226 



NA TURE 



[January 5, 1905 



marriage, and continuing to do so in successive gener- 

 ations. Now here we have in A and B not only the 

 two moieties of the future tribe, but the tribe itself, in 

 the making. The bisection grew out of a quasi- 

 purposive exogamous instinct against marriage within 

 the fire-circle. 



There seems to be nothing against Aristotle's view 

 that the tribe grew out of the family, except the 

 curious but fashionable prejudice in favour of an 

 organisation for primitive man of the baboon type. 

 Mr. Atkinson in a remarkable paper has dealt the 

 latest and one of the shrewdest blows at this prejudice, 

 and doubtless anthropologists may in time revert to 

 Darwin's suggestion that the earliest form of the 

 liuman family resembled rather that of the unsocial 

 anthropoids, such as the gorilla. It is noteworthy that 

 Dr. Howitt modifies considerably the earlier concep- 

 tion of the Undivided Commune, and regards it as 

 "having been originally something like " what occurs 

 when the modified Communes of the Lake Eyre tribes 

 reunite." The battleground of the two schools is, of 



-The Bret or Dead H; 



course, the so-called group-marriage of the tribes last 

 named. In this connection the author does good 

 service by putting together a full and revised account 

 of the Dieri marriage-system, with its Tippa-malku 

 or individual marriage, and its Pirraiirii or group- 

 union. We are thus enabled with some certainty of 

 data to compare the notorious Urabunna and Arunta 

 systems. But when Dr. Howitt says, " the germ of 

 individual marriage may be seen in the Dieri practice ; 

 for as I shall show later on, a woman becomes a 

 Tippa-malku wife before she becomes a Pirrauru or 

 group-wife " (p. 179), the logic strikes one as curious. 

 The inference should surely be that the group-marriage 

 has been evolved from the individual system, and not 

 the other wav about. 



The author still regards the practice, as amongst 

 the Wiimbaio, of exchanging wives on the approach 

 of a pestilence, as a survival of group-marriage, and 

 the right of access as a survival of the jus primac 

 noctis and an " expiation " for individual marriage. 

 One had thought that these two last categories had 

 been relegated to the limbo of outworn fictions anthro- 



NO. 1836.. VOL. 71] 



pological. Noticeable details are that the action of 

 jealousy is very strong in the Dieri tribe ; that, as the 

 Rev. O. Siebert puts it, " the practice of Pirrauru is 

 worthy of praise for its strength and earnestness in 

 regard to morality, and in the ceremonial with which 

 it is regulated, since no practice could be less in accord 

 with the hetairism which Lord Avebury has imagined 

 for the Australian aborigines " (p. 186). 



It is disappointing to find that no mention is made 

 of Cunow's theory of the four and eight subclasses; 

 it would have been instructive to see what light an 

 unrivalled personal knowledge of the system and an 

 acquaintance, doubtless extensive, with the dialects 

 might have thrown on the view that these classes are 

 age-divisions, and have primarily nothing to do with 

 marriage-restrictions. The Kurnai with their totems 

 which do not affect marriage, and their local, not class- 

 divisions, present a fascinating problem, and no one 

 knows more about the Kurnai than docs Dr. Howitt. 

 Their marriage by elopement, and the systematic use 

 therein of priestly assistance, are remarkable customs. 

 "It was the business of the Bunjil-yenjin to aid the 

 elopement of young couples. For instance, when a 

 young man wanted a wife, and had fixed his mind 

 on some girl, whom he could not obtain from her 

 parents, he must either go without her, persuade her 

 to run off with him, or call in the aid of the Bunjil- 

 yenjin. In the latter case his services were retained 

 bv presents of weapons, skin-rugs, or other articles." 

 The Bunjil-yenjin then sang a magic song until he 

 thought his magic strong enough to secure the 

 " covering up " of the parents in a state of coma. 



The author in a very interesting essay applies the 

 facts of " maternal descent " to the Teutonic Salic 

 Laws. Among the more important features of the 

 book is the masterly and final settlement of the vexed 

 questions of the native headmen, and the belief in 

 supreme beings, like Daramulun. The connection 

 between the two questions is that the headman in the 

 sky is the analogue of the headman of the tribe on 

 the earth. Among the Kurnai — to note another 

 difference between many of' the south-eastern tribes 

 and those studied bv Spencer and Gillen — the know- 

 ledge of Mungan-ngaua is confined to the initiated 

 men, who impart it in all sincerity to their novices; 

 the .•\runta, as .Spencer and Gillen inform us, take this 

 opportunity of explaining their deity away as a being 

 only believed in by women and children. .^mong 

 further details of interest are the Kurnai custom of 

 the Dead Hand, the performance of the Indian Rope 

 Trick by Kurnai medicine-men, the magical influence 

 which exists between opposite sexes, and the belief 

 that the initiated elders infuse their own magical 

 power into bovs at confirmation. 



The book is a fitting crown to Dr. Howitt's labours, 

 and is, in effect, the most considerable and important 

 of all studies of the .Xustralian race. 



A. Ernest Cra\\lev. 



CHANGES UPON THE MOON'S SURFACE. 



UNTIL within the last few years there has been 

 a verv general opinion that the moon was a cold, 

 dead world, or, as it has been sometimes expressed, 

 a burned out cinder, upon which nothing ever 

 happened. This view was apparently due to the fact 

 that the men who wrote the text-books on astronomy 

 were not the men who studied the mCKin. .\mong the 

 selenographers themselves, those astronomers who 

 made a special study of the moon, there is not one, 

 so far as the writer is aware, who has not expressed 

 his belief that changes of some sort, volcanic or others 

 wise, occasionally occur upon our satellite. Reference 



