Note 273 — Chapter IV · AGRICULTURAL TRIBES.

One might object, that possibly the women are held in such a slavelike state because male slaves are impossible or very difficult to procure, or because the coercive power of these tribes is not strong enough to admit of the keeping of slaves, or because male captives, where they are introduced into the tribe (as in the islands Bougainville Straits), are wanted for warriors. Shortly expressed the objection is, that slavery is not wanting because there exists a “slavery of women,” but “slavery of women” exists because slavery proper is wanting. We must own that this is quite possible. But, whatever be the cause of this “slavery of women,” as soon as it exists it renders slavery less necessary than it would otherwise be. War is frequent in Melanesia273, so there is no physical impossibility of procuring captives. And though it may be difficult to keep male slaves subjected,—if the men were unable to impose all work on the women and obliged to perform their due share of it themselves, they would decidedly take more pains to procure slaves and set them to work. A low condition of women, though only a secondary factor, certainly is a factor which tends to make slavery proper superfluous.