Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 25, 1914.djvu/308

From Wikisource
Jump to navigation Jump to search
This page needs to be proofread.

2 So Short Bibliographical Notices.

Short Bibliographical Notices.

Folk 7aks of Breffny. By B. Hunt. Macmillan, 1912. Sm. 8vo, pp. viii+ 197. 3s. 6d. ;/.

This is one of the most delightful books of stories which has been published in recent years. It contains memories of talk to a child of seven by an old labourer who had " the real old knowledge was handed down from the ancient times." " Most of his lore died with him," but we owe great gratitude for these twenty-six sur- viving tales, which, like the Waterford Tales elsewhere in this number, show that, if England has but few ears of story to glean, there are still rich sheaves to harvest in Erin, Fifteen tales relate to the fairies (three to leprechauns), two to the Devil, three to witchcraft, and four to hidden treasure (one being a version of the Tinker of Swaffham).

Materials for the Study of the Amu Language and Folklore. Coll.by Bronislaw Pilsudski and edit, by J. Rozwadowski. Cracow: Spolka Wydawnicza Polska, 191 2. 8vo, pp. xxviii + 242.

The Ainu believe that " there is danger from goblins for anyone who talks much of the things of old time," but Mr. Pilsudski, who spent amongst the Ainu of Sakhalin several of the eighteen years of his involuntary sojourn in the Far East, and also visited the Ainu of the Hokkaido, won their trust, and has gathered from their lips a lar.ge mass of folklore. The present volume, besides a short general account of their oral narratives and songs, contains the original texts of twenty-seven historical traditions, with English translations and copious phonetical, grammatical, and ethno- graphical notes. The volume can be very highly commended to students, who should secure that it shall meet with such a sale as to justify a speedy publication of the remainder of the 350 texts collected.

Books for Review should be addressed to

The Editor of Folk-Lore,

c/o Messrs. Sidgwick & Jackson,

3 Adam St., Adelphi, London, W.C.