of Indo-European Tradition and Folk-Lore</i>, 1863. 5. Stewart’s <i>Popular -Superstitions of the Highlanders of Scotland</i>, 1851. 6. Sternberg’s -<i>Dialect and Folk-Lore of Northamptonshire</i>, 1851. 7. Thorpe’s -<i>Northern Mythology</i>, 1851. 8. Birlinger, <i>Volksthümliches aus Schwaben</i>, -1861. 9. Koehler, <i>Volksbrauch im Voigtlande</i>, 1867. 10. Bosquet, -<i>La Normandie Romanesque</i>, 1845.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_428" id="Footnote_428"></a><a href="#FNanchor_428"><span class="label">[428]</span></a> <i>Origin of Civilisation</i>, 33.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_429" id="Footnote_429"></a><a href="#FNanchor_429"><span class="label">[429]</span></a> <i>Ibid.</i>, 23.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_430" id="Footnote_430"></a><a href="#FNanchor_430"><span class="label">[430]</span></a> Hammerton, <i>Round my House</i>, 254.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_431" id="Footnote_431"></a><a href="#FNanchor_431"><span class="label">[431]</span></a> Holderness, <i>Journey from Riga to the Crimea</i>, 254.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_432" id="Footnote_432"></a><a href="#FNanchor_432"><span class="label">[432]</span></a> Grimm, <i>Deutsche Mythologie</i>, ‘Aberglaube,’ cases 576, 664, 698, -898. These practices, even if no longer existent, throw light upon -those that still are.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_433" id="Footnote_433"></a><a href="#FNanchor_433"><span class="label">[433]</span></a> Amélie Bosquet, <i>La Normandie pittoresque</i>, 217.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_434" id="Footnote_434"></a><a href="#FNanchor_434"><span class="label">[434]</span></a> Fletcher, <i>Russe Commonweal</i>, 78.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_435" id="Footnote_435"></a><a href="#FNanchor_435"><span class="label">[435]</span></a> Schoolcraft, <i>Indian Tribes</i>, v. 419.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_436" id="Footnote_436"></a><a href="#FNanchor_436"><span class="label">[436]</span></a> Kane, 216.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_437" id="Footnote_437"></a><a href="#FNanchor_437"><span class="label">[437]</span></a> Williams, 248.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_438" id="Footnote_438"></a><a href="#FNanchor_438"><span class="label">[438]</span></a> Brett, <i>Indian Tribes of Guiana</i>, 369.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_439" id="Footnote_439"></a><a href="#FNanchor_439"><span class="label">[439]</span></a> Grey, <i>Polynesian Mythology</i>, 111-114.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_440" id="Footnote_440"></a><a href="#FNanchor_440"><span class="label">[440]</span></a> Cook, vi. 192.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_441" id="Footnote_441"></a><a href="#FNanchor_441"><span class="label">[441]</span></a> Doolittle, <i>Social Life of the Chinese</i>, ii. 328.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_442" id="Footnote_442"></a><a href="#FNanchor_442"><span class="label">[442]</span></a> There are several derivations for Beltane or Bealteine: 1. From -Baal or Belus, the Phœnician god, the worship being supposed to be of -Phœnician origin; 2. from Baldur, one of the gods of Valhalla who represented -the Sun; 3. from lá = day, teine = fire, and Beal = the name of -some god, but not Belus; 4. from Paleteine, Pales’ fire, the worship -being identified with that of the Roman goddess Pales, who presided -over cattle and pastures, and to whom, on April 21, prayers and offerings -were made. At the Palilia shepherds purified their flocks by sulphur -and fires of olive and pine wood, and presented the goddess with cakes -of millet and milk, whilst the people leaped thrice through straw fires -kindled in a row. Yet we should probably be right if we connected -the Palilia and the Beltanes, not as directly borrowed one from the -other, but as co-descendants from one and the same origin.</p> - -<p>Mr. Forbes-Leslie speaks of Beltane fires as still to be seen in 1865. -The Beltane feast proper was on May-day, but the word was also applied -to fires kindled in honour of Bel on other days, as on Midsummer Eve, -All Hallow-e’en, and Yeule, now Christmas. (<i>Early Races of Scotland</i>, -i. 120-1.)</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_443" id="Footnote_443"></a><a href="#FNanchor_443"><span class="label">[443]</span></a> Stewart, <i>Popular Superstitions of the Highlanders</i>, p. 149.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_444" id="Footnote_444"></a><a href="#FNanchor_444"><span class="label">[444]</span></a> Bancroft, iii. 701.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_445" id="Footnote_445"></a><a href="#FNanchor_445"><span class="label">[445]</span></a> Kolbe, <i>Caput bonæ Spei</i>, ii. 431-2, and Thunberg, in Pinkerton, -xvi. 143. Kolbe gives a picture of the practice.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_446" id="Footnote_446"></a><a href="#FNanchor_446"><span class="label">[446]</span></a> Kerr, <i>Voyages</i>, i. 131.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_447" id="Footnote_447"></a><a href="#FNanchor_447"><span class="label">[447]</span></a> Catlin, ii. 189.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_448" id="Footnote_448"></a><a href="#FNanchor_448"><span class="label">[448]</span></a> Schoolcraft, <i>Indian Tribes</i>, iii. 228.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_449" id="Footnote_449"></a><a href="#FNanchor_449"><span class="label">[449]</span></a> Latham, <i>Desc. Ethn.</i>, i. 141.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_450" id="Footnote_450"></a><a href="#FNanchor_450"><span class="label">[450]</span></a> Jones, <i>Antiquities of the Southern Indians</i>, p. 21, and Schoolcraft, -<i>I.T.</i>, v. 267.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_451" id="Footnote_451"></a><a href="#FNanchor_451"><span class="label">[451]</span></a> <i>Lancashire Folk-Lore</i>, p. 63.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_452" id="Footnote_452"></a><a href="#FNanchor_452"><span class="label">[452]</span></a> Sir W. Betham, <i>Gael and Cimbri</i>: 1834. ‘The branches of a -tree near the Stone of Fire Temple in the Persian province of Fars -were found thickly hung with rags, and the same offerings are common -on bushes round sacred wells in the Dekkan of India and Ceylon.’ -(Forbes-Leslie, <i>Early Races of Scotland</i>, i. 163.)</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_453" id="Footnote_453"></a><a href="#FNanchor_453"><span class="label">[453]</span></a> Schiefner, <i>Introduction to Sjögren’s Livische Grammatik</i>. St. -Petersburg, 1861.</p> - -</div> - -<div class="footnote"> - -<p><a name="Footnote_454" id="Footnote_454"></a><a href="#FNanchor_454"><span class="label">[454]</span></a> The instances of Esthonian superstitions are taken from Grimm’s -collection in the <i>Deutsche Mythologie</i>. Their date is 1788. The same -interest attaches to them from an archæological point of view, whether -they exist still or have become extinct.</p> - -</div> - -</div> - -<p class="titlepage"><span class="smcap">The End.</span></p> - - - - - - - - -<pre> - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Primitive Manners and Customs, by -James Anson Farrer - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PRIMITIVE MANNERS AND CUSTOMS *** - -***** This file should be named 60943-h.htm or 60943-h.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/6/0/9/4/60943/ - -Produced by Turgut Dincer and the Online Distributed -Proofreading Team at http://www.pgdp.net (This file was -produced from images generously made available by The -Internet Archive) - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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