Symbolism and Decoration
FACE-PAINTING
One of the most conspicuous customs of the Seri is that of painting the face in designs by means of mineral pigments. Of the 55 members of the tribe shown in the group forming plate XIII, 28 (in the original photograph; a somewhat less number in the reproduction) exhibit face-painting more or less clearly, and this proportion may be regarded as typical; i. e., about half of the tribe are painted.
On noting the individual distribution of face-painting, it is found to be practically confined to the females, though male infants are sometimes marked with the devices pertaining to their mothers, as adult warriors are said to be on special occasions; and so far as observed all the females, from aged matrons to babes in arms, are painted, though sometimes the designs are too nearly obliterated by wear to be traceable. About 35 of the individuals shown in the group (plate XIII) are females; of these, fully four-fifths showed designs or definite traces of the paint, while the remaining fifth bore traces too faint to be caught by the camera; but none of the men or larger boys were painted. In the smaller group shown in plate XIV all of the females display paint, as does the small boy in the center also, while the man (husband of the middle-aged matron) reveals no trace of the symbol. The two pictures typify the prevalence and the distribution by sex of the painting.
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SEVENTEENTH ANNUAL REPORT PL. XXIV
SERI BELLE
The painted designs vary among different individuals, but are fairly persistent for each. The prevailing design at Costa Rica in 1893 was that of the aged matron known as Juana Maria (plate XVIII), with variations in detail such as that exhibited by her unmarried daughter Candelaria (the Seri belle shown in plate XXIV); next in frequency were the designs, in white and red, exhibited by the matrons portrayed in plates XX and XXII. Other designs observed are indicated in plate XXVI. The variations in individual designs are apparently due either to varying care in the application of the paint or to the degree of obliteration by wear—e. g., the withered Juana Maria sometimes put on her design askew and was negligent of details, while the blooming Candelaria greatly elaborated the details of the pattern and carefully perfected the symmetry of the whole when preparing for her full-dress sitting before the camera (plate XXIV), so that her design was then gorgeous by contrast with the nearly obliterated blur of a half-hour before. The designs are renewed every few days, especially for ceremonious occasions, and hence are practically permanent.
When grouped in relation to their wearers, the designs are found to exhibit family connection. Thus, Juana Maria’s design is repeated, with greater elaboration of detail and with a pair of supplementary marks, in that of her daughter Candelaria; the winged symbol of the Seri matron portrayed in plate XX is repeated with minor variations in that of her daughter, the Seri maiden pictured in plate XXV; while the symbols of the mother and infant daughter depicted in plate XV are essentially alike. It is noticeable, too, that in the nearly spontaneous arrangement of individuals in the group shown in plate XIII there is a tendency toward subgrouping by symbols; and it was constantly observed that the family groups gathered about particular jacales (such as that shown in plate XIV) displayed corresponding designs, though there were frequent visitors from neighboring jacales bearing other designs. Briefly, all the observed facts, as well as the supplementary information gained by inquiry, indicate that the designs are hereditary in the female line, but are susceptible of slight modification both in elaborateness of detail and in the addition of minor supplementary features.
