TRANSACTIONS OF THE SECTIONS. 123 



session of it. Most people would hesitate to receive this as a clear evidence of 

 progress, and rather he disposed to suspect that later travellers, with perhaps bet- 

 ter opportunities, had seen what their predecessors had overlooked. This is no 

 hj'pothetical case. The early Spanish writers assert that the inhabitants of the 

 Ladrone Islands were ignorant ot the use of fire. Later travellers, on the con- 

 trary, find them perfectly well acquainted with it. They have, therefore, almost 

 unanimously assumed, not that the natives had made a step in advance, but that 

 the Spaniards had made a mistake ; and I have not brought this case forward in oppo- 

 sition to the assertions of Whately, because I am inclined to be of the same opinion 

 myself. I refer to it here, however, as showing how dilficult it would be to obtain 

 satisfactory e\-idence of material progi-ess among savages, even admitting that such 

 exists. The arguments derived from language, however, are liable to no such 

 suspicions ; but tell their own tale, and leave us at liberty to draw our conclusions. 

 1 will now very briefly refer to certain considerations which seem to show that 

 even the most ci%-ilized races were once in a state of barbarism. Not only 

 throughout Europe, not only in Italy and Greece, but even in the so-called cradle 

 of civilization itself — in Palestine and Syria — in Egypt and in India — the traces of 

 the stone age have been discovered. It may, indeed, be said that these were only 

 the fragments of those stone knives &c. which we know were used in religious 

 ceremonies long after metal was in general use for secular purposes. This indeed 

 reminds one of the attempt to account for the presence of elephants' bones in 

 England, by supposing that they were the remains of elephants which might have 

 been brought over by the Romans. But why were stone knives used by the 

 Egyptian and Jewish priests ? E-\-idently because they had been at one time in 

 general use, and there was a feeUng of respect which made them reluctant to use 

 the new substance in religious ceremonies. There are, moreover, other considera- 

 tions which point vei-y decidedly to the same conclusion. It is well known that 

 among various savage tribes female ^-irtue is looked on with a very indifferent eye. 

 Some savages have not — I will not say have not arrived .at — the idea of marriage. 

 I cannot here bring forwai-d the evidence in support of this statement, but every 

 one who has taken any interest in the lower races of men will admit that a savao-e's 

 wives are essentially a part of his property, as much so as his dog or his other slaves ; 

 and hence, when a man dies, his brother takes possession of the widow, together 

 with the rest of the property. In those cases where women are treated with rather 

 more justice, the first results are, according to our ideas, of doubtful advantage. 

 Among the Andaman Islanders, for instance, the man and woman remain together 

 only until the child is born and weaned, when they are free to separate and pair 

 with others. In other cases, maniage may be terminated at the wish either of 

 the husband or the wife. In others, again, the tie is of such a nature that it affords 

 not even a presumption as to parentage. The result of this is that many savao-es 

 have no idea of any relationship by paternity ; they recognize kinship through the 

 female line only. This is the case with the Australians, the Fijians, and indeed 

 the South Sea Islanders generally ; the ancient Celts, Greeks, the Kasias, Nairs, 

 and other tribes in Hindostan ; some of the Cossack hordes, many negro tribes, 

 &c., and traces of it occur all over the world. For the same reason a man's 

 heirs are not his own children, but those of his sisters ; while, probably again for 

 the same reason, the Wanyamwezi have the (at first sight) inexplicable custom 

 that a man's property goes to his illegitimate children, and not to his lawful off- 

 spring. Thus, then, by tracing up the gradual construction of the idea of marriage, 

 we can account for the two extraordinary customs which we find in every part of 

 the world — that a man is regarded as no relation to his own children, and that his 

 property goes not to them, but to those of his sisters. As things improved, and 

 the probability of parentage became greater, kinship through females only would 

 gradually be abandoned. Many savages have not yet advanced so far, others have 

 recently made the change— as, for instance, the Ait-Iraten, who did so less than a 

 century ago, and erected a stone pillar in memory of the event. Even, however 

 among the most civilized nations, we find in early history traces of this progi-es- 

 sion. Thus among the early Jews, Abraham married his half-si*ster. Nahor mar- 

 ried his brother's daughter, and Amram mamed his father's sister. Here we see the 

 system of kinship through females only. These women were not at that time re- 



