296 PRIMITIVE PATERNITY 



(now extinct). The Wakelbura mother exercised the 

 right of betrothal as soon as her daughter was born. 

 If the child on growing up consented to the match or 

 had been compelled to it, and afterwards eloped with 

 another man, her brothers " might almost kill her, 

 because they would thereby lose tne woman by whose 

 exchange they would obtain a wife for one of them." 1 

 In none of these cases had the father anything to do 

 with the matter. The growing patria potestas, how- 

 ever, has made itself felt among many of the matri- 

 lineal tribes ; though in most of them the consent of 

 the kindred is required. 2 



Among the Haida the growth of patria potestas has 

 been hindered by the custom, similar to that among 

 the peoples of the Lower Congo, by which the children 

 settle and build houses in the town of their mother's 

 brothers, whose successors in the family organisation 

 they are. The term ddgalaii, which we translate 

 brothers, as used by a woman, was applied to all men of 

 her clan in her own generation. Each of the two clans 

 into which the tribe was divided was subdivided into* 

 families. " The fundamental unit of Haida society 

 was the family, and the family chief was the highest 

 functionary. Generally the family chief was also 

 town chief, . . . but the large places were usually 

 inhabited by several families. In this case the town- 

 chief stood first socially among the family chiefs.'' 

 War might be declared by the chief of any family,. 



1 Howitt, 222. In the Mukjarawaint tribe the paternal grand- 

 parents had a voice in the disposal of their grand-daughter. But 

 there no doubt the paternal grandfather was the uncle, own or 

 tribal, of the mother, and consequently one of the elder men of 

 the grand-daughter's kin (Id. 243). 



2 Id. 210, 216, 227, 243, 251, 260. 