The principal apparatus and materials used in the face-painting are illustrated in plate XXVII. The chief pigments are ocher, gypsum, and the rare mineral dumortierite; the ocher yields various shades of red, ranging from pink to brown; the gypsum affords the white used in most of the designs; while the dumortierite is the source of the slightly varying tints of blue. So far as was observed, the pigments are not blended by mixing, though there is some blending due to overlapping in application. The ocher is commonly extracted and transported as lumps of ocherous clay or ocherous gypsum (plate XXVII, figures 1 and 5), though it is sometimes reduced to powder and transported in bits of skin or rag, or in cylinders of cane (plate XXVII, figures 3 and 4); and it is prepared by trituration with a pebble or rubbing with the fingers, usually in a shell cup. Sometimes the shell used for the purpose is the valve of a Cardium, which serves indiscriminately as cup, spoon, skin-scraper, etc.; but preference is apparently given to thick and strong shells, such as the wave-worn valve of Chama (?), shown in plate XXVII, figure 7, which are consecrated to the use and eventually buried with the user, together with a supply of the paint (like that illustrated in the cane cylinder—figure 4—which was a mortuary sacrifice). The gypsum is usually carried in natural slabs or other fragments, perhaps rounded by wear (plate XXVII, figures 6 and 8); it is prepared by wetting and rubbing two pieces together, the larger being reduced to metate shape by the operation. The dumortierite was observed only in the form of a pencil made by pulverizing the substance and mixing with sufficient clay to give consistency. The several pigments are applied wet by means of human-hair brushes kept for the purpose, the process occupying from half an hour to three or four hours for the more elaborate designs. So far as observed at Costa Rica in 1894, the paints were mixed in water only; but since painting outfits found on Tiburon island in 1895 were smeared with grease, it is probable that either water or fats may serve for menstrua, at the convenience of the artists. Commonly the process of painting is measurably cooperative. The matron usually depicts her device on the faces of her daughters up to the age of 12 or 15 years, when they learn to make the applications themselves; and frequently two or more women (usually those with similar devices) work together in preparing and applying the pigments, each laying the paint on her own face and apparently guiding her hand partly by the sense of feeling and partly by suggestions from her coworkers; but Candelaria and some other of the younger women at Costa Rica frequently worked alone, aided by a mirror in the form of a shallow bowl of water set in the shadow while the brilliant desert glare fell full on the face.
The mines yielding the pigments were not located. The geologic conditions are such that the ochers are undoubtedly abundant; but it is probable that the gypsum is uncommon and confined to a remote locality or two, and that the dumortierite is rare and scanty here as elsewhere. The care with which the paints are preserved, prepared, and applied, the fact that they are indispensable feminine appurtenances even on the longest journeys, and their sacred rôle in the mortuary customs, all combine to indicate that they are among the most highly prized possessions of the people and by far the most precious of their minerals.
The sematic functions of the designs are esoteric, yet an inkling of their meaning was obtained through Mashém, the interpreter at Costa Rica in 1894; from his expressions it appears that the designs are sacred insignia of totemic character, serving to denote the clans of which the tribe is composed. But three clans were identified, and these only with some uncertainty, viz., the Turtle clan,[257] denoted by the symbols of Juana Maria (plate XVIII) and Candelaria (plate XXIV and the upper left figure in plate XXVI); the Pelican clan, denoted by the designs of two typical matrons (plates XX and XXII) and a typical maiden (plate XXV), and probably also by those of the medio-lateral figures in plate XXVI; and (still less certainly) the Rattlesnake clan, denoted by the symbol of the lower left figure in this plate. The special sematic values of the colors also are esoteric, and were not ascertained; even in the case of the simple pelican design, the difference in meaning between the solid red pattern of one group and the similar pattern of white in another group was successfully concealed. So, too, the significance of the various subordinate or supplementary devices—the distinct border-line shown in plate XX, the lower cheek devices in plate XXIV, the separate chin mark in plate XXV, the fetish-like symbols on the lower cheeks in the lower left figure of plate XXVI, etc.—eluded inquiry; while some of the minor features of both form and color were sufficiently variable in the devices borne by different faces of the same family, and even in successive paintings of the same face, to suggest some individual freedom in carrying out the detail of the generally uniform designs.
