uments, which, as he shows, "border on the comic."
I myself have in this chapter, as well as in those on Africans,
American Indians, South Sea Islanders, etc., revealed the comicality
of the assertion that there is in a savage condition of life
"comparatively little reason for illegitimate relations," which forms
one of the main props of Westermarck's anti-promiscuity theory; and I
have also reduced _ad absurdum_ his systematic overrating of savages
in the matter of liberty of choice, esthetic taste and capacity for
affection which resulted from his pet theory and marred his whole
book.[167]

It is interesting to note that Darwin (_D.M._, Ch. XX.) concluded from
the facts known to him that "_almost_ promiscuous intercourse or very
loose intercourse was once extremely common throughout the world:" and
the only thing that seemed to deter him from believing in _absolutely_
promiscuous intercourse was the "strength of the feeling of jealousy."
Had he lived to understand the true nature of savage jealousy
explained in this volume and to read the revelations of Spencer and
Gillen, that difficulty would have vanished. On this point, too, their
remarks are of great importance, fully bearing out the view set forth
in my chapter on jealousy. They declare (99) that they did not find
sexual jealousy specially developed:

"For a man to have unlawful intercourse with any woman
arouses a feeling which is due not so much to jealousy
as to the fact that the delinquent has infringed a
tribal custom. If the intercourse has been with a woman
who belongs to the class from which his wife comes,
then he is called _atna nylkna_ (which, literally
translated, is vulva thief); if with one with whom it
is unlawful for him to have intercourse, then he is
called _iturka_, the most opprobrious term in the
Arunta language. In the one case he has merely stolen
property, in the other he has offended against tribal
law."

Jealousy, they sum up, "is indeed a factor which need not be taken
into serious account in regard to the question of sexual relations
amongst the Central Australian tribes."

The customs described by these authors show, moreover, that these
savages _do not allow jealousy to stand in the way of sexual
communism_, a man who refuses to share his wife being considered
churlish, in one class of cases, while in another no choice is allowed
him, the matter being arranged by the