Page:The evolution of marriage and of the family ... (IA evolutionofmarri00letorich).pdf/351

 to the manes, or the Srâddha, are excluded from the celestial abode. It is necessary to have a son to "pay the debt of the ancestors." "By a son, a man gains heaven; by the son of a son, he obtains immortality; by the son of this grandson, he rises to dwell in the sun." The Code of Manu already proclaims the right of primogeniture. It is by means of the eldest son that a man pays the debt of the ancestors; it is therefore he who ought to have everything; his obedient brothers will live under his guardianship, as they have lived under that of the father, on condition, however, that if the sons are of different mothers, the mothers of the younger ones are not of superior rank to that of the mother of the eldest son. The son of a brahmanee, for example, would not yield precedence to the son of a kchâtriya: caste is always of the first consideration. But the quality of son may be acquired otherwise than by community of blood. Thus a husband may, as we have seen, have his sterile wife fertilised by his younger brother. The child thus conceived is reputed to be son of the husband; nevertheless, in the succession, he is given the share of an uncle only, and not the double share to which he would have had a right if he had been the real son by flesh and blood. If a man has the great misfortune to have only daughters, he can obviate this by charging his daughter to bear him a son. For this purpose, it suffices for him to say mentally to himself: "Let the male child that she gives birth to become mine, and fulfil in my honour the funeral ceremony." The son thus engendered by mental incest and by suggestion, as we should say to-day, is perfectly authentic. He is not a grandson, but a real and true son, and he inherits all the fortune of his maternal grand-*father, with the light charge on it of offering two funeral cakes—one to his own father, his father according to the flesh, the other to his maternal grandfather, or father according to the spirit. The law of Manu does not totally disinherit daughters, but it cuts down their share considerably. Under pain of degradation, brothers must give their sisters, but only to their german sisters, the fourth of their share, to