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SEVENTEENTH ANNUAL REPORT PL. XXV
SERI MAIDEN
The telic functions, or ultimate purposes, of the face-painting are also esoteric, though not beyond the reach of inference from the sematic functions, coupled with general facts of zoic and primitive human customs. Even at first sight the painted devices bring to mind the directive markings of lower animals defined by Professor Todd[258] and interpreted by Ernest Seton-Thompson;[259] and in view of the implacably militant habit of the Seri it would seem evident that the artificial devices are, at least in their primary aspect, analogous to the natural markings. On analyzing the directive markings of animals, it is convenient to divide them into two classes, distinguished by special function, usual placement, and general relation to animal economy: the first class serve primarily to guide flight in such manner as to permit ready reassembling of the flock; they are usually posterior, as in rabbit, white-tail deer, antelope, and various birds; and they primarily signify inimical relations to alien organisms, with functional exercise under stress of fear. The second class of markings serve primarily for mutual identification of approaching individuals; as comports with this function, they are usually facial, or at least anterior; and their functional exercise is normally connected with peaceful association—though the strongly emphasized facial symbols of the males doubtless blazon forth the alternative meanings of preference for peace or readiness for strife, like the calumet tomahawk of the Sioux warrior (as interpreted by Cushing). So the directive markings of the first class are substantially beacons of danger and fear, while those of the second are just as essentially standards of safety and confidence; and they may properly be designated as beacon-markings and standard-markings, respectively.[260] On seriating the two classes in terms of development, it is at once found that the beacon-markings are in large measure connected with excursive movement and are centrifugal in effect, while the standard-markings are connected mainly with incursive movement and are centripetal in effect; at the same time the latter express not only the higher intelligence, but also the greater degree of that conjustment which forms the basis of collective organization; so that the latter unquestionably represents the higher developmental stage. Now, the primary functions of these directive markings of the higher grade—signalization (or attentionization) and identification—correspond precisely with paramount needs of the alien-hating and clan-loving Seri; so that careful analysis would seem fully to justify the casual impression of functional similitude between the Seri face-painting and the directive markings of social animals.
While the first survey establishes a certain analogy between the primitive face-painting and the standard-markings of animals, an important disparity is noted when the survey is extended to individuals; for among beasts and birds the standards are usually the more conspicuously displayed by the males, while the paint devices of the Seri are confined to the females. A suggestion pointing toward explanation of this disparity is readily found in the seriation of developmental stages marked by (1) the fear-born beacon-markings, (2) the confidence-speaking standard-markings, and (3) the painted symbols; for the artificial devices coincide with an immeasurably advanced mental development, with concomitant advance in safety and peace on the one hand and in artificializing weapons on the other hand. This suggestion alone fails to explain the disparity fully, yet it raises another, growing out of the great social advancement connected with the mental development—i. e., the effect of the distinctively demotic organization of the human genus as represented by the Seri people. On considering this organization, it is found strictly maternal: the tribe is made up of clans defined by consanguinity reckoned only in the female line; each clan is headed by an elderwoman, and comprises a hierarchy of daughters, granddaughters, and (sometimes) great-granddaughters, collectively incarnating that purity of uncontaminated blood which is the pride of the tribe; and this female element is supplemented by a masculine element in the persons of brothers, who may be war-chiefs or shamans, and may hence dominate the movements of groups, but whose blood counts as nothing in the establishment and maintenance of the clan organization. Thus the females alone are the blood-carriers of the clans; they alone require ready and certain identification in order that their institutional theory and practice may be maintained; and hence they alone need to become bearers of the sacred blood-standards. The warriors belong to the tribe, and are distinguished by luxuriantly flowing hair, by the up-stepping movement from which the people derive their appellation, by their unique archery attitude, and by their dark skin-color; the boys count for little until they enter the warrior class; but on the females devolves the duty of defining and maintaining the several streams of blood on which the rigidly guarded tribal integrity depends.[261] Undoubtedly the blood-markings play an important rôle in courtship and marriage, but too little is known of the esoteric life of the tribe to permit this rôle to be traced.
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CHARACTERISTIC FACE PAINTING.
In brief, the Seri face-painting would seem to be essentially zoosematic, or symbolic of zoic tutelaries, and to signify subspecific (or subvarietal) characteristics maintained by the clan organization and kept prominent by the militant habit of the tribe; at the same time it is noteworthy that the purely symbolic motive is accompanied by a nascent decorative tendency, displayed by the individual refinement of form and color in the symbol proper to each of the groups.
DECORATION IN GENERAL
Aside from the face-painting there is a conspicuous dearth of decoration or tangible symbolism among the Seri.
