MUTILATIONS. 67 



Mexican peoples, the Yucatanese, and the people of San 

 Salvador; and we meet with it again in Australia. Even 

 apart from the fact that their monuments show the 

 Egyptians practiced it from early times, and even apart 

 from the evidence that it prevailed among Arab peoples at 

 large, these proofs that circumcision is not limited to region 

 or race, sufficiently dispose of the current theological 

 interpretation. They sufficiently dispose, too, of another 

 interpretation not uncommonly given; for a general sur 

 vey of the facts shows us that while the usage does not pre 

 vail among the most cleanly races in the world, it is common 

 among the most uncleanly races. Contrariwise, the facts 

 taken in the mass are congruous with the general theory 

 thus far verified. 



It was shown that among the Abyssinians the trophy 

 taken by circumcision from an enemy s dead body, is 

 presented by each warrior to his chief; and that all such 

 trophies taken after a battle are eventually presented 

 to the king. If the vanquished enemies instead of being 

 killed are made slaves; and if the warriors who have 

 vanquished them continue to present the usual proofs 

 of their prow r ess; there must arise the circumcision of 

 living captives, who thereby become marked as subjugated 

 persons. A further result is obvious. As the chief and 

 the king are propitiated by bringing them these trophies 

 taken from their foes; and as the primitive belief is that a 

 dead man s ghost is pleased by whatever pleased the man 

 when alive; there will naturally follow a presentation of 

 such trophies to the ghost of the departed ruler. And then 

 in a highly militant society governed by a divinely- 

 descended despot, who requires all his subjects to bear this 

 badge of servitude, and who, dying, has his dreaded ghost 

 anxiously propitiated ; we may expect that the presentation 

 to the king of these trophies taken from enslaved enemies, 

 will develop into the offering to the god of like trophies 

 taken from each generation of male citizens in acknowledg- 



