[hill-tout] TOTEMISM : ITS ORIGIN AND IMPORT 67 



and his. It must not be understood, however, that 'the Dakota is an 

 idolator. It is not the image that he worships,. .. . hut the spiritual 

 essence which is represented by that image, and which is supposed to he 

 ever near it." ^ 



The ooast tribes of British Columibia hold similar views;, and the 

 accounts that have been given of fetishism in diiferent parts of the 

 world everywhere reveal the same belief. The Polynesian taboo beliefs 

 with xegard to certain objects being the shrine or habitation of their 

 gods is another illustration of this belief. On the island of Nukunono 

 Fakaafo was a stone wrapped about with matting, and held so sacred 

 by the natives that only the king durst view it, and even he only once 

 a year when it assumed a fresh suit of matting. This stone or idol or 

 fetish was termed by the natives the Tui Tokelau or Lard, of Tokelau 

 and was regarded as the personification of the god.^ The Ark of the 

 Israelites belongs to the same class of beliefs. 



It becomes clear then that in the mind of the savage the name of 

 a thing, the symbol or representative of that thing, and the thing itself 

 is all one and the same. They are to him only so many different 

 expressions of the same concept. Hence there is no inconsistency in 

 his designating them all by a common name. 



To follow the Algonquian cusitom, then, and call the several ele- 

 ments of our categories by one and ithe same term is, I submit, neither 

 illogical nor inconsistent. But in order that this may become the 

 more apparent it may be well to consider here briefly the nature of this 

 fundamental concept of primitive man of which totemism, in one form 

 or anothei", is everywhere the outward and visible sign. For, as I 

 remarked in my former paper, we can best apprehend the philosophy 

 of savage customs and beliefs when we view things fro'm the point of 

 view of savage intelligence. 



A particularly suggestive and hi/minous exposition of the mental 

 attitude of the Zuni toward the universe is given by Gushing in his 

 article on Zuni fetishes in the Second Annual Eeport of the Bureau 

 of Amer. Eth. As this report is now out of print, and as the Zuni 

 savage does not differ greatly from other savages elsewhere, it will not 

 be out of place if I cite a few pertinent passages from it. 



" The Zunis," he writes, " suppose the sun, moon and stars, the 

 sky, earth, and sea, in all their phenomena and elements; and all inani- 

 mate objects, as well as plants, animals, and men, to belong to one 

 great system of all-conscious and inter-related life in which the degrees 

 of relationship seem to be determined largely, if not wholly by the 

 degrees of resemblance. In this system of life the starting point is 



' Minn. Hi&t. Soc. Coll., Vol. II, pt. 2, p. 67. 

 ^ Turner, " 19 years in Polynesia." 



