Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 29, 1918.djvu/25

 PRESIDENTIAL ADDRESS.

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chair that I am about to vacate has been occupied by me for a round five years; and, though Roman precedent would justify the omission of the lustral ceremony at the end of such a period did the circumstances seem untoward, there is happily no reason as things are why a purificatory sacrifice should not now be accomplished in my person. My successor. Dr. Haddon, with his catholic experience of anthropological work in the field, the study, and the lecture-room—not to speak of his long connexion with this Society—may be trusted to reinvigorate our fellowship of keen workers as "iron sharpeneth iron." It is my privilege to be the first to congratulate the Society on having acquired a President so full of mana.

During the greater part of the time covered by my term of office a world-war has raged; nor is the end yet in sight. If, however, much else remain obscure, this at least grows plainer every day, that the war is a war of ideals—that no mere redistribution of territory and of political influence is involved in its issue, but a reconstruction of civilized society, according to one or another of certain conflicting doctrines of human nature and destiny.

Now as students of folklore we are not concerned with problems of social reconstruction. Our business is to cultivate a particular corner of the field of science, and raise a goodly crop of truths; whereas it is for the