These various considerations prove beyond a doubt that the power of the priesthood did by no means rest exclusively on deception. They indorse and explain the assertions of converted natives, that their power as prophets was something real, and entirely inexplicable to themselves. And they make it easily understood how those missionaries failed who attempted to persuade them that all this boasted power was false. More correct views than these ought to have been suggested by the facts themselves, for it is indisputable that these magicians did not hesitate at times to test their strength on each other. In these strange duels a l'outrance, one would be seated opposite his antagonist, surrounded with the mysterious emblems of his craft, and call upon his gods one after another to strike his enemy dead. Sometimes one, "gathering his medicine," as it was termed, feeling within himself that hidden force of will which makes itself acknowledged even without words, would rise in his might, and in a loud and severe voice command his opponent to die! Straightway the latter would drop dead, or yielding in craven fear to a superior volition, forsake the implements of his art, and with an awful terror at his heart, creep to his lodge, refuse all nourishment, and presently perish. Still more terrible was the tyranny they exerted on the superstitious minds of the masses. Let an Indian once be possessed of the idea that he is bewitched, and he will probably reject all food, and sink under the phantoms of his own fancy.

How deep the superstitious veneration of these men has struck its roots in the soul of the Indian, it is difficult for civilized minds to conceive. Their power is currently supposed to be without any bounds, "extending to the raising of the dead and the control of all laws of nature."[277-1] The grave offers no escape from their omnipotent arms. The Sacs and Foxes, Algonkin tribes, think that the soul cannot leave the corpse until set free by the medicine men at their great annual feast;[277-2] and the Puelches of Buenos Ayres guard a profound silence as they pass by the tomb of some redoubted necromancer, lest they should disturb his repose, and suffer from his malignant skill.[278-1]

While thus investigating their real and supposed power over the physical and mental world, their strictly priestly functions, as performers of the rites of religion, have not been touched upon. Among the ruder tribes these, indeed, were of the most rudimentary character. Sacrifices, chiefly in the form of feasts, where every one crammed to his utmost, dances, often winding up with the wildest scenes of licentiousness, the repetition of long and monotonous chants, the making of the new fire, these are the ceremonies that satisfy the religious wants of savages. The priest finds a further sphere for his activity in manufacturing and consecrating amulets to keep off ill luck, in interpreting dreams, and especially in lifting the veil of the future. In Peru, for example, they were divided into classes, who made the various means of divination specialties. Some caused the idols to speak, others derived their foreknowledge from words spoken by the dead, others predicted by leaves of tobacco or the grains and juice of cocoa, while to still other classes, the shapes of grains of maize taken at random, the appearance of animal excrement, the forms assumed by the smoke rising from burning victims, the entrails and viscera of animals, the course taken by a certain species of spider, the visions seen in drunkeness,[TN-16] the flights of birds, and the directions in which fruits would fall, all offered so many separate fields of prognostication, the professors of which were distinguished by different ranks and titles.[279-1]

As the intellectual force of the nation was chiefly centred in this class, they became the acknowledged depositaries of its sacred legends, the instructors in the art of preserving thought; and from their duty to regulate festivals, sprang the observation of the motions of the heavenly bodies, the adjustment of the calendars, and the pseudo-science of judicial astrology. The latter was carried to as subtle a pitch of refinement in Mexico as in the old world; and large portions of the ancient writers are taken up with explaining the method adopted by the native astrologers to cast the horoscope, and reckon the nativity of the newly-born infant.

How was this superior power obtained? What were the terms of admission to this privileged class? In the ruder communities the power was strictly personal. It was revealed to its possessor by the character of the visions he perceived at the ordeal he passed through on arriving at puberty; and by the northern nations was said to be the manifestation of a more potent personal spirit than ordinary. It was not a faculty, but an inspiration; not an inborn strength, but a spiritual gift. The curious theory of the Dakotas, as recorded by the Rev. Mr. Pond, was that the necromant first wakes to consciousness as a winged seed, wafted hither and thither by the intelligent action of the Four Winds. In this form he visits the homes of the different classes of divinities, and learns the chants, feasts, and dances, which it is proper for the human race to observe, the art of omnipresence or clairvoyance, the means of inflicting and healing diseases, and the occult secrets of nature, man, and divinity. This is called "dreaming of the gods." When this instruction is completed, the seed enters one about to become a mother, assumes human form, and in due time manifests his powers. Four such incarnations await it, each of increasing might, and then the spirit returns to its original nothingness. The same necessity of death and resurrection was entertained by the Eskimos. To become of the highest order of priests, it was supposed requisite, says Bishop Egede, that one of the lower order should be drowned and eaten by sea monsters. Then, when his bones, one after another, were all washed ashore, his spirit, which meanwhile had been learning the secrets of the invisible world, would return to them, and, clothed in flesh, he would go back to his tribe. At other times a vague and indescribable longing seizes a young person, a morbid appetite possesses them, or they fall a prey to an inappeasable and aimless restlessness, or a causeless melancholy. These signs the old priests recognize as the expression of a personal spirit of the higher order. They take charge of the youth, and educate him to the mysteries of their craft. For months or years he is condemned to entire seclusion, receiving no visits but from the brethren of his order. At length he is initiated with ceremonies of more or less pomp into the brotherhood, and from that time assumes that gravity of demeanor, sententious style of expression, and general air of mystery and importance, everywhere deemed so eminently becoming in a doctor and a priest. A peculiarity of the Moxos was, that they thought none designated for the office but such as had escaped from the claws of the South American tiger, which, indeed, it is said they worshipped as a god.[281-1]

Occasionally, in very uncultivated tribes, some family or totem claimed a monopoly of the priesthood. Thus, among the Nez Perces of Oregon, it was transmitted in one family from father to son and daughter, but always with the proviso that the children at the proper age reported dreams of a satisfactory character.[281-2] Perhaps alone of the Algonkin tribes the Shawnees confined it to one totem, but it is remarkable that the greatest of their prophets, Elskataway, brother of Tecumseh, was not a member of this clan. From the most remote times, the Cherokees have had one family set apart for the priestly office. This was when first known to the whites that of the Nicotani, but its members, puffed up with pride and insolence, abused their birthright so shamefully, and prostituted it so flagrantly to their own advantage, that with savage justice they were massacred to the last man. Another was appointed in their place who to this day officiates in all religious rites. They have, however, the superstition, possibly borrowed from Europeans, that the seventh son is a natural born prophet, with the gift of healing by touch.[281-3] Adair states that their former neighbors, the Choctaws, permitted the office of high priest, or Great Beloved Man, to remain in one family, passing from father to eldest son, and the very influential piaches of the Carib tribes very generally transmitted their rank and position to their children.

