PSYCHOLOGY AND PRIMITIVE CULTURE. By F. C. Bartlett, M.A. (Cambridge
University Press. - 8s. ed. net.)
This is an industrious book about the psychological traits at work in early as in advanced society, but it is a saddening one. The savage's bows; head-dresses and war-drums are stultified and sad things to.look at in a museum : -the lay 'figure of a savage set up in psychological lalioratories is equally a sad thing to beheld. In this book, for instande, there are ten chapters about him ; each has an argument prefixed and a summary appended, each is quite' logical and quotes the proper authorities. Surely it ought to show clearly how he works. It does not ; the method itself is unreal,' and the savage is left like a ventriloquist's dummy, seated upon the knee of his " uncle." Chapter VI. upon "cultural acquisition by borrowing " is as lively as any, for it tells the tale of how John. Rave became the prophet of the Winnebago Indians— although here again this piece of culture grows far less racy at the hands of its borrower. Still, the story of the diffusion of culture and of its elaboration is diligently set forth, and the 'book in general may be safely recommended to students at seats of learning, whose duty it is, for purposes of their degree, to approach the study of man from this academic angle.
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