INTRODUCTION

Among the Head-hunters of Formosa contains the substance of observations made during a two-years’ stay in Formosa—from September 1916 to September 1918. The book is written for the general reader, rather than for the specialist in anthropology or ethnology. Hence many details—especially those concerning minor differences in manners and customs among the various aboriginal tribes—have been omitted; for these, while perhaps of interest to the specialist, would prove wearying to the layman.

Inadequate as the treatment of the subject may seem to the anthropologist, I venture to hope that such information as the book contains may stimulate interest, and perhaps encourage further investigation, before it is too late, into the tribal customs and habits of a little-known, and rapidly disappearing, people.

A writer—signing himself “P. M.”—discussing the aborigines of Formosa, in the China Review (vol. ii) for 1873, says: “Decay and death are always sad sights to contemplate, and when decay and death are those of a nation or race, the feeling is stimulated to acuteness.[16]”

If this feeling in connection with the aborigines was aroused in a European resident in Formosa in 1873, how much more strongly is this the case to-day—nearly half a century later—when the aboriginal population has dwindled from approximately one-sixth of the population of the island (an estimate given by Keane in his remarks on Formosa, in Man Past and Present) to about 3 per cent. of the entire population—a decline of 15 per cent. in less than fifty years. Under the present system of “benevolent assimilation” on the part of the Japanese Government the aboriginal population seems declining at an even more rapid rate than it did under Chinese rule, which ended in 1895. Hence if the mistake which was made in the case of the Tasmanians—that of allowing them to die out before definite or detailed information regarding their beliefs and customs was gained—is to be avoided in the case of the Formosan aborigines, all anthropological data available, both social and physical, should be gained without further delay. Up to this time apparently but little has been done in the way of scientific study of these people, in spite of the fact that, as Keane points out, Formosa “presents a curious ethnical and linguistic connecting link between the continental and oceanic populations of Asia.”

Dr. W. Campbell, writing in Hastings’ Encyclop?dia of Religion and Ethics (vol. vi) remarks: “The first thing to notice in making any statement[17] about the savages of Formosa is the extreme paucity of information which is available.” If anything which I—the first white woman to go among certain of the tribal groups of these savages—am able to say will make less this “extreme paucity of information,” then I shall feel that the time spent in writing this book has not been wasted.

I must add that I am deeply indebted to Dr. Marett, of Oxford, who most kindly read the greater part of the book in manuscript form; and again in proof.

Janet B. Montgomery McGovern.

Salzburg, Austria.
March 1922.

NOTE

Among other valuable suggestions, Dr. Marett has called my attention to the fact that the word “caribou” (sometimes spelt carabao) is used in this book to describe an animal other than the American reindeer. It is quite true that no dictionary would define “caribou” as meaning the hideous, almost hairless, beast of the bovine species used in certain parts of Indonesia for ploughing the rice-paddies, and whose favourite recreation—when not harnessed to the plough—is to lie, or to stand, buried to its neck in muddy water; yet this beast is so called both in the Philippines and in Formosa; that is, by English and Americans resident in these islands. By the Japanese the animal is called sui-gyu; by the Chinese shui-niu (as nearly as the sound can be imitated in English spelling); the characters being the same in both languages, but the pronunciation different.

In connection with the pronunciation and the English[18] spelling of Chinese and Japanese words, the spelling is of course phonetic. This applies to the names of places, as well as to other words. As regards Formosan place names, the difficulty of adequate transliteration is aggravated by the fact that the Chinese-Formosans and the Japanese, while using the same written characters, pronounce the names quite differently. In spelling the names of places, I have followed that system usually adopted in English books. There can, however, be no hard and fast rules for Sino-Japanese spelling; therefore the Japanese gentleman to whom I am indebted for the map who has spelled Keelung with a single “e,” is quite “within his rights” from the point of view of transliteration.

J. B. M. M.