The symbolic or decorative modification of the physique would seem to be limited to two classes of mutilations, of which one was observed at Costa Rica in 1894 while the other is apparently obsolete. The observed corporeal modification is the absence of medial superior incisors of the females, in consequence of forcible removal at a period not definitely ascertained. The interpreter at Costa Rica was uncommunicative on the subject; Don Pascual opined that the mutilation formed part of an elaborate puberty ceremonial, and this opinion would seem to be corroborated by the condition of the cranium of an immature female examined by Dr Hrdlička; but since the half-dozen adult maidens at the rancho in 1894 were free from the mutilation while all the wives bore its gruesome trace, it would seem more probable that the custom is connected with marriage. Whatever the period of the infliction, Mashém’s guarded expressions seemed to indicate that it was a mark of physical inferiority; and this suggestion, interpreted in the light of the Seri use of teeth as weapons of offense and defense, would seem to indicate that the mutilation is at once the badge of corporeal inferiority and a means of maintaining the physical superiority of the males—of course in that theoretically fiducial but actually forceful way characteristic of primitive culture.
The second mutilation was the only corporeal modification noted by early missionaries and explorers—it was the perforation of the nasal septum for the insertion of a skewer, perhaps of polished stone (though doubtless more commonly of bone), to which swinging objects were attached. One of the most useful records is that of the Jesuit, Padre Joseph Och, who described the nasal attachment as a small, colored stone suspended by cords from the perforated septum, and guarded with such jealous veneration that “one must give them at least a horse or a cow for one” (ante, p. 78); while according to Hardy’s record, the nasal fetish is “a small, round, white bone, 5 inches in length, tapering off at both ends, and rigged something like a cross-jack yard.”[262] The custom is apparently obsolete, and nothing is known directly of details or motives.
Fig. 7—Snake-skin belt.
Excepting these mutilations the corporeal decoration of the Seri is apparently limited to the face-painting: among the 60 individuals at Costa Rica in 1894 there was no trace of tattooing or scarification of face, limbs, or body; there were no labrets or earrings, and neither lips nor ears were pierced, nor were nasal septa observed to be perforated in accordance with the reputed ancient custom; the teeth were neither filed nor drilled; no indications of amputation or other maiming (save the removal of the incisors) were observed—indeed, the instinct for physical markings of symbolic or decorative character, which seems to be normal to primitive men, was apparently satisfied by the prevalent and persistent face-painting among the females.
The extra-corporeal decorative devices are of a meagerness and poverty even transcending the poor apparel, flimsy habitations, and generally ill-developed artifacts of the lowly tribe.
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SEVENTEENTH ANNUAL REPORT PL XXVII
SERI FACE PAINTING PARAPHERNALIA.
Fig. 8—Dried flower necklace.
The most prominent personal possession is the pelican-skin robe; it is usually made of six skins, slightly dressed and in full plumage, sewed together with sinew in a conventional pattern of such sort as to give the greatest possible expanse consistent with the irregular outlines of the individual skins, and at the same time to display a conventional color pattern on the feathered side, the colors ranging from the dorsal slate to the ventral white of the fowl (as indicated in plate XXIII); sometimes there are only four skins and rarely there are eight, but the conventional arrangement is maintained. Before the beginning of a fairly regular barter at Rancho de Costa Rica, and hence before the introduction of manta and other stuffs, the pelican-skin robes were supplemented by kilts made of mesquite root or other fibers, spun and twisted in the fingers and woven probably on some primitive device no longer in use; but so far as is known these native fabrics were devoid of decorative patterns in color or weave. Less habitually a short wammus or shirt, with long sleeves, made of a material similar to that of the kilt, was worn; but it, too, was without ornamentation, so far as can be ascertained. The remaining article of utilitarian apparel is the belt, usually consisting of a strip of skin (of deer, rabbit, peccary, etc.), slightly dressed with the hair on; frequently this is replaced by a cord or braided band of human hair, while the favorite belt of some of the young warriors is a snake skin (such as that illustrated in figure 7); but so far as was seen the belts are not extended into tassels, decorative appendages, or even flowing ends.
