There are a number of cases in which it is at least conceivable that the older customs of a people, under a new surrounding, develop into taboos. I think, for instance, that it is very likely that the Eskimo taboo forbidding the use of caribou and of seal on the same day may be due to the alternating inland and coast life of the people. When they hunt inland, they have no seals, and consequently can eat only caribou. When they hunt on the coast, they have no caribou, and consequently can eat only seal. The simple fact that in one season only caribou can be eaten, and that in another season only seal can be eaten, may have easily led to a resistance to a change of this custom; so that from the fact that for a long period the two kinds of meat could not be eaten at the same time, the law developed that the two kinds of meat must not be eaten at the same time. I think it is also likely that the fish taboo of some of our Southwestern tribes may be due to the fact that the tribes lived for a long time in a region where no fish was available, and that the impossibility of obtaining fish developed into the custom of not eating fish. These hypothetical cases make it clear that the unconscious origin of customs is quite conceivable, although of course not necessary. It seems, however, certain that even when there has been a conscious reasoning that led to the establishment of a custom, it soon ceased to be conscious, and instead we find a direct emotional resistance to an infraction of the custom. Other actions which are considered proper or improper are continued solely through the force of habit; and no reasons are assigned for their occurrence, although the re-action against an infringement of the custom may be strong. If among the Indians of Vancouver Island it is bad form for a young woman of nobility to open her mouth wide and to eat fast, a deviation from this custom would also be deeply felt, but in this case as an impropriety which would seriously damage the social standing of the culprit. The same group of feelings are concerned when a member of the nobility, even in Europe, marries below his or her station. In other, more trifling cases, the overstepping of the boundaries of custom merely exposes the offender to ridicule, on account of the impropriety of the act. All these cases belong psychologically to the same group of emotional re-actions against breaks with established automatic habits.