Senescence : the last half of life / by G. Stanley Hall.

  • G. Stanley Hall
Date:
1923
Catalogue details

Licence: In copyright

Credit: Senescence : the last half of life / by G. Stanley Hall. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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    often comes very late. The greatest number of suicides is among the old people. A man who beat his mother said, “Let her cry and go hungry. She made me cry more than once and beat me for trifles,” etc. In this volume we are told, too, that even the Fue- gians, who in times of scarcity kill and eat their old women for food, are generally affectionate, and until the whites interfered with their social order the old often had considerable authority. They sometimes prepare programs for ceremonials, which are very strictly ob¬ served by a hundred younger men. In some Australian tribes, too, a man’s authority generally increases with age; and this is true, though less frequently, of women. The old enforce the strictest marriage rules and have much influence over the thoughts and feelings of the tribes. The old men often sit in a circle and speak on public matters, one after another, the young men stand¬ ing outside in silence. A few old men may retire to dis¬ cuss secret matters of importance. Offenders are often brought before them for trial and sentence. The old men of a tribe often band themselves together and by working on the superstitions of the tribe secure for themselves not only comfort but unbounded influence. In the famous Duk-Duk ceremonial they alone were in the secret, and all others were impressed with the super¬ natural character of the actors in these rites. Ploss and Bartels 14 amplify the great changes senes¬ cence brings to women. Age not only obliterates race but sex. It often makes the most beautiful into the most ugly, for handsome old women among primitives are unknown. Children dread them. They often become careless of looks, the hand is claw-like, etc. A wide¬ spread German superstition is that if an old woman crosses the path of a hunter he will get nothing. They ” Das Weib in der Natur- und Volkerkunde, Chap. 74.
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