Page:Journal of American Folklore vol. 12.djvu/450

 102 Journal of American Folk-Lore.

on world-wide causes and producing world-wide effects — the prob- ability that they are rightly explained by this theory of independent origins is increased, and in matters similar to the wooden huts we are, of course, practically certain that it is correct.

But, on the other hand, as the nature of the concept narrows, and the element of individualism or of arbitrary choice increases, it be- comes more and more difficult to explain analogies on this basis. It is for this reason that those scholars who have studied the similari- ties in the star lore and constellations of the different continents, while by no means denying the probability of independent origins for general analogies, have almost unanimously declined to accept that explanation as a solution of their difficulties. For many of the concepts in the stellar legends are of such a purely arbitrary charac- ter as to seem quite beyond the reach of explanation by general laws. One needs no better example of this than is supplied by noting the forms of our constellations and the degree of imagination required to see in the star groups the figures which are assigned to them. Re- inforce this observation with the question as to how many other shapes your imagination would apply to the stars in question with equal readiness, and then, I think, the force of a similar or identical name applied to those stars on different continents will hardly sug- gest independent origins. But this must not blind us, on the other hand, to the difficulties in the way of transmission between the con- tinents, such as intervening oceans, arctic climates, and dissimilar- ities in other concepts which apparently should also have been transmitted if communication took place. Most of these objections can be met, but not in a space reasonable for the purposes of this paper. I am acquainted with but one attempt to explain the iden- tity of the Bear stars on the basis of independent origins. This sup- poses that they were so named independently because they are the most conspicuous group near the pole, and the bear ventures farther north than any other familiar animal. But this would imply trans- mission south as far as the Arabians and the Zunis from the very few tribes who have ever reached a point far enough to the north to have observed this fact. Again, the stars of Cassiopeia are not appreciably less conspicuous nor less far north than those of Ursa Major. The Micmac legend, however, suggests another method of explaining this particular analogy on the basis of independent ori- gins. It is that the primitive hunter from thirty degrees of latitude northward used these stars as a compass and timepiece by night, because their position was peculiarly well adapted to serve these purposes, for they were high up in the sky, during the greater part of the time, yet sufficiently low to indicate direction and — most im- portant of all — rarely or never invisible on a clear night. Observa-

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