is
actually found in the tribes in question. For the Warramunga Spencer and
Gillen distinctly state[136] that the arrangement is dichotomous, in
which case the alleged result would not be brought about. The Anula and
Mara are exceptional tribes with direct male descent; it is hardly
likely that the eight-class system spread from them. The Mayoo have not
yet been reported on by an expert. Finally some of the tribes have not
even the dichotomous arrangement of totems but distribute them in both
phratries. The basis of the hypothesis, therefore, is hardly
established.

Singularly enough, Dr Durkheim[137] expresses his adherence to a
previous theory of his own as to the method of effecting the change from
female to male descent in four-class tribes. This he supposes to have
been done by transferring one of the two classes from each phratry to
the opposite one; and in the former discussion (_Annee Soc._ V, 82 sq.)
he showed that this procedure would result in scattering the totems
through both phratries, as we find them to be in the case of the Arunta.
It is therefore singular to find that he adheres to this theory when his
new hypothesis demands that the totems, so far from being more widely
distributed, should be actually confined to the members of one couple.
Beyond the Urabunna custom in intertribal marriages, however, which is
hardly decisive evidence, there does not appear to be any proof that the
transference from one phratry to the other ever took place.

The further support claimed by Dr Durkheim for his hypothesis from the
alleged male descent of the totem in tribes where female descent of the
class names prevails, rests on too uncertain a basis to make it
necessary to deal with it at length; some criticism of the evidence will
be found elsewhere.

We have seen above that the Dieri rule is precisely parallel to that of
the eight-class tribes in practice; it is however expressed, not by a
class system, but by enacting that people standing in a certain degree
of kinship or consanguinity shall marry. If Dr Durkheim's theory of the
origin of the eight-class system is correct, it should also apply to the
Dieri. Now the rule that a man must marry his maternal great-uncle's
daughter clearly prevents intermarriage with one of the mother's totem;
but this cannot be the object of the rule, for it is prevented already
by the phratry system. Dr Durkheim's theory therefore finds no support
in the Dieri rule.

On the other