[Book Reviews] | Nature

ABSTRACT MR. HALLIDAY has a personal experience of the Indians of British Columbia which goes back to 1873. He has been in personal contact with them for thirty-eight years, of which

twenty-six were spent in charge of the Canadian Government Indian Agency of the Kwawkewlth (Kwakiutl), of Vancouver. His reminiscences of Indian custom fall into two parts. In the first, he

describes an imaginary potlatch ceremony, that remarkable custom by which position and prestige was made to depend upon the lavishness with which gifts were distributed by the head of a clan

at a feast; and in the second he records such of his experiences among, and impressions of the Indians, while acting as a Government official, as will serve to throw light on Indian

character and mentality as expressed in religious belief, attitude to law and authority, and achievement under the white man's system of education. Mr. Halliday's views on racial

origins are not to be taken seriously. _Potlatch and Totem: and the Recollections of an Indian Agent_ By W. M. Halliday. Pp. xvi + 240 + 24 plates. (London and Toronto: J. M. Dent and Sons,

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