their
objection very often by running away. In the instance of Catskin the
running away was successful, as we all know; but in most instances the
unwilling bride was captured and forced to surrender. Mr. Farrer, in
his _Primitive Manners and Customs_, quite clears the ground for the
refutation of an argument that might be applied if we did not know the
customs of primitive society. It might be asked, why did Catskin run
away if the custom was a usual one? For the same reason, we answer,
that the women of savage society often do run away--objection to the
marriage.[81]

Thus we have to note that the two principal features of our ordinary
Catskin story are explainable by a reference to primitive manners and
customs; and it seems to me much easier and much more reasonable to
thus explain the origin of the Catskin story, than first of all to
create a "lovely myth," as the mythologists would undoubtedly have a
right to call it, of the Sun pursuing the Dawn, and then to say that
the Catskin story is simply a relation of this myth.

The opening incident of the Catskin story, as thus interpreted, is not
an isolated case of the survival of primitive marriage customs in
popular stories. If it were so, there would be considerable difficulty
in the way of supporting this interpretation. But it is only saying of
Catskin what can be said of other stories. "There are traces," says
Mr. Campbell, speaking of his Highland stories, "of foreign or
forgotten laws and customs. A man buys a wife as he would a cow, and
acquires a right to shoot her, which is acknowledged as good law."[82]
Yes, this is good savage law and custom there is no doubt, and Lord
Avebury and Mr. McLennan have illustrated it by examples. But in the
Highland story of the "Battle of the Birds" the wife is sought to be
purchased for a hundred pounds (Campbell, i. 36), and in the Irish
story of the "Lazy Beauty and her Aunts" we find something like
bride-capture and purchase as well.[83] So, again, if we turn to India
the same kind of evidence is forthcoming of another part of the
primitive ceremony. "Do not think," retorted the Malee in a story
collected by Miss Frere, "that I'll make a fool of myself because I'm
only a Malee, and believe what you've got to say because you're a
great Rajah. If you mean what you say, if you care for my daughter and
wish to be married to her, come and be married; but I'll have none of
your new-fangled forms and court ceremonies hard to be