We will only give one more example. The sign for crazy is as follows:—
Slightly contract the fingers of the right hand without closing it; bring it up to and close in front of the forehead; turn the hand so that the finger tips describe a little circle.
Bad boys sometimes speak of people having wheels in their head. This Indian sign certainly seems to show that the Indian idea of craziness is about the same as the boys'.
Captain Clark wrote a book on the Indian [pg 065] sign language, in which he described great numbers of these curious signs. Lieutenant Mallery, too, made a great collection of signs and wrote a long paper about them. A third gentleman has tried to make type which shall print the sign language. He made more than eight hundred characters. With these he plans to teach the old Indians to read papers and books printed in the signs. He thinks that the Indian can take such a paper, and making the signs which he sees there pictured, he will understand the meaning of the article.
W. P. Clark.—Soldier. Author of Indian Sign Language, which not only is a convenient dictionary of signs, but contains much general information regarding Indians.
Garrick Mallery.—Soldier, ethnologist. Connected with Bureau of Ethnology from its establishment until his death. His most extended papers are: Sign Language among North American Indians, Pictographs of the North American Indians, Picture Writing of the American Indians.
Lewis Hadley.—Inventor of Indian Sign Language type.
X. Picture Writing.
The Indians did not know how to write words by means of letters. There were, however, many things which they wished to remember, and they had found out several ways in which to record these.