268* THE SERI INDIANS [eth.ann.17 



side. The Seri miud is (1) local, (2) chance dominated, (3) exceeding 

 lowly, and especially (4) autochthonal iu its content and workings. 



There is an aspect of the inference as to the local and autochthonal 

 character of the Seri mind which is of wide-reaching application. As 

 indicated by many tribes, though most clearly by the Seri, there is a 

 definite relation between the somatic characteristics of primitive folk 

 and their environment; the indications are that the relation is inversely 

 proportionate to development, the lowliest tribes retiecting environ- 

 ment most closely, and the higher peoples responding less delicately to 

 the environmental pressure in the ratio of their increased power of 

 nature concjuest; and the relation is essentially phylogenetic, in that it 

 sums and integrates the innumerable interactions between organic kind 

 and environment during generations or ages. It is to be realized that 

 the relation is not simple and direct or physiologic merely (e. g., like 

 that between climate and the pelage of an animal), but that it is linked 

 through the human activities; for, as is conspicuously the case in Seri- 

 land, the environment prompts exercises of particular kinds, and it is 

 these exercises that shape the somatic features, such as strength of 

 lung, length of limb, and the soundness of constitution displayed iu 

 physical endurance; yet the relation is none the less real, in that it 

 operates through the activities rather than directly. The relation may 

 be characterized with respect to mechanism as bodily responsion, or 

 with respect to capacity as responsivity of body. Now, as is well illus- 

 trated by the provincial ideation of the Seri, the relation between environ- 

 ment and physique is accomijanied by a corresponding relation between 

 environment and thought. This relation, too, varies inversely with 

 development, the connection being closest among the most primitive 

 tribes, and growing less and less close with maturing mentality and 

 proportionately increasing power of nature-contest; and the relation 

 is still less direct (or physiologic merely) than that between the human 

 body and its environment, in that not only the bodily activities but the 

 instinctive and nascently ratiocinative processes are interposed. This 

 relation between mind and environment may be characterized as mental 

 responsion in its mechanical aspect, or as responsivity of mind when 

 regarded as a psychic property.' Accordingly, the relation between 

 the tribal mind and its environment, as illumined by the peculiarly 

 delicate interactions observed among the Seri, seem to indicate the 

 genesis and earlier developmental stages of mentality in its multifarious 

 aspects. 



The specially significant feature of the relatiou between environment 

 on the one hand and body + mind on the other is its diminishing 

 value with general intellectual advancement. Viewed serially, the 



* The responsivity of mind has been defined elsewhere as the basis of knowledge, and as one of five 

 fundamental i)rinciple3 of sriemi- (The Caidiiial Principles of Science, Proceedings of the Washing- 

 ton Academy of Sciences, vol. ii, 1900, pp. 1-12). 



