THE WESTERN DENES. 



119 



marry. So it is thnt emloganiy is looked upon witli horror among 

 them. Indeed, I think T am warranted in affirming that marriage 

 with a consanguine, unless a very close one, was preferred to matri- 

 monial union with a co-clansman. A.s it is, agnation and consanguin- 

 ity in the direct or collateral line on the paternal side were considered 

 powerful barriers to sexual relations, males and females descended 

 from the same stock being always regarded as brothers and sisters. 

 But at what particular point the offspring of a common or collateral ^ 

 branch would be deemed sufficiently distant to admit of matrimonial 

 union is more than I can say, none among the natives themselves 

 being able to s.itisfactorily solve that question. All I can say is that 

 as long as the common ancestors of two individuals were remembered, 

 the latter were easily dissuaded from contracting marriage together, 

 even to the fourth and perhaps the fifth degree of consanguinity, 

 especially if in the direct line. I do not mean to say that there never 

 were tacitly allowed deviations from this law, nor absolutely any 

 intermarriage in the same clan. But the repugnance which such 

 unions inspired only goes to show that in this case, as in others, the 

 exception confirms or proves the rule. 



Such was not the case, however, with consanguinity in collateral 

 lines by the mother's side, cousins of that class, even as near as the 

 first degree, being by a time honored custom, almost bound to inter- 

 marry. And hei'e it is as well to state at once that, in common with 

 nearly all the ])rimitive people, mother-right is the supreme lasv re- 

 gulating succession among nearly all of the Westei'n Denes, and I 

 may add that here^ it admits of no exception wliatever. On the other 

 hand, another ordinance of their social code forbids titles as well as 

 landed property to pass by heredity into a different clan. Therefore 

 chihlren of a notable among them belonging to their mother's clan, 

 could never inherit from their father. But if the latter had nephews 

 by a sister, one of them was de jure his successor, this nephdw 

 belonging through his mother to his uncle's clan. Now, by way of 

 compensation, and to permit the notable's children who could not 

 otherwise inherit from him, to enjoy at least, as much as was lawful 

 of their father's succession, one of his daughters would be united in 

 marriage with her inheriting maternal first cousin. 



' On the father's side. 



2 At Stuart's hake. — Ch. S. Cm. 



