of peace.
Their great stone or adobe dwellings, in which hundreds of persons live,
reared with almost incredible toil on the top of nearly inaccessible
rocks or on the ledges of deep gorges, were constructed to serve at the
same time as dwelling-places and as strongholds against the attacks of
the roaming and murdering Apaches. These people till the thirsty soil of
their arid region by irrigation with water conducted for miles. They
have developed many industries to a remarkable degree, and their pottery
shows both skill and taste.

These high-class barbarians are especially interesting because they have
undergone little change since the Spaniards, under Coronado, first became
acquainted with them, 364 years ago. They still live in the same way and
observe the same strange ceremonies, of which the famous "Snake-dance" is
the best known. They are, also, on a level of culture not much below
that of the ancient Mexicans; so that from the study of them we may get a
very good idea of the people whom Cortes found and conquered.

{15}

Chapter II

SOMETHING ABOUT INDIAN SOCIAL LIFE

Mistakes of the Earliest European Visitors as to Indian Society and
Government.--How Indian Social Life originated.--The Family Tie the
Central Principle.--Gradual Development of a Family into a Tribe.--The
Totem.

The first white visitors to America found men exercising some kind of
authority, and they called them kings, after the fashion of European
government. The Spaniards even called the head-chief of the Mexicans
the "Emperor Montezuma." There was not a king, still less an emperor,
in the whole of North America. Had these first Europeans understood
that they were face to face with men of the Stone Age, that is, with
men who had not progressed further than our own forefathers had
advanced thousands of years ago, in that dim past when they used
weapons and implements of stone, and when they had not as yet anything
like written language, they would have been saved many blunders. They
would not have called native chiefs by such high-sounding titles as
"King {16} Powhatan" and "King Philip." They would not have styled the
simple Indian girl, Pocahontas, a princess; and King James, of England,
would not have made the ludicrous mistake of being angry with Rolfe for
marrying her, because he feared that when her father died, she would be
entitled to "the throne," and Rolfe would claim to be King of Virginia!

The study of Ind