Fig. 9—Seed necklace.
Fig. 10—Nut pendants.
Fig. 11—Shell beads.
Fig. 12—Wooden beads.
The presumptively decorative costumery observed is limited to necklaces, usually of strung seeds, shells, and beads of wood or bone (figures 8, 9, 10, 11, 12, and 13), though animal appendages, such as hoofs, teeth, etc., are sometimes worn. The most highly prized necklace found at Costa Rica was a human-hair cord with nine crotalus rattles attached (figure 14), worn by a young warrior of the Rattlesnake (?) clan. Not the slightest indication of headdresses was seen (though deer and lion masks are said by Hardy to have been worn on occasions); there were no bracelets, leg-bands, or rings of any description, and the cheap jewelry given to many of the women and youths at Costa Rica was either strung about the neck or concealed; while it is significant that even the showiest jewelry was less appreciated than bits of manta or lumps of sugar. When it is remembered that the Seri have been in occasional contact with Caucasians for over three and a half centuries, the fact that not a single glass bead was found among them becomes significant; and the significance of the simple fact is increased by the virtual absence of that persistent desire and protean use for beads—or bead-sense—so prominent among most primitive tribes.
Fig. 13—Necklace of wooden beads.
Naturally the conditions at Costa Rica were unfavorable to the study of native ideas concerning apparel. The women and some of the children were arrayed chiefly in cast-off habiliments of the rancheras or in nondescript rags, while the men either aped Mexican fashions, like Mashém, or shamefacedly sweltered under the unaccustomed burden of tatterdemalion gear; yet there was a meaningful absence of that desire for finery so prominent among primitive peoples—a fact quite as eloquent in itself as the absence of bracelets and bangles, tassels and trappings. It is probable that the shamans and mystery-hedged crones in the depths of Seriland enhance their influence by the aid of symbolic paraphernalia (indeed, some inkling of such customs is found in the meager records of earlier visitors);[263] yet the conspicuous feature of Seri costumery is the dearth of decorative devices.
The habitations of the tribe are the simplest of jacales—mere bowers, affording partial protection from sun and wind, but not designed to shed rain or bar cold. Half a dozen of these were examined at Costa Rica in 1894 and probably a hundred more, in various stages of habitability, in Seriland proper in 1895, yet not the slightest trace of decoration was observed—the structures are plainly and barrenly utilitarian in every feature. The same may be said of the balsas in which the Seri navigate their stormy waters; for the peculiarly graceful curves of the craft evidently stand for nothing more than the mechanical solution of a complex problem in balanced forces, wrought out through the experience of generations, while the simple reed bundles are absolutely devoid of paint, of superfluous cord, of fetishistic appendages or markings, of tritons, nereids, or other votive symbols at bow or stern, and of industrially superfluous features or attachments in general—indeed, the only appendages discovered were one or two simple wooden marlinspikes (shown in figure 26), thrust among the reeds to be at hand in case of need for repairs.
Fig. 14—Rattlesnake necklace.
