144 IMAGES AND NAMES. 



the notion comes out with great clearness^ ttat tte mere speak- 

 ing of a name acts upon its owner, whether that owner be man, 

 beast, or spirit, whether near or far ofi". Sometimes it may be 

 explained by considering supernatural creatures as having the 

 power of hearing their names wherever they are uttered, and as 

 sometimes coming to trouble the living when they are thus dis-" 

 turbed. Where this is an accepted belief, such sayings as 

 " Talk of the Devil and you see his horns,^' " Parlez du Loup," 

 etc., have a far more serious meaning than they bear to us now. 

 Thus an aged Indian of Lake Michigan explained why the 

 native wonder-tales must only be told in the winter, for then 

 the deep ,snow lies on the ground, and the thick ice covers up 

 the waters, and so the spirits that dwell there cannot hear the 

 laughter of the crowd listening to their stories round the fire in 

 the winter lodge. But in spring the spirit-world is all alive, 

 and the hunter never alludes to the spirits but in a sedate, 

 reverent way, careful lest the slightest word should give of- 

 fence.^ In other cases, however, the effect of the utterance of 

 the name on the name's owner would seem to be different from 

 this. The explanation does not hold in the case of a man re- 

 fusing to speak his own name, nor would he be likely to think 

 that his mother-in-law could hear whenever he mentioned hers. 



Some of these prohibitions of names have caused a very 

 curious phenomenon in language. WTien the prohibited name 

 is a word in use, and often when it is only something' like such 

 a word, that word has to be dropped and a new one found to 

 take its place. Several languages are known to have been 

 specially affected by this proceeding-, and it is to be remarked 

 that in them the causes of prohibition have been different. In 

 the South Sea Islands, words have been tabued, from connexion 

 with the names of chiefs ; in Australia, Yan Diemen's Land, 

 and among the Abipones of South America, from connexion 

 with the names of the dead ; wliile in South Africa, the avoid- 

 ance of the names of certain relatives by marriage has led to a 

 result in some degree similar. 



Captain Cook noticed in Tahiti that when a chief came to the 

 royal dignity, any words resembling his name were changed. 

 1 Schoolcraft, part iii. pp. 314, 492. 



