Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 27, 1916.djvu/346

 3 1 8 Reviews.

of the people among whom their work Hes." It is a recognition of the truth long contended for by anthropologists, that a people cannot be properly governed by rulers who do not understand them and their history, and therefore are destitute of the sym- pathy that constitutes one of the most efficient instruments of government.

Apart from physical anthropology, in dealing with India the most prominent phenomenon is that of the great number of different castes, each of them forming a society, some smaller, some larger, divided from all the others by a seemingly impass- able barrier, and continually tending to increase. Accordingly a large part of the first volume is dedicated to an introductory essay of nearly two hundred pages, devoted to a general consideration of caste, the relation of the caste to the non-Aryan tribe, and the social and religious usages of various tribes and castes. The tests of caste and the different theories of caste are discussed. In dealing with this subject most of the modern works are cited and the theories of the writers considered, though the important Remarques sur le Regime des Castes, by M. Bougie, which appeared in VA7inee Sociologique, vol. iv. 1901, have been somehow over- looked. The writer shows, and constant examples in the sub- sequent volumes prove, that, caste-iron as the divisions between these various bodies and the prohibitions regulating their inter- course may seem, in reality the appearance is deceptive. There is a slow but restless movement. For some cause or other prohibitions are modified, castes rise or fall in the social scale ; they throw off sub-castes, thus multiplying their number ; they change their names, their customs, their occupations ; they cease to exist ; non-Aryan tribes by conforming to Hinduism are taken into the system as new castes. In short, even in the ancient and steadfast East, society being a living organism must adapt itself to the changing environment. The process has been accelerated by the advent of British rule. The occupations of many castes have been entirely changed. Fighters and plunderers have become peaceful agriculturists. Weavers have ceased to weave and turned to other employments. Numbers of despised castes have attended Government schools, acquired education, become Government servants, and thereby assisted to raise the