SECOJ^DARt SEXUAL OHARACTEHS, 679 



savages at the present day. They would not at that 

 period have partially lost one of the strongest of all 

 instincts common to all lower animals, namely, the love of 

 their young offspring ; and consequently they would not 

 have practiced female infanticide. Women would not 

 have been thus rendered scarce, and polyandry would not 

 have been practiced; for hardly any other cause except the 

 scarcity of women seems sufficient to break down the nat- 

 ural and widely prevalent feeling of jealousy and the desire 

 of each male to possess a female for himself. Polyandry 

 would be a natural stepping-stone to communal marriages 

 or almost promiscuous in tercoui-se; though the best authori- 

 ties believe that this latter habit preceded polandry. 

 During primordial times there would be no early betroth- 

 als, for this implies foresight. Nor would women be 

 valued merely as useful slaves or beasts of burden. Both 

 sexes, if the females as well as the males were permitted to 

 exert any choice, would choose their partners not for 

 mental charms, or property, or social position, but almost 

 solely from external appearance. All the adults would 

 marry or pair, and all the offspring, as far as that was 

 possible, would be reared; so that the struggle for exist- 

 ence would be periodically excessively severe. Thus, during 

 these times all the conditions for sexual selection would 

 have been more favorable than at a later period, when man 

 had advanced in his intellectual powers but had retro- 

 graded in his instincts. Therefore, whatever influence 

 sexual selection may have had in producing the differences 

 between the races of man and between man and the higher 

 Quadrumana, this influence would have been more power- 

 ful at a remote period than at the present day, though 

 probably not yet wholly lost. 



The Manner of Action of Sexual Selection with Man- 

 kind, With primeval man under the favorable conditions 

 just stated, and with those savages who at the present time 

 enter into any marriage tie, sexual selection has probably 

 acted in the following manner, subject to greater or less 

 interference from female infanticide, early betrothals, etc. 

 The strongest and most vigorous men those who could 

 best defend and hunt for their families, who were pro- 

 vided with the best weapons and possessed the most prop- 

 erty, such as a large number of dogs or other animals 