In ancient Anahuac the prelacy was as systematic and its rules as well defined, as in the Church of Rome. Except those in the service of Huitzilopochtli, and perhaps a few other gods, none obtained the priestly office by right of descent, but were dedicated to it from early childhood. Their education was completed at the Calmecac, a sort of ecclesiastical college, where instruction was given in all the wisdom of the ancients, and the esoteric lore of their craft. The art of mixing colors and tracing designs, the ideographic writing and phonetic hieroglyphs, the songs and prayers used in public worship, the national traditions and the principles of astrology, the hidden meaning of symbols and the use of musical instruments, all formed parts of the really extensive course of instruction they there received. When they manifested a satisfactory acquaintance with this curriculum, they were appointed by their superiors to such positions as their natural talents and the use they had made of them qualified them for, some to instruct children, others to the service of the temples, and others again to take charge of what we may call country parishes. Implicit subordination of all to the high priest of Huitzilopochtli, hereditary pontifex maximus, chastity, or at least temperate indulgence in pleasure, gravity of carriage, and strict attention to duty, were laws laid upon all.

The state religion of Peru was conducted under the supervision of a high priest of the Inca family, and its ministers, as in Mexico, could be of either sex, and hold office either by inheritance, education, or election. For political reasons, the most important posts were usually enjoyed by relatives of the ruler, but this was usage, not law. It is stated by Garcilasso de la Vega[283-1] that they served in the temples by turns, each being on duty the fourth of a lunar month at a time. Were this substantiated it would offer the only example of the regulation of public life by a week of seven days to be found in the New World.

In every country there is perceptible a desire in this class of men to surround themselves with mystery, and to concentrate and increase their power by forming an intimate alliance among themselves. They affected singularity in dress and a professional costume. Bartram describes the junior priests of the Creeks as dressed in white robes and carrying on their head or arm "a great owlskin, stuffed very ingeniously, as an insignia of wisdom and divination. These bachelors are also distinguishable from the other people by their taciturnity, grave and solemn countenance, dignified step, and singing to themselves songs or hymns, in a low sweet voice, as they stroll about the towns."[283-2] The priests of the civilized nations adopted various modes of dress to typify the divinity which they served, and their appearance was often in the highest degree unprepossessing.

To add to their self-importance they pretended to converse in a tongue different from that used in ordinary life, and the chants containing the prayers and legends were often in this esoteric dialect. Fragments of one or two of these have floated down to us from the Aztec priesthood. The travellers Balboa and Coreal, mention that the temple services of Peru were conducted in a language not understood by the masses,[284-1] and the incantations of the priests of Powhatan were not in ordinary Algonkin, but some obscure jargon.[284-2] The same peculiarity has been observed among the Dakotas and Eskimos, and in these nations, fortunately, it fell under the notice of competent linguistic scholars, who have submitted it to a searching examination. The results of their labors prove that certainly in these two instances the supposed foreign tongues were nothing more than the ordinary dialects of the country modified by an affected accentuation, by the introduction of a few cabalistic terms, and by the use of descriptive circumlocutions and figurative words in place of ordinary expressions, a slang, in short, such as rascals and pedants invariably coin whenever they associate.[285-1]

All these stratagems were intended to shroud with impenetrable secrecy the mysteries of the brotherhood. With the same motive, the priests formed societies of different grades of illumination, only to be entered by those willing to undergo trying ordeals, whose secrets were not to be revealed under the severest penalties. The Algonkins had three such grades, the waubeno, the meda, and the jossakeed, the last being the highest. To this no white man was ever admitted. All tribes appear to have been controlled by these secret societies. Alexander von Humboldt mentions one, called that of the Botuto or Holy Trumpet, among the Indians of the Orinoko, whose members must vow celibacy and submit to severe scourgings and fasts. The Collahuayas of Peru were a guild of itinerant quacks and magicians, who never remained permanently in one spot.

Withal, there was no class of persons who so widely and deeply influenced the culture and shaped the destiny of the Indian tribes, as their priests. In attempting to gain a true conception of the race's capacities and history, there is no one element of their social life which demands closer attention than the power of these teachers. Hitherto, they have been spoken of with a contempt which I hope this chapter shows is unjustifiable. However much we may deplore the use they made of their skill, we must estimate it fairly, and grant it its due weight in measuring the influence of the religious sentiment on the history of man.

FOOTNOTES:

[265-1] Haeser, Geschichte der Medicin, pp. 4, 7: Jena, 1845.

[265-2] Schoolcraft, Ind. Tribes, v. p. 440.

[267-1] Carver, Travels in North America, p. 73: Boston, 1802; Narrative of John Tanner, p. 135.

[267-2] Sahagun, Hist. de la Nueva Espana, lib. x. cap. 20; Le Livre Sacre des Quiches, p. 177; Lett. sur les Superstit. du Perou, pp. 89, 91.

[269-1] Life of Black Hawk, p. 13.

[270-1] Travs. in North America, p. 74.

[270-2] Journal Historique, p. 362.

[271-1] Sometimes facts like this can be explained by the quickness of perception acquired by constant exposure to danger. The mind takes cognizance unconsciously of trifling incidents, the sum of which leads it to a conviction which the individual regards almost as an inspiration. This is the explanation of presentiments. But this does not apply to cases like that of Swedenborg, who described a conflagration going on at Stockholm, when he was at Gottenberg, three hundred miles away. Psychologists who scorn any method of studying the mind but through physiology, are at a loss in such cases, and take refuge in refusing them credence. Theologians call them inspirations either of devils or angels, as they happen to agree or disagree in religious views with the person experiencing them. True science reserves its opinion until further observation enlightens it.

[272-1] Schoolcraft, Indian Tribes, iii. p. 287; v. p. 652.

[273-1] "The progress from deepest ignorance to highest enlightenment," remarks Herbert Spencer in his Social Statics, "is a progress from entire unconsciousness of law, to the conviction that law is universal and inevitable."

[273-2] The Creeks had, according to Hawkins, not less than seven sacred plants; chief of them were the cassine yupon, called by botanists Ilex vomitoria, or Ilex cassina, of the natural order Aquifoliaceae; and the blue flag, Iris versicolor, natural order Iridaceae. The former is a powerful diuretic and mild emetic, and grows only near the sea. The latter is an active emeto-cathartic, and is abundant on swampy grounds throughout the Southern States. From it was formed the celebrated "black drink," with which they opened their councils, and which served them in place of spirits.

[274-1] Martius, Von dem Rechtzustande unter den Ureinwohnern Brasiliens, p. 32.

[275-1] Mr. Anderson, in the Am. Hist. Mag., vii. p. 79.

[276-1] Such spectacles were nothing uncommon. They are frequently mentioned in the Jesuit Relations, and they were the chief obstacles to missionary labor. In the debauches and excesses that excited these temporary manias, in the recklessness of life and property they fostered, and in their disastrous effects on mind and body, are depicted more than in any other one trait the thorough depravity of the race and its tendency to ruin. In the quaint words of one of the Catholic fathers, "If the old proverb is true that every man has a grain of madness in his composition, it must be confessed that this is a people where each has at least half an ounce" (De Quen, Rel. de la Nouv. France, 1656, p. 27). For the instance in the text see Rel. de la Nouv. France, An 1639, pp. 88-94.

