This is so essential to our understanding of human love, that I wish I could follow it further. All the elaborate phenomena of sex in the animal kingdom have for their end the reproduction of the species. But in the case of man there is another purpose, often transcending this end--the independent significance of sex emotion, both on the physical and psychical side, to the individual. It seems to me that women have special need to-day to remember this personal end of human passion. This is not, however, the place to enter upon this question. I have now to attempt to trace as clearly as I can the history of primitive human love. To do this it will be necessary to refer to comparative ethnography.[99] We must investigate the sex customs, forms of marriage and the family, still to be found among primitive peoples, scattered about the world. These early forms of the sexual relationship were once of much wider occurrence, and they have left unmistakable traces in the history of many races. Further evidence is furnished by folk stories and legends. In peasant festivals and dances and in many religious ceremonies we may find survivals of primitive sex customs. They may be traced in our common language, especially in the words used for sex and kin relationships. We can also find them shadowed in certain of our marriage rites and sex habits to-day. The difficulty does not rest in paucity of material, but rather in its superabundance--far too extensive to allow anything like adequate treatment within the space of a brief and necessarily insufficient chapter. For this reason I shall limit my inquiry almost wholly to those cases which have some facts to tell us of the position occupied by women in the primitive family. I shall try to avoid falling into the error of a one-sided view. Facts are more important here than reflections, and, as far as possible, I shall let these speak for themselves. In order to group these facts it may be well to give first a rough outline of the periods to be considered--