242 PAPERS RELATING TO ANTHROPOLOGY. 



His figures of Indian men and women are particularly worthy of no- 

 tice, and one in watching him carefully can gain some idea of the rela- 

 tive importance that he attaches to the various parts of their war and 

 ordinary trappings through the emi>hasis with which he depicts some of 

 thein. 



But Choh is not much of a naturalist, as his woful delineations of 

 birds and animals will testify, and it was not until a week or more 

 ago that I accidentally discovered the true channel in which his talents 

 lay. I was passing tlirough the salesroom with my budget of mail 

 when I noticed this Indian as usual bent over his paper and more than 

 ordmarily absorbed in the design he was engaged upon, beneath the 

 great dislieveled mat of a winter's growth of the blackest of hair that 

 hung down from every part of his head. 



The glance I was enabled to get at his paper satisfied me in an in- 

 stant as to the cause of his increased interest. He was at work uj^on a 

 locomotive, with its tender and a couple of baggage cars, and was just 

 then giving the finishing touches to his design. The effort attracted 

 my attention at once, because an Indian's idea of a locomotive, drawn 

 by himself without the object before him, was to me something certainly 

 worthy of examination. The drawing of birds, and frogs, and lizards, 

 in their crude way is a thing we somehow naturally look for, and as it 

 has been a fact for so long a time before us, perhaps we take it, too, as 

 a matter of course that such people would make endeavor to depict ob- 

 jects which were constantly before their eyes in their common environ- 

 ment. A moment's consideration would also convince us that among 

 these very Indians, as it is with more highly civilized races, there 

 would be different degrees of merit exhibited even among those who 

 hiid claim to being proficient in the same branch. I saw this well 

 exemplified nearly a year ago, among the Zuni women, as they fashioned 

 and painted their pottery at the Pueblo, and no doubt it holds good 

 everywhere and in all paths of human acti\'ity. It was very prettily 

 brought before my mind in the case of the Zuni women, for one of the 

 group that I was watching on the occasion referred to was painting a 

 jar for me, when I got her to understand that it was my wish that she 

 should incorporate an animal and a few birds in her design. At this 

 she despondingly shook her head and pointed, with rather an envious 

 gesture, I thought, to one of her companions who sat opposite as the one 

 Avho was skilled in that part of the work. 



Another thing I have noticed is that the majority of these Indian art- 

 ists are great mimics, and there is much to lead us to believe that 

 inatiy of their designs, both in pottery and in art, have become quite 

 stereotyped. Not long ago I pointed out this tiict in an article which 

 I contributed to Science, wherein I showed how the Zunis had clung, 

 ]»erhaps for ages, to a common model for the owl. 



r.nt to draw a loconu^tive at all well is a vastly ditferent thing, and 

 ])arti('iihu]y so wImmi it is done from nuMuory alone. This is a great, 



