148 



THE AMERICAN MUSEUM JOURNAL 



ment, will be found the following esti- 

 mate of his fitness: 



.... Mr. Bandelier has for many years 

 occupied himself with the study of the history 

 and institutions of the native races of Mexico 

 and the adjoining region, at the time of, and 

 before the Spanish Conquest and settlement 

 of the country. The remarkable extent and 

 solidity of his learning in this field, his sound 

 judgment, and his acute intelligence in the 

 interpretation of historical evidence, have 

 been shown in his able and important essays, 

 "On the Art of War and Mode of Warfare of 

 the Ancient Mexicans"; "On the Distribu- 

 tion and Tenure of Lands, and the Customs 

 with respect to Inheritance, among the 

 Ancient Mexicans"; and "On the Social 

 Organization and Mode of Government of 

 the Ancient Mexicans." 



Thus qualified by erudition, Dr. Bandelier 

 is no less qualified by character for the task 

 of investigating the life and traditions of the 

 descendants of the people whom the Span- 

 iards found inhabiting the countries which 

 they conquered and occupied. His energy 

 and zeal, his capacity of adapting himself to 

 circumstances, his readiness to endure the 

 hardships incident to the performance of his 

 task, his unusual linguistic attainments, his 

 trained faculty of observation, form a combi- 

 nation of qualities such as warrant the value 

 of the work he may perform in the explora- 

 tion of the ancient remains, and the observa- 

 tion of the actual life of the Indians of the 

 Pueblos of the Southwest. 



That he did get deep into Indian life 

 is clear from extracts from his letters to 

 Charles Eliot Norton, then President 

 in the Archaeological Institute. In a 

 letter headed Cochiti, November 27, 

 1880, he wrote : 



My relations with the Indians of this 

 pueblo are very friendly. Sharing their 



food, their hardships, and their pleasures, 

 simple as they are, a mutual attachment has 

 formed itself, which grows into sincere 

 affection. They begin to treat me as one of 

 their own, and to exhibit toward me that 

 spirit of fraternity which prevails among 

 them in their communism. Of course they 

 have squabbles among themselves, which 

 often reveal to me some new features of their 

 organization; but on the whole they are the 

 best people the sun shines upon. How long 

 will they last? They progress slowly, but 

 still they are progressing. God preserve 

 them from any attempt at rapid "American- 

 ization." It would be their death-blow. 



At night, if they do not come to see me, 

 to sit around very modestly without inter- 

 ruption of my work, I sometimes go to call 

 on some of my nearest friends among them, 

 especially the Lieutenant of the "Capitan 

 della Guerra," Victoriano, a young man with 

 a small family. Squatting on one of their 

 low stools, hewn out of one block, or stretched 

 out side by side on scrapes, we chat and 

 smoke — water, out of the common tinaja, 

 being the only refreshment offered and ex- 

 pected. His wife and his sister go about, 

 mingling freely in the conversation — for 

 both sexes are on a footing of great equality. 

 We talk Spanish, and sometimes a word in 

 Queres. The girls tease me about my de- 

 fective pronunciation. 



In another letter he says : 



The Indians talk freely with me. Juan 

 Jose has begun to dictate to me in Queres the 

 history of Montezuma. I maintain my 

 original position — namely, that it is a stem 

 of Catholic ideas, and of the history of the 

 Conquest, and have even the proof of it. 

 The document will be at least linguistically 

 interesting. With the assistance of an 

 Indian friend, who has been at the school of 

 the Christian Brethren at Santa Fe, I am 

 beginning to assort my linguistic material 

 grammatically. 



