Is there, it may now be asked, anywhere any definite evidence to bear
out this contention. There is: and in abundance. For it, however, we
must look away from civilised communities, especially from the educated
portion of their populations. Civilisation, no doubt, gives much; but it
also takes much away. It has taken away much of the traditional lore of
women, and more and more of their traditional activities. This does not
merely mean that the practical ability and knowledge of civilised women
is greatly restricted; it means also that the peculiar intuitive wisdom
of women--the fruit of a richly-stored subconsciousness--is much
diminished. In capacity for pure thought the educated woman of civilised
communities no doubt excels all the rest: in most other respects the
barbarian or savage woman will--with some few exceptions--probably be
found her superior, whether judged merely by her mastery of the
conditions amid which she has to work, or, more broadly, by the amount
of her real knowledge and the range of her effective capacities.
Take, as an example, the Eskimo woman, who is considered to represent
the woman of palaeolithic times. As there is no Eskimo Board of
Education--no paraphernalia of Primary, Secondary, Technical, and other
Schools, with their red tape and officialism--she is free to carry on
the tradition of her ancestresses, and to rear, in the good old ways,
children who grow up to be sturdy men and women. The preparation she had
for her task was chiefly that of watching and imitating her own mother.
Thus, as a child, she followed all the processes of turning the dead
reindeer to account--learning thereby an economy and an unwillingness to
waste which were essentially scientific--learning, too, subconsciously.
She saw the flesh of the reindeer made into pemmican--cut into thin
slices, and dried in the sun or in the smoke of a slow fire, then
pounded between stones (the use of stones is worth noticing) and stored
under a cover of melted fat, poured over it in due proportion. She saw
the bones--after the marrow had been extracted from them--pounded down
and boiled to get out the residual fat; the horns set aside to make
fish-hooks, chisels, needles, and fishing-spears, work for the long
winter evenings; the skin carefully dressed with a split bone and cut
into shape to make clothing, and snow-shoes, thongs, bow-strings,
fishing-nets, and so on. The very tendons make threads for sewing: and
the garments thus fashioned are not only strong and serviceable, but
beautiful with that particular beauty, which may perhaps be called
barbaric, but which almost invariably denotes vigour and fulness of
subconscious life. The Eskimo women also make their own boats and their
own tools; they are good fishers and hunters. Their year's work
comprises an exercise of dexterity and quick wit of which the ordinary
Englishwoman can have no idea.
We might take as another example the North American Indian woman, with
her varied forest-lore; but, since space is limited, let us pass for one
further illustration to the despised Australian aboriginal. She too
knows and does things worthy of our admiration and imitation. For
instance the English housewife's preparation of the household food is
nothing like so conscientious as the Australian's, whose proceedings
have the keen disinterested concentration proper to a bit of scientific
research. Thus, to take but one example of the processes connected with
the preparation of one form of food--a seed of a species of eucalyptus:
"With a hooked stick she pulls down the terminal branches of the tree
and spreads them out to dry on a piece of ground cleared for the
purpose. After allowing them to lie there for a period determined by
temperature, she collects the distal ends of the branches, damps them
and brushes the seeds off into water. For a period of two or more hours
these seeds are kept soaking, but the water is repeatedly changed, so as
to remove all traces of the 'gum.' After this they are dried and ground
on a stone. Again, she builds their rough, but wisely devised home most
carefully according to ancient tradition. She takes her little girl,
armed with a miniature digging-stick, out to track the honey-ant with
her, and to learn by the way what are the birds and beasts and plants,
friendly or inimical, which surround their home-camp."
Alongside of this direct learning about nature goes the learning of the
legends and traditions of the tribe, together with the customary
dances, rituals, and religious practices. The activity of savage life is
everywhere such that no anomalies like our physical exercises are
needed,--for the physique of the young men and women is as graceful,
strong, and enduring as need be.
