Perhaps the nearest European analogue of this interesting Cinderella story is "One-Eye, Two-Eyes and Three-Eyes" (Grimm, ii. Household Tales, 169), No. 236 of Miss Cox's collection. In that case the heroine is nourished by a goat, and when the goat is killed she buries its entrails, which spring up into a tree with silver leaves and golden fruit. In the Macassar tale it is the fish's bones that are buried. This is in accordance with a wide-spread custom in the lower culture. The bones and other remains of food are not indeed everywhere buried, but they are usually treated with special care. Professor Frazer in the second volume of The Golden Bough has collected a large number of examples. The custom is also well represented in folk-tales other than those of the Cinderella cycle. Bones are, perhaps, more usually than other offal, the subject of ceremonious care. It is often explicitly believed that when this is done the creature will be restored to life, to become food again on a future day, or, at least, that if they be not treated properly the animals of the species will take offence, and the supply of game fall short. These beliefs and practices are specially prominent among the North American tribes, but they are by no means unknown elsewhere. In the Hebrides it is not considered right to throw sheep-bones on the fire (xiii. FolkLore, 35). The late Dr. Gregor records (iv. Folk-Lore Journal, 16) that in Scotland the bones of the haddock are not to be burnt; and in some places the rule is more general (iii. ibid. 183). We have no distinct intimation that the object of thus preserving the bones is to facilitate the resuscitation of the animal. But in the famous saga of Thor's adventures it will be remembered that he came one night to a countryman's house, and slew the goats that drew his chariot in order to provide the evening repast. He desired his host and hostess and their children to throw the bones into the goat-skins, which he laid beside the hearth. On the morrow he consecrated the skins and their contents with his hammer-in other words, performed a magical ceremony-and immediately the goats sprang up alive. But one of them was lame in consequence of the host's son having broken the thighbone for the sake of the marrow. There can be little doubt,

question, and treated the bones of animals killed for food in accordance with it. In the Macassar tale it is quite evident that the tree which grows up from the bones is a new manifestation of the fish: the fish is restored to life in a new form.

E. SIDNEY HARTLAND.

T. J

BURIAL OF AMPUTATED LIMBS.

(Vol. xviii. p. 216.)

a farmer, of Old Basford, Nottingham, fell off the shaft of his cart and injured his leg so badly that after some time he was obliged to have it amputated. His wife had a little coffin made for it and had it buried in the family grave. This happened about 18 years ago.

My father was Vicar of Old Basford for 53 years and I knew the J—— family very well. They were most respectable people, whose ancestors had lived on the same farm four hundred years.

Mr. J died about two years after the loss of his leg. E. B. PITMAN.

Humshaugh Vicarage, Northumberland.

WREN BOYS.

(Vol. xviii. p. 439.)

I send a Co. Louth Wren-rhyme for comparison.

"The wren, the wren, the king of all birds,

On St. Stephen's Day he was caught in the furze,

But though he's little his family's great

So rise up, kind people, and give us a treat.1

If you don't rise up and give us a treat

We'll bury the wren in under the gate.

1 These four lines are practically identical with an Essex rhyme quoted in A. W. Moore's Folk-Lore of the Isle of Man, except that in the English version

A wren, a wren, when you were young
A mouse couldn't stir off the floor,
But now you are dead and gone

We'll carry you from door to door.

With your pocket full of money and your barrel of beer,
I'll wish you a happy Christmas and a merry New Year.
So up with the kettle and down with the pan,

Give us some money to bury the wren."

In Mr. O'Faherty's 'Siamsa na Geiṁriò (noticed in FolkLore, vol. vi. page 308) is the following Irish wren-rhyme :

“A dreoilín, dreoilín, ríġ na n-eun,

is mór do muiriġin, is beag ¿ú féin.
Éiriġ suas, a bean an tiġe,

A's tabair dúinn ub na circe duibe

Tá siar i dtóin an tiġe.”

"O wren, wren, king of the birds,

Large is your family, small are you.
Rise up, woman of the house,

And give us the black hen's egg

That is back in the far end of the house."

I have never heard any explanation of the eighth line of the Louth rhyme, but one version of "The Battle of Birds" in Campbell's Popular Tales commences with a quarrel between the wren and the mouse.

I have once, some years ago, seen a party of young men going from house to house with blackened faces and one of their number dressed in straw, but as a rule the Louth ". wren-boys" are children. They carry a thorn bush decked with streamers of coloured paper, to a branch of which the wren is tied; that is if they have succeeded in killing one. An alternative is to carry the wren in a little coffin carved out of a turnip and covered with coloured paper.

BRYAN J. JONES.

REVIEWS.

THE CULTS OF THE GREEK STATES. By L. R. FARNELL, D.Litt. Vols. iii. and iv. With Illustrations. Clarendon Press. 32s. net.

We have already reviewed in these pages the first two volumes of Dr. Farnell's great work; and the greatness of his task may be gauged by the long interval of time that has passed since. the first two came out. No one who has not himself tried some such task can know how long it takes to prepare for it: of the hundreds and thousands of articles and monuments to be examined, weighed, their chaff left and their grain taken; how much work leaves no trace, since it discloses nothing good or nothing new. We are not surprised at the delay. One or two advantages, indeed, come from delay. Ten years ago, some theories were predominant that have now fallen into the background; this is especially the case with ethnology and folk-lore, where some notable advance has been made. For one thing, totemism has fallen into the background, owing to the uncertainty caused by new discoveries in Australia. Dr. Farnell never was much inclined to give weight to this and other problems of savagery, and no doubt he feels that his caution was justified. Then, again, the Cretan discoveries have thrown a new light on the beginnings of Greek religion: for whether the Cretans were Greeks or not, their religion certainly bears a direct

account of Crete, but we think he was not well advised, in a book so thorough as this, in not basing his work on a study of savagery. In one matter he has come to see this. It seems that whatever may have been the origin of the state cults of Greece, the people paid their chief worship to local heroes and ancestral divinities. Now hero-worship was no part of Dr. Farnell's original plan; but he has found himself compelled to include it, his investigation having shown him its importance. Yet the heroes do not take the place that is theirs historically, first in the work; they are to come last, not formally as part of this work, but separated. We are very glad they are to come, and we will not quarrel with their place so long as we get them.

It is not only in the plan of the work that we miss the element of savage belief and practice: any of the parts would have been the better for it. Not only is this the case with strange survivals such as the horse-headed Demeter, or the Mouse Apollo, but it would serve to throw light on the Mysteries. Not that Dr. Farnell omits this side of the subject entirely only he uses it half apologetically in illustration, not in explanation. No doubt to give it due attention would largely increase the bulk of the book; but we do not think that was or should be the determining principle. Perhaps we may see in the Dionysos volume fuller use made of the savage mythdances, which in two cases at least-Peru and Polynesia-were the starting point for the drama. We must however admit that Dr. Farnell gave us no excuse to expect this comparative treatment; and regarding the book as a collection of facts, marshalled and ordered, belonging to a period limited in time, it is of the highest value. Dr. Farnell shows always a sane judgment; he is neither confused by the complexity of his subject, nor apt to accept the latest new theory, and his resources are so wide as to be practically complete. The collection of the authorities cited in appendices by themselves has its drawbacks, but it has also a great advantage, in that the student may without trouble get a general conspectus of the evidence. We must add however, that the method of marking references is very far from