The "Man," the issue of this union, have shown a marked tendency to expand. From the mountain-tops which formed their original kingdom they have penetrated into Tonkin, Annam and the region of the lakes. They seem to have made ample use of a provision in their ancient Charter which entitled them to set fire to any forest which impeded their progress. They claim that this authority is still valid and subsisting, and we had the greatest difficulty in enforcing obedience to our forest regulations. The most interesting feature of this ethnical group is that it shows undoubted traces of the existence of an alliance formed in immemorial times with some species of animal. Now the underlying idea of totemism is that of a compact between an aggregation (family, or group) of human beings and some animal species from which has sprung a relationship at once physical and social.
The recent controversy over the definition of totemism seems to make it both redundant and impertinent for me to enlarge on a subject which is still fresh in the memory of all. Nor is the matter of great moment, for I am convinced that, with few exceptions, if the peoples whom I am studying have any connection with these quite special phenomena, that connection is too remote to be regarded as a basis for any satisfactory deductions.
Besides, it is well known that competent observers have frequently confused totemic practices with certain customs whose origin is rather to be looked for in zoolatry or theriolatry (thēr, a wild beast).
Theriolatry embraces such curiosities as tiger and crocodile-worship, while zoolatry signifies the worship of the domestic animals. It must be admitted that when the totem of a group is a wild beast the totemism is probably theriolatric, but it is impossible to dispute van Gennep's statement that all theriolatry is not necessarily totemic.
Organization in groups or totemic clans is only found among races that are just emerging from barbarism, and proof is not lacking that several peoples in classical antiquity had passed through that stage of progress before the period of recorded history begins.
Sorcerers, among the Moï, fall into two categories, those who are gifted with the faculty of divination whereby the guilty can be detected, and those whose exorcisms are confined and directed to the healing of disease.
As a rule the Spirit himself selects the individual whom he proposes to endow with these divine functions.
The first intimation to the happy mortal on whom the choice of Heaven has thus fallen is a feeling of violent colic or sickness of a peculiar kind which leaves no doubt as to its message or mission. The sufferer suffers gladly.
It is by no means the rule that initiation is followed by an immediate assumption of the divine functions. In most cases a prolonged interval elapses, for a candidate who feels unequal to the rôle thus suddenly thrust upon him will prefer exile rather than a return to the ranks of common mortals, a set-back which would make him a public laughing-stock.