Last year I wrote a paper on ‘Education and the Social Adjustment of Primitive Peoples to European Culture’. It was an attempt to analyse the problem of the downfall of native races brought into contact with Europe, and to suggest an educational policy which might obviate some of the evils resulting from such contact. The educational policy suggested was based upon two principles, firstly that the school should be built on native tradition and continuous with any system of training youths which existed prior to the advent of the European, and secondly that these institutions should be developed and enriched to meet the needs of the changing environment and to train the pupils to be leaders in social and economic progress. The principles have thus a dual aspect, that of trying to ensure continuity of development from the past by basing the school on native tradition, and that of developing these traditions to meet the demands of improved standards of living and of improved methods of production.

The problem of the production of text-books for African schools is one which is engaging much attention from those who are interested in African education, and indeed there are few problems of African life where the efforts of serious thought are likely to be better rewarded. In an admirable document (5) the International Institute of African Languages and Cultures has discussed some of the fundamental issues involved, and the writers of text-books will probably find it wise to follow the general lines there laid down. That discussion does not, however, claim to have exhausted the subject, but is rather intended to invite fresh suggestions. The purpose of the present study is to set forth some psychological and pedagogical considerations which bear on the problem. Much scientific research has already been devoted to the problems of reading instruction (2), and the results should be at the disposal of the makers of text-books for Africa.

The following notes are based mainly on information collected by the writer at Mbilwi (‘Sibasa’) from members of Mphaphuli's tribe, and at Tshakhuma (‘Tshakoma’) from members of Madzivhandila's tribe, and supplemented elsewhere in the Venda area. Obviously, over such a large region, a number of variations from the norm here indicated may be expected to exist; but it is thought that what is here given represents in substance, if not in all details, Venda law and custom in respect of this sphere of this people's life

This article is an attempt to give some account of the magicoreligious ideas of the Bachama tribe. It is based on notes made during a ten-days' visit to the tribe in the spring of 1927. During this visit I had the good fortune to witness the annual festival at Fare, the description of which occupies the major part of the following remarks. I am indebted to Dr. Bronnum of the Danish Mission at Numan for a number of suggestions.

Toutes les populations qui occupent le territoire s'étendant du Stanley-Pool à l'embouchure du fleuve Congo possèdent des du figurines sculptées que l'on appelle généralement ‘fétiches’. Si toutes ces figurines ont une signification spéciale, elles se rattachent cependant les unes aux autres tant par leurs caractères généraux et leurs attributs que par l'idée et les fonctions qu'elles incarnent. Sous ce rapport nous croyons pouvoir les subdiviser en deux grands groupes, (1°) les figurines fétiches, (2°) les figurines commémoratives.

Though the Gã are rich in folk-lore, proverbs, fables, and idiomatic sayings which refer to tribal customs, it is difficult to know just how many of these have been borrowed from the Twi—a good many, to judge by the extent to which Twi enters into their stories and songs. If a story has in it any sort of chant or ‘catch-phrase’, it is nearly always in Twi that that part is given, or Twi corrupted or mixed with Gã. Most of their tales are animal stories, and the Spider is always the clever and cunning villain of the piece, who gets caught in his own web, just as in the Brer Rabbit stories the fox gets caught in his own toils.