REPORT OF THE SECRETARY. 17 
BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY. 
The usual activities of the Bureau of American Ethnology, defined 
by law as “ ethnological researches among the American Indians, in- 
cluding the excavation and preservation of archeologic remains,” 
have been carried on during the year under the direction of Dr. J. 
Walter Fewkes, chief. Intensive studies were made of the dying lan- 
guages of the numerous Indian tribes in order to discover the rela- 
tionship of the various stocks of the aborigines and to gain a clearer 
insight into the origin, history, and migration of man on this con- 
tinent. The continued study of the material culture of the Indians 
also has its practical value, while another instructive line of work 
relates to the history of the Indians both before and after the advent 
of Europeans. 
Field researches include, in addition to those mentioned above, 
the excavation and preservation of archeological remains. A few of 
these researches are mentioned very briefly here in order to show the 
nature of the work. A somewhat more detailed account of these and 
other undertakings of the bureau during the year will be found in an 
appendix hereto. Valuable work was done by Dr. Fewkes in the 
McElmo and tributary canyons in Colorado and in Utah as far west 
as Montezuma Canyon, on the aboriginal castles and towers of that 
region, and through his efforts the Aztec Spring Ruin was presented 
by the owner, Mr. Henry van Kleeck, of Denver, to the National 
Park Service, and accepted by the Secretary of the Interior. 
Dr. J. R. Swanton, ethnologist, devoted much of his time to the 
collection of material from published sources for a study of the 
economic background of the life of the American Indians north of 
Mexico. He has also continued his study of the languages of the 
Indians of the lower Mississippi Valley and of the social systems of 
the Choctaw and Chickasaw Indians. 
Mr. J. N. B. Hewitt, ethnologist, prepared for the press the 
Onondaga version of the Myth of the Beginnings, the Genesis Myth 
of the Iroquoian peoples, and continued his previous study of the 
league. 
Mr. Francis LaFlesche, ethnologist, is now completing for publica- 
tion his notes on the rite of the chiefs, the tribal rite of the Osage 
people. In this ritual is embodied the story of the four stages of the 
development of the tribal government, including both the military 
and the civil forms, beginning with the chaotic state of the tribal 
existence. 
Mr. J. P. Harrington, ethnologist, has obtained. important corrob- 
orative evidence of the validity of his discovery that there is a close 
genetic relationship between Tanoan pueblo dialects of New Mexico 
