18 Proceedings of the Royal Society of Victoria. 



Morgan had his attention drawn to these questions by his 

 personal observations of the organisation of the Iroquois 

 tribe, of which he was an adopted member. Following out 

 the clue hereby gained, he spread his inquiries over the 

 greater part of the world, and his final results were recorded 

 in his work on " Ancient Societ3^" His views combine, in a 

 great measure, the essential portions of the other hypotheses, 

 and comprise a primitive community with promiscuit}', the 

 prevalence of a communal family, within which descent was 

 connected through the mother, and a gradual development 

 therefrom of social institutions through polygamy to 

 monogamy, as we now see it in civilized peoples. 



Neai'ly twenty years back our valued fellow member, 

 the Kev. Lorimer Fison, took up in Australia the work 

 commenced elsewhere by Dr. Morgan, and it was my 

 privilege to join him somewhat later. 



In Australia, if anywhere, one might expect to find 

 primitive institutions preserved. The aborigines are in a 

 low ethnic stage. They have been preserved until the 

 settlement of their country by the white man through 

 unknown periods almost wholly from contact with other 

 races in a different stage of culture. Therefore, one might 

 seek with good chances of success among them for, at the least, 

 traces of the earlier form of the family and of society. One 

 might further anticipate that evidence should be obtainable 

 to show either a process of development of or degradation of 

 the social status. 



During the last fifteen years, Mr. Fison and myself have 

 been diligently pursuing this line of inquiry against no 

 ordinary difficulties, and with the result that our general 

 conclusions have been received by leading anthropologists 

 with favour. The results of our investigations, so far as 

 regards the questions to which I have now directed attention, 

 are as follows : — 



(1) The social organisation of all the Australian tribes 

 is based on the same general principles, with local and 

 individual variations. 



(2) The most primitive form of the family is a communal 

 one, as evidenced by the existence in Central Australian 

 tribes of that which we have called the Pirauru practice, under 

 which a number of men, own or tribal brothers, cahabit in 

 common with a number of women who are own or tribal 

 sisters. 



