342 POPULAR SCIENCE MONTHLY. 



The north Pacific area. 



On the Pacific slope of America, between 45° and 60° north, lies 

 a well-marked culture area. The mountains near by and the ocean 

 have between them innumerable islands, great and small. Passing 

 among these was easy; the climate, by reason of warm currents in the 

 sea, mild ; animal and vegetable life useful to human existence, copious. 

 There is no flint, but slate, nephrite and volcanic rocks of good quality. 

 On this domain men traversed long distances in dugout canoes holding 

 fifty persons, and artists expressed their mythic fancies through the 

 obliging cedar wood. Had they lived thirty degrees farther south, 

 these men would have been able to rival the builders of Nahuan and 

 Mayan stone temples. For women, pliant roots and tough grasses 

 fascinated their artistic spirits, resulting in exquisite twined basketry. 

 As in all other island areas, however, the tendencies are centrifugal. 

 The linguistic families were separated into innumerable kwans, or 

 clans, without national solidarity. The southern boundary of this 

 canoe culture province is the Columbia river, highway of tribes and 

 patron of men. On this coast were matured commerce, slavery, a diver- 

 sity of industries and a varied annual round. Material was afforded 

 and leisure also for the unfolding of a complicated mythology and its 

 embodiment in wood, stone and hard animal substances. 



The Oregon-California area. 



The next unique area lies on the Pacific slope, between 35° and 48° 

 north, chiefly in Oregon and California. Upon this long strip facing 

 the sunset was woman's paradise ; it was at the same time ' No man's 

 land.' The men there are among the shortest, and the height of the 

 women is 94 per cent, of the men's. Twenty-four different stock-lan- 

 guages are spoken. It is not so much a single culture area as a series 

 of cul-de-sacs, a cloaca- gentium, coves in the mountains opening out on 

 the islandless, harborless, fathomless ocean. It is the Caucasus of the 

 Western Hemisphere. You see there no huge canoes, no carvings in 

 any material, no partnerships or great enterprises. The only redeem- 

 ing virile feature is the yew bow with sinew back and the most delicate 

 arrows on the continent. 



But what a heritage in textile materials! Nowhere else on the 

 globe was there such a variety of stitches in basketry and nowhere else 

 were women's fingers so nimble in basket-making. There was no 

 spindle, no loom, no pottery, but the basket served all purposes for the 

 gleaner, the miller, the cook and the purveyor. The art sense, almost 

 extinguished in the men, barring a little skill in shell and feathers, 

 effloresced in woman's work, to the astonishment of the ethnologist. 



