Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 4, 1893.djvu/355

Rh Horde: a Study of the Rite of Circumcision", by Ludwig Krzywicki; "On the Antiquity of the Folk-lore of the North-American Indians", by Miss K. Stanbery of Zanesville.

On the 15th came "Popular Tradition in France from 1889 to 1893", by M. Paul Sébillot of Paris; "Oral Literature of the French Creoles", by the Marquis Chasseloup de Laubat; "The Taming of the Shrew in Okraine Popular Tradition", by Prof M. Dragomanov; "Certain Modern Egyptian Superstitions coming from Antiquity", by Prof. G. Maspero; "Customs, Superstitions, etc., of the Argentine Ganchos", by M. Paul Groussac of Buenos Ayres; "The Present State of Research into Letto-Lithuanian Mythology", by Mr. E. Wolter of St. Petersburg.

On the last day a paper was read on the "History of the Svastika", by Mr. M. Smigrodzki; "Studies of the Lihguotnes: Songs of St. John's Eve", by Mr. A. Jurjan of Kharkov, with illustrations on the piano.

On the evening of the 14th an excellent concert of folk-music and folk-song was given, in which performers from about twenty different countries took part, including natives of Japan, Hindustan, Ceylon, Turkey, Ecuador, and other less remote places.

It is not easy to judge of the respective merits of a series of papers which one has only heard and not read. This is especially true in the present instance, for it happened unfortunately that the building where the Congress was held lay in very close proximity to the Illinois Central Railway, It therefore fell out that every five minutes, or thereabouts, a most unearthly din of screeching engines, coupled with the cling-clang of their warning bells, made hearing an impossibility. Again, in other instances, the voice of the reader was inadequate, and listening under such circumstances is an uncomfortable task. But certainly the papers by Messrs. Krzywicki, Majevvski, and Jurjan seemed to me more suggestive and interesting than the