Chapter II: , it follows that it is the female rather than the male that (4)

2. We have now to examine in turn the races of these four regions. The procedure will be that followed when dealing with hunting and fishing races. As before we begin with examples of intercourse before maturity. This may take the form of marriage before puberty or of less regular connexions. As Mr. Hartland says, ‘it would appear that sexual intercourse before puberty is either recognized by a formal marriage or tolerated as the gratification of a natural instinct among a great variety of peoples in all quarters of the globe’.[532] It will be sufficient here to note a few instances of this practice. Of the tribes of Guatemala, Bancroft says that ‘marriages take place at an early age, often before puberty’,[533] and the same would seem to be the case among the Navahos.[534] Accounts of the great laxity of manners and of early intercourse are given of some North American tribes—as, for instance, of the Hurons and the Illinois by Charlevoix.[535] The same is also commonly reported of the Brazilian tribes in such a manner as to leave little doubt that intercourse before puberty is common among them.[536]

3. Generally speaking, throughout America lactation lasted two years or more.[537] The suckling period indeed sometimes extended over several years; thus among the Sioux it might be continued until the child was five years old;[538] of the Lengua Indians of the Paraguayan Chaco, Hawtrey says that ‘it is customary to suckle children till five or six years of age’;[539] Bancroft reports that a child might be suckled until eight years old among the Chichmics.[540] Two years would appear to be about the minimum; in Mexico[541] and Guiana[542] it was three years or more. D’Orbigny gives three years,[543] and Forbes one or more, often two, for the Aymara Indians.[544] In Mexico suckling was said to last three or four years.[545]

4. With regard to postponement of marriage the facts are very similar to those in respect to the races of the first group. As an almost universal rule girls are married soon after puberty, if not before. There is no postponement of marriage of a nature to affect fertility in any noticeable manner. There is at times a certain postponement of marriage among the male part of the population, and occasionally some evidence of lifelong celibacy. This, however, has no bearing upon fertility; it is of interest in another connexion, and we shall on that account return to it later.

5. As noticed in the last chapter there are among nearly all primitive races a number of occasions upon which sexual intercourse is prohibited. Alone among these prohibitions, that against intercourse for some time after the birth of a child is of importance as a factor bearing upon fertility. We shall find that in Africa this prohibition becomes of very great importance. The evidence as to the existence of this prohibition in America is somewhat puzzling. In the last chapter two instances were given in which intercourse during lactation was prohibited in two hunting races. Both these instances are reported by authors who made their observations many years ago when the customs of the American Indians had been less modified by contact with white men than is the case with most of the observations upon which we have to rely. We also find that two other observers, who wrote more than a hundred years ago, record the existence of this custom. It is not clear to what tribes these remarks refer—whether to hunting peoples or to agricultural peoples, or to both. Weld says: ‘They suckle the few children they have for several years, during which time, at least among many of the tribes, they avoid all connexion with their husbands.’[546] Heriot speaks of ‘the length of time employed by the women in rearing their children, whom they nourish for three or four years, during which period they cohabit not with their husbands’.[547] In addition to this evidence we have the following records of the existence of this practice for various agricultural races. Two eighteenth-century writers—Le Beau, speaking of the Iroquois,[548] and Charlevoix of the Illinois[549]—state that intercourse was prohibited during lactation. Speaking of the Crow tribe, Holder mentions that abstention from intercourse during lactation was observed.[550] In Mexico, according to Bancroft, the suckling period lasted for three years or longer, and during this time there was often no intercourse.[551] D’Orbigny says of the Moxos and Chiquitos that the mother ‘invariably suckles her children for three years or more, during which time she has no relations whatever with her husband’.[552] There do not seem to be any denials of the existence of this practice except in the following instance; in most individual cases there is no mention of the practice. The exception referred to is in the case of the Fuegians. Hyades and Deniker, referring to the statement of D’Orbigny mentioned above, remark that sexual relations are resumed within two months of the birth of a child among the Fuegians.[553] It is not possible to arrive at any conclusion as to what the condition of affairs was before the habits of the Indians had been much modified by contact with white men. The fact, however, that the habit is definitely recorded by various authors, who for the most part made their observations at a time when the habits of these races were far less modified than when the more detailed accounts were written from which these races are best known, strongly suggests that this custom was formerly widespread.

There is no evidence of the use of any effective methods to prevent fertilization. We are told that among the Shawnees ‘the girls drink the juice of a certain herb which prevents conception, and often renders them barren throughout life’.[554] But in those cases which have been carefully investigated it would seem that such methods are not in fact effective. Hrdlicka, for instance, referring to a number of tribes, among whom are the Apaches, Navahos, Pueblos, Pimas, Nahua, Aztec, and Uti, says that ‘there is a very general belief among the Indians visited that sterility may be artificially induced’.[555] On investigation, however, it was found that the substances used were quite ineffective.