Among the utensils employed in the primitive householdry of the Seri the most conspicuous and at the same time the most essential is the olla, or water-jar. Its technical features are described elsewhere; but it may here be noted that the olla is the central artifact about which the very life of the tribe rotates: since the clans never reside and rarely camp nearer than 3 to 15 miles from the aguaje, a large part of the water consumed must be transported great distances in these vessels; since the region is one of extreme aridity, the lives of small parties often depend on the integrity of the olla and on the care with which the fragile vessel is protected from shock or overturning; and hence the utensil must occupy a large if not a dominant place in everyday thought—indeed, the fact that it does so is attested by constant custom and also by its employment as the most conspicuous among the mortuary sacrifices. Thus, the relation of the Seri olla to its makers and users is parallel with that of the ever-present earthen pot to the Pueblo people, or that of the cooking basket to the acorn-eaters of California, save that its relative importance is enhanced by the fewness of activital lines and motives in Seri life. Moreover, this most characteristic utensil is established and hallowed in Seri thought by immemorial associations: its sherds are sown over the hundred thousand square miles of ancient “despoblado” from Tiburon to Caborca, Magdalena, Rio Opodepe, and Cerro Prieto, and are scattered through the 90 feet of shells forming Punta Antigualla (perhaps the oldest shell mound of America); and all the sherds from the range and the shell-strata are so like and so different from any other fictile ware as to be distinguished at a glance. Hence it would seem manifest that the Seri olla must constitute a normal nucleus for the Seri esthetic; yet even here the field is practically barren, as is shown by the study of a score of usable and mortuary specimens and of thousands of sherds. The most ornate specimen seen is that depicted in plate XXXII. Its form, like that of the balsa, is a mechanical equation of forces and materials; its body-color is that of the clay, blotched and blackened irregularly by the smoke of the firing; and its decoration is limited to 17 faint lines or bands radiating downward from the ill-shaped neck. The radial bands were evidently drawn by a finger dipped in clayey water after the vessel was otherwise finished for the firing; they are irregular in placement, width, length, and direction; they generally run in pairs, two straight lines alternating with two zigzag lines, though the circuit is completed by two zigzags drawn wide apart and separated by a single straight line. The meaning of the device (if meaning there be) was not directly ascertained; but it is suggestive that its maker and owner was the mother of the youthful warrior from whom the rattlesnake necklace was obtained (her face-symbol is that shown in the lower left figure of plate XXVI), and that the vessel was surrendered more reluctantly than any other article obtained from the tribe.
Another utensil of some importance to the tribe is a basket of the type illustrated in figure 24. It is manufactured with much skill and is used for various domestic purposes, being practically water-tight and unbreakable, and materially lighter than even the unparalleledly light fictile ware of the Seri. In form and size and weave the half dozen examples seen correspond with widespread southwestern types; yet it is noteworthy that while otherwise similar baskets are habitually decorated by other basket-making tribes, the Seri specimens were absolutely devoid of decorative devices.
Practically the only remaining artifacts available for decoration are those connected with archery; and it suffices to say that while the bows are skilfully made and the arrows constructed with exceeding pains, not a single specimen seen showed the slightest trace of symbolism or of nonutilitarian motive.
Summarily, the Seri are characterized by extreme esthetic poverty. This has been noted by the early missionaries and by the few other travelers who have approached their haunts, as well as by the vaqueros on the Encinas and Serna and other ranchos bordering their range, who know them as “los pobrecitos”. All observers have been struck with their destitution and squalor; yet when the impressions are particularized they are seen to denote absence of the poor luxuries, rather than the bare necessities, of primitive life. The people are pathetically poor in the industrial sense; their equipment in artifacts—implements, weapons, utensils, habitations, apparel—is meager almost, if not quite, beyond parallel in America; yet their esthetic equipment, practically limited as it is to a single line of symbolic portrayal, is still more abjectly meager.
Any comparison of the Seri esthetic with that of other Amerind tribes serves only to emphasize its paucity: the tribes of the plains, with their eagle-feather headdresses, elaborately arranged scalp-locks, widely varied face-painting, and ritualistic camp circles; the Pueblo peoples, with their ornate masks, elaborate altars, figured stuffs, and painted pottery; the denizens of the eastern woods, with their feather-decked peace-pipes, divinatory games, fringe-bordered garments, and prayer-inscribed arrows; the coastwise peoples of the upper Pacific, with their labrets and tattoo-marks, totem-poles and carved house-fronts, painted canoes and prodigal potlatches; the neighboring desert tribes, with their festal footraces, decorated pottery and basketry, pendent scarfs and garters, and well-wrought caskets for family fetishes; even the timid acorn-eaters of California, with their sacramental baskets, artistically befringed kilts, bead-strings of far-traveled nacre, and patiently wrought fabrics of rare feathers—all of these seem rich in esthetic motives when contrasted with “los pobrecitos” of arid Seriland. And the contrast is only intensified when the economic motives of the various tribes are compared: the industrial motives of the Seri are fairly numerous and diverse; they are skilful huntsmen, successful fishermen, capable navigators, and competent warriors (as attested by the protection of their principality for centuries), so that despite the absence of agriculture and the avoidance of commerce, their industrial range is not very far below the aboriginal average; and while they are deficient in thrift, this shortcoming is balanced by a peculiarly developed vital economy whereby they are delicately adjusted to their environment, as has been already shown. On the whole, it would appear that the Seri are not only lower in esthetic development than the contemporary tribes thus far studied, but also that they stand at the bottom of the scale in the ratio of esthetic to industrial motives.
