[N MEMORIAM— JAMES MOONEY 



(PL 1) 



I consider it an obvious act of piety to dedicate tliis paper to the 

 memory of the scientist who devoted so much of his erudition and 

 enthusiasm to the ethnological study of the North American Indians, 

 and particularly of the Cherokee; to a man without whose previous ' 

 intelUgent research and pubhcations the following pages could not 

 now be offered to the pubUc. 



The glowing tribute paid to him in the name of his colleagues and 

 friends by Dr. John R. Swanton in the American Anthropologist, 

 volume 24, No. 2, April-June, 1922, pages 209-214, has done him justice 

 from one quarter only. Doctor Swanton was the eloquent spokesman 

 of James Mooney's white friends. When I went to hve with the 

 Cherokee of the Great Smoky Mountains to continue the work of 

 Mooney I found that his departure had been felt as cruelly by his 

 Indian friends as by his white colleagues. The mere statement that 

 I came to stay with them with the same purpose in view as had uq^do' 

 (Mooney's Cherokee name, meanuig "moon") served as the best 

 introduction I could have desired. People who looked askance, and 

 medicine men who looked sullen when first approached, changed as if 

 touched by a magic wand as they heard his name and as I explamed 

 my connection with his work. 



From all that I heard I concluded that his life and his dealings with 

 our mutual friends, the Cherokee, were a stimulating example for 

 me, and I was well satisfied whenever I heard my conduct and my 

 person not too unfavorably compared with that of my sympathetic 

 predecessor. 



The line of research which Mooney had started in the Cherokee field 

 was too interesting not to be followed up ; the results he had obtained 

 demanded still a considerable amount of further study, both in the 

 field and at the desk. It is sad indeed that he did not have the satis- 

 faction of seeing this manuscript pubhshed before he passed away 

 from his beloved Cherokee studies. But the fife of a scientist and a 

 pioneer like Mooney is not of threescore and ten only. He continues 

 to Hve for generations in his splendid and altruistic work, in monu- 

 ments more durable than stone. 



I consider it a great honor and an enviable privilege to link my name 

 with his, and at the same time to be able to contribute something 

 more to the memory of James Mooney, by offering to the public the 

 results of our joint work contained in the following pages. 



Frans M. Olbrechts. 



Kessel-Loo, Belgium, 

 Christmas, 1928. 

 7548°— 32 2 xvii 



