Page:American Journal of Sociology Volume 5.djvu/514

 498 THE AMERICAN JOURNAL OF SOCIOLOGY

A consequence of this is that in the lower races woman comes to be valued "not only as a wife, but as a mother." Fecundity, more than beauty, is what is required of a desirable wife. Among many inferior groups it is the custom not to marry a girl before she has had children, and, in some cases, before she has been tried by the prospective husband. Prolific- ness entitles a woman to general esteem and respect (at least where these feelings are not unknown); sterility is considered so disgraceful, and the charge thereof so humiliating, that Living- stone mentions, as not rare occurrences, cases of suicide occa- sioned by this serious accusation ; and in many uncivilized and half-civilized communities a woman's barrenness is deemed a most legitimate cause for repudiation or divorce."

While it is true that these facts seem to establish the wide extent of the "desire for offspring," it is equally true that this desire cannot always be identified with a race-preservation, or offspring-preservation, instinct. Among savages (as Mr. VVester- marck very properly observes), although instinct may play a part in the phenomena just described, the main motive is to be found in the utility derived by parents from their children. "They [children] are easily supported when young, and, in times of want, they may be left to die, or be sold. When a few years old, the sons become able to hunt, fish, and paddle, and later on they are their father's companions in war. The daughters help their mother to provide food, and, when grown up, they are lucrative objects of trade."" These remarks, which to an unphilosophical mind may appear as a shocking and repulsive picture of human nature, seem to be borne out by the cold testimony of facts. In savage life a wife is both a slave and a slave-making machine, and her value is estimated in pro- portion both to her fecundity and her personal ability. Of some American Indians Bancroft says that they "make capacity for

■ WestermaRCK, op. cit., chap, xvi, pp. 376-9, and chap, xxi, pp. 488-9, where numerous illustrations of the " desire for offspring " are given.

'WestermaRCK, op. cit., chap, xvi, p. 380. It is stated by Bruce that in Dixan, one of the frontier towns of Abyssinia, the only trade was that of selling children. Five hundred were annually exported to Arabia, and in times of scarcity four times that number.