The fact that the engagement was made publicly, and so was known and acknowledged by all the members of the local group and perhaps even of the whole tribe, emphasized its legal aspect. The cases where the tribal authority disposed of the girls or had to give consent itself shows this in a still stronger degree. We see therefore that two social factors were involved in the legal side of the marriage: the family, which was responsible for the carrying out of marriage and often for its maintenance,[150] and the community,[151] which gives its consent and often controls the right performance of expiatory ordeals. It may also be remarked that the mere moral sanction, which stamps one act as right and another as wrong, gives a strong support to the offended party and paralysed the help that the friends would perhaps like to give to the offender. Although it is difficult to adduce sufficient evidence in order to show in detail what were the obligations of the family and where the tribal supervision began--and it seems that these matters were possibly settled only roughly and on broad lines in the Australian society--one thing appears quite clearly from the whole evidence, viz. that in all tribes only those couples were secure from any interference who had married according to the legal form or whose marriage was subsequently legalized. We are informed by Spencer and Gillen that in some cases (when elopement was brought about by magic) there were some relatives who were lawfully entitled to help the eloper. This shows also clearly how little the settlement of these affairs was arbitrary. Elopement was in this case, and in all others, considered as a trespass; when it was a girl it was an encroachment on the rights of the family; when it was a married woman it was an offence against her husband and also perhaps against her family. According to circumstances and varying with the tribe, it was considered as a more or less serious trespass and punished accordingly. In order that an elopement might result in an acknowledged union, it had to be followed always and invariably by certain expiatory acts. Even in the case of capture, we saw in the example given by Spencer and Gillen that the woman was lawfully allotted to one of the party. Individual capture seems to occur very seldom; in its legal aspect it would not differ essentially from the elopement, but it would have had probably less chances of being made valid. [150] Family means here in the first place the father, who disposed of his daughter; or in some cases the brother or near relative, who got or will get a wife in exchange for her. [151] Or better, what was called above the tribal government.