CAPITAL AND ABSTINENCE. 527 



case the tribe would perish but for a previously accumulated 

 store of provisions; so, as a matter of simple self-preservation, 

 they must save. But in such case they only save enough 

 just to tide over the crisis, and barely enough for that. By 

 the time summer comes round again the whole tribe is gene- 

 rally in a state of semi-starvation. So serious a matter did 

 the Russian Government find this that it compelled every 

 household to contribute a supply of smoked fish during the 

 season to be stored away as a public provision, and doled 

 out in time of scarcity under stringent regulations. But 

 abstinence of this sort (barely to tide over a crisis) could not 

 account for the origin of accumulations. It was essentially 

 a temporary expedient, and barely effective even for its 

 temporary purpose. 



It is doubtful, however, whether even in presence of a 

 periodically recurring crisis like this the savage ever really 

 practices any self-denying abstinence in the season of plenty, 

 not only because abstinence is hateful to him, but because 

 there is really no necessity for it, as he is certain, if not to-day, 

 then to-morrow or the next day, to catch more fish than he 

 wants, in which case he can eat his fill as usual and yet save. 

 But, again, the saving does not consist in abstinence, but in 

 exertion ; that is, in industriously preserving and putting 

 away what he does not want at present, instead of idly 

 leaving it to I'ot. 



He does not eat his surplus straight off*, because he does 

 not want to — because he cannot. There is nothing to ex- 

 change it away for, and therefore nothing to do with it but 

 put it by. Abstinence does not come in anywhere in any 

 shape. Next day he has his day's food ready secured, so 

 need not go fishing again unless he likes ; but the question 

 with him is not whether he shall eat or go hungry, consume 

 or abstain, but whether he shall work or be idle. 



He decides to work, and makes (say) a net, which once 

 made lasts a long time ; and so by the intelligent use of his 

 spare time he gradually accumulates a variety of goods — nets 

 and lines, spears, and axes, pots and baskets, clothing and 

 ornaments, generally intended to satisfy some immediate 

 want or fulfil some immediate purpose, but any way all of a 

 more or less durable nature, outlasting their first use, often 

 outlasting many successive uses, and so accumulating faster 

 than they are worn out. 



But to commence an accumulation in this way it is not 

 necessary even that he should on any one day catch more 



