INQUIRIES AND SUGGESTIONS 



SIGN-LANGUAGE AMONG THE NORTH AMERICAN INDIANS. 



BY GARRICK MALLERY. 



INTRODUCTORY. 



The Bureau of Ethnology of the Smithsonian Institution has in prep- 

 aration a work upon Sign-Language among the North American Indians, 

 and, further, intended to be an exposition of the gesture-speech of mankind 

 thorough enough to be of suggestive use to students of philology and of 

 anthropology in general. The present paper is intended to indicate the 

 scope of that future publication, to excite interest and invite correspond- 

 ence on the subject, to submit suggestions as to desirable points and modes 

 of observation, and to give notice of some facilities provided for descrip- 

 tion and illustration. 



The material now collected and collated is sufficient to show that the 

 importance of the subject deserves exhaustive research and presentation by 

 scientific methods instead of being confined to the fragmentary, indefinite, 

 and incidental publications thus far made, which have never yet been united 

 for comparison, and are most of them difficult of access. Many of the 

 descriptions given in the lists of earlier date than those contributed during 

 the past year in response to special request are too curt and incomplete to 

 assure the perfect reproduction of the sign intended, while in others the 

 very idea or object of the sign is loosely expressed, so that for thorough 

 and satisfactory exposition they require to be both corrected and supple- 

 mented, and therefore the cooperation of competent observers, to whom 

 1 s L 



