HO UGH— EXPERIMENTAL WORK 



ments, and the whole work is replete with examples of the author's 

 acumen as to aboriginal technology. The continuation of this work 

 to the present day has aided greatly in clarifying American archeology 

 and has given a stimulus and added interest to the science. The work 

 of the school of American archeologists and ethnologists of which 

 Holmes is a pioneer put an end to the futile efforts of the old school 

 of anthropologists who sought to generalize without adequate observa- 

 tion and wholly without experiment. The records of earlier observers 

 were interesting, but generally woefully incomplete, and the writings 

 on the whole may now be regarded as belonging to the mythical age 

 of anthropology whose fancies and inexactness long kept the science 

 in America in what was little better than disrepute. The course of 

 investigation which Holmes outlined and forced home by precept 

 and example was taken up by Mason, Cushing, McGuire, and a few 

 others who formed the school of American anthropologists which has 

 left a profound impression on the science. These men were foremost 

 in the field, they were pioneers of aboriginal American technology. 

 They saw beyond dead artifacts some portions of the story of the 

 development of the arts and sciences, the beginnings of the conquest 

 of the mighty forces that are at the command of the men of the present 

 day. No romance is more fascinating than that recorded in the story 

 of the steps by which great industries arose from humble beginnings, 

 and no pursuit is more enthralling than the tracing of this history 

 whose educational and scientific value are beyond computation. These 

 men saw the nexus between archeology and ethnology; they believed 

 it unscientific to limit any branch of the great field of research to the 

 activities classified directly under its name. They saw that science is 

 an organic whole, each unit of which sweeps from nebula to life and 

 is dependent upon and mutually helpful to all other units. 



They also realized in some measure as unscientific the tendency 

 to enwrap in mysten - he artifacts of man which are separated from 

 the present merely lapse of time. In this respect there has been 

 great need for scie .ric soundness and conservation of research, quali- 

 ties which are preeminent in Holmes. For a number of years the 

 branch of ethnology has gradually confined its activities to culture 

 history of existent peoples. Archeology, however, has increased in 

 importance and may be said to rank with ethnology, the distinctions 

 in America being almost lacking. Material culture unites the two 

 branches of anthropology, which have always been strengthened 

 whenever the resources of each were employed. Archeology and 

 ethnology, so far as America is concerned, are handmaids and work 

 together upon the basal problems of human activities. 



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