[164] South Australia, Adelaide, 1804, p. 403.  The part author, part editor of this valuable book is not to be confounded with J.S.  Wood, the compiler of the Natural History of Man.

[165] See also the account he gives (I., 180) of the report as to aboriginal morals made in the early days of Victoria by a commission of fourteen settlers, missionaries, and protectors of the aborigines.  The explorer Sturt (I., 316) even found that the natives became indignant if the whites rejected their addresses.

[166] See also a very important paper on this subject by Howitt in the Journal of the Anthropological Institute, Vol.  XX., 1890, demonstrating that “in Australia at the present day group marriage does exist in a well-marked form, which is evidently only the modified survival of a still more complete social communism” (104).  Regarding the manner in which group marriage gradually passed into individual proprietorship, a suggestive hint may be found in this sentence from Brough Smyth (II., 316):  When women are carried off from another tribe, “they are common property till they are gradually annexed by the best warriors of the tribe.”

[167] In my mind the strongest argument against Westermarck’s views as regards promiscuity is that all his tributary theories, so to speak, which I have had occasion to examine in this volume have proved so utterly inconsistent with facts.  The question of promiscuity itself I cannot examine in detail here, as it hardly comes within the scope of this book.  In view of the confusion Westermarck has already created in recent scientific literature by his specious pleading, I need not apologize for the frequency of my polemics against him.  His imposing erudition and his cleverness in juggling with facts by ignoring those that do not please him (as e.g., in case of the morality of the Kaffirs and Australians, and the “liberty of choice” of their women) make him a serious obstacle to the investigation of the truth regarding man’s sexual history, wherefore it is necessary to expose his errors promptly and thoroughly.

[168] Journ.  Anthrop.  Inst., 1890, 53.

[169] Would our friend Stephens be fearless enough to claim that this custom also was taught the natives by the degraded whites?  Apart from the diabolical cruelty to a woman of which no white man except a maniac would ever be individually guilty—­whereas this is a tribal custom—­note the unutterable masculine selfishness of this “jealousy,” which, while indifferent to chastity and fidelity, per se, punishes by proxy, leaving the real culprit untouched and happy at having not only had his intrigue but a chance to get rid of an undesired wife!

[170] Jour.  Anthr.  Inst., XII., 282.