6. Among agricultural, as among hunting and fishing races, we find numerous references to the small average number of children in a family. Speaking generally of the Indians of the North, Weld states that the number of children is small,[556] and Le Beau that the number of children born is less than in Europe.[557] Charlevoix comments on the small size of the family among the Iroquois and attributes it to early intercourse, abstention from intercourse during lactation, and to prolonged lactation.[558] Catlin, whose experience was chiefly obtained among the Mandans, has given the estimate quoted in the fourth chapter,[559] and Holder’s estimate for the Crow tribe has also been cited.[560] Of the Sioux we are told that ‘sterility among women is by no means uncommon’,[561] and of the south-west Texas tribes ‘they are not prolific—a woman seldom having more than three children’.[562] In South America the facts are similar. Nordenskiöld visited the tribes between Peru and Bolivia. ‘The families are not large,’ he says, ‘they live in monogamy, and one sees in each family one to three children; in the largest family that I saw (and that was among the Atsahuaca Indians) there were four children.’[563] Of the Aymara Indians of the same district we are told that ‘there seem to be but few large families—very seldom more than four children, and often less than that number’.[564] Spix and Martins, travelling in Brazil, ‘seldom saw more than four children in a family’.[565] Azara was much impressed by the small number of children that he observed in South America. He investigated the matter among the Guaranis with particular care, and found that the average number in a family was four.[566] Taking into account various factors he came to the conclusion that the number of children born was less than among the Spaniards.[567] Rengger, who also visited the Guaranis, is of the same general opinion though he estimates the average number in a family to be smaller than does Azara;[568] to the Guanas he allows only two or at the most three children.[569] According to von Martius the marriages of the Macusis ‘are not rich in children’.[570] D’Orbigny carefully investigated the average number of children in a family among the Moxos and Chiquitos; he found it to be roughly about two in the case of the former and three in that of the latter. He attributed the small number to early intercourse and also to abstention from intercourse at certain periods.[571] Two is the average number of children in a family of the tribes of the Upper Hualaga, and marriages are often sterile.[572]

7. We have now to examine the extent of the practices of abortion and infanticide; with regard to the former, we may repeat what was said above—namely, that there is every reason to suppose the methods used are usually effective. Among the Sioux, Keating says that ‘married females frequently obtain miscarriages with the knowledge and consent of their husband’;[573] this fact is confirmed by Schoolcraft.[574] It was very common in the Crow tribe.[575] In a report upon the tribes of the South-western United States and Northern Mexico, Hrdlicka states that ‘artificial abortion is practised by all the tribes visited’.[576] The tribes visited include, among others, the Apaches, Navahos, Pueblos, Pimas, Nahua, Otommi, and Aztec. The Pima Indians practised abortion if conception took place before the previous child had been weaned; the suckling period among these people lasted until the child was six or seven years old.[577] The habit is recorded of the Menomini tribe and of the Zunis, though it is rare among the latter.[578] Among the Cheyennes ‘it has long been the custom that a woman should not have a second child until her first is ten years old’.[579] Abortion is not mentioned in this case, but in view of the widespread prevalence of this custom, abortion is presumably the means used to bring about this result. In Mexico[580] and throughout South America abortion was commonly employed. ‘The use of the means of abortion is common and explains the small number of children’, says Karl von den Steinen of the Bakairi.[581] It is especially frequent in Brazil and among the Indians of the Chaco.[582]

8. Compared with the prevalence of abortion, infanticide was not very common among the agricultural tribes of the northern half of the Continent. It was occasionally practised among the Sioux, and more girls were killed than boys.[583] Of the Creeks it is said that ‘to destroy a new-born infant is not uncommon’.[584] It was common among the Pimas.[585] Infanticide is usually confined to the killing of deformed children, and in this form it is recorded of the Apaches, Mohaves, Navahos, Zuni, and the Tepecano.[586] Infanticide is more common in South America. It is found in Brazil among the Guanas[587] and the Mbayas.[588] The former are said to kill more girls than boys. It is also practised to a considerable extent in the Chaco. ‘Infanticide is quite common among the Lenguas, an interval of seven or eight years being always observable between children of the same family.’[589] Grubb states that the first child is always killed if a girl.[590] The killing of deformed children is reported from many parts, including Dutch Guiana[591] and Peru.[592]

9. War plays no less a part in the lives of the agricultural than of the hunting tribes in America. It was perhaps more murderous among the famous tribes of the Atlantic coast and the great plains than anywhere else except possibly Brazil. ‘As all nations of the Indians in their natural condition’, says Catlin, ‘are unceasingly at war with the tribes that are about them, for the adjustment of ancient and never ending feuds, as well as from a love of glory, to which in Indian life the battlefield is almost the only road, their warriors are killed off to that extent, that in many instances two and sometimes three women to a man are found in a tribe.’[593] Another author, himself a member of the tribe, describes the manner in which the young Ojebway Indian is brought up to regard war as his chief object in life. ‘When they are young a spirit of war is instilled into their bosom; and in order to excite them to courage and ambition, the parents and the old wise men recount to them the wonderful exploits of the braves in former days, such as a single warrior stealing up secretly to a village, killing a number of the enemy, taking off their scalps, and making his escape before the remainder were apprised of the slaughter.’[594] So again, ‘among the earliest songs to which a Dacotah child listens are those of war. As soon as he begins to totter about, he carries as a plaything a miniature bow and arrow. The first thing he is taught as great and truly noble is taking a scalp, and he wants to perform an act which is so manly. At the age of sixteen he is often on the warpath.’[595]

