Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 25, 1914.djvu/434

 402 Reviews.

The bulk of the book is occupied with the Seven Ages, a division which goes back to a poem of Solon. Interesting in itself the discussion also leads one into obscure but fascinating by-paths. As one advances in time the system of the Seven Ages become more elaborate and its associations wider in scope. Astrology comes into the story, and the seven planets are associated with the Seven Ages, a fact of some importance for the history of mediaeval theories medical and moral ; moral, for through the medium of gnostic lore the seven planets provide the Middle Ages with the Seven Deadly Sins.

The scheme given in Ptolemy's Tetrabiblos is discussed, and one is overwhelmed by the waste of ingenuity, learning, and dexterity which v/ent to the making of these ])reposterous systems. The way in which the recognised astronomical order of the planets is preserved, the length of the different ages adjusted to their respective orbits, and the suitable astrological qualities retained for the different periods of life, is a marvel of dexterity. The system has all the beauty of an intricate yet perfectly fitting puzzle.

Finally, when we turn to the melancholy Jacques, we see in detail how strictly Shakespeare conforms to the recognised canon handed on through the Middle Ages and doubtless familiar in the popular literature of his day.

The book concludes with an appendix on the Hippokratean -epi e(38o[xd8wv which Roscher thought to be the earliest fragment of Ionian philosophy. Boll makes out a strong case for believing it to be very much later, and in character to be a work not crudely in advance of, but crudely behind the best knowledge of its time.

W. R. Halliday.

Die Verlobung im Volks- und Rechtsbrauch, mit besonderer Beriicksichtigung der Schweiz vergleichend-historisch dar- gestellt. Von Hanns Bachtold. Basel: Verlag der Schweiz. Gesellschaft fiir Volkskunde, 1913. 8vo, pp. 219.

This doctorate dissertation is a good and careful piece of work. It is designed to form one chapter out of twenty-five of a book