[277-1] Schoolcraft, Indian Tribes, v. p. 423.

[277-2] J. M. Stanley, in the Smithsonian Miscellaneous Contributions, ii. p. 38.

[278-1] D'Orbigny, L'Homme Americain, ii. p. 81.

[279-1] See Balboa, Hist. du Perou, pp. 28-30.

[281-1] D'Orbigny, L'Homme Americain, ii. p. 235.

[281-2] Schoolcraft, Ind. Tribes, v. p. 652.

[281-3] Dr. Mac Gowan, in the Amer. Hist. Mag., x. p. 139; Whipple, Rep. on the Ind. Tribes, p. 35.

[283-1] Hist. des Incas, lib. iii. ch. 22.

[283-2] Travels in the Carolinas, p. 504.

[284-1] Hist. du Perou, p. 128; Voiages aux Indes Occidentales, ii. p. 97.

[284-2] Beverly, Hist. de la Virginie, p. 266. The dialect he specifies is "celle d'Occaniches," and on page 252 he says, "On dit que la langue universelle des Indiens de ces Quartiers est celle des Occaniches, quoiqu'ils ne soient qu'une petite Nation, depuis que les Anglois connoissent ce Pais; mais je ne sais pas la difference qui'l y a entre cette langue et celle des Algonkins." (French trans., Orleans, 1707.) This is undoubtedly the same people that Johannes Lederer, a German traveller, visited in 1670, and calls Akenatzi. They dwelt on an island, in a branch of the Chowan River, the Sapona, or Deep River (Lederer's Discovery of North America, in Harris, Voyages, p. 20). Thirty years later the English surveyor, Lawson, found them in the same spot, and speaks of them as the Acanechos (see Am. Hist. Mag., i. p. 163). Their totem was that of the serpent, and their name is not altogether unlike the Tuscarora name of this animal usquauhne. As the serpent was so widely a sacred animal, this gives Beverly's remarks an unusual significance. It by no means follows from this name that they were of Iroquois descent. Lederer travelled with a Tuscarora (Iroquois) interpreter, who gave them their name in his own tongue. On the contrary, it is extremely probable that they were an Algonkin totem, which had the exclusive right to the priesthood.

[285-1] Riggs, Gram. and Dict. of the Dakota, p. ix; Kane, Second Grinnell Expedition, ii. p. 127. Paul Egede gives a number of words and expressions in the dialect of the sorcerers, Nachrichten von Groenland, p. 122.



CHAPTER XI.

THE INFLUENCE OF THE NATIVE RELIGIONS ON THE MORAL AND SOCIAL LIFE OF THE RACE.

Natural religions hitherto considered of Evil rather than of Good.—Distinctions to be drawn.—Morality not derived from religion.—The positive side of natural religions in incarnations of divinity.—Examples.—Prayers as indices of religious progress.—Religion and social advancement.—Conclusion.

Drawing toward the conclusion of my essay, I I am sensible that the vast field of American mythology remains for most part untouched—that I have but proved that it is not an absolute wilderness, pathless as the tropical jungles which now conceal the temples of the race; but that, go where we will, certain landmarks and guide-posts are visible, revealing uniformity of design and purpose, and refuting, by their presence, the oft-repeated charge of entire incoherence and aimlessness. It remains to examine the subjective power of the native religions, their influence on those who held them, and the place they deserve in the history of the race. What are their merits, if merits they have? what their demerits? Did they purify the life and enlighten the mind, or the contrary? Are they in short of evil or of good? The problem is complex—its solution most difficult. The author who of late years has studied most profoundly the savage races of the globe, expresses the discouraging conviction: "Their religions have not acted as levers to raise them to civilization; they have rather worked, and that powerfully, to impede every step in advance, in the first place by ascribing everything unintelligible in nature to spiritual agency, and then by making the fate of man dependent on mysterious and capricious forces, not on his own skill and foresight."[288-1]

It would ill accord with the theory of mythology which I have all along maintained if this verdict were final. But in fact these false doctrines brought with them their own antidotes, at least to some extent, and while we give full weight to their evil, let us also acknowledge their good. By substituting direct divine interference for law, belief for knowledge, a dogma for a fact, the highest stimulus to mental endeavor was taken away. Nature, to the heathen, is no harmonious whole swayed by eternal principles, but a chaos of causeless effects, the meaningless play of capricious ghosts. He investigates not, because he doubts not. All events are to him miracles. Therefore his faith knows no bounds, and those who teach that doubt is sinful must contemplate him with admiration. The damsels of Nicaragua destined to be thrown into the seething craters of volcanoes, went to their fate, says Pascual de Andagoya, "happy as if they were going to be saved,"[288-2] and doubtless believing so. The subjects of a Central American chieftain, remarks Oviedo, "look upon it as the crown of favors to be permitted to die with their cacique, and thus to acquire immortality."[288-3] The terrible power exerted by the priests rested, as they themselves often saw, largely on the implicit and literal acceptance of their dicta.

In some respects the contrast here offered to enlightened nations is not always in favor of the latter. Borrowing the pointed antithesis of the poet, the mind is often tempted to exclaim—

"This is all The gain we reap from all the wisdom sown Through ages: Nothing doubted those first sons Of Time, while we, the schooled of centuries, Nothing believe."

But the complaint is unfounded. Faith is dearly bought at the cost of knowledge; nor in a better sense has it yet gone from among us. Far more sublime than any known to the barbarian is the faith of the astronomer, who spends the nights in marking the seemingly wayward motions of the stars, or of the anatomist, who studies with unwearied zeal the minute fibres of the organism, each upheld by the unshaken conviction that from least to greatest throughout this universe, purpose and order everywhere prevail.

Natural religions rarely offer more than this negative opposition to reason. They are tolerant to a degree. The savage, void of any clear conception of a supreme deity, sets up no claim that his is the only true church. If he is conquered in battle, he imagines that it is owing to the inferiority of his own gods to those of his victor, and he rarely therefore requires any other reasons to make him a convert. Acting on this principle, the Incas, when they overcame a strange province, sent its most venerated idol for a time to the temple of the Sun at Cuzco, thus proving its inferiority to their own divinity, but took no more violent steps to propagate their creeds.[290-1] So in the city of Mexico there was a temple appropriated to the idols of conquered nations in which they were shut up, both to prove their weakness and prevent them from doing mischief. A nation, like an individual, was not inclined to patronize a deity who had manifested his incompetence by allowing his charge to be gradually worn away by constant disaster. As far as can now be seen, in matters intellectual, the religions of ancient Mexico and Peru were far more liberal than that introduced by the Spanish conquerors, which, claiming the monopoly of truth, sought to enforce its claim by inquisitions and censorships.

