270 



THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



any great man in the past wrote, what in- 

 fluences controlled and directed him, was 

 mere presumptuous extravagance. We are 

 also told that literature is made up of 

 beauty, and is only to be enjoyed ; students 

 of its principles are carefully warned off 

 from its treasures. Yet one might as well 

 tell a botanist that flowers are only to be 

 enjoyed, or a mineralogist that gems exist 

 but for the purpose of evoking admiration ; 

 the sciences of these imaginary men would 

 survive such impossible advice, and the ex- 

 istence of these sciences, it may be well to 

 notice, has not yet tended to diminish the 

 interest or delight in the objects with which 

 they are concerned. 



If, then, the reasonableness of some form 

 of the scientific study of literature may be 

 acknowledged, this book, which contains a 

 serious application of the results of socio- 

 logical investigation to various early litera- 

 tures, is well worthy of attention. The con- 

 ditions of early society have been ascertained 

 by long and careful investigation ; the com- 

 parative study of its beginnings has been 

 facilitated by observing phenomena still 

 existent among rude races, and in this vol- 

 ume Mr. Posnett applies to letters the up- 

 shot of these studies. Naturally, it is to the 

 literature of Greece that he turns with es- 

 pecial interest, for, besides its importance 

 to all later civilizations, it bears distinctly 

 the marks of autochthonous growth. Inas- 

 much as society developed from the com- 

 munal form of the clan into the fuller ex- 

 pression of individuality, it becomes im- 

 portant to examine the growth of literature 

 by the light of these discoveries, as this au- 

 thor has done, and the result is most grati- 

 fying. It is obvious that any one who ap- 

 proaches Greek territory with such inten- 

 tions is sure to stir up a hornets' nest. 

 Anything that tends to show that the sacred 

 spirit of Hellas has grown up under con- 

 ditions that may be explained by studying 

 other races is held to lay profane fingers 

 on a carefully guarded art. Mr. Andrew 

 Lang has tasted some of the wrath of zealous 

 scholars who have not fancied his proof that 

 the stone age of Greece was like the stone 

 age of every other race ; and it is hard to 

 conceive the miserable fate that awaits Mr. 

 Posnett for daring to compare the early 

 Doric choral dances to the buffalo-dance of 



the North American Indians. Yet he has 

 done this ; and, moreover, he has shown 

 how the customary belief of clans in in- 

 herited guilt and in vicarious sacrifice sur- 

 vived in the plays of ^Eschylus and Sopho- 

 cles, only to disappear in those of Euripi- 

 des with the growth of individuality. His 

 proof of the limitations of the Greek ideas 

 through these bonds is most valuable. Here 

 at last we have something like solid ground 

 to take the place of a priori hypothesis. 

 To enforce his points he has brought togeth- 

 er abundant testimony from the early He- 

 brew, Sanskrit, Persian, Chinese, Japanese, 

 Arabic, and other literatures, which is the 

 only way in which this vast subject can be 

 properly studied. The study of Greek liter- 

 ature alone has led to extravagant notions 

 of the miraculous force of genius ; by ex- 

 amining all the testimony, though the task 

 is an arduous one, sounder ideas will prevail. 

 Space is lacking for even a statement of 

 all that is contained in this excellent book, 

 but it may be said that every student of 

 literature will find his reward in mastering 

 its pages. No one will agree with every- 

 thing that Mr. Posnett says, but whoever 

 learns to apply to the foundation of litera- 

 ture the light obtained from the study of 

 contemporary society may be sure that he 

 is on the right path. That is the whole 

 secret: to study literature as but a part 

 of man's development, not as a separate, 

 divinely inspired entity a mysterious thing 

 created by incomprehensible genius. 



Hunting Trips of a Ranchman. By Theo- 

 dore Roosevelt. New York: G. P. 

 Putnam's Sons. Pp. 347. Price, $3.50. 



The character of this book is further 

 described by its sub-title, " Sketches of Sport 

 on the Northern Cattle-Plains " ; and this 

 makes it appropriate to begin the story 

 with a description of those plains and their 

 for the time at least great industry. 

 They lie in the basin of the Little Missouri 

 River, and " stretch from the rich wheat- 

 farms of Central Dakota to the Rocky Mount- 

 ains, and southward to the Black Hills and 

 the Big Horn Chain, thus including all of 

 Montana, Northern Wyoming, and extreme 

 Western Dakota." The region is a nearly 

 treeless one, of light rainfall, cut up by 

 streams of the most capricious character, 

 diversified with deserts of alkali and sage- 



