7 2 



NATURE 



[July 20, 191 1 



the "husband's" absence ("Native Tribes of Central 

 Australia," p. 63). 



No one denies that the earliest marital relations 

 were in a fluid state, or that even with individual 

 marriage the husband may have had to fight for the 

 continued possession of the wife. Of the two ex- 

 tremes of animal analogies, the baboon and the gorilla 

 type, Lord Avebury favours the former. In the evolu- 

 tion of social organisation it is quite probable that, 

 given the latter type as the normal, the pendulum 

 might at times swing to the former. In the ages 

 before custom a tendency to individual marriage 

 would have to struggle for existence, just as the 

 tendency to individual property had to struggle. 

 Customs like " avoidance " seem to be expressions 

 of a fear of "trespass." The rise of the idea of 

 fatherhood is closelv connected with the property- 

 instinct, and the evolution of marriage, generally, 

 will receive its most probable demonstration when 

 adequate account is taken of the psychological and 

 historical relations between the ideas of ownership 

 and marital possession. 



The book suffers from the lack of an index. There 

 are some misprints, e.g. M'Lennan for McLennan, 

 Ling Roth for W. E. Roth, Reinack for Reinach. 



(2) The second part of "The Golden Bough" is an 

 enlargement of the original chapter on "Taboo and 

 the Perils of the Soul." It fulfils the promise of the 

 first part in the way of multiplication combined with 

 continuity. In view of the fact that the two chief 

 subjects of the volume bring us so very near to the 

 origins of spiritual religion on one hand, and of the 

 immense, complex, and changing body of human 

 morality and law on the other, one regrets that neither 

 subject is treated as a whole. Prof. Frazer points 

 out that such a treatise would far exceed the limits 

 he has prescribed for himself in "The Golden Bough." 

 Nor can we fairly ask him for more than is necessary 

 to place in the clearest lisfht the central figure, the 

 supreme subject, of the book, the idea of the god-man. 

 When first propounded, twenty-one years ago, this 

 idea, as a world-force, savoured of the improbable, 

 but to-day we know it as an axiomatic principle of 

 social evolution. The idea of a man who is "a pledge 

 and guarantee of the continuance and orderly succes- 

 sion of those physical phenomena upon which mankind 

 depends for subsistence " is, in its many forms, one 

 of the most powerful factors in human history. It 

 is a mistake to confine its operation to royal prie=.is 

 and divine kings ; it is embodied in all who are vicars 

 of nature, aristocrats of science and of commerce, 

 no less than aristocrats of politics and religion. At 

 one end we have the savage medicine-man, in his way 

 a depositarv of knowledge and a controller of sup- 

 plies; at the other we have the inventor and the 

 capitalist. But its most spectacular form is in religion, 

 and of all great national religions, with few excep- 

 tions, it is the living nucleus. To have proved this 

 so convincingly is the chief social service of "I In- 

 Golden Bough." 



Among new sidelights are the study of confession, 



showing the remarkable sensitiveness of the individual 



brain to tin social judgment ; the Eskimo theory 



i.ii»" (thai brilliant discover) of Dr. F. Boas), a 



NO. 2177, VOL. 87] 



really fascinating chapter in human ethical thought, 

 which we will not spoil bv a pricis. 



In his preface and conclusion the author has some 

 suggestive observations on the continuity of human 

 nature and the fluidity of moral ideas. 



" When all is said and done, our resemblances to 

 the savage are still far more numerous than our 

 differences from him ; and what we have in common 

 with him and deliberately retain as true and useful 

 we owe to our savage forefathers, who slowly acquired 

 by experience and transmitted to us by inheritance 

 those seemingly fundamental ideas which we are apt 

 to regard as original and intuitive." 



" The old view that the principles of right and 

 wrong are immutable and eternal is no longer 

 tenable." The ethical theory and the moral practice 

 of an enlightened future will owe much to the pages 

 of "The Golden Bough," veritable leaves of a tree of 

 knowledge. A. E. Crawley. 



CAMBRIDGESHIRE AND THE ISLE. 

 Highways and Byivays in Cambridge and Ely. By 

 the Rev. E. Conybeare. Illustrated. Pp. xviii + 

 439. (London : Macmillan and Co., Ltd., 1910.) 

 Price 6s. 



THE Rev. Edward Conybeare has written a fas- 

 cinating book about Cambridge and the Isle of 

 Ely. He has taken as his theme a county and an 

 isle the natural features of which to many seem dull, 

 flat and unprofitable. Yet all England is beautiful 

 and all England is interesting, and owing to the skill 

 of his pen and to his wide knowledge, Mr. Conybeare 

 has succeeded in telling us something interesting even 

 of the meanest of Cambridge country villages. The 

 fascination of the fens to those who like far-off hori- 

 zons and gorgeous sunsets does not escape him. 



To any member of the University of Cambridge 

 Mr. Conybeare on his bicycle is as familiar a figure 

 as the White Knight. It is on this bicycle that he has 

 visited and inspected innumerable churches, remote 

 villages, out of the way farmhouses, ruins, and anti- 

 quities. He has a most intimate acquaintance with 

 the roads, lanes, and bypaths of this part of East 

 Anglia, and his book adds a new joy to life to those 

 inhabitants of these districts who are interested in 

 the history of their forefathers. 



Mr. Conybeare deals fully with the early history 

 of the country, the Devil's Dyke, Fleam Dyke, tumuli 

 and other prehistoric works, but he is equally at home 

 with what, in comparison with these mounds, is 

 modern history, and as this appeals rather more imme- 

 diatelv to us, we venture to give as an example of 

 his style two quotations, one of which is to the in- 

 famous Dowsing : — 



"In 1863, Hardwick Church, which is so conspicu- 

 ous an object from the roof of King's College Chapel, 

 was purified by Dowsing, who notes with disgust that 

 for dealing with ' ten superstitious pictures and a 

 cross ' he was here paid only 3s. 2d. instead of the 

 6s. Sd., which was his regular fee. The great icono- 

 clast had the same grievance in the adjoining village 

 of Toft, where he got 'only 65. 8d.' for a specially 

 heavy ' purification ' of the church, involving the de- 

 struction of ' twenty-seven superstitious pictures in 

 the windows, ten others in stone, three inscriptions, 



