Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 21, 1910.djvu/294

 258 Reviews,

primitive methods, this shows a point of view at which it is hard to arrive. . . . Theoretically, also, it is an obvious absurdity to speak of raising the natives, and at the same time deprive them of the best means of education, namely self-government" (pp. 220-221).

A. Werner.

VoLKSKUNDLiCHES Aus ToGO. Marchen und Fabeln, Sprich- worter und Ratsel, Lieder und Spiele, Sagen und Tauschung- spiele der Ewe-Neger von Togo. Gesammelt von Josef ScHONHARL. Leipzig: Kochs, 1909. 8vo, pp. x + 204.

Folk Stories from Southern Nigeria West Africa. By Elphinstone Dayrkll. With an Introduction by Andrew Lang. Longmans, Green, & Co., 1910. 8vo, pp. xvi-l- 159. Frontispiece.

Herr Schonharl's book is an important addition to the scanty records of the folklore of the Ewe-speaking peoples. It com- prises 28 tales from Togoland, half a dozen from Dahomey, 200 proverbs, — (Ellis gives only 120), — 176 riddles and parables, 119 trinknamefi, 11 games, 3 sleight-of-hand tricks with maize grains, and 25 songs (with the music of 20). Beast fables, com- bining keen observation of animals' ways with a full disclosure of native ways, are the most popular of West African tales, and there are numerous specimens here, as well as tales of origins, — how death came (28), why women have breasts (15), why foxes chase hens (23), why a mosquito buzzes in one's ear at night (25), etc. The trick played by the hare in the fourth tale, (in which the crocodile suckles the same young one four times in suc- cession, mistaking it for the three other children already slain and eaten), and the similar trick played on the leopard by the wicked twins in the thirteenth story, are the same as that played on the leopard by the jackal in a Hottentot story,^ and there are numerous other resemblances to Bantu as well as Negro tales. In Togoland, as elsewhere amongst the Ewe, the spider {Eyevi) is the superior of all animals, as the possessor of the inventive

^Vaughan, Old HendriKs Tales, p. 11 7-