the other Bantu peoples, and give the highest place to the Negroes. Such a classification compels us to seek for the primitive conditions among the Bechuanas, not among the Negroes. A hasty glance at the Bushmans and Hottentots teaches us that their social order is altogether primitive, since it is so extremely simple. The Bechuana communities can also be easily explained from the fact of their primitive condition. We see tribes or hordes gather round the most conspicuous person as their chief; and since this office depends upon personal advantages, it is not hereditary, although the son inherits his father's property. The wife has a right to the property she has gained for herself, and in the event of a divorce, she retains the young children.2 A girl who is marriageable, and not yet promised in marriage, cannot, among the Bushmans, be married without her own consent; but girls are, for the most part, promised to some member of the tribe from the time of their birth.3 As soon as property increases in importance, and is less equally distributed, the question with respect to the sons' share in the inheritance leads to testamentary bequests, such as we noted among the Bechuanas, and the office of chief, which is combined with considerable wealth, becomes hereditary. The relatively high position of women may be assumed in this case.

A comparison between the primitive social life of African peoples, as it is found among the Hottentots, and that of the Brazilian tribes, shows that in both countries the single family, with the father as ruler, must be taken as the fundamental type of social development. Differences occur, however, in conformity with the differences which affect the natural conditions of life; some differences also appear during the process of development and

1 Le Vaillant, Voyage, vol. ii. p. 72; Sec. Voyage, vol. iii. pp. 10, 11. Burchell, vol. i. p. 373.

2 Burchell, vol. i. p. 373. Le Vaillant, Voyage, vol. ii. p. 43. 3 Burchell, vol. ii. p. 59.

in the motive forces. The American Indian possesses nothing of value except his daughters, while in Africa the movable property of cattle plays an important part. In America, habit, the fear of their common enemy, the name, dwelling, and tamanuus which they have in common, create the first groups within the tribe; in Africa, men are associated together by their property. In both countries the formation of groups is due, not so much to ideas of descent as to their local boundaries; this principle begins by assigning to the mother a separate hut, placed within the father's kraal, and goes on to establish clans living in distinct quarters of the village. Our imaginative power is associated with objects of sense, and the thoughts of primitive men consist in imaginations; only those things are combined in thought which he has seen in local association, and at first that will appear to him to be hostile of which he fails to see the local connection.

CHAPTER IV.

ASIA.

Malayan Gezin-Semando and Djudur-Indian aborigines-Service and migration of bridegroom-Kasias-Process of development-Promiscuous intercourse of Nairs-Nair development-Limboos and Lepchas-Western Asia.

IN China, and among the other Mongolian races, as well as among the Finns, we find clans, or, at least, clan-like groups of kinsfolk, who also possess the usual characteristic of exogamy. In all cases individuals are distributed into patriarchal families, and no direct traces of the female line of descent exist.

The primitive conditions are maintained in their greatest purity among the Malays of Sumatra, in the kingdom of Menangkabao. This people is divided into tribes (Laras) and subdivided into clans (Sukus). Each village has a chief for every sukus it contains. Each sukus is responsible for all the families of which it consists, and each family (Gezin) is responsible for the debts of its members, and the family holds and inherits property in common. Each individual belongs to his mother's gezin and sukus; even after his marriage, a man cannot form an independent gezin, but he, his brothers and sisters, still belong to that of their mother. He works for the gezin and is bound to provide for it; he is not bound in the same way to his wife, although he usually assists her as far as he is able to do so. These conditions

now appear to be dying out; the male line of descent and individual property are fast spreading under European influence and that of Islam.1

8

The form of marriage which enjoins each man to remain in the house of his parents is only the extreme form of that which is in use in Sumatra under the name Semando. In such marriages the man and wife are on an equal footing, and their respective rights are protected by a contract between the relations of the two parties.2 This form of marriage, however, is only common among the poor; marriages are more commonly either Djudur-in which case a man buys his wife as his absolute propertyor Ambelanak-in which the woman's family buys a husband for her, who is thereby completely detached from his own family; his new family becomes responsible for the debts he contracts after the wedding, and he lives with them as something between a son of the house and a slave. Djudur involves the observance of the male, Ambelanak of the female line, and the question as to which was the original line of kinship among the Malays resolves itself into the question whether the man originally took his wife to his own home or established himself in her family.

It is certainly difficult to decide on the priority of this or that custom. In order to make our argument as conclusive as possible, we must also consider the primi1 Bachofen, Ant. Br., vol. i. p. 55.

vol. ii. p. 220.

Waitz, vol. v. pp. 1, 141. Newbold,

3 Ibid., p. 300.

A

2 Ibid., p. 226. Marsden, pp. 225-227, 236, 272. See Forbes, Eleven Years in Ceylon, vol. i. p. 333: "In Cingalese marriages there is no community of property between the husband and wife; and the two forms, called Beena and Deega marriage, cause a great difference in the right of female inheritance. woman married in Beena lives in the house, or in the immediate neighbourhood of her parents, so as to be able to cook for them, and render them assistance in times of sickness or in old age; if so married, she has a right of inheritance along with her brothers. If married in Deega, that is, to live in her husband's house and village, she loses her right of paternal inheritance, and acquires new rights from the patrimony of her husband." See also Formosa, Lambert, vol. i. p. 32.

tive peoples of India. In the case of these peoples, I have only observed two instances of the man establishing himself in the wife's dwelling; among the once-powerful Koochs, and among the Kasias. We shall presently consider the Kasias more closely. We are told that a Kooch woman owns the property, and it is inherited from mother to daughter; the husband lives with his wife and her mother, and is subject to both of them.1 Although this migration of the husband rarely takes place, yet it is very common for the bridegroom to live for a while in his bride's house; 2 and the reason for this custom is that, as in America, the husband buys his bride by working for her kinsfolk. Knox tells us that in Ceylon, where the houses consist of only one room, the children, as they grow up, are accustomed to pass the night in a neighbour's house, which they prefer to their own home, and where perhaps they find a bedfellow. These neighbours are not displeased that young people in the same rank of life should make acquaintance with their daughters in this way, since they know that it will be the means of inducing the young men to help them in their work, and in other matters. Among the Marianas, the wooer who is unable to contribute to the support of his future wife must become a servant to her family until he marries her.4

3

We may be disposed to trace a connection between customs which enjoin the bridegroom to earn his bride by labour in her parents' house, and, again, to take up his permanent abode with them. Yet it can be safely asserted that no such connection exists, and that the two customs spring from distinct ideas. Serving for the bride is only a mode of purchasing a wife, while the

1 Journal of Asiat. Soc. of Bengal, 1849, vol. xviii. p. 707; Hodgson. See Appendix XXII.

2 Eg. Kookies (Butler's Travels, p. 82. See Journal of Asiat. Soc. of Bengal, 1855, vol. xxiv.; Stewart), Meekins (Butler's Truveis, p. 138), and Mishmees (Cooper, Mish. Hills, p. 236).

3 Knox, p 192.

Freycinet, vol. ii. pt. i. p. 386.