Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 27, 1916.djvu/40



if Sir James Frazer can furnish us with an example of a primitive king who, when the proper time had come for him to die for the good of his people, found himself unexpectedly reprieved and bidden to reign for a fresh term. Something of the sort has happened in the present case. The ceremonial slaying of the President is an annual, or at most biennial, custom which this Society for its own good must duly perform in normal times. But the times are not normal. Hence it has been ordained that the outworn vessel in which the mana of the Society is stored should continue to fulfil its functions as best it may—fit symbol, I suppose, of a diminished, though, let us hope, merely suspended, vitality on the part of that science which the Society exists to further. As for personal inclination or disinclination to remain in office, I ought perhaps to say nothing about it, since such a consideration is, strictly, not in point at all. A vessel as such has no feelings. Thus the primitive king was expected to keep his private sentiments to himself. Neither need he take up his duties with a nolo episcopari on his lips, nor need he lay them down with a volo immolari. Nevertheless, despite the lack of anthropological precedent, let me thank you heartily for the great honour you have done me in thus affixing a fresh clasp to my presidential medal. Your