Abstract
IN this book Dr. Codrington gives us the results of observations and inquiries made in the Melanesian Islands from 1863, when he first visited them, to 1887, when he left the Melanesian Mission. He does not profess to offer a complete account of the Melanesian people; nevertheless, the work is one of great value, for it is in the main a record, not of what Europeans say about the natives, but of what the natives say about themselves. The most careful of European inquirers may, of course, mistake the real significance of what natives tell them but Dr. Codrington seems to have been at all times fully conscious of this danger, and to have done his best to guard against it.
The Melanesians: Studies in their Anthropology and Folk Lore.
By R. H. Codrington (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1891.)
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The Melanesians: Studies in their Anthropology and Folk Lore. Nature 44, 613 (1891). https://doi.org/10.1038/044613a0
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/044613a0