The neighbouring tribes maintained feuds that must have been the cause of a regular and by no means inconsiderable amount of elimination. The Crows were at war with the Blackfeet,[596] the Sioux with the Ojebway,[597] the Minnetanes with the Shoshones.[598] The Sioux are said to have killed women.[599] Farther south the Yuchi and other members of the Creek Confederacy were very warlike.[600] The Pueblo Indians were more peaceful, though they were subject to vigorous and frequent attacks from the Apache and other neighbours.[601] The wars undertaken by the empires of Mexico and Peru were of rather a different nature. Both states pursued a regular policy of aggression towards the less advanced peoples who surrounded them. These wars partook more of the nature of raids upon the weaker nations for the purpose of robbery than of great sporting contests, as were on the whole the wars of the northern tribes. Throughout South America warfare seems to have been a regular feature of inter-tribal relation. It was usually very sanguinary. According to Wallace the Mandrucos fight with their neighbours every year.[602] Much the same is reported by Church of the Araras, Mogos, Masas, and other tribes of the Amazon basin,[603] and also by White of the north-western regions of the southern half of the Continent.[604] The peoples of the Chaco were formerly at continual war with the Guaranis.[605]

10. There are frequent references to blood feuds in the accounts of these races. Blood feuds are only to be with difficulty distinguished from warfare; feuds between man and man and between family and family merge into those feuds between tribes that are called warfare. It will be sufficient here to note that a considerable amount of elimination must among certain tribes arise from that peculiar form of blood feud which is connected with the belief that natural death is caused by some enemy. In Guiana ‘a person dies and it is supposed that an enemy has secured the agency of an evil spirit to compass his death. Some sorcerer, employed by the friends of the deceased for that purpose, pretends by his incantations to discover the guilty individual or family, or at any rate to indicate the quarter where they dwell. A near relative of the deceased is then charged with the work of vengeance.... If the supposed offender cannot be slain, some innocent member of his family—man, woman, or little child—must suffer instead.’[606] The Uaupes of the upper waters of the Rio Negro ‘scarcely seem to think that death can occur naturally, always imputing it either to direct poisoning or to the charms of some enemy, and on this supposition will proceed to revenge it. This they generally do by poison.’[607] It is difficult to ascertain how far these beliefs are acted upon; it seems nevertheless clear that among certain tribes a considerable amount of elimination must be attributed to this source.

11. It is not necessary to repeat here what was said in the former chapter with regard to disease. Our conclusion was that in all probability most diseases did not evolve until at or about the beginning of the third period. We therefore regard this source of elimination as of relatively small importance among the races of this group whether in America or elsewhere. We may note a few examples of the evidence to the effect that these races were formerly on the whole remarkably healthy and long-lived. Catlin says that the Mandans were ‘undoubtedly a longer lived and healthier race’ than most civilized peoples.[608] According to Le Beau the Iroquois were ‘practically never ill’; in spite of a climate that he himself found trying, ‘they were’ he says, ‘nearly all strong and robust’, and had few diseases.[609] ‘On the whole, the Yuchi, men, women, and children, are a remarkably healthy set of people.’[610] The Shawnees are ‘very healthy and are exempt from many diseases’.[611] Spix and Martius, with their extensive knowledge of the Indians of Brazil, say in general that ‘the Indians are seldom sick and generally live to an advanced age’.[612]

12. There is among the agricultural races of America as among the hunting races, and, as we shall see, among all primitive races, a very high rate of child mortality. As before we find the chief causes to be lack of knowledge, lack of care, lack of suitable food and surroundings, and certain peculiar customs.[613] It is not necessary to review the evidence in detail. Of the Sioux we are told that ‘many die in infancy caused by exposure’.[614] Another observer uses the same phrase, and adds that ‘their mothers, to inure them to suffering and to strengthen their constitution, do not take all the necessary care of them’.[615] Lumholtz attributes child mortality in part to the eating of unsuitable food.[616] Not only in North America but also in Brazil are new-born children regularly dipped in cold water.[617]

_Africa_

13. Pre-puberty intercourse is common throughout Africa both in the form of recognized early marriage and of irregular but tolerated early sexual relations. Among the Cross River natives ‘until she reach the age of puberty, a girl is permitted by her parents and by her betrothed to go about freely and have as many lovers as she pleases’.[618] A considerable proportion of marriages among the Ibo-speaking people of Nigeria take place before puberty.[619] In the Congo districts the habit is specially common.[620] Sexual relations commence early among the Bushongo; after reaching the age of puberty ‘a girl is not supposed to have further sexual relations before marriage’.[621] It is also recorded by van Overbergh of the Mangbetu,[622] by Delhaise of the Warego,[623] by de Rochebrune of the Onolove.[624] Speaking of the Bangala, Weeks says that ‘above the age of five years it would be impossible to find a girl who was a virgin’.[625] ‘The sexual morality of the Bahuana is conspicuous by its absence; the unmarried indulge as they please from a very early age, and the girls before puberty.’[626] Torday and Joyce, who are responsible for this statement, speak very similarly of the Bambala,[627] and du Chaillu of the Mpongwe.[628] The Masai and the Nandi in East Africa have a regularized system of intercourse before puberty.[629] It also occurs among the tribes inhabiting the Baringo district[630] and among the Swaheli.[631] Children of the Wapagoro, in what was German East Africa, are brought together by their parents when about seven years of age, and are separated for a period when menstruation begins—that is to say, about three years later.[632] Pre-puberty marriage was formerly very prevalent among the Makonde[633] and the Wanjamuesi[634] of the same district. ‘As regards the little girls over nearly the whole of British Central Africa, chastity before puberty is an unknown condition. Before a girl is become a woman it is a matter of absolute indifference what she does, and scarcely any girl remains a virgin after about five years of age.’[635] Similar testimony is given by Stannus[636] and by Maugham[637] for the same district.

