758 THE DESCENT OF MAN 



be so much more important, owing to the need of mutual 

 protection and aid, than that between the mother and. her 

 child, as to lead to the sole use of terms expressive of the 

 former relationships; but Mr. Morgan is convinced that this 

 view is by no means sufficient. 



The terms of relationship used in different parts of the 

 world may be divided, according to the author just quoted, 

 into two great classes, the classificatory and descriptive — the 

 latter being employed by us. It is the classificatory system 

 which so strongly leads to the belief that communal and 

 other extremely loose forms of marriage were originally uni- 

 versal. But as far as I can see, there is no necessity on this 

 ground for believing in absolutely promiscuous intercourse; 

 and I am glad to find that this is Sir J. Lubbock's view. 

 Men and women, like many of the lower animals, might 

 formerly have entered into strict though temporary unions 

 for each birth, and in this case nearly as much contusion 

 would have arisen in the terms of relationship as in the case 

 of promiscuous intercourse. As far as sexual selection is 

 concerned, all that is required is that choice should be ex- 

 erted before the parents unite, and it signifies little whether 

 the unions last for life or only for a season. 



Besides the evidence derived from the terms of relation- 

 ship, other lines of reasoning indicate the former wide preva- 

 lence of communal marriage. Sir J. Lubbock accounts" for 

 the strange and widely extended habit of exogamy — that is, 

 the men of one tribe taking wives from a distinct tribe — by 

 communism having been the original form of intercourse; 

 so that a man never obtained a wife for himself unless he 

 captured her from a neighboring and hostile tribe, and then 

 she would naturally have become his sole and valuable 

 property. Thus the practice of capturing wives might 

 have arisen; and from the honor so gained it might ulti- 

 mately have become the universal habit. According to Sir 

 J. Lubbock," we can also thus understand "the necessity of 



' Address to British Association, "On the Social and Religious Condition 

 of the Lower Races of Man," 1870, p. 20. 



