OF THE NATIVE EACI« OF AMFKICA. 23 



refresh his memory." (Histor// of the Conquest of Peru, Book I, chap. 4). After Professor 

 Max Miiller's testimony as to the oral transmission of the Vedas, this mode of composition 

 need not be wondered at. Among a people so conditioned and trained, the exercise of 

 their mnemonic and oratorical powers in the council and in the drama would become 

 second nature. The eloquence of the native races of the North is well known. With 

 them the warrior was not necessarily the man of few words that he customarily is among 

 the practical Anglo-Saxons. Like the Greek and the Roman, he coiild talk as well as 

 fight and defend his cause in the forum as well as in the field. In the Hon. A. Morris's 

 " Treaties of Canada with the Indians of Manitoba," we may see how apt and lawyer- 

 like are the questions, how su.btle the arguments, how effective occasionally the meta- 

 phors, of the Indians of our own North-West. The wonderful tact of some of the chiefs 

 in carrying on the négociations for the N. W. Angle Treaty is especially emphasized. 

 The demeanour of the Indians on that occasion is thus described : " Whether the demands 

 put forward were granted by the governor or not, there was no petulance, no ill-feeling 

 evinced; but every thing was done with a calm dignity that was pleasing to behold and 

 which might be copied with advantage by more pretentious deliberative assemblies." 

 (The Treaties of Canada, etc., p. tG). In reminding the governor of the reteutiveness of the 

 native memory, one of the chiefs said : " You must remember that our hearts and our 

 brains are like paper; we never forget." {The Treaties, etc., p. 68). In the monarchies 

 of Peru, Central America and Mexico liberty of speech would not be so widely enjoyed 

 as under the more free-and-easy tribal rule of the North. But still they doubtless had 

 their orators, and, at the outset of the tragic invasion, which robbed prince and peasant 

 of national independence for ever, -we may see, from the recorded interviews between the 

 new-comers and the chosen spokesmen of their sovereign, with what art the latter con- 

 ducted the negotiations. 



But it was in the form of the drama especially that the inter-tropical races displayed 

 their gifts of speech and action. " The Peruvian pieces," says Prescott, " aspired to the 

 rank of dramatic compositions, sustained by character and dialogue, founded sometimes 

 on themes of tragic interest and at others on such as, from their light and social character, 

 belonged to comedy." Though rude the execution may have been, the historian points 

 out that the mere conception of such an amusement distinguished the Peruvians from 

 those rougher races whose pastime was war. In his Storia critica dei Teatri, Signorelli 

 devotes a chapter to the native American theatre. He does not so much credit the Peru- 

 vians, however, with dramatic skill as with taste for the divine art of poetry ; and he 

 praises a poetical composition or haravec, preserved by Garcilasso de la Vega, as enriched 

 with just and vivid images. He acknowledges, at the same time, the existence of a certain 

 kind of drama in Peru, which had its most effective representation at the great festival of 

 the sun at Cuzco which Marmoutel has made so prominent a feature in " Les lucas." 

 Before long we are likely to have a triple treat of Peruvian poetry. Dr. Brinton has just 

 now in preparation an American anthology which will be a characteristic " collection of 

 the songs, chants and metrical compositions of the Indians, designed to display the emo- 

 tional and imaginative powers of the race and the prosody of their languages." He also 

 informs us, in his "Aboriginal American Authors," that 8enor Gavino Pacheco Zegarra is 

 about to publish a Trésor de la Langue des Incas, which will contain many of the Peruvian 

 yaravis or elegiac chants and that Mr. Clements Markham collected some twenty songs 