14. The suckling period would appear to last nearer three than two years on the average. A few examples may be given. Ewe-speaking people, two or three years;[638] Yoruba-speaking people, three years;[639] the Tenda, two and a half to three years;[640] in Liberia, three or four years;[641] the Kagero, two to three and sometimes five years;[642] the Hausa, two years;[643] the Bushongo, two years;[644] in the Congo Basin, at least two years on the average;[645] the Mangbetu, a year and a half or longer;[646] in West Africa, on the average two to three years;[647] the Mayombe, two years or longer;[648] in Uganda, at least two years;[649] the Nandi, two years;[650] the Kuku, three years;[651] the Wamakonde, Wakaua, and Wamuera, three years;[652] the Baganda, three years;[653] the Wadschagga, two years[654] the Wanjamuesi, two to three years;[655] the Wazaramo, two to three years;[656] the Baronga, three years;[657] in the Madi district of Central Africa, three years;[658] in South Africa, two years, according to Lichtenstein,[659] frequently until three years, according to Kidd.[660]

15. There is little or no evidence of any postponement of marriage among girls. The facts with regard to men will be given later. According to Denham and Clapperton, girls in Bornu ‘rarely marry until they are fourteen or fifteen; often not so young’.[661] Among the Bangala, girls marry at the age of sixteen to eighteen.[662] ‘In the primitive Bantu tribe every girl gets married, some, however, sooner than others.’[663] The average age at marriage among girls south of Lake Nyassa is fifteen.[664] ‘For the whole of the Bantu tribes south of the Limpopo the average [age at marriage for girls] would probably be between fifteen and sixteen.’[665]

16. Throughout the negroid and Bantu races of Africa sexual intercourse is almost invariably prohibited for some time after child-birth. As a rule the prohibition holds good so long as suckling lasts, and this we have seen to mean more nearly three than two years. In some cases the period is shorter, and there are instances where it only endures for a few months. There are also very rare examples of the exact opposite—namely, of a prohibition against breaking off intercourse. As the evidence given below shows, to this custom we must attribute very great importance.

A Ewe-speaking woman ‘may not admit the male ... while suckling’.[666] Among the Yoruba-speaking people ‘during the period of lactation the wife must not cohabit with her husband’.[667] Intercourse during the suckling period is prohibited by the Kagero,[668] the Hausa,[669] and in Benin.[670] In the Warri district of the Niger Protectorate it is ‘customary for a woman to avoid cohabitation with her husband for nearly three years after pregnancy’.[671] Mungo Park, who travelled through this district, observed that ‘three years’ nursing is not uncommon, and during this period the husband devotes his whole attention to his other wives’.[672] Other authors record similar facts for other West African races. The Moioa abstain for four years,[673] the Gallinas until the child can talk and walk,[674] the Hobbés during lactation;[675] Nassau, speaking generally of the Cameroon district, mentions three years,[676] and Reade, speaking of Ashanti, mentions the period of lactation.[677] With regard to the Congo district, Cureau,[678] Johnston,[679] and Ward[680] mention prohibition during the suckling period. Among the Bangala ‘during the suckling period the husband has no sexual relations with his wife, or the child will become thin and weak and probably die’.[681] Another account of the same people mentions two years as the length of the period.[682] Prohibition during lactation is also recorded of the Mayombe,[683] the Ababua,[684] and the Bayaka.[685] Intercourse is only resumed among the Mandja[686] and the Warega[687] when the child can walk. The Adio of the Upper Congo region form a curious exception; soon after birth intercourse again takes place; if it did not, the child would die, since the father would thereby show no affection for the mother.[688] The Kuku only interrupt intercourse for three or four months,[689] although suckling lasts three years,[690] and among the Nandi prohibition only extends over a period of three months,[691] while lactation lasts two years.[692] Similarly ‘among the Awa-Wanga many believe that within five or six days of the birth of a child the parents must cohabit or the child will die’.[693]

The last-mentioned cases are rare exceptions; the customs that we saw to be normal in the west of Africa are also normal elsewhere in Africa. In Uganda ‘a woman must live apart from her husband for two years, at which time the children are weaned’.[694] A Baganda woman ‘lived apart from her husband for three years while nursing her child’.[695] When a woman in the region of the Rovuma river ‘bears a child she lives completely apart from her husband till the child is able to speak, as otherwise it is believed that harm, if not death, would come to the infant’.[696] A year is mentioned as the length of the prohibited period among the Swaheli,[697] and the duration of lactation as the period among the tribes of the Baringo district[698] and among the Wanjamuesi.[699] On the other hand the prohibited period is short among some of the tribes of what was German East Africa; it is two months in Konde-land,[700] three months among the Wapagoro,[701] and ‘a few months’ among the Wagogo.[702] In British Central Africa the wife does not resume sexual intercourse with her husband for two years, unless she is the only wife, when six months to one year is allowed to elapse.[703] In the Miri district the period is six months, although suckling lasts for two years,[704] and the same is recorded of the Atonga.[705] Speaking of Baronga, Junod says that there is no cohabitation until the child is weaned, and mentions that this is so among all the Bantu races of South Africa,[706] Kidd confirms Junod’s statement, and says that most Kaffir women live in strict seclusion from their husbands while they are suckling their children, which frequently lasts for three years.[707] In Loango the suckling period is the prohibited period.[708]

