Sketches From Oldest America 



It is doubtful if these masks were very good like 

 nesses of the individuals, but they have served their 

 purpose remarkably well. It is also doubtful if our 

 more civilized artists could have done much better 

 than these untrained sculptors with the same rude 

 tools and materials with which they had to work. 

 Sometimes the untutored artist would create an un 

 satisfactory face, one rather hideous in its appear 

 ance; then he would declare that he had made the 

 face of Toongna. At other times faces would be 

 created without any intention of their representing 

 any particular individual. Such faces were hung up 

 in homes for the same reason that we adorn our 

 walls with oil paintings or photographs, simply to 

 look at them. Other large faces were made and 

 used in the festivities of a feast, but I have never 

 learned that such faces were looked upon with any 

 degree of superstition, as many have supposed. 



108 



