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SCIENCE 



[N. S. Vol. XXV. No. 641 



just enumerated and it was undoubtedly that 

 of the other tribes until within a compara- 

 tively recent period. Turning to the exhibit 

 itself, it seriously fails as a whole to represent 

 adequately the wealth of the house life on the 

 plains. To judge of this failure by a single 

 example, the miniature tipi, thrown open so 

 as to permit a view of its interior, may be 

 taken. The model seems entirely inadequate 

 and appears rather as an interesting toy. Its 

 interior arrangement does not conform to that 

 of the Indian tipi ; the beds are represented as 

 on the ground ; the leanbacks are not in pairs, 

 and it is equally at fault in other details. The 

 little model consisting of two men, presumably 

 hunters or warriors, for their bows, arrows 

 and shields are near-by, is even more mislead- 

 ing. The group is either intended to repre- 

 sent men preparing a hasty meal while on the 

 hunt, in which case they would not, ordinarily, 

 boil their meat by hot stones in skin vessels, 

 or it represents a process of cooking, in which 

 case it would not be done by men, but by 

 women. The section devoted to the subject of 

 transportation presents some curious features. 

 In the section of the human burden-bearer 

 there is exhibited a pair of moccasins, which, 

 by the way, are a specialized type worn only 

 in winter by certain tribes, several cradle- 

 boards typical of no one tribe or group of 

 tribes, while at the top of the section is a poor 

 specimen of a packing strap badly shown. 



This plains exhibit, even more than that of 

 the Eskimo, is inconsistent. Whereas the first 

 section of this idealized exhibit treats the 

 plains as a unit, in the latter sections tribal 

 elements appear, thus introducing an amount 

 of detail which, however valuable it may be 

 for scientiiic purposes, seems out of keeping 

 with the idea of the exhibit. I refer especially 

 to the exhibit illustrating the warrior orders 

 of the Arapaho and Blackfeet. Of course, it 

 would have been possible to have maintained 

 a logical and consistent point of view through- 

 out this exhibit, in which case these specialized 

 exhibits would not appear, but in their stead 

 would be found a general treatment of the 

 religious and social life. No such attempt, 

 however, has been made. 



Throughout this exhibit, as in the Eskimo 



exhibit, is everywhere manifest the result of 

 the conscious effort to make the cases look 

 pretty, to have the object on one's right bal- 

 ance in size with that on one's left, quite re- 

 gardless of whether it illustrates anything or 

 not. After all, the chief defect of this exhibit 

 of the plains is that, in attempting to illus- 

 trate an idealized culture, it not only fails to 

 recognize the actual conditions which exist in 

 that culture, it not only makes it impossible 

 to study these conditions and the reasons 

 therefor, but it assumes that all peoples within 

 this area had a common culture. To illustrate 

 this by a single observation — when a buckskin 

 shirt is shown as the costume of a man the 

 casual visitor would assume that all the men 

 wore buckskin shirts, presumably of this pat- 

 tern, whereas many Indians on the plains wore 

 no shirts at all. The labels here, as in the 

 Eskimo exhibit, are prolific in number, but 

 generally of a trivial kind, conveying informa- 

 tion of a kindergarten nature. 



Such exhibits as those above characterized 

 might with some degree of propriety be found 

 in the lower grades of the public school, but 

 they certainly do not seem worthy of an insti- 

 tution which claims to be foremost among 

 American museums. If exhibits of this na- 

 ture are advisable, it would seem that there is 

 no reason for the concentration under one 

 roof of large collections. If the purpose of 

 the general public is to be served by such 

 exhibits it would seem desirable that the great 

 bulk of the collections which are now being 

 stored should be distributed among some ten 

 or twenty of the high schools of the city, for 

 thus the ideal of this scheme might the more 

 easily and cheaply be realized. Or, again, 

 this type of installation might very well be 

 adopted in a small institution with extremely 

 limited resources, or it might even be adopted 

 for a single one of the great halls of the Amer- 

 ican Museum; indeed, it is conceivable that 

 one of the halls, such as the north hall of the 

 main floor, might very appropriately, in this 

 institution, be given up to an exhibit, in the 

 briefest and most concise manner possible, 

 which would attempt to represent the great 

 general areas of culture which exist among 

 the different peoples of the earth. Such a hall 



