Here we see how even such sublime and poetic phenomena as sun and moon are to the aboriginal mind only symbols of their coarse, sensual lives: the heavenly bodies are concubines of the men, welcomed when fat, driven away when thin. That puts the substance of Australian love in a nutshell.
BARRINGTON'S LOVE-STORY
In the absence of aboriginal love-stories let us amuse ourselves by examining critically a few more of the alleged cases of romantic love discovered by Europeans. The erudite German anthropologist Gerland expresses his belief (VI., 755) that notwithstanding the degradation of the Australians "cases of true romantic love occur among them," and he refers for an instance to Barrington (I., 37). On consulting Barrington I find the following incident related as a sample of "genuine love in all its purity." I condense the unessential parts:
A young man of twenty-three, belonging to a tribe near Paramatta, was living in a cave with two sisters, one of fourteen, the other of twenty. One day when he returned from his kangaroo hunt he could not find the girls. Thinking they had gone to fetch water or roots for supper, he sat down till a rain-storm drove him into the cave, where he stumbled over the prostrate form of the younger sister. She was lying in a pool of blood, but presently regained consciousness and told him that a man had come to carry off her sister, after beating her on the head. She had seized the sister's arm to hold her back when the brute knocked her over with his club and dragged off the sister.
It was too late to take revenge that day, but next morning the two set out for the tribe to which the girl-robber belonged. As they approached the camp, Barrington continues, "he saw the sister of the very savage who had stolen his sister; she was leaving her tribe to pick some sticks for a fire (this was indeed a fine opportunity for revenge); so making his sister hide herself, he flew to the young woman and lifted up his club to bring her to the ground, and thus satisfy his revenge. The victim trembled, yet, knowing his power, she stood with all the fortitude she could; lifting up her eyes, they came in contact with his and such was the enchanting beauty of her form (!) that he stood an instant motionless to gaze on it (!). The poor thing saw this and dropped on her knees (!) to implore his pity, but before she could speak, his revenge softened into love (!); he threw down his club, and clasping her in his arms (!) vowed eternal constancy (!!!); his pity gained her love (!), thus each procured a mutual return. Then calling his sister, she would have executed her revenge, but for her brother, who told her she was now his wife. On my hero asking after his sister, his new wife said she was very ill, but would soon be better; and she excused her brother (!) because the means he had taken were the customary one of procuring a wife (!!); 'but you,' said she, 'have more white heart' (meaning he was more like the English), 'you no beat me; me love you; you love me; me love your sisters; your sisters love me; my brother no good man.' This artless address won both their hearts, and now all three live in one hut which I enabled them to make comfortable within half a mile of my own house."
Barrington concludes with these words: "This little anecdote I have given as the young man related it to me and perhaps I have lost much of its simplicity." It is very much to be feared that he has. I have marked with, exclamation points the most absurdly impossible parts of the tale as idealized and embellished by Barrington. The Australian never told him that he "gazed motionless" on the "enchanting beauty" of the girl's form or that his "revenge softened into love;" he never clasped her in his arms, nor "vowed eternal constancy." The girl never dreamt of saying that his pity gained her love, or of excusing her brother for doing what all Australian men do. These sentimental touches are gratuitous additions of Barrington; native Australians do not even clasp each other in their arms, and they are as incapable of vowing eternal constancy as of comparing Herbert Spencer's philosophy with Schopenhauer's. Yet on the strength of such dime novel rubbish an anthropologist assures us that savages are capable of feeling pure romantic love! The kernel of truth in the above tale reduces itself to this, that the young man whose sister was stolen intended to take revenge by killing the abductor, but that on seeing his sister he concluded to marry her. These savages, as we have seen, always act thus, killing the enemy's women only when unable to carry them off.
RISKING LIFE FOR A WOMAN
Lumholtz relates the following story to show that "these blacks also may be greatly overcome by the sentiment of love" (213):
"A 'civilized' black man entered a station on Georgina River and carried off a woman who belonged to a young black man at the station. She loved her paramour and was glad to get away from the station; but the whites desired to keep her for their black servant, as he could not be made to stay without her, and they brought her back, threatening to shoot the stranger if he came again. Heedless of the threat, he afterward made a second attempt to elope with his beloved, but the white men pursued the couple and shot the poor fellow."
If Lumholtz had reflected for a moment on the difference between love as a sentiment and love as an appetite, he would have realized the error of using the expression "the sentiment of love" in connection with such a story of adulterous kidnapping, in which there is absolutely nothing to indicate whether the kidnapper coveted the other man's wife for any other than the most carnal reasons. It is not unusual for an Australian to risk his life in stealing a woman. He does that every time he captures one from another tribe. In men who have so little imaginative faculty as these, the possibility of being killed has no more deterrent effect than it has in two dogs or stags fighting for a female. We must not judge such indifference to deadly consequences from our point of view.