1873.] 4:«/t/ [Brinton. 



nizable for all that. This conclusion is indeed the opinion of the Creeks 

 themselves, as they told William Bartram, 1 nearly a century ago, that 

 "the Natchez was a dialect of the Muscoculge," as he calls the Maskoke. 

 There is, further, no reason to doubt but that the great mass of the 

 nation were of Maskoke lineage. The only point in which they differed 

 essentially from the tribes around them was in the despotic character of 

 their rulers. Many other of the Chahta-Maskoke tribes were nearly 

 equally civilized. The Yasous, Coras, Offagoulas and Ouspie erected 

 mounds and earthworks for their villages 2 , as, indeed, did most of the 

 Creektribes ; the so-called "Temple" and the perpetual fire kept therein, 

 were customs common throughout the Maskoke country 3 ; the Nache 

 celebrated the feast of new corn just as the Creeks did, and, according to 

 Du Pratz's description, with very similar ceremonies ; while the title 

 " Great Sun" was so far from a strange or unusual metaphor to apply 

 to a chief that, for instance, the Delawares conferred it on Col. Daniel 

 Broadhead in 1781*. 



The body of roots wholly dissimilar from any I have been able to find 

 in the Chahta-Maskoke dialects, embraces a number of important words, 

 and makes up a sufficiently large percentage of the language to testify 

 positively to a potent foreign influence. In what direction Ave are to look 

 in order to find analogies for them, and thus, perhaps, throw light on 

 the origin of the despotic government of the Nache and some of their 

 peculiar customs, I shall not at present discuss. 



AN ACOUSTIC PHENOMENON IN THE ROCKY MOUNTAINS. 

 {Read at the Meeting of the Philosophical Society, Nov. 1th, 1873.) 



On the eighth day of August, 1873, a party of four, ascended Bald 

 Mountain, one of the loftiest summits of the Wahsatch Range, bounding 

 Salt Lake valley on the east. It rises nearly four thousand feet above 

 the Mining Camp of Alta, and over twelve thousand above the level of 

 the sea. The shady gulches of the mountains were still patched with 

 snow, around which acres of wild flowers during this, their tardy spring, 

 were blooming in lavish profusion. 



As its name imports, vegetation nearly ceases some hundreds of feet 

 from the top of the mountain, partly owing to its extreme elevation, and 

 partly to its destitution of soil. Its top had withered into a more or 

 less spherical form, and was shingled with disintegrated shale — (about 



1 Travels through North and South Carolina, etc.. p 463. 



2 De La Harpe, Annals of Louisiana, p, 106. 



3 Interesting particulars respecting these customs are given by William Bartram in a MS. 

 in the possession of the Penna. Historical Society. 



4 Heckewelder, Xarratioe of the Mission of the United Brethren among the Delaware 

 and Mohegan Indians, p. 218. 



