7 
ON THE ETHNOGRAPHICAL SURVEY OF THE UNITED KINGDOM. 631 
elements ;’ and the question is, How can these be determined? Asa rule 
it will be found that the radical elements are the most constant parts of 
the whole group of examples, appearing more frequently, possessing 
greater adherence to a common form, changing (when they do change) with 
slighter variations ; while the divergent elements, on the other hand, 
assume many different varieties of form, are by no means of constant 
occurrence, and do not even amongst themselves tend to a common form. 
To these considerations, derived entirely from a study of the analysis, is 
to be added the fact that the radical elements are alone capable of being 
equated with customs or beliefs obtaining among savage or barbaric 
peoples. 
When any given custom or belief, having undergone this double pro- 
cess of analysis of component elements and classification of the individual 
examples, reveals a distinct parallel between its radical elements and the 
elements of a custom or belief occupying a place in the cultus of a barbaric 
or savage people, we may then, and only then, discuss its right to a gene- 
alogy which can be traced back to a prehistoric cultus of the same stage 
of development as that of modern barbarism or savagery. This right will 
depend upon several important conditions. The custom in question must 
in the first place be not a single isolated example of such a possible ge- 
nealogy, but must be found associated with several other customs, each of 
which, being treated in exactly the same manner, has been found to ex- 
hibit exactly the same relationship to the same barbaric or savage cultus 
or religion. In this way classification and analysis go hand in hand as 
the necessary methods of studying survivals. Without analysis we cannot 
properly arrive at a classification of examples ; without classification we 
cannot work out the genealogy of survivals. The argument for detecting 
in modern survivals the last fragments of a once prevailing system basea 
upon this extensive groundwork is of itself a very strong one, and can 
only be upset by one counter argument. This is nothing less than proof 
that no such system ever existed, or could have possibly existed, in the 
country or among the people, where and among which the survivals have 
been discovered. Clearly the burden of such a proof could hardly be sup- 
ported ; for the very fact of the existence of such survivals becomes in 
itself one of the strongest arguments for the existence of the original 
system from which they descended, and of the race or people among 
whom such original system obtained. 
2. Fire Rites and Ceremonies. 
The particular custom which I purpose examining on the principles 
laid down relates to the use of fire. I shall not attempt to draw any 
general conclusions until the work of analysis and classification is 
completed, but shall first of all simply put together the evidence as it 
appears from the notes of the collectors and chroniclers of this group 
of customs. Apart, however, from general conclusions, there are a 
few special characteristics which it wili be well to specify during the 
progress of our work, partly because their significance would not appear 
so usefully if deferred until the work of analysis and classification is 
completed, and partly to avoid what must always be an obstacle to 
researches of this kind—namely, repetition of description. 
The most important example is the well-known custom of burning 
the clavie at Burghead. The fire is made by the youths of the village, 
who must be the sons of the original inhabitants, and every stranger is 