In this view of the relative powers of deities lay a potent corrective to the doctrine that the fate of man was dependent on the caprices of the gods. For no belief was more universal than that which assigned to each individual a guardian spirit. This invisible monitor was an ever present help in trouble. He suggested expedients, gave advice and warning in dreams, protected in danger, and stood ready to foil the machinations of enemies, divine or human. With unlimited faith in this protector, attributing to him the devices suggested by his own quick wits and the fortunate chances of life, the savage escaped the oppressive thought that he was the slave of demoniac forces, and dared the dangers of the forest and the war path without anxiety.

By far the darkest side of such a religion is that which it presents to morality. The religious sense is by no means the voice of conscience. The Takahli Indian when sick makes a full and free confession of sins, but a murder, however unnatural and unprovoked, he does not mention, not counting it crime.[291-1] Scenes of brutal licentiousness were approved and sustained throughout the continent as acts of worship; maidenhood was in many parts freely offered up or claimed by the priests as a right; in Central America twins were slain for religious motives; human sacrifice was common throughout the tropics, and was not unusual in higher latitudes; cannibalism was often enjoined; and in Peru, Florida, and Central America it was not uncommon for parents to slay their own children at the behest of a priest.[291-2] The philosophical moralist, contemplating such spectacles, has thought to recognize in them one consoling trait. All history, it has been said, shows man living under an irritated God, and seeking to appease him by sacrifice of blood; the essence of all religion, it has been added, lies in that of which sacrifice is the symbol, namely, in the offering up of self, in the rendering up of our will to the will of God.[291-3] But sacrifice, when not a token of gratitude, cannot be thus explained. It is not a rendering up, but a substitution of our will for God's will. A deity is angered by neglect of his dues; he will revenge, certainly, terribly, we know not how or when. But as punishment is all he desires, if we punish ourselves he will be satisfied; and far better is such self-inflicted torture than a fearful looking for of judgment to come. Craven fear, not without some dim sense of the implacability of nature's laws, is at its root. Looking only at this side of religion, the ancient philosopher averred that the gods existed solely in the apprehensions of their votaries, and the moderns have asserted that "fear is the father of religion, love her late-born daughter;"[292-1] that "the first form of religious belief is nothing else but a horror of the unknown," and that "no natural religion appears to have been able to develop from a germ within itself anything whatever of real advantage to civilization."[292-2]

Far be it from me to excuse the enormities thus committed under the garb of religion, or to ignore their disastrous consequences on human progress. Yet this question is a fair one—If the natural religious belief has in it no germ of anything better, whence comes the manifest and undeniable improvement occasionally witnessed—as, for example, among the Toltecs, the Peruvians, and the Mayas? The reply is, by the influence of great men, who cultivated within themselves a purer faith, lived it in their lives, preached it successfully to their fellows, and, at their death, still survived in the memory of their nation, unforgotten models of noble qualities.[293-1] Where, in America, is any record of such men? We are pointed, in answer, to Quetzalcoatl, Viracocha, Zamna, and their congeners. But these august figures I have shown to be wholly mythical, creations of the religious fancy, parts and parcels of the earliest religion itself. The entire theory falls to nothing, therefore, and we discover a positive side to natural religions—one that conceals a germ of endless progress, which vindicates their lofty origin, and proves that He "is not far from every one of us."

I have already analyzed these figures under their physical aspect. Let it be observed in what antithesis they stand to most other mythological creations. Let it be remembered that they primarily correspond to the stable, the regular, the cosmical phenomena, that they are always conceived under human form, not as giants, fairies, or strange beasts; that they were said at one time to have been visible leaders of their nations, that they did not suffer death, and that, though absent, they are ever present, favoring those who remain mindful of their precepts. I touched but incidentally on their moral aspects. This was likewise in contrast to the majority of inferior deities. The worship of the latter was a tribute extorted by fear. The Indian deposits tobacco on the rocks of a rapid, that the spirit of the swift waters may not swallow his canoe; in a storm he throws overboard a dog to appease the siren of the angry waves. He used to tear the hearts from his captives to gain the favor of the god of war. He provides himself with talismans to bind hostile deities. He fees[TN-17] the conjurer to exorcise the demon of disease. He loves none of them, he respects none of them; he only fears their wayward tempers. They are to him mysterious, invisible, capricious goblins. But, in his highest divinity, he recognized a Father and a Preserver, a benign Intelligence, who provided for him the comforts of life—man, like himself, yet a god—God of All. "Go and do good," was the parting injunction of his father to Michabo in Algonkin legend;[294-1] and in their ancient and uncorrupted stories such is ever his object. "The worship of Tamu," the culture hero of the Guaranis, says the traveller D'Orbigny, "is one of reverence, not of fear."[294-2] They were ideals, summing up in themselves the best traits, the most approved virtues of whole nations, and were adored in a very different spirit from other divinities.

None of them has more humane and elevated traits than Quetzalcoatl. He was represented of majestic stature and dignified demeanor. In his train came skilled artificers and men of learning. He was chaste and temperate in life, wise in council, generous of gifts, conquering rather by arts of peace than of war; delighting in music, flowers, and brilliant colors, and so averse to human sacrifices that he shut his ears with both hands when they were even mentioned.[295-1] Such was the ideal man and supreme god of a people who even a Spanish monk of the sixteenth century felt constrained to confess were "a good people, attached to virtue, urbane and simple in social intercourse, shunning lies, skilful in arts, pious toward their gods."[295-2] Is it likely, is it possible, that with such a model as this before their minds, they received no benefit from it? Was not this a lever, and a mighty one, lifting the race toward civilization and a purer faith?

Transfer the field of observation to Yucatan, and we find in Zamna, to New Granada and in Nemqueteba, to Peru and in Viracocha, or his reflex Manco Capac, the lineaments of Quetzalcoatl—modified, indeed, by difference of blood and temperament, but each combining in himself all the qualities most esteemed by their several nations. Were one or all of these proved to be historical personages, still the fact remains that the primitive religious sentiment, investing them with the best attributes of humanity, dwelling on them as its models, worshipping them as gods, contained a kernel of truth potent to encourage moral excellence. But if they were mythical, then this truth was of spontaneous growth, self-developed by the growing distinctness of the idea of God, a living witness that the religious sense, like every other faculty, has within itself a power of endless evolution.

If we inquire the secret of the happier influence of this element in natural worship, it is all contained in one word—its humanity. "The Ideal of Morality," says the contemplative Novalis, "has no more dangerous rival than the Ideal of the Greatest Strength, of the most vigorous life, the Brute Ideal" (das Thier-Ideal).[296-1] Culture advances in proportion as man recognizes what faculties are peculiar to him as man, and devotes himself to their education. The moral value of religions can be very precisely estimated by the human or the brutal character of their gods. The worship of Quetzalcoatl in the city of Mexico was subordinate to that of lower conceptions, and consequently the more sanguinary and immoral were the rites there practised. The Algonkins, who knew no other meaning for Michabo than the Great Hare, had lost, by a false etymology, the best part of their religion.

