THE 



POPULAR SCIENCE 

 MONTHLY. 



JULY, 1877. 

 ON THE EYOLUTION OF THE FAMILY. 



By HEEBEET SFENCEE. 

 11. 



AND here we come in face of the fact before obliquely glanced at, 

 that Sir Henry Maine's hypothesis takes account of no stages 

 in human progress earlier than the pastoral or agricultural. The 

 groups he describes as severally formed of the patriarch, his wife, 

 descendants, slaves, flocks, and herds, are groups implying that 

 animals of several kinds have been domesticated. But before the 

 domestication of animals was achieved, there passed long stages 

 stretching back through prehistoric times. To understand the patri- 

 archal group, we must inquire how it grew out of the less-organized 

 groups that preceded it. 



The answer is not difficult to find if we ask what kind of life the 

 domestication of herbivorous animals entailed. Where pasture is 

 abundant and covers large areas, the keeping of flocks and herds does 

 not necessitate separation into very small clusters : instance the Co- 

 manches, who, with their hunting, join the keeping of cattle, which 

 the members of the tribe combine to guard. But where pasture is 

 not abundant, or is distributed in patches, cattle cannot be kept to- 

 gether in great numbers; and their owners consequently have to part. 

 Naturally, the division of the owners will be into such clusters as are 

 already vaguely marked off" in the original aggregate: individual men 

 with such women as they have taken possession of, such animals as 

 they have acquired by force or otherwise, and all their other belong- 

 ings, will wander hither and thither in search of food for their sheep 

 and oxen. As already pointed out, we have, in prepastoral stages, 

 as among the Bushmen, cases where scarcity of wild food necessitates 

 parting into very small groups ; and clearly when, instead of game 



VOL. XI. 17 



