Comparitive Studies in Melanesia ¹

Abstract

IN the interests of his topographical work the author, of the memoir under consideration was obliged to be almost constantly on the move; though this rendered any intensive study of a special people impossible, yet it afforded him opportunities for personal comparison of various peoples and cultures over a wide area. He has worked up the older sources with great care, and in many instances extends his comparisons to America, as he is anxious to see a full treatment of Malayo-Polynesian affinities with South American cultures worked out; the cursory treatment of this vast theme in Graebner's “Bogenkultur” he regards as quite inadequate and faulty in method.