ANTHROPOLOGY. 653 



Miiller delivered a lecture on Missions, iu Westminster Abbey. In this 

 address religions were classified into non-missionary and missionary 

 religions — the former including Judaism, Brahmiuism, and Zoroastri- 

 anism, the latter Buddhism, Mohammedanism, and Christianity*. Dr. 

 Kuenen observes the subject from a somewhat different point of viewj 

 that is, he does not ask them what they aim to be, but what they are 

 essentially. With respect to Judaism, therefore, he is led to a differ- 

 ent result, which in its prophetic element presents the character of uni- 

 versality. Mohammedanism, on the other hand, weighed in the Kueneu 

 balance is found wanting. 



The Rev. J. Owen Dorsey, formerly missionary among the Omahas, 

 has been engaged for two years past under the direction of the Bureau of 

 Ethnology in collecting myths from the various Dakotan tribes among 

 whom he has labored. In this work he is assisted by others in the sev- 

 eral tribes on our reservations. The object of Major Powell in this is to 

 gather a very large quantity of well-recorded myths, from which a true 

 philosophy of American priscan religion may be deducted. Nothing 

 exhibits more plainly the oneness of the human race than a comparison 

 of myths. Turning to one of Mr. Dorsey's Iowa traditions we read : 

 "Once upon a time there was a man whose family consisted of himself, 

 his wife, and a daughter about twelve years old, and a son three years 

 younger than the daughter. Tlie father kills the mother, cooks her, and 

 gives her to the children for venison. The children pursue him like a 

 fate, are helped in their travels by the ghost of their mother, until the 

 tribe into which the father fled are brought to want." The incident of 

 the naming of the animals is a very charming part of this story. This 

 body of myths will appear in Major Powell's Contributions to North 

 American Ethnology. {Am. Antiquarian, iv.) 



The visit of Mr. Frank Cushing to the East with a band of Zuiiis, 

 in order to pay their respects to the great Ocean, or Father of Waters, 

 was an event of no little importance in the history of mythology. Mr. 

 Cushing has temi)orarily expatriated himself in order to become familiar 

 with the ZuQian social life. In this he has been most successful, having 

 been initiated into their mysteries and sacred orders. His researches 

 will form a part of the publications of the Bureau of Ethnology. 



X. — HEXIOLOGY. 



The amount of modifying influence which the conditions affecting the 

 respiratory and digestive organs of man are capable of exerting within 

 a given period of time is a subject of the utmost importance to the 

 anthropologist. Closely related to this inquiry is that which discusses 

 the unity or the plurality of human species. If the total force of the en- 

 vironment has been sufficient within the period of human existence to 

 bring about those hereditable characteristics which mark oft' the races 

 of men, then we have no need of two or five or many origins. On the 

 other hand, if the difterentia of the races of men have the exalted value 