17. Among the races hitherto surveyed there is no evidence of the existence of any practice that renders sexual intercourse fruitless. There are numerous instances of magical practices that are supposed to have this result, but we have no reason to think that any of them are effective. In Africa we again meet with similar magical practices, and we must similarly account them to be without effect. In this area, however, we also meet with for the first time practices of quite a different nature. Many races in different parts of the Continent are acquainted with means of preventing fertilization. It is not necessary to describe how this end is achieved.[709] Any one who is interested in the subject can turn to Junod’s account. The methods employed in other parts of Africa are apparently similar to those there described. Knowledge of these methods extends throughout South Africa,[710] the Congo,[711] what was formerly German East Africa,[712] and probably elsewhere. Generally speaking this practice is employed under two different circumstances; measures may be taken to prevent conception by those who are not married and who do not wish to be married for some time; they may also be used by married people under certain circumstances, as for example by parents in the Thonga tribe who may have intercourse when the child begins to crawl, but who must avoid conception until the child is weaned.[713] Again, young married couples in the neighbourhood of Port Herald live in a special house so long as they are unable to build a house for themselves, and during this time no children must be conceived.[714]

18. Almost without exception the average number of children is everywhere recorded as small. Mungo Park, referring apparently to the Mandingoes, says that ‘few women have more than five or six children’.[715] In Northern Nigeria, four to five is given as the maximum number.[716] Talbot collected some statistics for the Ekoi people; the average number born to sixty-one married women was 4·3.[717] ‘The marriages’, says Burton of the Egbas, ‘are not very prolific’.[718] Assinien women very exceptionally have more than six children, according to Mondière:[719] in Liberia families are said to be small.[720] Among the Bangala ‘it is rare for a woman to have more than two or three children’;[721] another observer, speaking of the same people, remarks that ‘there was much sterility’.[722] Cureau, speaking generally of the tribes of the Congo Basin, says that families are small.[723] Kuku women bear three children on the average.[724] The number of children is given as three to five for the Baholoholo,[725] three to four for the Bambala,[726] and the same for the Warega;[727] among the Mangbetu families are not large,[728] while ‘on an average a Bayaka woman bears three children; families of more than four are rare’.[729] Turning to the races of the eastern side of the Continent we find that the average Swaheli family is given as consisting of two children.[730] Figures have been collected concerning forty-nine families of the Akikuyu, from which it appears that the average number of children is between three and five.[731] The Bakene women ‘are, as a rule, strong and healthy and have children, though few of them ever have so many as six, three being the average number for each wife’.[732] Two or three—at the most five—children are born to the Wanjamuesi mother.[733] Among the tribes south of Lake Nyassa ‘the average number of children in a family is three to five’.[734] The Makalaka ‘race is not prolific, and the women ... seldom bear more than an average of three children.’[735] Lastly, the Hottentots have ‘seldom more than two or three children’, and ‘many of the women are barren’,[736] while similarly in Madagascar the natives ‘do not, as a rule, have large families, and a considerable portion is childless’.[737]

19. Abortion is practised by many races in various parts of Africa. Among the Tenda people married women rarely practise abortion, unmarried women more frequently;[738] Tremearne mentions it in speaking of some of the Nigerian tribes.[739] It appears to be on the whole more common in the Congo district than elsewhere in Africa. ‘The practice of provoking abortion is a very common one throughout Congoland (though ignored, for example, by the Bayaka), but most of all in the North and Centre.’[740] With regard to particular races in this district, we find abortion mentioned as common among the Bangala,[741] Bahuana,[742] Warega,[743] Ababua,[744] and Onolove[745]; it exists but is less common among the Mangbetu,[746] and the Bushongo.[747] In what was German South-west Africa abortion is very frequently employed.[748] It would appear to be less frequently practised in the eastern half of the Continent. It is known among the Akamba[749] and the Swaheli.[750] In what was formerly the German Nyassa district[751] and in British Central Africa it is said to be not uncommon[752]; the same is said of the Zambezi Valley.[753] Abortion is ‘almost universally practised by all classes of female in Kaffir society’.[754] It is mentioned in connexion with Madagascar.[755]

20. Almost every tribe throughout Africa kills children under certain circumstances which they believe to be unpropitious. Examples of such circumstances are peculiarities in the process of birth, the birth of twins, or the cutting of the upper teeth before the lower. Motherless children are also sometimes killed. The cumulative effect of these habits cannot be considerable, and we may disregard them. It is an almost invariable rule that infanticide—in the sense in which we use the term when speaking of the Australians—is unknown in Africa. The only exceptions are to be found among the Hottentots and in Madagascar—in both cases the races practising infanticide not being of Negroid or Bantu stock. The former are said to have killed their female children fairly frequently;[756] in Madagascar infanticide was very common.[757] Among the various unpropitious circumstances mentioned above, there is one which is widely recognized in Africa, and which is of interest to us. Children who are abnormal or deformed are nearly always killed. Among other instances this practice is recorded of the Hausa,[758] Kagero,[759] the Congo tribes generally—the Fangs being especially mentioned in this respect[760]—the Mandja,[761] the Basonge,[762] the Ababua,[763] the Bushongo,[764] the Wanika,[765] the Wakamba,[766] in the Lenda district,[767] in the Lind Hinterland,[768] in British Central Africa,[769] in Portuguese East Africa,[770] among the Kaffirs[771] and the Hottentots.[772]

21. The nature and frequency of warfare varies very greatly in different parts of the Continent. Although among some few tribes and in some districts war is as murderous as in America, it is on the whole far less effective as an agent of elimination than in that country. The position is somewhat complicated by the fact that the more northern Negroid races have long been in contact with Hamitic and Semitic tribes; the latter have made war on the former and greatly influenced the history of the Negroid races. Movements have been set on foot and passed like waves over the whole Continent.

