Chap. XX. 
INTERFERING CAUSES. 
S61 
“ wage as an infringement of tribal rites, since, accord- 
“ ing to old ideas, a man had no right to appropriate 
“ to himself that which belonged to the whole tribe.” 
Sir J. Lubbock further gives a most curious body of 
facts shewing that in old times high honour was be- 
stowed on women who were utterly licentious ; and this, 
as he explains, is intelligible, if we admit that pro- 
miscuous intercourse was the aboriginal and therefore 
long revered custom of the tribe . 6 
Although the manner of development of the mar- 
riage-tie is an obscure subject, as wo may infer from 
the divergent opinions on several points between the 
three authors who have studied it most closely, namely, 
Mr. Morgan, Mr. M'Lennan, and Sir J. Lubbock, yet 
from the foregoing and several other lines of evidence it 
seems certain that the habit of marriage has been gradu- 
ally developed, and that almost promiscuous intercourse 
"Was once extremely common throughout the world. 
Nevertheless from the analogy of the lower animals, 
more particularly of those which come nearest to man 
in the series, I cannot believe that absolutely promiscu- 
ous intercourse prevailed formerly, w hen man had hardly 
attained to his present rank in the zoological scale. 
Man, as I have attempted to shew, is certainly descended 
from some ape-like creature. With the existing Quad- 
ruinana, as far as their habits are known, the males of 
some species are monogamous, but live during only a 
Part of the year with the females, as seems to be the 
case with the Orang. Several kinds, as some of the 
Indian and American monkeys, are strictly monogam- 
ous, and associate all the year round with their wives. 
Others are polygamous, as the Gorilla and several 
* ‘ Origin of Civilisation,’ 1870, p. 86. In the several works above 
'looted there will be found copious evidence on relationship through 
the females alone, or with the tribe alone. 