Looking around for other standards wherewith to measure the progress of the knowledge of divinity in the New World, prayer suggests itself as one of the least deceptive. "Prayer," to quote again the words of Novalis,[296-2] "is in religion what thought is in philosophy. The religious sense prays, as the reason thinks." Guizot, carrying the analysis farther, thinks that it is prompted by a painful conviction of the inability of our will to conform to the dictates of reason.[296-3] Originally it was connected with the belief that divine caprice, not divine law, governs the universe, and that material benefits rather than spiritual gifts are to be desired. The gradual recognition of its limitations and proper objects marks religious advancement. The Lord's Prayer contains seven petitions, only one of which is for a temporal advantage, and it the least that can be asked for. What immeasurable interval between it and the prayer of the Nootka Indian on preparing for war!—

"Great Quahootze, let me live, not be sick, find the enemy, not fear him, find him asleep, and kill a great many of him."[297-1]

Or again, between it and the petition of a Huron to a local god, heard by Father Brebeuf:—

"Oki, thou who livest in this spot, I offer thee tobacco. Help us, save us from shipwreck, defend us from our enemies, give us a good trade, and bring us back safe and sound to our villages."[297-2]

This is a fair specimen of the supplications of the lowest religion. Another equally authentic is given by Father Allouez.[297-3] In 1670 he penetrated to an outlying Algonkin village, never before visited by a white man. The inhabitants, startled by his pale face and long black gown, took him for a divinity. They invited him to the council lodge, a circle of old men gathered around him, and one of them, approaching him with a double handful of tobacco, thus addressed him, the others grunting approval:—

"This, indeed, is well, Blackrobe, that thou dost visit us. Have mercy upon us. Thou art a Manito. We give thee to smoke.

"The Naudowessies and Iroquois are devouring us. Have mercy upon us.

"We are often sick; our children die; we are hungry. Have mercy upon us. Hear me, O Manito, I give thee to smoke.

"Let the earth yield us corn; the rivers give us fish; sickness not slay us; nor hunger so torment us. Hear us, O Manito, we give thee to smoke."

In this rude but touching petition, wrung from the heart of a miserable people, nothing but their wretchedness is visible. Not the faintest trace of an aspiration for spiritual enlightenment cheers the eye of the philanthropist, not the remotest conception that through suffering we are purified can be detected.

By the side of these examples we may place the prayers of Peru and Mexico, forms composed by the priests, written out, committed to memory, and repeated at certain seasons. They are not less authentic, having been collected and translated in the first generation after the conquest. One to Viracocha Pachacamac, was as follows:—

"O Pachacamac, thou who hast existed from the beginning and shalt exist unto the end, powerful and pitiful; who createdst man by saying, let man be; who defendest us from evil and preservest our life and health; art thou in the sky or in the earth, in the clouds or in the depths? Hear the voice of him who implores thee, and grant him his petitions. Give us life everlasting, preserve us, and accept this our sacrifice."[299-1]

In the voluminous specimens of Aztec prayers preserved by Sahagun, moral improvement, the "spiritual gift," is very rarely if at all the object desired. Health, harvests, propitious rains, release from pain, preservation from dangers, illness, and defeat, these are the almost unvarying themes. But here and there we catch a glimpse of something better, some dim sense of the divine beauty of suffering, some feeble glimmering of the grand truth so nobly expressed by the poet:—

aus des Busens Tiefe stroemt Gedeihn Der festen Duldung und entschlossner That. Nicht Schmerz ist Unglueck, Glueck nicht immer Freude; Wer sein Geschick erfuellt, dem laecheln beide.

"Is it possible," says one of them, "that this scourge, this affliction, is sent to us not for our correction and improvement, but for our destruction and annihilation? O Merciful Lord, let this chastisement with which thou hast visited us, thy people, be as those which a father or mother inflicts on their children, not out of anger, but to the end that they may be free from follies and vices." Another formula, used when a chief was elected to some important position, reads: "O Lord, open his eyes and give him light, sharpen his ears and give him understanding, not that he may use them to his own advantage, but for the good of the people he rules. Lead him to know and to do thy will, let him be as a trumpet which sounds thy words. Keep him from the commission of injustice and oppression."[300-1]

At first, good and evil are identical with pleasure and pain, luck and ill-luck. "The good are good warriors and hunters," said a Pawnee chief,[300-2] which would also be the opinion of a wolf, if he could express it. Gradually the eyes of the mind are opened, and it is perceived that "whom He loveth, He chastiseth," and physical give[TN-18] place to moral ideas of good and evil. Finally, as the idea of God rises more distinctly before the soul, as "the One by whom, in whom, and through whom all things are," evil is seen to be the negation, not the opposite of good, and itself "a porch oft opening on the sun."

The influence of these religions on art, science, and social life, must also be weighed in estimating their value.

Nearly all the remains of American plastic art, sculpture, and painting, were obviously designed for religious purposes. Idols of stone, wood, or baked clay, were found in every Indian tribe, without exception, so far as I can judge; and in only a few directions do these arts seem to have been applied to secular purposes. The most ambitious attempts of architecture, it is plain, were inspired by religious fervor. The great pyramid of Cholula, the enormous mounds of the Mississippi valley, the elaborate edifices on artificial hills in Yucatan, were miniature representations of the mountains hallowed by tradition, the "Hill of Heaven," the peak on which their ancestors escaped in the flood, or that in the terrestrial paradise from which flow the rains. Their construction took men away from war and the chase, encouraged agriculture, peace, and a settled disposition, and fostered the love of property, of country, and of the gods. The priests were also close observers of nature, and were the first to discover its simpler laws. The Aztec sages were as devoted star-gazers as the Chaldeans, and their calendar bears unmistakable marks of native growth, and of its original purpose to fix the annual festivals. Writing by means of pictures and symbols was cultivated chiefly for religious ends, and the word hieroglyph is a witness that the phonetic alphabet was discovered under the stimulus of the religious sentiment. Most of the aboriginal literature was composed and taught by the priests, and most of it refers to matters connected with their superstitions. As the gifts of votaries and the erection of temples enriched the sacerdotal order individually and collectively, the terrors of religion were lent to the secular arm to enforce the rights of property. Music, poetic, scenic, and historical recitations, formed parts of the ceremonies of the more civilized nations, and national unity was strengthened by a common shrine. An active barter in amulets, lucky stones, and charms, existed all over the continent, to a much greater extent than we might think. As experience demonstrates that nothing so efficiently promotes civilization as the free and peaceful intercourse of man with man, I lay particular stress on the common custom of making pilgrimages.

