At this point he takes leave of the peoples he would class as "savage," their leading characteristic from the economic point of view being that they lead the more or less wandering life of hunters or of mere "gatherers." He then goes on to arrange similarly, in an ascending series of three divisions, the peoples that he terms "barbarian." Economically they are either sedentary, with a more or less developed agriculture, or, if nomad, pursue the pastoral mode of life.

His lowest type of group, which includes the Iroquois, Maoris, and so forth, ranges from one thousand to five thousand; next come loosely organized states, such as Dahomey or Ashanti, where the numbers may reach one hundred thousand; whilst he makes barbarism culminate in more firmly compacted communities, such as are to be found, for example, in Abyssinia or Madagascar, the population of which he places at about half a million.
Now I am very sceptical about Mr.Sutherland's statistics, and regard his bold attempt to assign the world's peoples each to their own rung on the ladder of universal culture as, in the present state of our knowledge, no more than a clever hypothesis; which some keen anthropologist of the future might find it well worth his while to put thoroughly to the test.

At a guess, however, I am disposed to accept his general principle that, on the whole and in the long run, during the earlier stages of human evolution, the complexity and coherence of the social order follow upon the size of the group; which, since its size, in turn, follows upon the mode of the economic life, may be described as the food-group.
Besides food, however, there is a second elemental condition which vitally affects the human race; and that is sex.

Social organization thus comes to have a twofold aspect.

On the one hand, and perhaps primarily, it is an organization of the food-quest.