1038 The American Naturalist. [November, 
assemblage. Mr. Mooney stated that the present Messiah excitement is 
not the first of its kind among the Indians, and is not even peculiar 
to the race. It is only another expression of the universal longing for 
a happiness that died when the world was young, and a faith that in a 
time yet to come we shall be able to close our eyes upon present mis- 
eries and waken again to the realization of the old ideals. The Mes- 
siah doctrine is born of the despair of the Indian, who finds himself 
helpless and starving before the white man, and sees no hope but in the 
direct interference of a redeemer of the red race, who is invoked in 
the wild ceremonial of the ghost dance. The present agitation origi- 
nated among the Poiites in Nevada, and was carried by native apostles 
to nearly every tribe of the plains and mountains from the British 
border almost to Mexico. The belief is that the whites are to be dis- 
possed, and that the land will be restored to the Indians, together with 
the buffalo and other game and all the old-time Indian life. There are 
various theories as to how this will be accomplished, the favorite one 
being that a new earth, upon which are all the dead Indians, the buf- 
falo and other game, will come, preceded by a wall of fire, and slide 
over this old world. The believers will be lifted up over the wall of 
fire by means of the sacred crow feathers which they wear on their 
heads, while the whites will be driven before the fire to the eastern land 
across the the water from which they came. In the dance they pray 
for the speedy coming of their deliverance, and sing of the old pleas- 
ures of the hunt and the camp, and of their present miserable condi- 
tion. These songs are all plaintive in tone, and many of them are 
really beautiful. The great majority are in the Arapaho language. 
Those who become unconscious in the trance—through the intense 
nervous strain and the hypnotic action of the priests—catch glimpses 
of the glory to come, and on awaking recite these visions in songs 
which are taken up at the next dance. As many as a dozen frequently 
become unconscious in a single night, and lie for hours perfectly rigid 
upon the ground. 
The following papers were considered as read by title and passed for 
want of time: An Ancient Human Cranium from Southern Mexico, 
F. W. Putnam. The Length of a Generation, C. M. Woodward. 
Burial Customs of the Hurons, Chas. A. Hirschfelder. Study of a 
Dwarf, Frank Baker. Stone Drills and Perforations in Stone from 
the Susquehanna River, Atreus Wanner. Evidences of the High Anti- 
quity of Man in America, Thos. Wilson. On Bone, Copper, and 
Slate Implements Found in Vermont, G. H. Perkins. Some Archeo- 
logical Contraventions, Gerard Fowke. On the Distribution of Stone 
PEE a en 
Ear or 


