MORGAN’S ANCIENT SOCIETY; or, Researcheson the Lines of Human Progress throughSavagery and Barbarism to Civilization. By LewisH. Morgan, LL.D. 8vo. $4.
SIR HENRY SUMNER MAINE’S WORKS:
Ancient Law: Its Connection with the EarlyHistory of Society, and its Relation to Modern Ideas.By Henry Sumner Maine, Member of the SupremeCouncil of India, and Regius Professor of the CivilLaw in the University of Cambridge. With an Introductionby Theodore W. Dwight, LL.D. 8vo.$3.50.
Lectures on the Early History of Institutions.A Sequel to “Ancient Law.” 8vo. $3.50.
Village Communities in the East and West.Six Lectures delivered at Oxford: to which are addedother Lectures, Addresses, and Essays. 8vo. $3.50.
E. B. TYLOR’S WORKS:
Primitive Culture: Researches into the Developmentof Mythology, Philosophy, Religion, Art, andCustom. 2 vols. 8vo. $7.00.
Researches into the Early History of Mankind,and the Development of Civilization. 8vo.$3.50.
PRIMITIVE MANNERS
AND CUSTOMS
BY
JAMES A. FARRER
NEW YORK
HENRY HOLT AND COMPANY
1879
INTRODUCTION.
From the myths characteristic of savage tribes, fromtheir beliefs, their proverbs, their political and socialregulations, it is here sought to gain some generalestimate of their powers of intelligence and imagination,their moral ideas, and their religion; subjectsnaturally of much interest and inevitably of somedispute. For the reason that in savagery as in civilisationthere are heights and depths, with more oflight here, more of darkness there, it is quite impossibleto bring the whole of savage life into focus atonce, so that every general conclusion can only betaken as true within limits. The field to be studiedis also so large and diversified, that no two minds canexpect to derive from it the same impressions, nor toattain to more than partial truth about it. But sincethe savage can never hope to be heard in court himself,it is only fair to start with certain considerations[vi]which he would be entitled to urge, and which deserveto weigh in any judgment made regarding him.
Statements of very low powers of numerationhave been perhaps too hastily taken as indicative ofa low state of intelligence; for not only have similarassertions concerning American and Tasmaniantribes by the earliest voyagers proved on subsequentinvestigation to be erroneous, but many savages havesubstitutes for our arithmetic which serve them perfectlywell, the Loangese, for instance, expressingnumbers in narration not by words but by gestures;and the Koossa Kaffirs—very few of whom are said tobe able to count above ten—possessing the peculiarfaculty of detecting almost at a glance any loss in aherd of cattle which may amount to half a thousand.In the same way the want of a written language is oftensupplied by symbolism. Puzzle as it might a personof education to read a letter, expressed by a bundlecontaining a stone, a piece of charcoal, a rag, apepper-pod, an