46 REPORT OF THE SECRETARY. 



.archives relating to aboriginal mythology. While in charge of the United States 

 Geographical and Geological Survey of the Rocky Mountain region, before the Bureau 

 was instituted, the Director began the collection of myths among the Indians of the 

 Territories, and when the Bureau was created this material, in connection with a 

 body of linguistic manuscripts obtained by the Smithsonian Institution, formed the 

 original archives. Additional material was collected from time to time by the 

 Director and by several of the collaborators, and there are now some hundreds of 

 manuscript records ready for study. Satisfactory progress has been made in the 

 preliminary arrangement of the manuscripts and in the extraction and classification 

 of salient features in the primitive mythology prevailing among all of the native 

 tribes before the advent of the white man. 



Mrs. Matilda Coxe Stevenson has continued the final revision of her manuscript 

 for a memoir on the Zuiii Indians, designed for incorporation in the nineteenth 

 annual report. Most of the chapters are now complete, and nearly all of the illus- 

 trations are ready for reproduction. The Pueblo Indians well illustrate certain 

 results of environment in the development of belief and ceremony. A harsh envi- 

 ronment begets profound faith; this is illustrated by the history of many cults. 

 The Pueblo region was a gathering ground of primitive faiths, each fertilizing the 

 others in accordance with the law already set forth and each intensified by hard 

 local conditions. The northern tribes, who furnished much of the blood of the Pueblo 

 peoples, were pressed down from more humid regions and brought into conflict with 

 alien warriors and with an arid habitat in which the specters of thirst and famine 

 were ever present ; the southern tribes, who furnished most of the culture of the 

 Pueblos, were in part at least forced up toward the plateaus from the still more arid 

 district* about the present national boundary into which they had fled, as the excess 

 of population from the more fertile districts of pre-Columbian Mexico. All of the 

 peoples were shadowed by the dangers of drought and by the hard labor required for 

 the maintenance of existence ; all were accustomed to invocations for rain ; all were 

 accustomed to ceremonies connected with the growth of corn; all were accustomed 

 to reverence of beast-gods, and all ascribed their preservation from ever-present 

 danger to their success in propitiating the maleficent mysteries by which they were 

 surrounded — for that which is simply a hard natural condition to the advanced 

 thinker is always a maleficent potency to the primitive thinker. All of the circum- 

 stances were such as to develop a profoundly devotional cast of mind among the 

 Pueblo peoples; and their myths and ceremonies became so striking as to attract 

 the attention of students throughout the world, as white men came in contact with 

 them. Mrs. Stevenson's researches concerning the myths and ceremonies have been 

 exceptionally thorough, and the results now nearly ready for publication will form 

 a substantial contribution to the knowledge of aboriginal mythology. 



DESCRIPTIVE ETHNOLOGY. 



During the year the important work of compiling a Cyclopedia of Indian Tribes 

 of North America was continued by Mr. F. W. Hodge, with the assistance of Dr. 

 Cyrus Thomas, the former carrying forward the work in connection with other 

 duties. Dr. Thomas completed the preliminary arrangement of the material relating 

 to the tribes of the Algonquian stock, submitting the material for editorial revision. 

 He afterward took up the manuscript and literature relating to the tribes of the 

 Siouan stock, and has made satisfactory progress in the arrangement of the material. 



COLLECTIONS. 



A number of collections have been acquired during the year under the more imme- 

 diate direction of the Secretary. Some of these are noted above; in addition there 

 have been acquired (1) a collection of Jamaican antiquities by MacCormack, includ- 

 ing 160 specimens of ancient stone implements, earthenware, etc., and 20 petaloid 