THE SIGNIFICANCE OF DECORATION
Largely through recent researches among the American aborigines, it has been shown that decorative and many if not all other esthetic concepts normally arise in symbolism, gradually expand in conventionism, and eventually mature in a realism which is itself the source of ever-extending esthetic motives; and the observations on the lowly Seri afford opportunity for somewhat extending the generalizations based on higher tribes.
When peoples of unequal cultural development are compared, it is commonly found that the higher are the more independent in action and thought: thus, advanced peoples make conquest of nature for their own behoof, while primitive peoples are largely creatures of environment; Caucasian citizens are self-conscious lawmakers, while Amerind tribesmen are semiconsciously dominated by mysteries fearsomely interpreted by their shamans; and, in general, enlightened men think and speak freely, come and go as they like, and discard the badges of conventionism, while savages are constrained by customs carrying the power of law, controlled by precedent, and clothed in hierarchic regalia. So, too, when a particular series of tribes are compared, it is found that those of higher culture (or wider knowledge) are the more independent, the more given to essays in social and industrial and other lines of activity, and hence the more varied in esthetic and economic motives: thus, the several Iroquoian tribes integrated the knowledge proper to each, and thus made themselves an intellectual and physical power able to eliminate or assimilate the isolated tribes on their borders; the sages of the Siouan stock induced the warriors of their leading tribes to combine in a circle of seven council fires, which grew into the great Dakota confederacy and soon gained strength to dominate the entire northern plains; but while these and other federations were pushing forward on the way leading to feudalism and thence to national organization, the self-centered California tribes consecrated their tongues to their own kindred, thereby stifling culture at its source and virtually leashing themselves unto the acorn-bearing oaks of their respective glades. Still more striking are the differences in independence revealed by a comparison of human and subhuman organisms; for the humans are immeasurably freer and more spontaneous in thought and action than even the highest beasts: thus, the Seri blood-bearer applies, renews, and elaborates her face-mark at will, while the antelope and the raccoon unconsciously develop their standard-marks through the tedious operation of vital processes regulated under the cruel law of survival; men make their beds according to the dictates of judgment, while the half-artificialized dog lies down in accordance with a hereditary custom which has been needless for a hundred generations; and the very essence of human activity is volitional choice (or artificial selection), while the keynote of merely organic agency is the nonvolitional chance of natural selection. No less striking are the differences found on comparing other realms of nature, in which the higher are invariably characterized by the greater independence; the animal realm is distinguished from the vegetal realm mainly by the possession of volitional motility; while the vegetal is distinguished from the mineral realm chiefly by those better selective powers exemplified in vital growth. The several comparisons seem to define that course of volitional development arising in the chemical and mechanical affinities of the mineral realm, burgeoning in simple vitality, multiplying in the motility of animal life, greatly expanding in the collective activity of demotic organization, and culminating in the conquest of nature through the mind-guided powers of enlightened mankind. Expressed briefly, this course of development may be characterized as the progressive passage from automacy to autonomy.
