Page:The Folk-Lore Journal Volume 4 1886.djvu/218

 210 THE SCIENCE OF FOLK-LORE.

Nothing much has since been done as to the third of these points, but the first two have been considerably developed. In their first Report, too, the Council began to define the word " Folk-lore," and to talk of the ^' Science " ; but their statement of the work that the Society pro- posed to itself was still mainly confined to the collection of materials. Mr. Lang, however, devoted his preface to the second volume of the Record mostly to the *' Science of Folk-lore," and what was to be expected of it; and the following year saw Mr. Nutt's translation of Sebillot's scheme of classification, and its issue to members in pamphlet form. At the same time Mr. Lang suggested the sys- tematic classification of Proverbs, and a committee was formed for this purpose. The fourth volume was enriched by Mr. Nutt's "Aryan Expulsion and Return Formula," with the valuable chart attached, which led to a very important result in the formation of the Folk- Tale Committee. The fifth and last volume contained the Report of this committee, which included the system of tabulating Folk-tales since found so useful; and the Annual Report of the Council, published at the same time, showed how the Society's work was progressing from the collection of materials to the consideration of the same, it being no longer possible to restrict its work to its original sphere. We now come to the Folk-Lore Journal, and by the time the second volume is reached we find the scientific study of Folk-lore already developed into a branch of anthropological science ; and at p. 285 is Mr. Gomme's note on '* Folk-lore Terminology," which, especially since he followed it up with the wish that it should be settled once for all that Folk-lore is a science, has led to that long subsequent dis- cussion on the Science of Folk-lore, to which the present paper is intended as a contribution. As far as I can make out, the various writers who have joined in it have attempted to define the scope of the new science, and also to develop a scheme for the study of it. It is further clear, from what they have said, that each scheme of study put forth has depended on the definition that preceded it. The result of the friendly controversy which has thus been carried on is in effect this : we have before us several separate definitions of the word "Folk-lore," and several distinct plans for studying it, each of which