If we turn to savage or barbarian peoples higher in the scale we shall
find their knowledge, abilities, and accomplishments higher and also
more varied. But, on the whole, until we come to the average modern
woman of a civilised community, we shall find that the women--through
their happily developed subconsciousness--are equal to the best the
community requires of them. They do not call their training Common-sense
Biology, but that is what it practically is. They know all about their
surroundings, and what to do therein. And grace and beauty wait upon
what they do.
This ideal is not, however, quite without parallel among the more highly
civilised peoples. The Greeks conceived of Athene, the great goddess of
wisdom and of war, as also Athene Ergane, the Workwoman, the goddess of
handicrafts in the home. In our own country--to take examples near to us
and familiar--the names of Caroline Herschel, Jane Austen, the Brontes,
Mary Somerville, and George Eliot not only attest the fact that
exquisite skill in domestic arts is not, in a woman, incompatible with
learning and genius, but may also lead us to suspect that the exercise
of this skill actually aided and furthered their better-known
achievements.
In our civilised communities--from the point of view of the
subconscious--women are in two ways at a disadvantage. First, excessive
division of labour, with our dependence upon machinery, has made the
life of the State far more complicated than in former days; and
secondly, the activity of the individual, from the same causes, is far
more monotonous, far less well-calculated to bring out all her powers
and train her being as a whole, than it used to be. Hence, as we said,
women have lost a good deal subconsciously--even though, in
consciousness, they may have gained.
There is nothing in which the character of the subconscious is more
clearly seen than in a person's attitude towards the great mysteries of
life: towards birth and marriage and death on the one hand--towards
religion on the other. It is, of course, matter of common knowledge that
in regard to marriage the customs of some savage tribes are what we
should describe as licentious. A truer understanding of the savage mind
has, however, mitigated many of the judgments passed even upon the worst
of these practices--at least in so far as they were taken to indicate
gross inward depravity on the part of the women. And among many peoples
there are found laws and customs of real beauty and noble significance,
witnessing to reverence, fine intuition, and real care for the highest
good of the tribe. And in general of all savage races it may be said
that whatever their laws and customs are--though perhaps born of
ignorance and selfishness--they feel seriously about them as about
sacred things, and observe them scrupulously.
The better side is exemplified chiefly by the women. When
anthropological work is more largely undertaken by women, and when,
through their sympathy, the jealously guarded secrets of the women's
tradition, now almost entirely unknown, are yielded up to us, it is
probable that our conceptions of savage life and thought will have to be
radically modified. However that may be, it is even now sufficiently
well known that the women do not leave the question of reproduction and
marriage to chance in the education of their girls. The girls are
definitely, carefully, and it would seem often tenderly, taught; and if,
among some peoples, they are made to undergo great sufferings, a closer
study usually reveals in these the effects of the long subjection of the
women to the cruelty and uncontrolled passions of the men. All this
should not blind us to the fact that the maternal instinct is here
actively grappling with the great realities of life: and we may contrast
this with the ways of the modern woman who, less developed in
subconsciousness, is not so forcibly impelled to make any such attempt,
and, for the most part, practically lets the whole thing slide. Here, as
in other directions, the fuller development of the subconscious would
compel and also enable us to correct a grave omission: while the
knowledge necessarily acquired concerning reproduction and birth in the
course of biological work would fill up that which has hitherto often
been wanting even in the best-inspired women who have dealt with this
question.
It must by now have been made clear that our object in advocating this
Common-sense Biology is to recover what was excellent in the equipment
of the women of the past, and to unite it with what is most excellent,
and most germane to woman's life, in the methods and knowledge of the
present. Since modern household life is deficient in the requisite
opportunities we are obliged to have recourse to definite educational
schemes. But education of this sort will assuredly continue to be
necessary even after many improvements in the home have been brought to
pass; because it will always be necessary to keep the knowledge and
activities of women in correspondence with the advance of science. At
the same time it is worth while to remember that the earlier the child
begins to observe living things, to live with them, learn about them,
and take care of them, the better the final result will be; while the
ideally trained mother in the ideal home, herself practical and active,
will be able to do more for her children in this regard than most
people, perhaps, would now dream of.