THE PROBLEMS OF ARCHEOLOGY 541 



sions, so far as the comparison of art-forms has been used as a 

 basis for still further-reaching conclusions, nowhere as yet has the 

 often-repeated assertion that the development of the tribes on this 

 continent was the result of influences coming either eastward or 

 westward from what we call the Old World found any support. On 

 the contrary, the researches of the Jesup expedition have almost 

 conclusively proved that in the northwest there took place an over- 

 flow of American civilization, a spread of American elements of 

 population, to the Asiatic side of the Behring Sea. For that science, 

 also, which tries to search out the mysteries of the laws which have 

 governed the human mind in its development from its obscure 

 beginnings, the observations which we have made or are in a posi- 

 tion to make on American soil will be of greater importance than 

 those made in any other part of the world. For the observations 

 made here have all the advantages of pure experiment. That is the 

 special privilege of American studies, and the special interest which 

 attaches to them. To provide the material for that comprehensive 

 science, the study of the human race as a whole is thus not only 

 the real and greatest task of American archeology, but also its 

 most rewarding. It will be a great joy to me if the conviction of 

 this shall spread in ever wider circles, and bring to American arche- 

 ology the new laborers of which it still has such pressing need. 



