I wish also to examine, in greater detail than I should have had space for in a note, how far the case of the Samoyeds bears out Mr Baring Gould's theory of the development of idolatry from its grosser to its more refined manifestations, or of the progress of the human race from barbarism to the light of religion and of civilisation. Mr Baring Gould says, p. 136-- "'When a Schaman is aware that I have no household god,' said a Samoyed to M. Castren, the linguist, 'he comes to me, and I give him a squirrel, or an ermine skin.' This skin he brings back moulded 'into a human shape.' ... 'This Los is a fetish; it is not altogether an idol; it is a spirit entangled in a material object. What that object is matters little; a stump of a tree, a stone, a rag, or an animal, serves the purpose of condensing the impalpable deity into a tangible reality.' Through this coarse superstition glimmers an intelligent conception. It is that of an all-pervading Deity, who is focussed, so to speak, in the fetish. This deity is called Num. 'I have heard some Samoyeds declare that the earth, the sea--all nature, in short--are Num.' 'Where is Num? asked Castren of a Samoyed, and the man pointed to the blue sea: but an old woman told him that the sun was Num. The Siethas, worshipped by the Lapps, had no certain figure or shape formed by nature or art; they were either trees or rough stones, much _worn by water_. Tomæus says they were often mere tree stumps with the roots upwards."[125] [125] Is not "Num" cognate to "Numen?" and their worship of trees and worn stones worship of memorials of the Deluge? Compare Boulanger, _infra_, ch. xi., and on the regard for boulders in India (_vide_ Gainet, vol. i.) Bryant ("Mythology," iii. 532) says, speaking of the Egyptians--"I have mentioned that they showed a reverential regard to fragments of rock which were particularly uncouth and horrid; and this practice seems to have prevailed in _many other countries_." Probably for the same reason the Lapps worshipped their lakes and rivers, as is known from the names annexed to them--"Ailekes Jauvre," that is, sacred lake, &c. _Vide_ Pinkerton, i. 468. (Leems.)