The temple on the island of Cozumel in Yucatan was visited every year by such multitudes from all parts of the peninsula, that roads, paved with cut stones, had been constructed from the neighboring shore to the principal cities of the interior.[302-1] Each village of the Muyscas is said to have had a beaten path to Lake Guatavita, so numerous were the devotees who journeyed to the shrine there located.[302-2] In Peru the temples of Pachacama, Rimac, and other famous gods, were repaired to by countless numbers from all parts of the realm, and from other provinces within a radius of three hundred leagues around. Houses of entertainment were established on all the principal roads, and near the temples, for their accommodation; and when they made known the object of their journey, they were allowed a safe passage even through an enemy's territory.[302-3]

* * * * *

The more carefully we study history, the more important in our eyes will become the religious sense. It is almost the only faculty peculiar to man. It concerns him nearer than aught else. It is the key to his origin and destiny. As such it merits in all its developments the most earnest attention, an attention we shall find well repaid in the clearer conceptions we thus obtain of the forces which control the actions and fates of individuals and nations.

FOOTNOTES:

[288-1] Waitz, Anthropologie der Naturvoelker, i. p. 459.

[288-2] Navarrete, Viages, iii. p. 415.

[288-3] Relation de Cueba, p. 140. Ed. Ternaux-Compans.

[290-1] La Vega, Hist. des Incas, liv. v. cap. 12.

[291-1] Morse, Rep. on the Ind. Tribes, App. p. 345.

[291-2] Ximenes, Origen de los Indios de Guatemala, p. 192; Acosta, Hist. of the New World, lib. v. chap. 18.

[291-3] Joseph de Maistre, Eclaircissement sur les Sacrifices; Trench, Hulsean Lectures, p. 180. The famed Abbe Lammenaais and Professor Sepp, of Munich, with these two writers, may be taken as the chief exponents of a school of mythologists, all of whom start from the theories first laid down by Count de Maistre in his Soirees de St. Petersbourg. To them the strongest proof of Christianity lies in the traditions and observances of heathendom. For these show the wants of the religious sense, and Christianity, they maintain, purifies and satisfies them all. The rites, symbols, and legends of every natural religion, they say, are true and not false; all that is required is to assign them their proper places and their real meaning. Therefore the strange resemblances in heathen myths to what is revealed in the Scriptures, as well as the ethical anticipations which have been found in ancient philosophies, all, so far from proving that Christianity is a natural product of the human mind, in fact, are confirmations of it, unconscious prophecies, and presentiments of the truth.

[292-1] Alfred Maury, La Magie et l'Astrologie dans l'Antiquite et au Moyen Age, p. 8: Paris, 1860.

[292-2] Waitz, Anthropologie, i. pp. 325, 465.

[293-1] So says Dr. Waitz, ibid., p. 465.

[294-1] Schoolcraft, Algic Researches, i. p. 143.

[294-2] L'Homme Americain, ii. p. 319.

[295-1] Brasseur, Hist. du Mexique, liv. iii. chaps. 1 and 2.

[295-2] Sahagun, Hist. de la Nueva Espana, lib. x. cap. 29.

[296-1] Novalis, Schriften, i. p. 244: Berlin, 1837.

[296-2] Ibid., p. 267.

[296-3] Hist. de la Civilisation en France, i. pp. 122, 130.

[297-1] Narrative of J. R. Jewett among the Savages of Nootka Sound, p. 121.

[297-2] Rel. de la Nouv. France, An 1636, p. 109.

[297-3] Ibid., An 1670, p. 99.

[299-1] Geronimo de Ore, Symbolo Catholico Indiano, chap, ix., quoted by Ternaux-Compans. De Ore was a native of Peru and held the position of Professor of Theology in Cuzco in the latter half of the sixteenth century. He was a man of great erudition, and there need be no hesitation in accepting this extraordinary prayer as genuine. For his life and writings see Nic. Antonio, Bib. Hisp. Nova, tom. ii. p. 43.

[300-1] Sahagun, Hist. de la Nueva Espana, lib. vi. caps. 1, 4.

[300-2] Morse, Rep. on the Ind. Tribes, App. p. 250.

[302-1] Cogolludo, Hist. de Yucathan, lib. iv. cap. 9. Compare Stephens, Travs. in Yucatan, ii. p. 122, who describes the remains of these roads as they now exist.

[302-2] Rivero and Tschudi, Antiqs. of Peru, p. 162.

[302-3] La Vega, Hist. des Incas, lib. vi. chap. 30; Xeres, Rel de la Conq. du Perou, p. 151; Let. sur les Superstit. du Perou, p. 98, and others.



INDEX.

Abnakis, 174

Acagchemem, a Californian tribe, 105

Age of man in America, 35-37

Ages of the world, 213 sq.

Akakanet, 61

Akanzas, 238

Akenatzi, 284

Algonkins, location, 26 name of God, 58 n.[TN-19] mythical ancestors, 77 veneration of birds, 103 of serpents, 108, 109, 113, 116 myths and rites, 133, 136, 144, 147, 151, 161, 174, 198, 209, 220, 224, 236, 240, 244, 248, 277, 297

Aluberi, a name of God, 58 n.[TN-19]

Anahuac, 29, 282

Angont, a mythical serpent, 136

Apalachian tribes, 27, 225

Apocatequil, a Peruvian deity, 153

Ararats, of America, 203

Araucanians, 33 name of God, 48, 61 myths, 204, 248

Arks, 255

Arowacks, 58 n.[TN-19]

Ataensic, an Iroquois deity, 123, 131, 170

Ataguju, or Atachuchu, 152

Atatarho, mythical Iroquois chief, 118

Athapascan tribes, 24 myths, 104, 150, 195, 205, 229, 248, 257

Atl, an Aztec deity, 131

Aurora borealis, 245

Aymaras, 31, 34, 177

Aztecs, their books and characters, 10 divisions, 29 names of God, 48, 50, 58 n.[TN-19] government, 69 rites, 72, 126, 127, 147 calendar, 74 worship of cross, 95 names of cardinal points, 93 worship of birds, 102, 106, 107 of serpents, 111 myths, 132, 133, 134, 138, 144, 156, 171, 181, 205, 214 sq., 227, 240, 246, 248, 252, 258 priests, 282 prayers, 292

Aztlan, 181

Bacab, Maya gods, 80

Baptism, 125 seq.

Bimini, 87

Bird, symbol of, 101 sq., 195 sq., 229, 254

Blue, symbolic meaning of, 47

Bochica, 183

Boiuca, a mythical isle, 87

Bones, preservation of, 255 soul in the, 257

Botocudos, 123, 201

Brasseur, Abbe, his works, 41

Brazilian tribes, 102, 134, 250 (See Tupis, Botocudos.)

Busk, a Creek festival, 71, 96

Caddoes, 93, 203

Camaxtli, 158

Cardinal points, adoration of, 67 sq. names of, 93 sq.

Caribs, 32 theory of lightning, 104, 114 myths and rites, 145, 184, 223, 237, 244, 256 priests, 282

Catequil. (See Apocatequil.)

