REPORT OF THE SECRETARY. 87 



tutelary. The researches conducted in the Bureau have already rendered it clear 

 that decoration, and indeed the greater portion of the fine arts, arises in symbolism 

 and develops through conventionism; and the researches of the year suggest a related 

 genesis for industries. The results of the work are in preparation for full publication. 



While among the surviving aborigines of California, Mr. W J McGee was enabled 

 to make observations corroborating and extending generalizations already framed 

 with respect to those of the primitive industries involving the use of stone as material 

 for iniijlements. The several tribes studied may conveniently be classed as Acorn 

 Indians, since acorns form their principal source of food, and since their character- 

 istic industries are conditioned by this food supply. Some of the processes and 

 implements vary from tribe to tribe; e. g., in some tribes the acorns are cracked in 

 the teeth in order that the meats may be extracted, in others they are cracked with 

 spheroidal hammer-stones, and in still others an elongated pestle-like stone, grasped 

 by one hand and used in the fashion of a club or civilized hammer, is employed for 

 the same purpose. Other devices, such as those used for grinding the acorn meats, 

 are substantially alike from tribe to tribe; though it is noteworthy that in each tribe 

 there is a diversity growing out of the age of the apparatus, or the degree of develop- 

 ment by use. Thus it is found that the nether millstone, which may be either a ledge 

 or other mass in place of a portable bowlder, is, in the early stages of use, a flat or 

 slightly concave metate, which after more extended use becomes a deeply concave 

 metate, still later a shallow mortar, and at length a deep mortar which may event- 

 ually be worn through, if the original mass is not more than 9 to 15 inches in thick- 

 ness; while the grinding-stone concordantly changes from a simple roller or i-rusher 

 to a mano (or muller) , and finally to a pestle, at first broad and short, but after- 

 wards long and slender. It follows that in this region the northerly device of the 

 mortar and the southerly device of the metate overlap; yet it is much more sig- 

 nificant that the overlapping is essentially genetic, and only incidentally geographic. 

 Not infrequently the genesis of an individual mill corresponds with the rise and 

 passing of a family; the young woman may begin life with a bowlder, flat on one 

 side, and a few river-worn cobbles as a mill, which is then used as a metate; gradu- 

 ally the mill develops into a mortar, with a well-rounded and polished pestle, 

 shaped chiefly by wear, perhaps supiilemented l)y slight dressing, on which she 

 grinds vigoronsly in her old age for the support of her daughters and their hus- 

 bands, and the growing grandchildren; and on her death apparently the pestle is 

 broken and the bottom knocked out of the mortar. Neglecting the final act, the 

 indivitlual growth of the primitive mill well epitomizes the phylogeny of its species, 

 and demonstrates that in general the mortar must be regarded as the differentiated 

 and eventually ilegraded offspring of a metate-like' prototype, whence sprang also 

 the metate along one line and the (juirn and its derivatives along another. It is par- 

 ticularly significant, too, that the milling apparatus still used by the Californian 

 natives consists initially of naturally-formed ledges or bowlders, with stream-worn 

 cobbles for grinders, and that both liowlder and cobble are, for the niost])art, shaped 

 gradually by wear, without definite recognition of the shaping on the part of the 

 operator — i. e., that the mills represent protolithic culture, rather than the tecluioli- 

 thic art characterized by designs and models. 



The plan for the Indian Congress at Omaha (mentioned in a preceding paragraph) 

 was formulated chiefly by Mr. James Mooney, in connection with Hon. Edward 

 Rosewater, president of the board of publicity and promotion of the exiMisition, 

 though conditions connected with administrative control and policing of the Indians 

 assembled on the grounds led to the assignment of a representative of the Indian 

 Bureau, Capt. W. A. Mercer, as officer in charge of the congress; but ]\Ir. Mooney 

 cooperateil in the installation and remained on the ground throughout the exposition. 

 In accordance with the plans of Messrs. Mooney and Rosewater, the Indians wert> 

 domiciled, so far as practicable, in houses or lodges of their own construction, and of 



