4 -' '- 1 



NATURE 



[June 26, 191; 



defined by the authors, means a predominantly 

 "Caucasic " (and dolichocephalic) race modified by 

 Mongol admixture, the latter strain supplying an 

 element which, as the authors remark (ii., 228), 

 has been wrongfully ignored by some writers. The 

 second main stock is the brachycephalic " Malay- 

 an " or " Southern Mongol " element, called 

 " proto-Malays " both by our authors and Dr. 

 Haddon. This element is described (ii., 229) as 

 "a blending of the Mongol stock (or of a part 



The Pagan Tribe 



of the Indonesian race) with darker " proto- 

 Dravidian stock, "of which the Sakai of the 

 Malay Peninsula (and perhaps the Toala of Central 

 Celebes) seem to be the surviving representatives 

 in Malaysia." Thus the chief factors in the popu- 

 lation are due to varying blends of two main 

 stocks, the one Indian, the other Mongolian, these 

 elements agreeing with those that are found, 

 though quite differently blended, on the neighbour- 

 ing mainland of Asia. Yet the negrito element, 

 NO. 2 2;8, VOL. qi] 



which occurs both in the Malay Peninsula and 

 the Philippines, seems now to be in total default 

 in Borneo, and of Melanesians, according to Dr. 

 Haddon, there are also no traces. It should be 

 noted that Dr. Haddon (ii., 313) regards the 

 Punans and Kenyahs as " mainly proto-Malayan 

 in origin," whereas the authors classify them 

 definitely as Indonesians. 



It would take many pages of Nature to do full 

 and adequate justice to all sections of this book. 

 A veritable museum of Bornean ethnology, 

 its cases contain, as in the matter of the 

 Kayan headhunting cult (the stupid Euro- 

 pean exaggerations about which receive 

 satisfactory castigation, i., 76), weird forms 

 of burial, tatu rules, strange forms of 

 spirit-worship and possession, and so forth, 

 many of the most suggestive specimens of 

 modern race-lore. 



We may conclude with an item of 

 personal interest in reference to totemism. 

 In vol. ii. (p. 112 and footnote) Messrs. 

 Hose and McDougall, boldly heterodox, 

 avow and give reasons for their belief in 

 the possibility of deriving the clan totem 

 from that of the individual. Upon this 

 very point Mr. Lang, in 1908, remarked 

 to the present writer : " I am unable to 

 conceive the reason, when everybody has 

 his own ngarong, which he has not hither- 

 to bequested, for a rule that Mary's or 

 Jane's ngarong must for ever belong to 

 her descendants. . . . Given the individual 

 with his rapport, no one has shown how it 

 became hereditary, in the female line, at a 

 time, too, when the man's children (or the 

 woman's) had also their individual 

 rapport." 



The writer of the words just cited silet, 

 alas, aeternumque silebit, but the con- 

 troversy continues, and it should, perhaps, 

 in justice be conceded that the case made 

 out by Messrs. Hose and McDougall is, 

 so far as it goes, a strong one. It would 

 have been interesting if they could have 

 told us of any communities where the 

 children were regularly named after plants 

 or animals, or other natural objects. We 

 must not, however, be led into a discussion 

 on the origin of totemism, which is too 

 large a question to discuss here, and must 

 therefore recommend the authors' views to 

 the attention of the advance guard of 

 totemic experts. 



(2) Mr. P. Amaury Talbot's "In the 

 Shadow of the Bush " gives us an intensely vivid 

 and illuminating picture of the Ekoi, a semi-Bantu 

 people of the south-east corner of Nigeria, a region 

 that recalls the mingled mystery and horror of — 

 Enter these enchanted woods, 



Ye who dare. . . . 

 Thousand eyeballs under hoods 

 Have you by the hair ! 



Here all is blasted by the terrible blight of negro 

 witchcraft. Indeed, the attention will doubtless 



