Aside from these potent incentives to self-discipline and energy there is the delight in the contest itself. This presents in its most concentrated form the pleasure of games to which we have previously referred (p. 129). Many of the most popular amusements are imitations of the great game of war, but all fall short of the keen intensity of the reality.
" 'Twere worth ten years of peaceful life, One hour of such a day." This applies more forcibly to the contests of primitive races, which were carried on man against man, than to those of our own clay, where hand-to hand conflict is rare.
The Influence influence of war in developing the inven tion of weapons and the construction of defensive edifices has already been mentioned. The nation at large, as well as the individual, feels its bene ficial effect. Nothing so much consolidates a community as the menace of a common foe. The earliest tribes and confederacies had no other origin. • The ambition of the conqueror, which leads him to gather war riors from all directions, brings together in a mutual bond diverse nations and races, and lays the foundation for peaceful intercourse in after ages. And although the track of such a conqueror may be one of blood and fire, he brings about that intermingling of nationalities which is essential to the intellectual growth of the race. In a remarkable passage in his Kosmos, Alexander von Humboldt has traced the advantages to learning derived from the Asiatic campaigns of Alexander of Macedon ; and in a less degree all conquerors before and since have contributed in a similar manner to the progress of ideas.
Origin of Castes.—The social distinction of castes is nearly always an outgrowth of war. The conquered nation were either reduced to a condi tion of serfdom or slavery, while the conquerors remained among them as masters. Hence the difference of castes is usually ethnologic as well as political. Such a relationship was, in England, established between the Danes and Britons, and later between the Normans and Saxons ; but nowhere was the line more sharply drawn than in India, where the white Indo-Aryans conquered the brown Dravidian tribes, and in order to pre serve purity of blood established barriers which have lasted four thousand years or more. Its origin is distinctly conveyed in the native name for
caste, varna, the color of the skin.
Caste or rank within a nation has also its usual origin in distinction gained in war. Nothing else is so immediately recognized as a well founded claim to superiority. Even very rude tribes acknowledge degrees of rank. The Polynesians were always found to be divided into nobles and commons, and many minute distinctions were in vogue. On the Oregon coast the nobles were entitled to an artificially flattened shape of the skull, which was sedulously cultivated. In Peru the higher class per forated and stretched their ears to an inordinate length, whence they were called Orejones by the Spaniards. Among the Abipones of South America the missionaries found as much pride of blood as they had left behind them in Europe. Poor and wrinkled old women would boast of their " line of long descent " with all the haughtiness of a Lady Clara Vere de Vere, and insist that they should be addressed in a form of the language where suffixes are added to the words to indicate respect (Dobriz hoffer). Such a dialectic variation employed in speaking to those of higher rank has also been observed in Nahuatl, Choctaw, and other American idioms. It illustrates how deeply the regard for rank is implanted among those who, we are too apt to imagine, live on a com mon plane of barbaric equality.
Defensive Institutions.—Living in the constant anticipation of warfare, the necessity for providing against it has always modified the forms of human society. In some nations, as the Japanese, one of the castes looked forward to no other occupation than fighting, while the others expected to devote themselves to peaceful pursuits except in emergencies. Wherever there are large standing armies this must be the case to a great degree. In a condition of society where a state of war is more frequent than one of peace this has its advantages ; but where the reverse is the case, as in modern Europe, the diversion of a large share of the best intelligence of the nation into the army detracts heavily from the general efficiency of the people.