logical interpretations of play however important these may be,
and that I have employed anthropological terms and explanations
but sparingly, even where I have had to quote ethnological facts.
He will find no mention of mana and the like, and hardly any of
magic. Were I compelled to put my argument tersely in the form
of theses, one of them would be that anthropology and its sister
sciences have so far laid too little stress on the concept of play
and on the supreme importance to civilization of the play-factor.

The reader of these pages should not look for detailed docu-
mentation of every word. In treating of the general problems of
culture one is constantly obliged to undertake predatory incursions
into provinces not sufficiently explored by the raider himself. To
fill in all the gaps in my knowledge beforehand was out of the
question for me. I had to write now, or not at all. And I wanted
to write.

Leyden,
June 1938.

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