FOLK-LORE STUDY IN AMERICA. 



59 l 



the most promising fields of folk-lore exploration in the United 

 States. There has been a strange mingling of races in Louisiana. 

 The result is that relics of the voodoo or obi rites, conjurings, 

 magic, medical superstitions, fables, plantation songs, and religious 

 notions of the negroes linger on side by side with the superstitions, 

 ghost stories, omens, charms, nursery tales, and rhymes brought 

 by the whites from Europe. The quaint dialects of these settlers 

 offer an inviting field of study which should not be overlooked. 



The Louisiana Association has given an impulse to folk-lore 

 study in the State, and it has resulted in the collection of many 

 stories and superstitions current among the Creoles and negroes 

 "before the war." The ladies have contributed many items of 

 traditionary lore. Mrs. Pres- 

 ton Johnston, Mrs. Mason 

 Cooke, Mrs. C. V. Jamison, 

 and Mrs. M. E. Davis have 

 written out stories told to 

 them in childhood by their 

 negro nurses. The folk lore 

 of French Louisiana has 

 been collected by Prof. For- 

 tier during the past twenty 

 years. Some of this valu- 

 able material has appeared 

 in the Folk-lore Journal, and 

 some of it, entitled Bits of 

 Louisiana Folk Lore, was 

 printed in the Transactions 

 of the Modern Language As- 

 sociation for 1887. Thanks 

 to American scholar ship, not 

 to American liberality, the 



Complete WOrk Of Prof. For- Miss ALICE C. FLETCHER. 



tier will be issued shortly, 



as the second of a series of monographs of the American Folk- 

 lore Society.* 



It is with pleasure that we record the establishment of a so- 

 ciety for the study of folk lore in Canada. The formation of the 

 Montreal branch was due largely to the diplomatic efforts of Prof. 

 D. P. Penhallow and Mr. John Reade, who soon had the cordial 

 sympathy and support of many Canadian students, among whom 



* The American Folk-lore Society is about to begin a series of Memoirs. The first of 

 these will consist of a collection of Folk Tales of Angola (Africa) by Mr. Heli Chatelain. 

 The connection of West African folk lore with that of American negroes brings the material 

 within the field covered by the society, and should excite much interest. 



