Page:Journal of American Folklore vol. 12.djvu/149

 Record of A merican Folk- Lore. 137

Copehan. Mr. Jeremiah Curtin's book, " Creation Myths of Primitive America, in relation to the Religious History and Mental Development of Mankind" (Boston, 1898, 530 pp.), contains 22 "very interesting creation myths" of the Indians of California Wintuns and Yanas, in literary form, with a few explanatory notes. No native texts are given, and fuller explanations would not have been altogether out of place. The Wintuns are reckoned as of the Copehan stock by the Bureau of Ethnology, while the Yanan is another independent family of speech.

Eskimo. In the "Globus" (Bd. lxxiv. S. 124-132), Friederici dis- cusses Eskimo art — " Die darstellende Kunst der Eskimos." — In the "American Anthropologist" (vol. xi. p. 356) for November, 1898, Prof. O. T. Mason raises the question, "Were the ancient Es- kimo artists? " and answers the question in the negative, holding that "the artistic expression of the Eskimo, in the line of etching, is exactly parallel to the extent to which he has come in contact with white men." — To the " Report of the U. S. National Museum " for 1896, Dr. Walter Hough contributes (pp. 1025-1056) an extended and well illustrated — 24 plates, with numerous figures — account of "The Lamp of the Eskimo." The Aleuts, we learn, have "the most primitive lamps on earth, many of them merely unmodified rock fragments." The lamp is, in Eskimo-land, "a social factor, peculiarly the sign of the family unit, each head of the family (the woman) having her lamp," and the "architecture of the house is related to the use of the lamp."

Haida. As vol. ii. of the Archives of the " International Folk- Lore Association," is published Mr. James Deans's "Tales from the Totems of the Hidery" (Chicago, 1899). Most of the material in the book has appeared in past volumes of the "American Anti- quarian," and the general introduction is of an ethnographic and sociological nature. — In "Globus" (Bd. lxxiv. S. 194-196), C. Hen- ning discusses "Die Gesichtsbemalungen der Indianer von Nord- Britisch-Columbien," — the topic treated of by Dr. F. Boas.

Iroquoian. The chief portion of Mr. David Boyle's " Archaeolo- gical Report, 1898" (Toronto, 1898), is taken up with an account of the " Pagan Iroquois " of the Grand River Reserve, Ontario (pp. 54- 196). Their religion, festivals, dances, feasts, music, songs, myths, folk-lore, sociology, customs, personal names, gentes, place-names, etc., are discussed, and the report is illustrated by numerous photo- graphs. In his investigation Mr. Boyle had " the cooperation of Mr. J. Ojijatekha Brant-Sero, one of the brightest and most intelli- gent Iroquois ever born on the Reserve." The descriptions and records of the midwinter festival, the burning of the white dog, the Cayuga spring sun dance, the Seneca spring sun dance, the green-

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