PREFATORY NOTE. 



THE range of this Handbook is so extensive, that it is 

 obviously impossible to accomplish more than a very 

 superficial review of its subjects in the compass of a 

 hundred pages. For it touches on Primitive Zoolatry 

 (glancing at Totemism and Sacred Fish-myths), Zoological 

 Mythology, Legendary Art, the Folk-tale of all nations, 

 Fables, the Sciences of Heraldry and Astronomy, Poetry 

 from Chaucer to Wordsworth and Modern Folk-lore. 

 Moreover, following the liberal " fish-idea " of the Exhi- 

 bition, it has been necessary to wander from the cetaceans 

 on the one hand through fishes proper to the Crustacea and 

 molluscs on the other. So that not only in Unnatural, but 

 in Natural History also, the range of this Handbook is of 

 necessity very wide. I have contented myself, therefore, 

 with bringing a few leading thoughts into prominence 

 antiquity of the Religious Fish-myth, its dignity, its im- 

 portance in Totemism, the benign aspect of Fish in the 

 Folk-tale, the persistence of ancient fancies in modern 

 superstitions. 



Such subjects are not, I take it, to be treated with a 

 uniform gravity ; at the same time their intrinsic import- 

 ance should never be lost sight of. 



It is in this humour that I have written, and fully 

 conscious that the magnitude of the matters of which I 

 have to treat Animism in some of its widest and latest 

 aspects makes it impossible, in so limited a space, to say 

 all that I should, would, or could. 



I would, therefore, anticipate my critics, by saying, that 

 the value of this Handbook will probably be found in what 

 it omits rather than in what it contains. It has in it the 

 suggestions for a very desirable and entertaining volume. 



PHIL ROBINSON. 



