ORIGIN OF THE PHYSICAL FEATURES OF THE 

 UNITED STATES* 



By G. K. Gilbert, 



United States Geological Survey 



Fifteen 3^ears ago, on a September morning, I stood on a house- 

 top in Zuni, waiting for the rising of the sun. On other house- 

 tops here and there were other watchers, sitting or standing with 

 their faces toward the east, and close at my side stood a vener- 

 able priest of the Sun, oblivious of all else and gazing intently 

 on the spot where the sun should appear. From his neck hung 

 a small bag containing sacred meal. When the first streak of 

 light appeared above the eastern mesa his lips began to move, 

 and he repeated slowly and with low voice art invocation to the 

 Sun. Then, taking from the bag a small offering of the conse- 

 crated flour, he breathed upon it and cast it toward the east, 

 Cushing, who became a Zuni Indian that he might learn their 

 lore, tells us that this sun-rise ritual contains archaic words of 

 which few modern Zunis know the meaning — words related to the 

 modern Zuni tongue as Norman French to modern English, and 

 showing that the Zuni sun-worship began in remote times, far 

 beyond the possibility of historical determination. 



The Zuni's reverence for the sun-god is shared by many savage 

 tribes, and belongs to the early history of many civilized peoples. 

 In later stages of culture it is succeeded by the worship of ani- 

 mals, of the personified powers of nature, and of personified 

 mental power, so that with civilized man the old sun-worship 

 has disappeared; but there is a new sun-worship, introduced and 

 fostered by science, for science has discovered in the sun a creator 

 of wonderful versatility and power. 



Geographers worship also another nature-god, the inner earth 

 or the underground, a creator also and co-worker with the sun. 

 These two gods of physical geograph}^ were known to the Greeks 

 as Helios and Hades, to the Romans as Apollo and Pluto. In 



*The course of afternoon lectures arranged for the winter and spring of 1898 was 

 planned by the late President Hubbard to present the effect of geographic environment 

 on the civilization and progress of the United States. The present essay was prepared at 

 his request as the introductory lecture of the course, dealing with general principles 

 and the most comprehensive groups of natural features. 



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