Centeotl, goddess of maize, 22, 134

Chac, Maya gods, 80

Chalchihuitlycue, an Aztec god, 123

Chantico, an Aztec god, 138

Cherokees, location, 25 name of God, 51 serpent myth, 115 baptism, 128 deluge, 205 priests, 281

Chia, goddess of Muyscas, 134

Chichimec, 139 n., 158

Chicomoztoc, the Seven Caves, 227

Chicunoapa, the Aztec Styx, 249

Chipeways, picture-writing, 10 records, 17 magicians, 71 myths, 163, 168

Choctaws, location, 27 name of God, 51 myths, 84 n.,[TN-20] 225, 261 priests, 281

Cholula, 180, 181, 204, 228

Cihuacoatl, the Serpent Woman, 120

Cihuapipilti, 246

Circumcision, 147

Citatli, 131

Clairvoyance, 269

Coatlicue, 118

Colors, symbolism of, 47, 80, 140, 165

Con or Contici, 155, 176

Coxcox, 202

Craniology, American, 35

Creation, myths of, 193 seq.

Creeks, location, 27 name of God, 50 rites, 71, 96 mythical ancestors, 77 serpent myth, 115 other myths, 137, 225, 242, 244 priests, 273, 283

Cross, symbolic meaning of, 95-7, 183, 188 of Palenque, 118

Cupay,[TN-21] the Quichua Pluto, 61, 251

Cusic, his Iroquois legends, 63, 108 n.

Dakotas, location, 28 rites, 71 language, 75 mythical ancestors, 77 myths, 62, 103, 133, 150, 237, 259, 279

Dawn, myths of, 166, 167, 175, 227

Delawares, 140 n., 144 (See Lenni Lenape.)

Deluge, myth, origin, etc., 198-212

Devil, idea of unknown to red race, 59, 251

Divination, 278

Dobayba, 123

Dog, as a symbol, 137, 229, 247-9

Dove, as a a[TN-22] symbol, 107

Dualism, moral, not found in America, 59 sexual not found, 146

Eagle, as a symbol, 104

East, myths, concerning, 91, 165, 174, 180 (See Dawn.)

Eastman, Mrs., her Legends of the Sioux, 103

Eldorado,[TN-23] 87

Enigorio and Enigohahetgea, 63

Epochs of nature, 200 seq.

Esaugetuh Emissee, 50

Eskimos, location, 23 name of chief god, 50, 76 term for south, 94 veneration of birds, 101 myths, 173 n., 193, 226, 229, 241, 245, 261, 280

Fear in religion, 141, 292

Fire-worship, 140 seq.

Flood-myth. (See Deluge.)

Florida, 87

Forty, a sacred number, 94

Fountain of youth, 129

Four, the sacred number of red race, 66 sq., 105, 157, 167, 178, 182, 184, 240

Four brothers, the myth of, 76-83, 152, 167, 178, 182

Garhonia, Iroquois deity, 48

Gizhigooke, the day-maker, 169

Guaranis, 32, 84 n.[TN-20]

Guatavita Lake, 124

Gucumatz, the bird-serpent, 118

Gumongo, god of the Monquis, 93

Haitians, myths of, 78, 85, 135, 188

Hand, symbol of the, 183

Haokah, Dakota thunder god, 151

Hawaneu. (See Neo.)

Heaven, the, of the red race, 243

Hell, the hidden world, 252

Heno, Iroquois thunder-god, 156

Hiawatha, myth of, 172

Hobbamock, 60

Huemac, the Strong-hand, 181, 183

Huitzilopochtli, the god of war, 118, 282

Hunting, its effect on the mind, 21, 67, 100

Hurakan or hurricane, meaning of, 51 a Maya god, 81, 82, 114, 156, 196

Hurons, 25, 48, 114, 136, 169, 248, 250, 275

Hushtoli, Choctaw name of God, 51

Illatici, Quichua name of God, 55, 155

Incas, secret language, 31 official title, 69 ancestors, 82, 153 arms, 120 sun-worship, 142 myths, 188, 191, 244

Ioskeha, supreme god of Iroquois, 63, 170-2

Iroquois, location, 25 name of God, 48, 53 myths of, 83, 85, 169-72, 196, 227, 236 veneration of serpents, 108, 116, 118 of fire, 148

Isolation of the red race, 20, 34

Itzcuinan, the Bitch-Mother, 138

Jarvis, Dr., his Discourse on American Religions, 39

Juripari, 61

Killistenoes, 270

Kittanitowit, 58, 60

Ku, a name of divinity, 46, 47

Kukulcan, god of air, 118

Languages of America, 7 esoteric of priests, 284

Lenni Lenape, 26, 96, 161, 231

Light, universal symbol of divinity, 173

Lightning, the, 112 seq., 151 seq., 168

Madness, as inspiration, 274 seq.

Magic, natural, 266

Maistre, Joseph de, his theory of mythology, 291, n.[TN-24]

Maize, distribution of, 22, 37

Man, origin of, 222 sq., 258 word for, 223

Mandans, 71, 85, 107, 184, 205, 228

Manibozho. (See Michabo.)

Mannacicas, 250

Manoa, 87

Manes, 111

Mayas, alphabet, 13 location, 30 calendar, 74, 80 mythical ancestors, 79, 80, 85 myths and rites, 93, 146, 183, 188, 214, 221 name of cross, 97

Mbocobi, 201

Meda worship, 162 n.

Medicine, 45 lodge, 267 men, 264, 277 seq.

Memory, cultivated by picture-writing, 18

Mesmerism, 272

Messou, 209 (See Michabo.)

Metempsychosis, 253

Mexicans, (See Aztecs.)

Meztli, 132, 135

Michabo, supreme Algonkin god, 63, 116, 136, 161-9, 198, 220, 294

Mictlan, god of the dead, 92, 252

Migrations, coarse of, 34

Milky-way, 244

Millennium, 261

Minnetarees, 228, 230, 250

Mixcoatl, or Mixcohuatl, 22, 51, 158

Mixtecas, 90, 196

Monan, 211

Monquis, 93, 106

Montezuma, 187, 190

Moon, worship of, 130 seq.

Moxos, 124, 230

Mueller, J. G., his work on American religions, 40, 59, 61

Mummies, 257-60

Muscogees, 195 (See Creeks.)

Muyscas, 31 myths, 84 n.,[TN-20] 183-4

Nahuas, 29, 73 myths, 84 n.,[TN-20] 118, 138, 158, 206 (See Aztecs.)

Nanahuatl, 135

Natchez, 27, 28 n.[TN-25] myths, 126, 142, 149, 205, 225, 239

Natural religions, 3

Navajos, 79, 84 n.,[TN-20] 103, 127, 205, 241

Neo, Iroquois corruption of Dieu, 53

Nemqueteba, 183

Netelas, 50, 105 n.

Nez Perces[TN-26] 272, 281

Nicaraguans, 145, 158, 201, 245, 288

Nine Rivers, the, 248

Nootka Indians, 297

North, myths concerning, 82

Nottoways, 25, 84

Numbers, sacred, 66, 98 (See Four, Three, Seven.)

