d remaining under water when he could not; while at
the same time he had not as yet perceived that the intelligence of
animals was in any way inferior to his own, and he credited many of
them with the power of speech. Thus certain animals were venerated on
account of the qualities associated with them, and out of them in the
course of time anthropomorphic gods personifying the qualities were
evolved. The Australian aborigines of the kangaroo totem, when they
wish to multiply the number of kangaroos, go to a certain place where
two special blocks of stone project immediately one above the other
from the hillside. One is supposed to represent an 'old man' kangaroo
and the other a female. The stones are rubbed and then painted with
alternate red and white stripes, the red stripes representing the red
fur of the kangaroos, and the white ones its bones. After doing this
some of them open veins in their arms and allow the blood to spurt
over the stones. The other men sing chants referring to the increase
in the numbers of the kangaroos, and they suppose that this ceremony
will actually result in producing an increased number of kangaroos
and hence an additional supply of food. [106] Here the inference
seems to be that the stones represent the centre or focus of the
life of kangaroos, and when they are quickened by the painting, and
the supply of blood, they will manifest their creative activity and
increase the kangaroos. If we suppose that some similar stone existed
on the Acropolis and was considered by the owl clan as the centre of
the life of the owls which frequented the hill, then when the art of
sculpture had made some progress, and the superiority of the human form
and intellect began to be apprehended, if a sculptor carved the stone
into the semblance of a human being, the goddess Athena would be born.

55. Primitive language.

It has been seen that primitive man considered the life and qualities
to be distributed equally over the body in a physical sense, so that
they formed part of the substance and flesh. The same view extended
even to instrumental qualities or functions, since his mental powers
and vision were necessarily limited by his language. Language must
apparently have begun by pointing at animals or plants and making
some sound, probably at first an imitation of the cry or other
characteristic of the animal, which came to connote it. We have to
suppose that language was at the commencement a help i