The volitional development thus seriated may be divided, somewhat arbitrarily yet none the less safely, into its esthetic and economic factors; and, for convenience, the latter maybe considered to comprise the industrial, institutional, linguistic, and sophic constituents—i. e., the esthetic activities may be juxtaposed against the several other activities of demotic life. When this division is made, it at once becomes manifest that the esthetic activities are the freest and most spontaneous of the series, and hence lead the way to that autonomy which marks the highest development. This significant relation has been glimpsed by various artists and poets, scholars and naturalists; it was at least partly caught by Goethe when he taught that knowledge begins in wonder; it was loosely seized by Schiller, and later by Spencer, in the surplus-energy theory of play; it was grasped by Groos in his prophecy theory of play,[264] and still more firmly (although less conspicuously) by Seton-Thompson in his analysis of animal conduct and motives. The relation has for some years been recognized as one of the principles underlying the American ethnologic researches; yet it is not so well understood as to obviate the need for further consideration. Accordingly it may be pointed out that while the human activities and the agencies of lower nature rest alike on a mechanical foundation, the mechanical element diminishes in relative magnitude in passing from the lower to the higher realms of nature: in the mineral realm the agencies may be deemed mechanical in character and individual in effect; in the vegetal realm vitality is superadded, and the effects are carried forward through heredity; in the animal realm motility is added in turn, and instinct arises to shape the individual and hereditary and motile attributes; the social realm may be considered to be marked by the accession of conjustment, with its multifarious and beneficent effects on individuals, generations, movements, and groups; while the rational realm maybe defined as that arising with the accession of reason as a guide to action, and with the development of nature-conquest as its most characteristic effect—though it is to be noted that the several transitions are progressive rather than saltatory. Thus each realm is characterized by the attributes of each and all of those lower in the scale, plus its own distinctive attribute. It may also be pointed out that each new attribute defining a higher realm is freer and more spontaneous than those of lower realms; for vitality is freer than mere affinity, self-movement than mere growth, and cooperation than mere movement, while reason-led action is freest of all. Accordingly each realm (as already implied) is characterized by a larger autonomy than any of those lower in the scale; i. e., by all the factors of autonomy in the lower realms, plus its own distinctive factor.
It may be pointed out farther that, in the higher realms at least, the action normal to each realm tends to generate that characteristic of the next higher realm: the self-movement of the animal realm is, under favorable conditions, constrained through vital economy to fall into the conjustment of the social realm; and the organization of the social realm, involving as it does a hierarchic arrangement of organisms according to mentality,[265] habituates the higher individuals of the organizations to that control of lower individuals which buds in agriculture, blossoms in civil rule, and fruits in nature-conquest. Thus the factors of each realm are prophetic of the distinctive factor of the next higher—and the prophecy is not merely passive, but is, rather, an actual step in causal sequence.
It may be pointed out still further that, in the higher realms at least, spontaneous action necessarily precedes maturely developed function: in the vegetal realm the tree shoots upward before its form is shaped and its tissue textured by wind and sun and environing organisms; in the animal realm youthful play presages the prosaic performances normal to adult life; in the social realm men behave before framing laws of behavior; and in the rational realm fortuitous discovery paves the road for sure-footed invention. Thus natural initiative arises in spontaneous action, while mechanical action is mainly consequential.
It may be pointed out finally that the field of spontaneous action is relatively increased with the endless multiplications of action accompanying the passage from the lower realms to the higher—indeed the relations may be likened unto those of exogenous growth, which is largely withdrawn from the irresponsive and stable interior structures and gathered into the responsive and spontaneously active peripheral structures; so that spontaneous activity attending natural development is relatively more important in the higher stages than in the lower.[266]
Now, on combining the several indications it is found clear (1) that the more spontaneous developmental factor in all normal growth corresponds with the esthetic factor in demotic activity; (2) that this is the initiatory factor and the chief determinant of the rate and course of development; (3) that it is of relatively enlarged prominence in the higher stages; and hence (4) that the esthetic activities afford a means of measuring developmental status or the relative positions in terms of development of races and tribes.
On applying these principles to the Seri tribe, in the light of their meager industrial motives and still poorer esthetic motives, it would appear that they stand well at the bottom of the scale in demotic development. Their somatic characteristics are suggestively primitive, as already shown; and the testimony of these characteristics is fully corroborated by that of their esthetic status as interpreted in the light of the laws of growth.