Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 18, 1907.djvu/501

 Reviews. 455

of the Malays, are reaching a stage of decadence ; and there seems little reason to doubt that, as in parts of India and Africa, Mohammedanism will ultimately swamp the aboriginal faiths.

Perhaps the most interesting contribution to our knowledge of these primitive beliefs is the account, which we owe to Vaughan- Stevens, of the method by which the Semang provide the living but unborn child with a soul. This account, though it still awaits corroboration by other observers, is regarded by Mr. Skeat as none the less credible, particularly as the idea of comparing the soul to a bird is world-wide, and is familiar to the Malays. Putting it briefly, the method provides that the expectant mother should visit a tree of the same species as her own birth-tree, and lay an offering of flowers at its root. " Even though the real birth- tree itself may be many miles distant, yet every tree of its species is regarded as identical with it. The bird, in which the child's soul is contained, always inhabits a tree of the species to which the birth-tree belongs ; it flies from one tree (of the species) to another, following the as yet unborn body. The souls of first-born children are always young birds newly hatched, the offspring of the bird which contained the soul of the mother. These birds obtain the souls from Kari" (the thunder god) (II. 4.).

Mr. Skeat deals exhaustively with the beliefs and folk-lore of these races. As might have been expected from the author of Malay Magic, he has paid special attention to the numerous charms and incantations employed in the collection of jungle produce and in the elementary processes of agriculture which they practise. These he has recorded in the original dialects, with neat metrical translations. Among other matters of interest it may be noted that though there are cases found of skin puncturation, what some observers have been accustomed to call "tattooing" is only scarification, or even perhaps nothing more than skin-paint. As regards marriage, the curious rite of circling round a mound or ant-hill deserves further investigation ; and the exchange of wives at the annual harvest carnival of the Besisi, which Mr. Skeat classes with the annual universal wedding- day of the Peruvians, might perhaps be more aptly compared with a similar mimetic charm to promote fertility among some of the Indian Dravidians. In the funeral rites the Semang use