abundantly by comparison of their language and by the results of excavation of the graves and kitchen-middens on the islands. On this side of ethnography the work is very full and valuable. As a race they seem to be not unalloyed with the blood of neighbouring peoples of the continent: this we might expect from the intermittent relations with them disclosed by their traditions and by the remains found on the islands. Mr. Torii has done much to rescue from oblivion a helpless and dying people; and we have reason to be grateful to him for his labours, conceived and carried out in a truly scientific spirit worthy of a young and vigorous university, the meeting-place of the learning and philosophy of East and West.
Folk-Lore from India.
Mr. Masani tells us that while, as Municipal Secretary of Bombay, he was engaged in a campaign to cleanse the wells of the city from the anopheles mosquitos, the cause of an outbreak of malaria, it was part of his duty to consider the pleas raised by well-owners against the orders issued by the sanitary authorities to close them. This led him to investigate the folk-lore of wells and water cults which are described in this work. The protests raised by well-owners, disclosing the widespread use of water for religious purposes, and the belief that wells are haunted by various spirits which on the wells being closed showed their dissatisfaction by bringing various calamities on the owners, are interesting and instructive. Besides this the author has collected, partly from his own observations, partly from printed authorities, a good deal of information on water cults in India. It is remarkable that though both Hindus and Parsis believe in water spirits, these spirits are generally those of Musalmān saints, Pirs or Sayyids, a striking example of the influence of a race of conquerors on local beliefs.