War is not a very serious matter among the Gallinas of Sierra Leone[773] or the Ewe-speaking people of Togoland.[774] It was very different in Dahomey[775] and Benin;[776] the Amazons of the former region have often been described.[777] Tremearne gives an account of the head hunters of Nigeria, whose habits must have been the cause of a great deal of elimination.[778] Throughout the whole of this region, especially in Ashanti[779] and Benin, human sacrifice is practised on a large scale, and results in a considerable loss of life.[780] Passing farther south towards the Congo region, we find that warfare is a moderately important factor of elimination.[781] Weeks describes family, town, and district fights—the last two developing out of the former; considerable loss of life and material damage appears to follow.[782] Du Chaillu describes what he calls ‘blood feuds’ in the Shekiani tribe; ‘frequently a dozen villages are involved, ... the killing and robbing goes on for months and even for years’.[783] Again, ‘when war has rarely broken out in the country [of the Bakalai] there is no rest or safety. No man or woman in any village can take a step in any direction, day or night, without fear of death.... At last whole districts are depopulated; those who are not killed desert their villages.’[784] Burrows, describing the tribes of the Upper Welle district, says that they all live ‘in a perpetual state of internecine warfare’.[785] War and human sacrifice have a perceptible effect upon the numbers of the Banyala;[786] fighting is frequent among the Bambala, but is not very sanguinary.[787] Of the Bahuana we hear that ‘wars are frequent, and in some cases last for years’,[788] of the Bayaka that, though ‘frequent’, wars ‘do not seem to have any appreciable effect upon the population’.[789] The Baganda are a warlike people, and fighting occurs yearly with the neighbouring tribes. Though a regular cause of the loss of life, such wars are not so serious as the intermittent civil wars ‘which also broke out from time to time in Uganda between rival princes who laid claim to the throne. These latter wars were by far the most disastrous that could happen to the country; and during the few weeks they lasted, untold damage was done and a great loss of life took place.’[790] In this district the presence of the Masai tribe was a continuous source of murderous war.[791] Among the Akanda ‘no warriors but those who had killed a Masai were supposed to be able to marry’;[792] between the Akikuyu and the Masai perpetual war was waged.[793] Of the tribes of the Baringo district it is said that they are all good fighters, and that war is a sanguinary affair.[794] The pastoral Bahima are, on the other hand, a peaceable people.[795] ‘It is doubtful whether (in Central Africa) great loss of life occurs in any of the wars among the natives.’[796] In South Africa the military qualities of the Zulus are well known; all through this region in former days warfare was regularly waged, and was a constant source of elimination.[797] Of the Hottentots we hear that the tribes ‘were constantly at war with each other’;[798] from another account it would seem that the fighting was neither very prolonged nor sanguinary.[799]

22. Belief in witchcraft as the cause of death is common throughout Africa; furthermore as a result of this belief the supposed offender is often slain. There seems to be no doubt that among many tribes this factor of elimination is of some importance. Speaking of Kalabar, Hutchinson says: ‘They cannot believe, or at least they will not try to understand, how natural causes create diseases, but attribute them and subsequent death to “ifod” or witchcraft. Hence a plan is adopted to find out the perpetrator by fixing on a number of persons, and compelling them as the alternative of the Egbo law of decapitation, to take a quantity of a poisonous nut, which is supposed to be innocuous if the accused be innocent, and to be fatal if guilty.’[800] Even among the relatively advanced Baganda, ‘death from natural causes rarely presented itself to the native mind as a feasible explanation for the end of life; illness was much more likely to be the result of malice finding vent in magical art’.[801] Torday mentions the Bayaka as an exception to the general rule in that they accept illness as a cause of death, though ‘trials for witchcraft are not unknown’.[802] Though the belief is widespread that the cause of death is to be sought in magic, the amount of elimination varies considerably from place to place. Formerly in British Central Africa ‘it was so general that deaths due to it were in the larger villages matters of daily occurrence’.[803] Among the South African tribes ‘the number of persons who perished on charges of dealing with witchcraft was very great’.[804] In West Africa it was undoubtedly common.[805] For the Congo district, Burrows[806] and Du Chaillu,[807] for Central Africa, Werner[808] and Macdonald,[809] for South Africa, Junod,[810] and for Madagascar, Parker,[811] bring similar evidence. Speaking of the Congo region, Weeks says that three forms of death are recognized; (1) by act of God; (2) by another’s witchcraft; (3) by one’s own witchcraft. Thus to die by the swamping of a canoe is a case of the first, to die by being swamped and eaten by a crocodile is an example of the second, because ‘no crocodile will upset a canoe unless told to do so by a witch’. Deaths from the second cause and executions following upon them appear to be frequent.[812]

23. With respect to disease the African races are in a somewhat different position when compared with the other races of this group. Owing to the fact that they have never been wholly cut off from Eur-Asiatic civilization, some diseases have penetrated among them which are not found, for instance, among the American agricultural races who were cut off from the rest of mankind long before the origin of the third period. It is a very difficult matter to decide what diseases are African in origin and what diseases have found their way into Africa from the north. It is possible that sleeping sickness and black-water fever are African in origin. It is certain, however, that most of the diseases which cause a large amount of elimination among the African races at the present time have been imported from Asia. Among the latter are dengue fever, small-pox, bubonic plague, cholera, Asiatic relapsing fever, dysentery, typhus, and syphilis.[813] Nevertheless in spite of the fact that disease is of more importance in Africa than in America, there is a considerable amount of evidence to the effect that upon the whole before the advent of the white man the African races were healthy and long-lived. Thus Theal says that the Bantu races of South Africa were formerly ‘subject to few diseases’,[814] and Roscoe, that the Baganda ‘were happy and healthy before the introduction of European civilization’.[815] In earlier days the Basuto were remarkable for their healthiness;[816] they lived to a great age. We are also told that the Hottentots suffered from few diseases.[817]

