not exist, a most curious system was adopted to establish paternity.
In Tyrol, at the present day, so as not to break up an allodial farm, where there be, say, five brothers, on the death of the father lots are cast as to which of the brothers is to marry and continue the family. The lot does not always fall on the eldest; but however it falls, it is submissively obeyed. In a farm one may see the brothers working as common operatives, under the direction of the married brother. None of them think of marrying—their lot is to remain on the allodial land and work for it.
But this points back to a prior condition of affairs, where the woman was the wife of all the brothers, as is the condition now in Ceylon. Christianity has stepped in and altered that; and now these simple, honest, pure-minded men work on humbly and lovingly under the direction of their brother and sister-in-law.
And now we come to the method adopted among a wild people to establish paternity in place of matriarchy, and that was the couvade.
Mr. Tylor has dealt with this, and has shown how that among an uncultured people the idea exists that the health of the child is inseparably bound up with that of the parents.
