Dec. 5, 1889] 



NATURE 



99 



it is clear that the right way to solve the problem is for 

 local authorities and School B,)ards to push ahead, as we 

 believe they can do without fear. The list read by Sir 

 Henry Roscoe at the opening of the proceedings shows 

 what progress in this direction has already been made 

 towards adopting the Act, and the Conference can hardly 

 fail to result in a still more vigorous attempt to make a 

 wise and extensive use of its provisions. 



AMERICAN ETHNOLOGICAL REPORTS. 



Sixth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the 

 Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1884-85. By 

 J. W. Powell, Director. (Washington : Government 

 Printing Office, 1888.) 



FROM the introductory remarks of the Director of the 

 Bureau, we learn that the results of the research 

 prosecuted among the North American Indians, as 

 directed by Act of Congress, were of special interest 

 during the continuance of the work in the fiscal year 

 1884-85. 



As in forme years, the labourers in the mound explora- 

 tions were remarkably successful, more especially in the 

 territories east of the Rocky Mountains, where Prof. 

 Cyrus Thomas, in 1885, and his coadjutors, Messrs. 

 Middleton and Thing, subsequently, made important 

 finds in Indian pottery, which were unique of their kind. 

 Even more valuable are the results of the explorations 

 carried on in New Mexico by Mr. and Mrs. Stevenson, 

 the latter of whom succeeded in obtaining the largest 

 and most important collection extant of objects relating 

 to the sociology of the Zuni tribes. This rare treasury 

 of Indian relics includes specimens of woven fabrics, 

 pottery, stone implements, both ancient and modern, 

 pictured urns, shrines, altars, sacred masks, fetishes, 

 plume sticks, and other objects connected with the 

 ancient mythology and religious practices of these people. 

 Owing to the great variety of the objects, their true 

 ■character cannot be determined without prolonged inves- 

 tigation, and in the meanwhile they have been deposited 

 in the U.S. Museum, where they await their final classi- 

 fication. According, however, to Mr, Curtis, these, as 

 well as the still more numerous collections of pottery, 

 stone implements, and other objects, amounting to 4000 

 specimens, which have been obtained in New Mexico, all 

 belong to the indigenous arts and industries of the 

 ancient tribes who occupied the almost unknown tracts 

 of Central America in which the Pueblo Indians are now 

 located. 



In the department of linguistic research, prosecuted 

 by the various employes of the Bureau, none have perhaps 

 been more successful than Mrs. Ermine Smith, who was 

 fortunate enough to discover two Onondaga MSS., and one 

 MS. in the Mohawk dialect, all of which she has anno- 

 tated and translated with the assistance of a half-caste 

 of Tuscaroran descent. The origin and history of these 

 MSS. are not distinctly known, but it is conjectured that 

 they are copies of originals which have been lost or 

 ■destroyed. In their present form, they are, however, 

 alike interesting from a sociological and a linguistic point 

 of view, for while the Mohawk MS. gives an account of 

 the religious rites and chants of the Iroquoian League 



which represented the elder members of the entire nation, 

 one of the Onondaga MSS. x'ecords the ritual in use 

 among the younger members of the same council, and 

 the other the form of address used by the chief Shaman 

 on the initiation of a newly elected chief. 



These curious records have been turned to good 

 account by Mrs Smith in the completion of her Tuscarora 

 dictionary, and in filling up her vocabulary for the " In- 

 troduction to the Study of the Indian Languages " now 

 preparing for publication. 



In the Far West, and especially in California, the 

 results of linguistic field-work are not equally satisfactory ; 

 and in the latter province, it would appear from the report 

 of Mr. Henshaw, who was charged with the inquiry, that 

 a number of the native dialects are extinct. Only a 

 month before his arrival, an old woman had died who 

 was the last person to speak the language of the Indians 

 of Santa Cruz. The search for still surviving members of 

 the several families of Indian languages current on the 

 arrival of the Spaniards has not, therefore, begun too 

 soon. The general results of these linguistic researches 

 are embodied in a work entitled " Proof-Sheets of a 

 Bibliography of the Languages of the North American 

 Indians." This volume, a quarto of more than iioo 

 pages, was compiled by Mr. Pilling, and issued in 1884 

 by the Institute, which, with its usual liberality, has dis- 

 tributed the hundred copies printed to other public insti- 

 tutions, and to the various collaborators in the work. 



In turning from the highly interesting explanatory 

 remarks of the Director to the various monographs con- 

 tained in the volume before us (a folio of more than 800 

 pages), we have first to notice the comprehensive and 

 profusely illustrated treatise of Mr. Holmes, "On the 

 Ancient Art of Chiriqui on the Isthmus of Panama." 



Here the author supplies the technologist with an 

 exhaustive history of the rise and development of 

 plastic and textile art in this part of the continent, while 

 he also treats fully of the literature and geography of this 

 hitherto little-known province, whose position between 

 North and South America imparted to the people some 

 of the characteristics of the civilization of both sections 

 of the western hemisphere. 



Almost the whole of the enormous mass of clay and 

 metal objects found in Chiriqui was extracted from tombs 

 in the various huancals, or cemeteries, which are scattered 

 over the Pacific slope of the province. These were first 

 made known to science by Mr. Merritt, the director of a 

 gold mine in Veragua, who, on hearing of the accidental 

 discovery of a gold figure in Chiriqui, visited the district, 

 and published a report of his explorations in 1859. From 

 him we learn that in 1858, after it became known that a 

 golden image had been discovered at Bugava, more than 

 1000 persons flocked to the spot, who it was estimated 

 had in that year collected 50,000 dollars' worth of gold 

 from one cemetery alone, which had an area of only 12 

 acres. A curious fact connected with the plastic decora- 

 tions of the Chiriqui vases and other objects is that no 

 vegetable forms have served the artificers as models, 

 animals alone having been used for the purpose, as 

 crocodiles, armadillos, monkeys, lizards, alligators, owing 

 probably to their zoo-mythic conceptions of their divini- 

 ties. Among the various groups of vases, the one com- 

 prising the so-called " alligator ware " is the most interest- 



