292 



The Review of Reviews. 



THE WORLD'S FASTEST RUNNERS. 



In Badminton for March Mr. G. C. Terry gives a 

 most interesting account of the Tarahumare Indians, 

 the champion runners of Mexico. Some 15,000 of these 

 Indians dwell in the Sierre Madre Range. They are 

 the sole remaining cave-dwellers in North America.- 

 They are pagans. They live on beans and corn, and 

 when these give out, on rats and snakes. They excel 

 in the running of races — not the sprint of the white 

 man, but of a kind that no white man could or would 

 endure. As couriers probably no other runners on 

 earth can compare with them. They are employed 

 as couriers by the Mexican Government and by mining 

 concerns of Chihuahua and Sonora. They average 

 frequently 170 miles a day. One specially quick 

 messenger covered a distance of 600 miles in five days. 

 The runner had no luggage, but simply carried his 

 white wool blanket and a package of ground corUj 

 " pimole " :— 



When short of amnmnition (they use only the bow 

 and arrows) these Indians will run down a deer, there 

 being great numbers of these animals in the Sierras. Half-a- 

 dozen men will take part in the chase ; they head oft" the 

 animal, talcing up the pursuit in relays, until finally the poor 

 beast, running in ever narrowing circles, drops from pure 

 exhaustion. They also chase and capture the wild turkey in 

 the same manner. The runners undergo a sort of training 

 before the races come oft' ; that is they eat no fat, no potatoes, 

 eggs, or anything sweet. Neither must they touch "tesvino," 

 their own native intoxicating drink. Their food consists of 

 meat and pimole. A " shaman " (chief or medicine-man) has 

 also put them through a sort of primitive rubbing-down and 

 massage ; and the night before the race all runners are " cured." 

 The said curing consists of semi-religious ceremonies, led by the 

 shaman, and all the men sleep within sight of their tribal tokens 

 or gods. 



THE LABADISTS. 



An interesting article in the Anliqiuvy of January 

 and February is that by Mr. J. F. Scheltema, on Anna 

 Maria van Schuurman. and her relations with the sect 

 of dissenters in Holland called Labadists. A pioneer 

 of the mo\ement in vindication of the rights of her 

 sex, Anna Maria van Schuurman maintained that 

 women ought to be allowed to culti\ate the arts and 

 sciences on the same footing as men. Herself a prodigy 

 in every branch of science and art, she was the wonder 

 of her age. When Jean de Labadic left the Reformed 

 Church, and founded a " kerk " of his own, orthodox 

 hate made it impossible for him to tend his flock. 

 Anna Maria van Schuurman stepped forward to the 

 rescue, and e\entually the Labadists were enabled to 

 settle at \Meuwerd in Friesland. Here they lived the 

 simple life. All that tended to foster a taste for finery 

 was forbidden, and those who had been accustomed to 

 comfort and refinement were given the most menial 

 tasks to perform. Anna Maria van Schuurman 

 (died 1678) seems to have made many converts to the 

 new faith, but to-day, alas ! there is practically nothing 

 visible left of the Labadists at Wieuwerd. 



FOUR NATION-MAKERS. 



Mr. G. M. Trevelvan reviews M. Thayer's " Life of 

 Cavour " in the Atlantic Monthly for February. Mr, 

 Trevelyan sa)s : — 



Germany is a greater country than Italy, but Cavour was 

 greater than Bismarck, .ilin'ist in proportion to the inferiority of 

 the material with which la- liad to work. Wliereas Italy suffers 

 to-day just in so far as she has failed to understand or refused to 

 imitate the spirit of Cavour's statesmanship, Germany's ills 

 derive from too close an imitation of the great man who made 

 her, — his tarifi's, his junkerism, his dislike of the power of 

 I'arliament, and his belii-f in the army as the proper factor tn 

 dominate in national life. Bismarck used a maximum and 

 Cavour a minimum of tbrcc. Cavour thought force bad in 

 itself, and Bismarck thoui^hl it good in itself. 



Not with Bismarck, therefore, must Cavour rank. 

 He has his place in a trio of a higher order : — 



As a nation-maker, therefore, Cavour stands with Vi'illiam 

 the Silent and George Washington. Each of these men fought 

 tlirough the agony of a war of liberation, yet never yielded for 

 a moment to the militarist or despotic ideals so liable to be bred 

 in time of crisis ; each loved free institutions with his whole 

 heart ; each could have said (as one of them did say), " I was 

 always on the side of the people " ; yet each avoided the special 

 faults of the demagogue as completely as Wellington or Peel ; 

 each planted justice and mercy amid the chaos of wrath and 

 revolution ; each kept an heroic equanimity of temper toward 

 all their supporters, even toward the foolish and the false who 

 bade fair to ruin their work ; finally,, each died leaving as his 

 handiwork a nation whose every merit is symbolised in the life 

 of the man who made it, w liose every defect is due to the tradi- 

 tion which he started being too lofty for imitation. 



THE SIX INSTINCTS. 



" Education Dramatised " is the title of a sugges- 

 ti^■e paper by Harriet Finlay-Johnson in the Atlantic 

 Monthly for Februarv-. She says : — 



No less an authority than Mr. E. G. A. Holmes, late Chief 

 Inspector of Elementary Schools in England, has tabulated 

 these instincts in his recent book on Education. They are — 



1. The Conimunicative instinct — to talk and listen. 



2. The Dramatic instinct — to act, to make believe. 



3. The Artistic instinct — to draw, paint, and model. 



4. The Musical instinct — to sing and dance. 



5. The Inquisitive instinct — to know the why of things. 



6. The Constructive instinct — to make and invent things. 



THE DRAMATIC INSTINCT. 



The writer goes on to insist : — 



If we neglect any one channel of expression we are not 

 developing the whole man. If Nature implanted certain 

 instincts it is not ours to discriminate which, if any, we shall 

 neglect and help to stunt and kill. Children are born actors. 

 They are constantly impersonating, or making their dolls 

 imper.sonate, other people. They play at "mothers and 

 faihers " ; or, with dolls for scholars, they play at being 

 "teacher." Some people might say this is merely mimicry; 

 but if one listens to the plays one finds originality rather than 

 mimicry. .\II who are interested in the education of children 

 know how successful is the kindergarten game among little 

 ones in presenting to their senses and understanding things 

 which it would be otherwise impossible to teach them. In the 

 play for older scholars we visualise facts in a similar way, 

 extending and profiting by our experience with younger 

 scholars. _^__^__^^^^^_^ 



In the March Royal the bursting of the Bradfield 

 Reservoir at Sheftield is described to Walter Wood by 

 a surviving spectator, Mr. Jo'in Gilley, then clerk to 

 the Chief Constable of Shefl.eld. 