Occaniches, 284

Oki, name of God, 46-8

Onniont, a mythical serpent, 114

Onondagas, 171

Oonawleh unggi, 51

Otomis, 6, 158

Ottawas, 93, 145, 161

Ottoes, 84 n.[TN-20]

Pacari Tampu, 82, 179, 227

Pachacamac, 56, 176-7, 298

Panos, 13

Paradise, myth of, 86 seq.

Paria, 87

Passions, worship of, 146, 149

Pawnees, 71 n., 84 n.[TN-20]

Pend d'Oreilles, 233

Peru, 69 rites and myths, 82, 102, 106, 131, 132, 137, 138, 142, 149, 152 sq,[TN-27] 176-9, 188, 213, 219, 227, 240, 251, 260 priests, 278, 282, 284 (See Aymaras, Incas.)

Phallic worship, 146, 149

Picture writing, 9

Pilgrimages, custom of, 301

Pimos, 185

Prayers, specimens of, 296-300

Priesthood, native, 263 sq.

Puelches, 277

Quetzalcoatl, the supreme Aztec god, 106, 118, 157, 180-3, 188, 294-6

Quiateot, a rain god, 131

Quiches, 30 Sacred Book, 41 names for God, 51, 58 n.[TN-19] evil deities, 64 myth of first four brothers, 81 of paradise, 89 of creation, 196 of flood, 207 of hell, 251, 258

Quichuas, 31 religion, 55 ancestors, 82, 153 names of cardinal points, 93 n. myths, 155 (See Peru, Incas.)[TN-28]

Quipus, 14

Rattlesnake, as a symbol, 108 sq.

Raven, as a symbol, 195, 204, 213, 229

Red, symbolic meaning, 80, 88, 140

Sacrifice, its meaning, 291

Sacs, 84, 277

Sanscrit flood-myth, 212

Schwarz, Dr., his views of mythology, 112

Seminoles, 129

Serpent, as a symbol, 107 sq., 136, 158

Seven, a sacred number, 66, 128 n., 202, 204, 273 n., 281, 283

Shawnees, 26, 84 n.,[TN-20] 110, 113, 114, 144, 281

Shoshonees, 28, 138

Sillam Innua, 50, 76

Sioux, 28, 151, 236

Soul, notions concerning, 235 sq., 277

Sua, the Muysca God, 184

Sun-worship, 141 sq., 149, 243-9

Suns, Aztec, 215 sq.

Takahlis, 127, 197, 201, 253, 256

Tamu, 184, 294

Taras, 158

Taronhiawagon, 171

Tawiscara, 170

Teczistecatl, 132

Teatihuacan,[TN-29] 46, 69

Three, a sacred number, 66, 98, 156

Thunder-storm, in myths, 150 sq.

Tici, the vase, 130

Timberlake, Lt., his Memoirs, 115

Titicaca, Lake, 124, 178

Tlacatecolotl, supposed Aztec Satan, 106

Tlaloc, god of rain, 75, 88, 156-7

Tlalocan, 88, 246

Tlapallan, 88, 91, 181

Tloque nahuaque, 58 n.[TN-19]

Tohil, 157

Toltecs, 29, 180

Tonacatepec, 88

Toukaways, 231

Trinity, in American religions, 156

Tulan, 88, 89, 181

Tupa, 32, 84, 152, 185

Tupis, 32 myths, 83 n., 152, 185, 210, 258, 274

Twins, sacred to lightning, 153-4

Unktahe, a Dakota god, 133

Vase, symbol of, 130, 155

Viracocha, supreme god in Peru, 124, 155, 177-80

Waitz, Dr., his Anthropology, 40, 288

Wampum, 15

Water, myths of, 122 seq., 194

West, myths of, 92, 93, 166

White, as a symbol, 165, 174-6

Whiteman's land, 21 n.

Winds, myths of, 49-52, 74 sq., 96, 103, 166, 182

Winnebagoes, 220

Witchitas, 224

Writing, modes of, 9-13

Xelhua, 228

Xibalba, 64, 251

Xochiquetzal, 137

Xolotl, 258

Yakama language, 50

Yamo and Yama, twin deities, 154 n.

Yoalli-ehecatl, 50

Yohualticitl, 132

Yupanqui, Inca, 55

Yurucares, 201, 224, 259

Zac, empire of, 31, 124

Zamna, culture hero of Mayas, 93, 183, 188

Zapotecs, 183



ERRATA.

Page 31, note, for "Ureinbewohner" read "Ureinwohner."[TN-30] " 101, line 10 from bottom, for "clouds" read "clods." " 145, note 1, for "Gomara" read "Gumilla."



Transcriber's Note

The following typographical errors were noted in the original text.

Page Error TN-1 57 the Inds. p. should read the Inds., p. TN-2 89 Orstnamen should read Ortsnamen TN-3 115 o should read of TN-4 134 knaws should read gnaws TN-5 140 extingish should read extinguish TN-6 144 fn. 2 Reconnoissance was spelled this way in the title of original publication, quoted correctly TN-7 158 fn. 3 Hist du Mexique should read Hist. du Mexique TN-8 162 wizzard should read wizard TN-9 218 foreboding shave should read forebodings have TN-10 223 fn. 2 yelk should read yolk TN-11 226 fn. 2 above should read above TN-12 234 after.world should read after world TN-13 248 scimetar should read scimitar TN-14 251 Xibilha should read Xibalba TN-15 258 supersitions should read superstitions TN-16 278 drunkeness should read drunkenness TN-17 294 fees should read frees or feeds? TN-18 300 give should read gives TN-19 303 (and elsewhere) 58 n. refers to footnote 57-3, the continued text of this footnote was printed on p. 58 in the original book TN-20 304 (and elsewhere) 84 n. refers to footnote 83-3, the continued text of this footnote was printed on p. 84 in the original book TN-21 304 Cupay should read Cupay TN-22 304 a a symbol should read a symbol TN-23 304 Eldorado should read El Dorado TN-24 305 291, n. should read 291 n. TN-25 305 28 n. refers to footnote 27-2, the continued text of this footnote was printed on p. 28 in the original book TN-26 306 Nez Perces should read Nez Perces, TN-27 306 152 sq, should read 152 sq., TN-28 306 See Peru, Incas should read See Peru, Incas TN-29 306 Teatihuacan should read Teotihuacan TN-30 307 Ureinbewohner was not found in the text

The following words were inconsistently spelled:

Mannacicas / Mannicicas Perces / Perces Quiche / Quiche role / role Tamoei / Tamoi

The following words were inconsistently hyphenated:

Aka-kanet / Akakanet Ama-livaca / Amalivaca child-birth / childbirth Teo-tihuacan / Teotihuacan under-world / underworld Ur-religionen / Urreligionen Yoalli-ehecatl / Yoalliehecatl

Other inconsistencies

Titles of works referred to in the footnotes are occasionally not italicized. Author names of the works referred to in the footnotes are occasionally italicized.

THE END