ELEPHANT TUSKS 421 



the carved spiral band adorning one of them. Dr. Carlos 

 E. Cummings, to whom we are indebted for much interest- 

 ing information regarding the Congo ivories of the Buffalo 

 Society of Natural History, remarks that the native carvers' 

 choice of the serial designs does not seem to have been 

 guided by any logical sequence of thought, and finds a 

 possible explanation of this in the fact that the carver, 

 Mabeale, executed the works in Buffalo under the new, 

 strange, and disturbing influence of a twentieth-century 

 exposition. Of the young Congo carver's personal appear- 

 ance — he was apparently not more than twenty years old — 

 Dr. Cummings says: "He possessed a mouth conspicuous 

 for its size even among his brethren, a nose hardly elevated 

 above his cheeks, and a face as absolutely devoid of intelli- 

 gence as one of his own carvings." Two of the tusks had 

 already been carved before his arrival in Buffalo; others 

 were finished in the twenty weeks of his stay there. In spite 

 of his unquestionable skill in making use of the simple tools 

 with which he was equipped, Mabeale was quite unable to 

 make any success in sketching with a pencil. As an ade- 

 quate illustration of the jumble of images in these spiral 

 tusk decorations, we here give a full description of one of 

 them carved in Africa before the native's departure for 

 America, and exhibiting seven complete turns of the spiral. 



1. The lower end of the spiral shows an alligator 7 J in. 

 long with its jaws closed on the thighs of a native boy. 2. 

 The house of Mons. X. Pene, complete with balcony and 

 windows, raised on posts above the ground; in front a flag 

 is flying from the flagpole. 3. Mons. Pene standing with 

 notebook and pencil, his foot resting on a bale of goods 

 placed on the ground. 4. Four native porters, bearing 

 bundles on their heads. 5. Three natives, chained to- 

 gether by the neck and bearing bundles of goods on their 

 heads, are followed by an Arab with fez sword and a flint- 



