CHAPTER II.

SAVAGE MODES OF PRAYER.

Difficulties in the study of natural religions—Importance of prayer in savage life—Examples of savage prayers—Are they limited to temporal interests?—Baptismal rites equivalent to prayers—Prayers in the form of toasts—The worship of evil spirits—Doubtful distinction between good and bad divinities among savages—Treatment of obdurate gods—Relation of sacrifice to prayer—Tendency of sacrifices to become more numerous and severe—Pantomimic dances possibly acted petitions—The African gorilla-dance, the Mandan buffalo-dance, the Sioux bear-dance, the Australian kangaroo-dance—A similar idea in prayers for rain—War-dances—Fetichistic practices perhaps extinct forms of prayer—Prayers to animals, to the moon, to trees, and their survival in modern folk-lore 41-77