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SCIENCE 



[Vol. IV., No. 



knowing; how Major Powell is not only a great ex- 

 plorer and worker himself, but has the art of infus- 

 ing his energy and enthusiastic spirit through the 

 branches of an institution which stands almost alone, 

 being, on the one hand, an institution doing the work 

 of a scientific society, and, on the other hand, an in- 

 stitution doing that work with the power and lever- 

 age of a government department. If we talked of 

 working a government institution in England for 

 the progress of anthropology in the way in which it 

 is being done here, we should be met with — silence, 

 or a civil answer, but with no practical result ; and 

 any one venturing to make the suggestion might run 

 the risk of being classed with that large body de- 

 scribed here as ' cranks.' The only way in which 

 the question can be settled, how far a government 

 may take up scientific research as a part of its legiti- 

 mate functions, is by practical experiment; and some- 

 how or other your president is engaged in getting 

 that experiment tried, with an obvious success, 

 which may have a great effect. If in future a prop- 

 osition to ask for more government aid for anthro- 

 pology is met with a reply that such ideas are 

 fanatical, and that such schemes will produce no 

 good results, we have a very good rejoinder in 

 Washington. The energy with which the Bureau of 

 ethnology works throughout its distant ramifications 

 has been a matter of great interest. It is something 

 like what one used to hear of the organization of the 

 Jesuits, with their central authority in a room in a 

 Roman palace, whence directions were sent out which 

 there was some agent in every country town ready 

 to carry out with skill and zeal. For instance: it 

 was interesting at Zuiii to follow the way in which 

 Col. and Mrs. Stevenson were working the pueblo, 

 trading for specimens, and bringing together all that 

 was most valuable and interesting in tracing the 

 history of that remarkable people. Both managed 

 to identify themselves with the Indian life. And one 

 thing I particularly noticed was this, that to get at 

 the confidence of a tribe, the man of the house, 

 though he can do a great deal, cannot do all. If his 

 wife sympathizes with his work, and is able to do it, 

 really half of the work of investigation seems to me 

 to fall to her, so much is to be learned through the 

 women of the tribe, which the men will not readily 

 disclose. The experience seemed to me a lesson to 

 antbropologists not to sound the ' bull-roarer,' and 

 warn the ladies off from their proceedings, but rather 

 to avail themselves thankfully of their help. 



Only one word more, and I will close. Years ago, 

 when I first knew the position occupied by anthro- 

 pology, this position was far inferior to that which it 

 now holds. It was deemed, indeed, curious and 

 amusing ; and travellers had even, in an informal way, 

 shown human nature as displayed among out-of-the- 

 way tribes to be an instructive study. But one 

 of the last things thought of in the early days of 

 anthropology, was that it should be of any practical 

 use. The effect of a few years' work all over the 

 world shows that it is not only to be an interest- 

 ing theoretical science, but that it is to be an agent 

 in altering the actual state of arts and beliefs and in- 



stitutions in the world. For instance: look at the 

 arguments on communism in the tenure of land in 

 the hands of a writer who thinks how good it would 

 be if every man always had his share of the land. 

 The ideas and mental workings of such a philoso- 

 pher are quite different from those of an anthropolo- 

 gist, who knows land-communism as an old and still 

 existing institution of the world, and can see exactly 

 how, after the experience of ages, its disadvantages 

 have been found to outweigh its advantages, so that 

 it tends to fall out of use. In any new legislation on 

 land, the information thus to be given by anthropol- 

 ogy must take its place as an important factor. 



Again: when long ago I began to collect materials 

 about old customs, nothing was farther from my 

 thoughts than the idea that they would be useful. 

 By and by it did become visible, that to show that a 

 custom or institution which belonged to an early 

 state of civilization had lasted' on by mere conserva- 

 tism into a newer civilization, to which it is unsuited, 

 would somehow affect the public mind as to the ques- 

 tion whether this custom or institution should be 

 kept up, or done away with. Nothing has for months 

 past given me more unfeigned delight than when I 

 saw in the Times newspaper the corporation of the 

 city of London spoken of as a ' survival.' You have 

 institutions even here which have outlived their origi- 

 nal place and purpose; and indeed it is evident, that, 

 when the course of civilization is thoroughly worked 

 out from beginning to end, the description of it from 

 beginning to end will have a very practical effect 

 upon the domain of practical politics. Politicians 

 have, it is true, little idea of this as yet. But it al- 

 ready imposes upon bodies like this anthropological 

 society a burden of responsibility which was not at 

 first thought of. We may hope, however, that, under 

 such leaders as we have here, the science of anthro- 

 pology will be worked purely for its own sake; for, 

 the moment that anthropologists take to cultivating 

 their science as a party-weapon in politics and reli- 

 gion, this will vitiate their reasonings and arguments, 

 and spoil the scientific character of their work. I 

 have seen in England bad results follow from a pre- 

 mature attempt to work anthropology on such con- 

 troversial lines, and can say that such an attempt is 

 not only in the long-run harmful to the effect of an- 

 thropology in the world, but disastrous to its imme- 

 diate position. My recommendation to students is to 

 go right forward, like a horse in blinkers, neither 

 looking to the right hand nor to the left. Let us do 

 our own work with a simple intention to find out 

 what the principles and courses of events have been 

 in the world, to collect all the facts, to work out all 

 the inferences, to reduce the whole into a science; 

 and then let practical life take it and make the best 

 it can of it. In this way the science of man, ac- 

 cepted as an arbiter, not by a party only, but by the 

 public judgment, will have soonest and most perma- 

 nently its due effect on the habits and laws and 

 thoughts of mankind. 



I am afraid I have not used well, under such short 

 and difficult conditions, the opportunity which you 

 have done me the great pleasure and honor of giving 