24. We find many records of a high death-rate among children. Undoubtedly this is largely due nowadays to diseases that have been introduced into Africa within the last few hundred years. The evidence seems to show, however, that, when we discount this factor, child mortality is still high, and is due to ignorance and want of care on the part of the mother. Both Harris[818] and Talbot,[819] speaking of West Africa, remark upon the high rate of infant mortality, and connect it with want of care. ‘As soon as an infant is able to walk, it is permitted to run about with great freedom,’ says Mungo Park.[820] According to Du Chaillu, ‘they know nothing scarcely of the care of children, and lose a great proportion through mistake in treatment in infancy’.[821] In the Congo region, ‘that a great portion of the children die—once they are born—is evident from the Baptist Mission records, extending over more than twenty years. This is chiefly due to unsuitable, indigestable, or insufficient food. Grenfell has some notes on the preposterous attempts to feed infants a few weeks old with manioc paste.’[822] Among the Mangbetu many children die, ‘as they are left to look after themselves at about two or three years of age’.[823] Weeks[824] and van Overbergh[825] also record high infant mortality for other tribes of this region. It is interesting to observe that Delhaise, speaking of the Warega—an isolated and primitive people—says that disease is rare among the children, though the death-rate is high.[826] According to Gutmann, many children die in infancy among the Wadschagga, owing to the very unsuitable methods of feeding. A mother takes food from her mouth and presses it into that of her child.[827] Similarly a high infant death-rate and want of care is recorded of the Zulus,[828] Basutos,[829] and Kaffir[830] races generally.

_Oceania_

25. Intercourse before the age of puberty is not very common among the races of Oceania. In New Zealand, however, it was frequent. ‘It often happened that a girl would have intercourse with a youth before she arrived at puberty. At times marriage took place and was consummated at this early age.’[831] This state of things is confirmed by several other authors.[832] Dumas says it formerly occurred in Hawaii,[833] and from an account given by Kubary it seems to have been practised in the Pelew Islands.[834] Although Brainne does not actually say so, his account seems clearly to indicate that intercourse occurs before puberty in New Caledonia,[835] and the same may be deduced from Codrington’s account of Banks’s Island[836] and from Danks’s description of the marriage customs of the New Britain group.[837] Krieger mentions pre-puberty intercourse in British New Guinea,[838] while Murray says that among the Baru and other tribes girls are married when between seven and ten years old, adding that marriage is consummated immediately.[839] According to Seligman among the Sinaugolo ‘connection often takes place before menstruation is established’.[840] The same is reported as occurring among the Javanese[841] and very occasionally among the Topebatos of Celebes.[842]

26. The average length of the suckling period would seem to be at least two years and is probably longer. A few facts may be given. In Samoa it lasts two years,[843] in the Solomon Islands two years or more,[844] in New Caledonia more than three years,[845] in Fiji two or three years,[846] in the Bismarck Archipelago often up to three years,[847] in what was German New Guinea about three years,[848] in Sarawak three to five years,[849] among the Bontoc Igorot slightly less than two years,[850] and among the Ainu four or five years.[851]

27. Of postponement of marriage among girls there is again practically no evidence. In the Society Islands girls were married when between twelve and sixteen years of age.[852] In the Western Islands of the Torres Straits girls marry a few years younger than the men, of whom the age of marriage is given as between twenty and twenty-five.[853] Very occasionally, as in the above cases, there would seem to be some insignificant postponement of marriage. In general, however, it is clear that practically all women are married from the beginning of and throughout the mature period.

28. The important taboo upon sexual intercourse for a period after child-birth is common. The Maori cease to cohabit ‘after child-birth till the child is weaned’.[854] ‘Throughout the Western Islands (of the Torres Straits) cohabitation ceases early in pregnancy and is not resumed for some time, the baby sleeping between the husband and wife. This restriction is in force in Maburag until the child spontaneously endeavours to move about. As a matter of fact another child is seldom born until the previous one is some three or four years old.’[855] In Savage Island ‘the child was usually suckled about twelve months, during which period there was strict sexual abstention between the parents’.[856] According to Kubary the prohibited period lasted ten months in the Pelew Islands,[857] and according to Krämer, six months in Samoa.[858] A married woman among the Sinaugola ‘is supposed to forego cohabitation during the period of suckling’.[859] In the neighbourhood of Finschafen in New Guinea, intercourse is not resumed until the child can walk and speak.[860] With regard to the Solomon Islands, Ribbe speaks of a ‘long period’ of prohibition;[861] with reference to New Caledonia, Glaumont speaks of several months[862] and another observer of a considerable time in this connexion.[863] ‘After the birth of a child (in the Bismarck Archipelago) the husband was not supposed to cohabit with his wife until the child could walk.’[864] ‘During the whole of this time [two or three years], unless he had more than one wife, a Fijian was obliged to lead a life of celibacy.’[865] The same author says that ‘in Tonga and the Gilbert Islands the separation is rigidly enforced’.[866] Another account places the length of the period of separation in Fiji at three or ‘even four years’.[867]

