It will thus be seen that life, health, prosperity, and peace are the ends sought in all this region of human activity as they are presented in the study of savage life. The opinions held by the people on these subjects are primarily expressed in speech and organized into tales, which constitute mythology, and they are expressed in acts, as ceremonies and observances, which constitute their religion, their medicine, and their esthetic arts. These arts consist of sculpture and painting, by which their mythic beings are represented, and they also consist of dancing, by which religious fervor is produced, and they give rise to music, romance, poetry, and drama. Thus it is that the esthetic arts have their origin in mythology. The epic poem and the symphony are lineal descendants of the dance, and the dance arises as the first form of worship, born of the mythic conception of the powers of nature.
[ THE MIDĒ´WIWIN, OR GRAND MEDICINE SOCIETY OF THE OJIBWA, BY W. J. HOFFMAN, AND THE SACRED FORMULAS OF THE CHEROKEES, BY JAMES MOONEY.]
Mr. Hoffman presents a paper on the “Midē´wiwin, or Grand Medicine Society of the Ojibwa,” and sets forth the vestiges of a once powerful organization existing among these people. Mr. Mooney has made a study of the Cherokee with the same end in view. In the opinion of the Director they are important contributions to this subject. The same lines of investigation have been carried on by other members of the Bureau with other tribes where societies and practices have been but little modified by the contact of the white man, and where the subject is therefore much more plainly arrayed. In due time these additional researches will be published.
In Mr. Hoffman’s paper it is seen that two and a half centuries of association with the white man has not only served to break down this organization to some extent, but has also inculcated in the minds of the Ojibwa a clearer conception of a Great Spirit and a future life than is normal to the savage mind. Mr. Mooney, whose paper largely deals with the use of plants by the Indians for the healing of disease, naïvely compares the pharmacopoeia of savagery with that of civilization, assuming that the latter is a standard of scientific truth. Perchance scientific men will make one step in advance of this position, and will be interested in discovering the extent to which savage philosophy is still represented in civilized materia medica as expressed in officinal formulas.
A word in relation to the dramatis personæ of Indian mythology. In all those mythologies which have been studied with any degree of care up to the present time zoic deities greatly prevail, the progenitors and prototypes of the animals of the land, air, and water; yet there are other deities. Chief among these are the sun, moon, stars, fire, and the spirits of mountains and other geographical and natural phenomena. Yet these beings are largely zoomorphic, being considered rather as mythic animals than as mythic men; but it must be understood that the line of demarcation between man and the lower animals is not so clearly presented to the savage mind as to the civilized mind. In speaking of the theology of the North American Indians as being zoomorphic it must therefore be understood to mean that such is its chief characteristic, but not its exclusive characteristic; and further, it must be understood that it contains by survival many elements from an earlier condition in which hecastotheism prevailed, that is, that the form of philosophy known as animism was generally accepted, and that psychic life, with feeling, thought, and will, was attributed to inanimate things. But more than this, zootheism is not a permanent state of philosophy, but only a stepping-stone to something higher. That something higher may be denominated physitheism, or the worship of the powers and more obtrusive phenomena of nature. In this higher state the sun, the planets, the stars, the winds, the storms, the rainbow, and fire take the leading part. The beginnings of this higher state are to be observed in many of the mythologies of North America. It is worthy of remark that a mythology with its religion subject to the influences of an overwhelming civilization yields first in its zoomorphic elements. Zoic mythology soon degenerates into folk tales of beasts, to be recited by crones to children or told by garrulous old men as amusing stories inherited from past generations; while physitheism is more often incorporated into the compound of paganism and Christianity now held by the more advanced tribes. Notwithstanding this general tendency, zootheism is often, though not to so great an extent, compounded in the same way. The study of this stage of mythology, and of the arts and customs arising therefrom, as they are exhibited among the North American Indians, will ultimately throw a flood of light upon that later stage known as physitheism, or nature worship, now the subject of investigation by an army of Aryan scholars.
[ FINANCIAL STATEMENT.]
Table showing amounts appropriated and expended for North American ethnology for the fiscal year ending June 30, 1886.
| Expenses. | Amount expended. | Amount appropriated. |
|---|---|---|
| Services | $31,287.93 | |
| Traveling expenses | 2,070.71 | |
| Transportation of property | 478.91 | |
| Field subsistence | 284.99 | |
| Field expenses and supplies | 360.32 | |
| Field material | 163.61 | |
| Modeling material | 63.11 | |
| Photographic material | 34.44 | |
| Books and maps | 469.69 | |
| Stationery and drawing material | 169.44 | |
| Illustrations for reports | 289.65 | |
| Goods for distribution to Indians | 767.82 | |
| Office furniture | 12.00 | |
| Office supplies and repairs | 63.56 | |
| Correspondence | 13.87 | |
| Specimens | 800.00 | |
| Bonded railroad accounts forwarded to Treasury for settlement | 103.84 | |
| Balance on hand to meet outstanding liabilities | 2,566.11 | |
| Total | 40,000.00 | $40,000.00 |