Febrtjabt 18, 1887.] 



SCIENCE. 



149 



tions of his woodcraft, to learn to chop timber right 

 and left handed ; and the carpenter may be fre- 

 quently seen using the saw and hammer in either 

 hand, and thereby not only resting his arm, but 

 greatly facilitating his work. In all the fine arts 

 the mastery of both hands is advantageous. The 

 sculptor, the carver, the draughtsman, the en- 

 graver and cameo-cutter, each has recourse at 

 times to the left hand for special manipulative 

 dexterity ; the pianist depends little less on the 

 left hand than on the right ; and as for the organ- 

 ist, with the numerous pedals and stops of the 

 modem grand organ, a quadrumanous musician 

 would still find reason to envy the ampler scope 

 which a Briareus could command." That all 

 this is true is abundantly shown by the numerous 

 examples cited by the author, — from the greatest 

 of artists, the left-handed Lionardo da Vinci, to 

 the distinguished ex-president of the American 

 scientific association, Prof. Edward F. Morse, and 

 (we may add) to Dr. Wilson himself, both of 

 whom are known to be accomplished draughts- 

 men with this too-neglected hand. In view of 

 these facts, it is evident that few more important 

 subjects can be offered for the consideration of 

 educators than that which is presented in this 

 impressive essay. 



THE HUP A INDIANS: AN ETHNOGRAPHIC 

 SKETCH. 



One who has charge of a museum is frequently 

 told, " I should be delighted to help you if I only 

 knew what you want." In the former articles of 

 this illustrated series special arts have been elabo- 

 rated in order to explain the completeness desired 

 in anthropotechnic collections. The present paper 

 appeals to the traveller, the missionary, the army 

 or navy officer or private, and shows what any 

 one of them may do at his leisure. 



Since his expedition to Point Barrow, Lieutenant 

 Ray, U.S.A., has been stationed at Fort Gaston, in 

 north-west California, on the lower Trinity River. 

 Here is the Hupa reservation, and here dwell what 

 are called the Hupa Indians, — bands known by 

 various names, but nearly all belonging to the 

 Pacific coast branch of the great Athabascan 

 stock, represented by the Kulchin and Tinne on 

 the north, and by the Apache and Navajo on the 

 south. Before these aborigines were terrorized by 

 the white miners and fishermen, they were, in the 

 language of Stephen Powers, the Romans of Cali- 

 fornia. Although they have been calmed down 

 to the normal stagnation of a government reserva- 

 tion, there remains a great deal of the old art and 

 civilization among them. They are really in the 

 neolithic age, and may tell us much about the way 



in which Frenchmen of the Robenhausien epoch 

 lived. 



If we commence by saying that their mountain 

 homes are in the midst of giant redwoods, that 

 their streams are the resorts of the salmon, that 

 around them grow the materials for the finest 

 textiles and clothing, the story of their daily life 

 is blocked out. 



The Hupa lives in a puncheon or slab house (see 

 accompanying plate, 1, 2), and paddles his canoe 

 of redwood in the fish-prolific waters of the Trinity 

 and Klamath. By means of elkhorn wedges and 

 neatty polished, bell-shaped hammers, he is able to 

 reduce the largest tree to any desired form of 

 slab, which he smooths and shapes with adzes, 

 formerly flint-bladed, now edged with steel. He 

 also cleansed himself in a sweat-house, sat on a 

 humble chair (4), slept like an oriental on a pillow 

 of wood (5), and nursed his baby in the prettiest 

 of willow cradles (3). His mush he cooked in a 

 water-tight grass basket (6) by means of hot stones 

 (7), baked his bread in rude soapstone pans (9), 

 and served his roasted salmon in a wicker tray (8). 

 Since the U. S. fish-hatching station has been 

 planted not far oflf, he gently scoops around the 

 wharf in rude citizen's dress ; but formerly he 

 made a barbed harpoon from the leg-bone of the 

 deer (10) and rawhide, and therewith landed the 

 wildest salmon. 



Neither ancient nor modern savage could sur- 

 pass him in chipping jasper and obsidian. His 

 lames de silex, whether fur-wrapped (13), hafted 

 in wood (14), or on a long pole for fishing (15), are 

 justly the admiration of the world. His finest 

 weapons, however, were his bows and arrows (16). 

 The bow is of yew or cedar, and so deftly backed 

 with a mixture of shredded deer-sinew and fish- 

 glue that the uninitiated mistake the backing for 

 a tough bark. His arrow consists of the following 

 parts : shaft of willow or other soft wood ; fore- 

 shaft of hard wood, inserted in the pith of the 

 shaft and seized with sinew ; head of jasper or 

 obsidian, untanged, and lashed with sinew ; and 

 the feather often laid on spirally. Add a pretty 

 quiver of otter, fox, or wolverine skin, and the 

 artillery is complete. 



The Hupa women are among the most refined 

 and delicate tanners, embroiderers, and basket- 

 weavers in the world. A cloak of deerskin (19), 

 fringed and decked with colored grass, or a skirt 

 of pine-nuts, etc., is a most graceful drapery. 



The Hupa has a kind of money (17) made by 

 wrapping snake-skin or maiden-hair fern bark 

 around long dentalium shells (17). He also cuts 

 out disks from the clam or olive shells. The 

 former money he keeps in a curious pocket-book 

 of elkhorn hollowed out and wrapped with buck- 



