the human races, when there was no such appropriation
of women to particular men; when, in short, marriage, _as it exists
among civilised nations_, was not practised. Marriage, _in this
sense_, was yet undreamt of.' Mr. M'Lennan adds (pp. 130, 131), 'as
among other gregarious animals, the unions of the sexes were probably,
in the earliest times, loose, transitory, and, _in some degree_,
promiscuous.'

Sir Henry Maine opposes to Mr. M'Lennan's theory the statement of
Mr. Darwin: 'From all we know of the passions of all male
quadrupeds, promiscuous intercourse in a state of Nature is highly
improbable.'[208] On this first question, let us grant to Sir Henry
Maine, to Mr. Darwin, and to common-sense that if the very earliest
men were extremely animal in character, their unions while they
lasted were probably monogamous or polygamous. The sexual jealousy
of the male would secure that result, as it does among many other
animals. Let the first point, then, be scored to Sir Henry Maine:
let it be granted that if man was created perfect, he lived in the
monogamous family before the Fall: and that, if he was evolved as an
animal, the unchecked animal instincts would make for monogamy or
patriarchal polygamy in the strictly primitive family.

(2) Did circumstances and customs ever or anywhere compel or induce
man (whatever his original condition) to resort to practices which
made paternity uncertain, and so caused the absence of the patriarchal
family, kinship being reckoned through women? If this question be
answered in the affirmative, and if the sphere of action of the
various causes be made wide enough, it will not matter much to Mr.
M'Lennan's theory whether the strictly primitive family was
patriarchal or not. If there occurred a fall from the primitive
family, and if that fall was extremely general, affecting even the
Aryan race, Mr. M'Lennan's adherents will be amply satisfied. Their
object is to show that the family, even in the Aryan race, was
developed through a stage of loose savage connections. If that can be
shown, they do not care much about primitive man properly so called.
Sir Henry Maine admits, as a matter of fact, that among certain races,
in certain districts, circumstances have overridden the sexual
jealousy which secures the recognition of male parentage. Where women
have been few, and where poverty has been great, jealousy has been
suppressed, even in the Venice of the eighteenth century. Sir H. Maine