l subjection on the part of
the group-daughters, an opinion which arises, I am certain, from the
curious misconception of the passivity of the human female in love.

I do not wish to conceal that my conjecture of an active part having
been taken by the women, both in their captures and also in all the
relationships of the family, is opposed to the great majority of
learned opinion. The reason for this already has been suggested.
Almost invariably the writers on these questions are men, and there
is, I imagine, a certain blindness in their view. I am convinced that
from the earliest beginnings of the human family women have exercised
a much stronger and more direct influence than is usually believed.
All the movements towards regulation and progress, so ingeniously
worked out by Mr. Atkinson, are easier to credit if we accept the
initiative as having come from the group-mothers. I have an inward
conviction of an unchanging law between the two sexes, and though I
cannot here attempt to give any proof, it seems to me, we can always
trace _the absorption by the male of female ideas_. The man accepts
what the woman brings forward, and then assumes the control, believing
he is the originator of her ideas. Take this case of capture: If, as I
suggest, the young women assisted or even took the initiative in their
own captures, they would very plainly not be willing to allow sexual
relationships with another hoary patriarch. I would urge that here
again it was by the action of the young women, rather than the young
men, that the new order was established. But this is a small matter.
If I am right, the communal living and common danger among the women
would powerfully bind them together in union, and sever them from the
male rulers. Once this is granted, it follows that social
consciousness in the women must have been stronger than in the
solitary males. Then there can be no possible doubt of the part taken
by women in the slow advancement of the group by regulation to social
peace. Moreover, I believe, that confirmation of what is here claimed
for women will be found (as will appear in the later part of my
inquiry) in many social habits among existing primitive peoples, who
still live under the favourable conditions of the maternal family;
habits that suggest a long evolutionary process, and that can be
explained only if they have arisen in a very remote beginning. But
enough on this subject has now been said.

Many interesting