The Genesis of the United States National Museum. 173 



CAWFORNIA. 



A race of different origin is seen in the different style of manufactures, ornaments, 

 and woven baskets for carrying water and cooking ; others richly ornamented with 

 feathers, plumes, ear ornaments, l)eadwork. 



Bows and arrows of the usual American pattern ; war spears headed with bone. 



Feather dress for a sort of priest or devil. 



The arrow-proof cuirass and hemispherical cap of the Shasta Indians. 



C. Pickering. 



November, 1842. 



report upon the dra\arings made by messrs. drayton and 



AGATE. 



Through the labors of the artists, Messrs. Drayton and Agate, in connection with 

 the literary and scientific duties of the other officers, the journals of the Expedition 

 are of two kinds— the written and the pictorial, and, although the former is neces- 

 sarily the more complete, yet the latter in consequence of the industry of those gen- 

 tlemen and the large niimber and faithfulness of the sketches made, would of itself 

 give a very thorough account of the islands and races we have .seen ; and in many 

 respects far more detailed and satisfactory descriptions than is possible M'ith the pen. 

 The scenery of the islands, their mountains and forests, their villages, with interior 

 and exterior views of the huts or houses of both chiefs and common people, spirit 

 houses or temples, war implements, fortifications, household utensils, tools, canoes, 

 the natives sitting in council, dressed and painted for war, the domestic scenes of the 

 villages, costumes, tattooing, modes of cooking, eating, drinking cava, taking and 

 curing fish, swinmiing, gambling, and other amusements, war dances, club dances, 

 jugglerj', and numerous other particulars illustrating the modes of life, habits, and 

 customs of the various tribes inhabiting the i.slands or countries visited, have been 

 sketched with fidelity. Indeed, nothing escaped their pencil when time was allowed, 

 and the series of sketches when finished — for many were necessarily left in outline — 

 will be more instructive and interesting than the highest literary abilities could 

 render the journal of the voyage. One picture by Mr. Agate, representing a temple 

 on a newly discovered island, and the cocoanut grove about it, containing on one 

 side, three or four half-naked savages starting in affright from an officer who is just 

 beginning to puff a cigar, and is pouring the volumes of smoke from his mouth, the 

 impression of siicli a scene can not be conveyed in words, nor the idea it gives of the 

 ignorance and superstition of the savage. The portraits are numerous, and are 

 not merely general sketches, but accurate likenesses of particular individuals — so 

 faithful, indeed, although but the work of a few minutes in the hands of our skillful 

 artists, that the natives would cry out with surprise the name of the individual when 

 a sketch was shown them. 



Besides historical and ethnographical drawings, the sketches of objects in natural 

 history are very numerous; and they embrace all departments of natural science, 

 including some geological sketches. The variety and beauty of marine animals in 

 the coral seas of the Pacific are beyond description. Like birds in our forests, fish 

 of rich colors and strange forms sport among the coral groves; and various mollusca — 

 animals low in the scale of organization — cover the bottom with living flowers. A 

 new world of beings is here opened to an inhabitant of our cold climate, and many 

 of these productions are so unlike the ordinary forms of life that, but for our eyes, 

 we could scarcely believe in their existence. Many of them are among the most 

 brilliant and beautiful objects drawn and colored by Mr. Drayton. Among the geo- 

 logical sketches by Mr. Drayton the representations of the great crater of lyua Pele, 

 especially the night scenes of its boiling lakes of lava, are highly valuable. There is 

 probably no volcano in the world where the processes of volcanic action are more 



