566 THE POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY 



ness, of a wholly different cultus, than even Chinese or other antipodal tales; 

 and over and above this there is a glamour and sleep-walking mystery which 

 often incline a man to rub his eyes in the midst of a Mabinogi, and to think 

 of previous states of existence. 



It is this sense of strangeness, this " sleep-walking mystery," as 

 Lanier calls it, that haunts the aboriginal American tale. It is of the 

 same cultus as the Celtic, and both loom above the horizon of later 

 English culture as distinctly aboriginal and belonging to preexistent 

 races that occupied the soil ages before the transplanting of the dom- 

 inant English type in Britain and America. Like the vanishing fauna 

 of an invaded land, these ancient culture tales linger in remote places, 

 amid aboriginal surroundings, elusive, and disappearing with the en- 

 croachment of the newer life. 



In the early years of the last century Henry Schoolcraft gathered a 

 number of Algonquin folk tales taken directly from aboriginal story- 

 tellers around lodge fires in the then remote wilderness of the North- 

 west — about the upper lake region and the headwaters of the Mississippi. 

 These form the basis of his "Algic Researches," first published in 

 1839, and of later editions and compilations, one of which is the Indian 

 Fairy Book. What Geoffrey of Monmouth did for the Celtic romances 

 in his " History of The Britons," Schoolcraft has done for these Algon- 

 quin legends — given them an enduring place in the literature of Eng- 

 lish-speaking peoples. Both sources of legend have lent their matter 

 to the verse of later English poets — Idylls of the King, the Morte 

 d' Arthur and Hiawatha — reset fragments from an earlier period of 

 epic the sources of which lie far back in the dim, mythopceic past. 



The likeness of the primitive mind in two so widely separated cul- 

 ture areas as Britain and aboriginal North America, as revealed in 

 both sets of tales, is seen in the overcoming of obstacles, often of super- 

 human character, by feats of prowess aided by magic. Indeed, magic 

 plays the chief part, as it does in the tales of all primitive folk. In an 

 Ojibwa story — The Red Swan — a younger brother sets forth in quest 

 of a mysterious bird that he has hit with a magic arrow. He traverses 

 wide stretches of country, coming on the evening of the second day to 

 the lodge of an old magician who feeds him from a magic kettle and 

 who encourages him to go forward in his enterprise. " Often has this 

 Eed Swan passed," the old man tells him, " and those who have fol- 

 lowed it have never returned : but you must be firm in your resolution, 

 and be prepared for all events." On the evening of the third day he 

 reaches the lodge of another old man, similar in every respect to the 

 first, and in like manner a third old man entertains him the following 

 night, each with the same magic kettle. When the youth has finished 

 eating this last old man thus addresses him: 



Young man, the errand you are on is very difficult. Numbers of young 

 men have passed with the same purpose, but never returned. Be careful, and 

 if your guardian spirits are powerful, you may succeed. This Red Swan you 



