________________________________________________
_ Thus, once more, we are baffled in our attempts to find genuine romantic love. Of its fourteen ingredients the altruistic ones are missing entirely. What Dalton writes (248) regarding the Oraons,
"Dhumkuria lads are no doubt great flirts, but each has
a special favorite among the young girls of his
acquaintance, and the girls well know to whose touch
and pressure in the dance each maiden's heart is
especially responsive," will not mislead any reader of
this book, who will know that it indicates merely
individual preference, which goes with all sorts of
love, and is moreover, characteristically shallow here;
for, as Dalton has told us, these village flirtations
"seldom end in marriage."
The other ingredients that primitive love shares with romantic love--monopoly, jealousy, coyness, etc., are also, as we saw, weak among the wild tribes of India. Westermarck (503) indeed fancied he had discovered the occurrence among them of "the absorbing passion for one." "Colonel Dalton," he says, "represents the Paharia lads and lasses as forming very romantic attachments; 'if separated only for an hour,' he says, 'they are miserable.'" In reality Dalton does not "represent them" thus; he says "they are represented;" that is, he gives his information at second-hand, without naming his authority, who, to judge by some of his remarks, was apparently a facetious globe-trotter. It is of course possible that these young folks are much attached to each other. Even sheep are "miserable if separated only for an hour;" they bleat pathetically and are disconsolate, though there is no question of an "absorbing passion for one." What kind of love unites these Paharia lads and lasses may be inferred from the further information given in Dalton's book that "they work together, go to market together, eat together, and sleep together;" while indiscretions are atoned for by shedding the blood of an animal, whereupon all is forgiven! In other words, where Westermarck found "the absorbing passion for one," a critical student can see nothing but a vulgar case of reprehensible free lust.
And yet, though we have found no indications of true love, I can see reasons for Dalton's exclamation,
"It is singular that in matters of the affections the feelings of these semi-savages should be more in unison with the sentiments and customs of the highly organized western nations than with the methodical and unromantic heart-schooling of their Aryan fellow-countrymen."
Whether these wild tribes are really more like ourselves in their amorous customs than the more or less civilized Hindoos to whom we now turn our attention, the reader will be able to decide for himself after finishing this chapter. _
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