to disentangle the facts
for which he is a first-hand witness, from those which he reports at
second, third, or fourth hand. Scarcely anything, I may observe in
passing, more impairs the value and impedes the usefulness of personal
observations of savage races than this deplorable habit of attempting to
combine the work of description with the work of comparison and
generalisation. The two kinds of work are entirely distinct in their
nature, and require very different mental qualities for their proper
performance; the one should never be confused with the other. The task
of descriptive anthropology is to record observations, without any
admixture of theory; the task of comparative anthropology is to compare
the observations made in all parts of the world, and from the comparison
to deduce theories, more or less provisional, of the origin and growth
of beliefs and institutions, always subject to modification and
correction by facts which may afterwards be brought to light. There is
no harm, indeed there is great positive advantage, in the descriptive
anthropologist making himself acquainted with the theories of the
comparative anthropologist, for by so doing his attention will probably
be called to many facts which he might otherwise have overlooked and
which, when recorded, may either confirm or refute the theories in
question. But if he knows these theories, he should keep his knowledge
strictly in the background and never interlard his descriptions of facts
with digressions into an alien province. In this way descriptive
anthropology and comparative anthropology will best work hand in hand
for the furtherance of their common aim, the understanding of the nature
and development of man.

[Sidenote: The religion of the Tamos. Beliefs of the Tamos as to the
souls of the dead.]

Like the Papuans in general, the Tamos of Astrolabe Bay are a settled
agricultural people, who dwell in fixed villages, subsist mainly by the
produce of the ground which they cultivate, and engage in a commerce of
barter with their neighbours.[385] Their material culture thus does not
differ essentially from that of the other Papuans, and I need not give
particulars of it. With regard to their religious views Dr. Hagen tells
us candidly that he has great hesitation in expressing an opinion.
"Nothing," he says very justly, "is more difficult for a European than
to form an approximately correct conception of the religious views of a
savage people,