29. Here, as elsewhere, we find numerous references to practices intended to render conception impossible. A good example is found in Seligman’s account of the Sinaugolo. ‘There is generally a woman in the village or one of the surrounding villages who is supposed to be gifted with a power inherited from her mother of causing women to become “hageabani”, literally incapable of having more children. Suppose that a woman considers that she has had enough children, she will by stealth seize an opportunity of consulting such a woman and will pay for services. The woman gifted with the power sits down behind and as close as possible to her patient, over whose abdomen she makes passes while muttering incomprehensible charms. At the same time herbs or roots are burnt, the smoke of which the patient inhales.’[868] Such practices are obviously purely magical, and are quite ineffective. There are many definite statements with regard to particular races that no effective practices are known. In a few cases it is asserted that conception can be and is prevented. Krieger, for instance, says that in what was German New Guinea methods of preventing conception are known.[869] Pfeil gives a circumstantial account of a method said to be employed in New Ireland.[870] It seems clear, nevertheless, that the prevention of conception can be of but little importance in this region.

30. There is the same remarkable unanimity of evidence with regard to the small average size of families in Oceania as elsewhere. In New Zealand ‘families are usually small in number’.[871] According to Dieffenbach, ‘families are not large; there are rarely more than two or three children’,[872] while Brown says ‘they have very few children. Large families are never seen among them; perhaps two would be a high average compared with the number of marriages.’[873] There are rarely more than three children in a family in the Western Islands of the Torres Straits;[874] in the Eastern Islands the number varies from two to six, leaving childless marriages out of account.[875] In the Sandwich Islands the average is said to be three.[876] ‘There were few instances of large families’ in Samoa; ‘four or five would be the average.’[877] Three is said to be the average among the Aru Islanders,[878] while in the Pelew Islands marriages are reported to be often childless.[879] ‘I have never known’, says Melville of the Marquesas, ‘of more than two youngsters living together in the same home, and but seldom even that number.’[880] Tautain, who collected some figures for these islands, found the birth-rate to be very low.[881] In the Kingsmill Islands ‘a woman seldom has more than two children, and never more than three’.[882] Dr. Seligman is under the impression that ‘childless marriages are not very uncommon’ among the Koitu and Motu of New Guinea;[883] and Stone says of the latter that ‘as a rule their progeny is not numerous’.[884] Krieger remarks upon the small families in New Guinea, attributing the fact to abortion and infanticide.[885] In the Bismarck Archipelago ‘families as a rule are not very large.... A large number of the women have no children.’[886] Three is the average number in New Ireland; a family of four or five is considered large.[887] In New Caledonia there are seldom more than three in a family.[888] Fijian women are not prolific.[889] Ling Roth, surveying the literature of Sarawak, notes that the small size of the families has often been remarked upon, and quotes the statements of Houghton and Whitehead.[890] According to the former, ‘in general there are more than two children in a family; on an average three or four, very seldom only one child’. ‘The families of the natives’, says Whitehead, ‘are very small; in one or two instances I have known them to contain eight or more by one mother, but many women have only three or four, most one or two children; and it is by no means uncommon to find them childless.’ Brooke estimated ‘four or five births to every married woman’.[891] Wallace was impressed by the same fact, and took some pains to investigate the matter. ‘From inquiries at almost every Dyak tribe I visited, I ascertained that the women had rarely more than three or four children, and an old chief assured me that he had never known a woman have more than seven.’[892] So, too, according to Bock, ‘a Dyak family seldom consists of more than three or four children’.[893] Hagen estimates four children born per fertile married woman as the average among the Orang Kubu of Sumatra;[894] while Marsden, writing in the eighteenth century, was struck by the small average fertility; ‘women are by nature unprolific’ in Sumatra, was his opinion.[895] Two or three is the average in Nias;[896] ‘the average number of persons in one family in Java, where it is perhaps as large, if not larger than elsewhere, is estimated at only four or four and a half’.[897] Kreutz has compiled some figures for Celebes. He makes two and a half children to be the average per married woman among the Tolage and four among the Topebatos.[898] The Ainus ‘are not at all prolific’;[899] while according to another author, ‘not many children are born, usually three or four’.[900]

31. Abortion and infanticide are common, and there are many places where both practices are employed. Abortion is often spoken of among the Maoris; it would appear to be fairly common.[901] In the Murray Islands of the Torres Straits ‘abortion was very common’;[902] and in the Western Islands it is very frequent according to Haddon,[903] and similar facts are recorded of the Eastern Islands.[904] Abortion was known in Hawaii;[905] in the Kingsmill or Gilbert Islands it was extremely prevalent,[906] and also in Samoa.[907] It was practised at times in Rotuma[908] and in Savage Island.[909] Abortion seems to be fairly common in Fiji.[910] It is said to be ‘fairly frequent’ in the New Hebrides;[911] according to Jamieson, ‘a certain proportion of women die in endeavouring to procure abortion’.[912] There is very similar evidence from New Caledonia[913] and the Solomon Islands; it was probably more prevalent in the latter than in the former, especially among the south-eastern islands of the group.[914] In the Bismarck Archipelago it is reported to be frequently practised,[915] and so also in the Aru Islands[916] and the island of Flores.[917] Similar evidence comes from all parts of New Guinea.[918] It is specially mentioned for the Gulf of Geelink,[919] among the Baru tribe,[920] near Dorej,[921] among the Mafulu people,[922] among the Koitu and the Motu,[923] and the Southern Massim.[924] It is also practised in Nias,[925] Central Celebes,[926] among the Bontoc Igorot,[927] and in the Mitchell group.[928]