Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 17, 1906.djvu/265

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Reviews. 2 5 1

blowing into its mouth and compelling it to swallow. It is, moreover, treated to strong purgatives during the same period. The Basutos who survive may well be a hardy race.

Bertram C. A. Windle,

The Czech Ethnographical Review, vol. xi. Published by the Society of the Cech Ethnographical Museum. Prague, 1905.

When at Prague last autumn it was our good fortune to inspect this museum, founded in 1896, formerly located in Count Sylva- Tarouca's palace on the Prikopy, and since 1902 in a charming villa in the Kinsky garden in the suburb of Smichov. The museum was the outcome of an ethnographical exhibition arranged for the purpose of awakening interest in the ancient manners, customs, and dress of the Bohemians and kindred Slavonic peoples in Austria. The extensive materials are grouped under the heads of models of dwellings, costumes and embroidery, peasants at work, manners and customs, music, song and dance, with sociological, anthropological, and linguistic sections. The museum receives some State and civic subsidies, but is compelled to rely on voluntary effort as well.

The revival of national interest among the Czechs has led to the issue of a vast amount of literary and artistic productions, like the periodicals Zlatd Praha (Golden Prague), Cesky Svet (Bohemian World), most of very high merit. In order to see the people in native guise it is advisable to leave "hundred- towered, golden Prague" and visit the country districts. At Pilsen we saw the quaint female head-dress known as holiibinka (from holub, a pigeon). An interesting experience was a visit to a peasant school at Vlasim, where the children in local costumes went through actions illustrative of rural occupations, to the accompaniment of Smetana's pretty folk songs. At the annual fair, youthful swains purchase ornate cups for the damsels who take their fancy, some of the latter amassing a considerable