398 ANTHROPOLOGY. 



savage and barbarous races are never acquired either for the purposes 

 of traffic, or as a part of polite learning, it follows that all vocabularies, 

 syllabaries, or collections of sentences gathered among such people are 

 materials of anthropology. 



Among our North American Indians there is at present great diligence 

 in collecting linguistic material. The missionaries who have labored 

 with the greatest success among them have been those who have dis- 

 covered that the comj)liment paid to a tribe in the acquisition of their 

 language returns with interest to the teacher in the form of increased 

 confidence and attention. Almost the entire Scriptures have been 

 translated into the speech of the civilized tribes. The labors of Riggs, 

 Dorsey, Vetromilye, bear witness to this fact, and furnish the philologist 

 with some of his best material. 



The work of collecting Indian vocabularies, grammars, and diction- 

 aries set on foot by the Smithsonian Institution is continued with great 

 zeal by the Bureau of Ethnology. Mr. James C. Pilling is preparing a 

 complete bibliography of North American Indian linguistics, which will 

 enable the student to investigate each tribe in the whole body of its 

 literature. Mr. Albert S. Gatschet continues his labors in the languages 

 of the California tribes, and will produce the coming year two large 

 volumes upon the Klamath. 



A glance at the bibliography accompanying this paper will show that 

 the same activity has characterized those who have investigated the 

 languages of other parts of the world. Especial attention might be 

 called to the researches of Hovelacque, Keane, Oppert, Powell, Sayce, 

 and Whitney. 



The work, however, that has attracted most attention in this direction 

 is that of Col. Garrick Mallery upon the sign language or gesture speech 

 of mankind. The author has not yet completed his researches, and there- 

 fore his work cannot be fully appreciated. The following tentative pub- 

 lications will show the compass of the undertaking. The first attempt 

 to present the subject publicly was at the Saratoga meeting of the 

 American Association, in 1879, an account of which will be found in the 

 volume of proceedings published in the following year. 



A paper with the same title, not identical with the above, but contain- 

 ing the greater part of it, and specially designed for circulation among 

 officers of the Army and Navy appeared in the United Service, vol. ii, 

 No. 2, Philadelphia, February, 1880, pp. 226-243. 



In the Aonerican Antiquarian, vol. ii, No. 3, pp. 210-228, the author 

 continues his studies under the title, '^ The Sign Language of the Indians 

 of the Upper Missouri in 1832." This was a translation and discussion 

 of the gesture signs reported by Prince Maximilian von Wied Neuwied 

 as in use among the Aricaras, &c., in 1832-'34. 



The most thorough work of Colonel Mallery is the "Introduction to 

 the Study of Sign Language among the North American Indians as 

 Illustrating the gesture speech of mankind." The chief object of the 



