AUGUST 14, 1902 | 
NATURE 
381 
Man,” but it is not yet possible to map the distribution of most 
of the toys and games, to trace their origin, or to indicate the 
meaning that in many cases was primitively attached to their 
exercise. 
Thanks to the investigations of Messrs. A. MacFarland Davis, 
F. Cushing, Stewart Culin, G. A. Dorsey and others, we have 
some indication concerning the variations, distribution and 
significance of the principal games of the North American 
Indians. Some hundred or so of these games are known, which 
can, however, be reduced to six main groups. These are 
derived from the employment of the shield and spear, marked 
arrows, shields on which were painted the four world quarters, 
and balls. Some of these games may have been originally 
merely games of skill, others were divinatory, while others, 
again, were doubtless magical. 
In that vague region known as the Far East, the fragmentary 
evidence points to similar conclusions as the researches, amongst 
others, of Messrs. Stewart Culin, G. von Schlegel, R. Andree 
and E. B. Tylor. The same, too, appears to hold good for 
Oceania. 
These general remarks will show how important it is that 
further evidence should be collected, and will indicate the 
welcome that will be given to the last of Dr. Walter E. Roth’s 
studies in the ethnography of North Queensland. The follow- 
ing is Dr. Roth’s classification of games, sports and amuse- 
ments :—(1) Imaginative games, suchas tales, of which nine are 
given. (2) Realistic games, playing with pets, playing with 
plants, making smoke spirals, bathing, &c. (3) Imitative 
games, objects and phenomena of nature imitated by attitudes, 
movements and paintings; the author figures seventy-four 
FEV. 
= A 
vival 
== 
examples of those ingenious string figures in which so many 
primitive peoples excel. Very few illustrations of ‘‘cat’s 
cradles” have ever been published, so that we cannot at 
present say how far particular devices are common to different 
peoples. One at all events (Plate v., Fig. 6), which represents 
NO. I71II, VOL. 66] 
a duck flying (Fig. 1), is similar to a string figure in Torres 
Straits which is called ‘ throwing the fish spear,” but this is a 
very simple figure to make. In this category are placed all 
those games in which children imitate their elders. Several 
round games are described in which ‘‘collecting honey,” 
Fic. 2. 
“*catching cockatoos’’ and similar operations are represented ; 
| one of them, ‘‘ playing bean tree” (ig. 2), resembles a game 
I have described as played by Papuan children (‘* Head- 
Hunters, Black, White and Brown,” 1901, chap. xv.). There 
are other analogies between the games of the aborigines of 
North Queensland and those of the Papuans. (4) Discrimina- 
live ganies, hide and seek and a guessing game. (5) Disputa- 
tive games, wrestling, tug-of-war. (6) Propulsive games, ball 
games, tops, stick-throwing games, &c. ; amongst the latter are 
certain methods of casting petioles of grass blades similar in 
principle to what is done by certain Papuan children, Of 
special interest is the hurling of a toy spear by means of a 
knotted string ; a similar device was used by the men of the 
Southern New Hebrides, New Caledonia and the Loyalty 
Islands, and the present writer has recorded it as a child’s 
| plaything at Delena, Hall Sound, British New Guinea, and. 
now it has turned up amongst the coastal blacks of North 
Queensland. (7) Exultative games, songs, dances, music. 
This little memoir, which is illustrated by thirty-nine plates, 
is full of valuable information, as it opens up a new field to the 
student. INA (Cy lel 
ONIVERSITY AND EDUCATIONAL 
INTELLIGENCE. 
Sir GEORGE G. SToKEs, Bart., F.R.S., senior fellow and ' 
president of Pembroke College, Cambridge, has been elected, 
master of the College, in succession to the late Dr. Searle. 
Dr. W. PALMER WYNNE, F.R.S.., assistant professor of chemiss 
try in the Royal College of Science, South Kensington, has been 
appointed to the chair of chemistry in the School of Pharmacy 
of the Pharmaceutical Society of Great Britain in succession to 
Dr. J. Norman Collie, F.R.S., who was recently appointed to 
the chair of organic chemistry in University College, London. 
THE council of University College, Liverpool, has unanie 
| mously agreed to invite Dr. Benjamin Moore to accept the chair 
of biochemistry recently founded in University College by Mr. 
William Johnston. Dr. Moore is now lecturer on physiology in 
the Charing Cross Medical School, and has made himself widely 
known among men of science as a successful teacher and an 
original investigator. 
Mr. J. Quick has been appointed principal of the Technical 
Institute, Limerick. 
AFTER a discussion extending over several sittings, the 
seventh clause of the Education Bill has passed Committee of 
the House of Commons inanamended form. The clause refers 
to the management of elementary schools, and it raised the 
