December 19, 1884] 



SCIENCE 



545 



In their marriage relations I found but little 

 difference from those of Eskimo better known. 

 The marriage contract is arranged early in life 

 by the parents, although Ikgueesik bought a 

 wife for his nearly grown brother, who was 

 also of my part} 7 , for the consideration of a 

 whaler's jack-knife. 



Their pugilistic encounters generally take 

 place between the ' best men ' of different vil- 

 lages, and especially of different tribes, so that 

 all my Eskimo were promptly challenged ; but 

 being feather weights, compared with these 

 giants, I interfered. Their fights are managed 

 somewhat in this way : one of the combatants, 

 sitting or standing, leans forward with both 

 hands or elbows resting on his knees, when his 

 opponent, with clinched fist, deals him such a 

 blow on the side of the head as he may see fit, 

 the first stroke being usually comparatively 

 light. No. 2 then takes his turn in leaning 

 forward, and No. 1 deals him a blow, generally 

 a little heavier than that he has just received. 

 This operation goes on until one or the other 

 is either knocked senseless, or rendered help- 

 less from sheer exhaustion. 



Another danger threatening the natives of 

 nry party was no less than the undertaking to 

 assassinate one of them, or possibly a white 

 man, should circumstances favor. Family 

 feuds are not unfrequent ; and, when a death 

 results, every male relative of the murdered 

 man feels bound to avenge the death by killing 

 some man of the offending tribe, the murderer 

 or some near relative being preferable. This 

 vengeance may be postponed almost indefinite- 

 h\ and friendly social relations maintained ; 

 but, slow as it is, it is sure to come, sooner 

 or later. 



I have known one of these murderers to 

 coolly take up his residence among his ene- 

 mies, and to all intents and purposes be as one 

 of them. Among the Netschilluks at the last 

 camp we visited was a powerfully built speci- 

 men of his tribe, Toolooah by name. Many 

 years before, — so many that he could not 

 count them on his fingers, and therefore could 

 not tell how many, — a relative of his had 

 fallen a victim at the hands of an Iwillik, and 

 had not yet been avenged. Although there 

 was not an Iwillik among us, still my own 

 Eskimo felt that an} 7 of us might fall to atone 

 for this ancient crime. They told me that 

 they felt satisfied that many of the natives 

 who watched our sledge-loading the morning 

 we left had long knives secreted in their 

 sleeves, should they need to defend the Net- 

 schilluk Toolooah, who still persisted in his 

 idea of revenge, should opportunit} 7 offer. 



But the sight of our man} T and wonderful 

 weapons frightened him into a peaceful atti- 

 tude. Singularly, these feuds never swell into 

 tribal wars. Frederick Schwatka. 



HOW THE PROBLEMS OF AMERICAN 

 ANTHROPOLOGY PRESENT THEM- 

 SELVES TO THE ENGLISH MIND. 1 



I have seldom, ladies and gentlemen, felt myself 

 in a more difficult position than I do at this moment. 

 Yesterday morning, when we returned from an expe- 

 dition out into the far west, — an expedition which 

 your president was to have joined, but which, to our 

 great regret, he was obliged to give up, — I heard that 

 at this meeting of the Anthropological society of 

 Washington I should be called upon to make, not 

 merely a five-minutes' speech, but a substantive ad- 

 dress; and since that time my mind has been almost 

 entirely full of the new things that I have been see- 

 ing and hearing in the domain of anthropology in this 

 city. I have been seeing the working of that un- 

 exampled institution, the Bureau of ethnology, and 

 studying the collections which, in connection with 

 the Smithsonian institution, have been brought in 

 from the most distant quarters of the continent; and 

 after that, in odd moments, I have turned it over in 

 my mind, What can I possibly say to the Anthropo- 

 logical society when I am called upon to face them 

 at thirty-six hours' notice ? I will not apologize : I 

 will do the best I can. 



I quite understand that Major Powell, who is a 

 man who generally has a good reason for every thing 

 that he does, had a good reason for desiring that an 

 anthropologist from England should say something 

 as to the present state of the new and growing sci- 

 ence in England as compared with its condition in 

 America, — for believing that some communication 

 would be acceptable between the old country and the 

 new, upon a subject where the inhabitants of both 

 have so much interest in common, and can render to 

 one another so much service in the direction of their 

 work. And therefore I take it that I am to say be- 

 fore you this evening, without elaborate oratory and 

 without even careful language, how the problems of 

 American anthropology present themselves to the 

 English mind. 



Now, one of the things that has struck me most in 

 America, from the anthropological point of view, is 

 a certain element of old-fashionedness. I mean old- 

 fashionedness in the strictest sense of the word, — 

 an old-fashionedness which goes back to the time of 

 the colonization of America. Since the Stuart time, 

 though America, on the whole, has become a country 

 of most rapid progress in development as compared 

 with other districts of the world, there has prevailed 

 in certain parts of it a conservatism of even an 

 intense character. In districts of the older states, 

 away from the centres of population, things that 

 are old-fashioned to modern Europe have held their 



1 A lecture delivered by Dr. Edward B. Tydor before the 

 Anthropological society of Washington, Oct. 11, 1SS4. 



