Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 24, 1913.djvu/165

 Revieivs. 1 49

State may be congratulated on the publication of this useful Ethnographical Survey. Materials have been collected for a third volume, which will include anthropometrical statistics. It may be hoped that nothing will prevent the completion of this praise- worthy undertaking.

W. Crook E.

Thk LusHEi KuKi Clans. Uy Lt.-Col. J. Shakespean. Macmillan and Co., 191 2. 8vo, pp. 235. Map + 4 col. pi. + 19 ill. 10s. ;/.

Out of the fulness of an intimate knowledge comes tliis book. Colonel Shakespear went to the Lushei Hills in 1888, and has served there or thereabouts ever since. Of the use to which he has put his unrivalled opportunities for gathering accurate first- hand information concerning the Lusheis proper and their dependent clans and the Old Kuki and other Kuki clans, this volume packed full of interesting facts gives eloquent testimony. He gives us matter to weigh and ponder at every page. Why do Lusheis practise teknonymy? We have the Lushei explana- tion, and when we learn that the Lusheis are an " extremely superstitious race " we may be sure that their explanations are worth attention. Like so many of the tribes in their neighbour- hood, they believe that there is a divine Supreme Being who recks not now of mankind. Direct dealings with men are for a lesser deity, but men are chiefly concerned with the propitiation of the Huai, evil spirits of hill and dale, of river and jungle. Add to this a complicated psychology which recognizes a dual soul, one half of which is in incessant struggle with the other, and you will see that Lusheis are necessarily unreliable, a fact which a Poli- tical Officer soon has forced on his notice. Of chapter iv., with its full and careful account of Lushei religion, I can only say that it is a fit prelude to chapter v., in which we have not only folk-tales in ample number, but a most interesting analysis of Lushei beliefs regarding superstitions and magic. It begins with the " Thimzing " time when the auk swallowed the sun so effectually that "a general transformation took place, men being