November 28, 1884.] 



SCIENCE, 



499 



part of a collection of exotics ; but since the 

 reason for their many strange and complicated 

 forms was set forth by Mr. Darwin, in his work 

 on their fertilization, the name ' orchid ' at once 

 suggests a plant worthy of more careful study. 

 While we do not have Angraecum, Pterostylis, 

 or Catasetum among our wild plants, to indicate 

 the extreme adaptation to insect-pollination of 

 which the family is capable, our flora contains 

 many species quite as interesting to the student 

 as those to be seen in most collections ; and 

 Mr. Baldwin has done very good service in 

 collecting the scattered notes on their pecul- 

 iarities. Of the fifty-nine species or well- 

 marked varieties of our eastern flora, no less 

 than forty-seven are found in New England ; 

 so that the book is of more than local interest. 

 With few exceptions, the sixty illustrations, 

 the larger ones mostly from nature, are very 

 good ; some are excellent, and show not only 

 a botanist's knowledge, but an artist's appre- 

 ciation of light and shade and of the value 

 of a well-selected background. The w r riter's 

 style is pleasing ; and, if the professional bot- 

 anist might feel disposed at times to criticise 

 it as sacrificing something of precision for the 

 sake of avoiding technicality, it contrasts very 

 favorably with the many popular books whose 

 only merit is their style, since every page 

 shows personal study. It is not surprising 

 that a popular book on a group which has long 

 been an object of special observation should 

 contain little that is new ; yet this is far from 

 being entirely devoid of new matter, and is 

 worthy of a place on the shelves of the specialist 

 as well as of the amateur. 



INDIAN FOLK-LORE AND ETHNOLOGY. 



The Algonquin legends of New England ; or, Myths 

 and folk-lore of the Micmac, Passamaquoddy , and 

 Penobscot tribes. By Charles G. Leland. 

 Boston, Houghton, Mifflin, fy Co., 1884. 400 p. 

 12°. 



A migration legend of the Creek Indians, with a lin- 

 guistic, historic, and ethnographic introduction. 

 By Albert S. Gatschet, of the U. S. bureau 

 of ethnology. Vol. i. [Libr. abor. Amer. lit., 

 iv.] Philadelphia, Brinton, 1884. 257 p. 8°. 



The comparison of languages, if made on 

 scientific principles, affords undoubtedly the 

 best, and indeed the only sure, means of tra- 

 cing the relationship of different branches of 

 the human race. Next to this method, though 

 at a long interval, comes the study of their 

 myths and legends. This study, though infe- 

 rior in the certainty of its deductions to that 



of comparative philology, has certain evident 

 advantages in other respects. We learn from 

 it the intellectual and moral traits of the peo- 

 ple who preserve and repeat the legends. We 

 get to understand their habits of life, their 

 ways of thought, their views of this world, and 

 their ideas of a future life. Occasionally, also, 

 we gather traces of genuine tradition, some- 

 times even of a far distant past, which, when 

 corroborated by the evidence of language and 

 perhaps other memorials, ma}' be of real his- 

 torical value. 



Mr. Leland has been obliged by w r ant of 

 space, as he tells us, to exclude from his pres- 

 ent work the historical legends which he has 

 collected, and which, it is to be hoped, will be 

 hereafter published. His work is thus entirely 

 made up, as its titlepage professes, of what 

 may properly be termed the ' myths and folk- 

 lore ' of the eastern or Abenaki branch of the 

 great Algonquin race. As such it must be 

 deemed one of the most valuable as well as 

 most interesting contributions that have been 

 made to this department of knowledge. The 

 collection comprises some seventy stories, dis- 

 tributed under different heads, such as ' Gloos- 

 hap the divinity,' ' The merry tales of Lox the 

 mischief-maker,' 'The amazing adventures of 

 Master Rabbit,' ' The Chenoo legends,' ' Tales 

 of magic,' and some minor divisions- The 

 whole work shows the hand of an experienced 

 writer, who is at once practised in the literary 

 art, and alive to the requirements of science. 

 The stories themselves display much imagina- 

 tive power and a genuine sense of droller}'. 

 As evidence of intellectual capacity in their 

 framers, some of them will bear comparison 

 with any thing contained in Grimm's Teutonic 

 legends. Mr. Leland is disposed to consider 

 them superior to the legendary tales of the 

 other Indian tribes, but in this view he is 

 certainly mistaken. There is no reason for 

 supposing that the Abenaki Indians surpassed 

 in intelligence the Algonquin tribes of the west 

 and south, or their neighbors of the Huron- 

 Iroquois stock. These, indeed, are known to 

 possess a folk-lore of remarkable extent and 

 interest, which, in the specimens we possess, 

 is not at all inferior to that disclosed to us in 

 the present volume. 



The author, in his preface, modestly an- 

 nounces that his chief object has been, not to 

 discuss theories, but to collect and preserve 

 valuable material for the use of better ethnolo- 

 gists to come hereafter, who, as he humorously 

 suggests, " will be much more obliged to him 

 for collecting raw material than for cooking- 

 it." This captivating humility, the reader 



