Apparently, in the village communities, the existence of a mythical ancestor, not ancestress, is postulated; while in the northern tribes, with female descent, mythical ancestresses are postulated. But if, among the Kwakiutl proper, male ancestry is now the recognised rule (and it dimly seems to be so), then, as usual, Kwakiutl myth will throw back into the unknown past the institutions of their present state, will say "ancestor," not "ancestress." No argument can be based on traditions which are really explanatory conjectures. There is advanced no valid reason for supposing that the Kwakiutl proper began with descent in the female line, then advanced to the male line, and then doubled back on the female line, and so evolved transmission of crests in the female line, through husbands.
The waverings of the Kwakiutl between the two lines of descent are, in fact, such as we expect to occur when a people has retained, like the Tlingit, Haida, and Tsimshians, the system of female descent after reaching a fair pitch of physical culture, and arriving at wealth, rank, and the attribution of children to the paternal stock.
[39] T. and E., vol. iii. pp. 318, 319.
[40] Fifth Report on N. W. Tribes of Canada, 1890. T. and E., vol. iii. p. 320, note 1.
[41] Twelfth Report on N. W. Tribes of Canada, 1898, p. 676. T. and E., vol. iii. p. 320, note 1.
[42] T. and E., vol. iii. p. 332, citing Dr. Boas in Fifth Report on N. W. Tribes of Canada, p. 33, 1889.
[43] It seems to me impossible to suppose that the village community was ever anywhere "the original social unit."—A. L.
[44] Rep. U.S. Nat. Museum, 1897. pp. 334-335.