ntellectual power and mental processes the Florida Indians,
when compared with the intellectual abilities and operations of the
cultivated American, are quite limited. But if the Seminole are to be
judged by comparison with other American aborigines, I believe they
easily enter the first class. They seem to be mentally active. When the
full expression of any of my questions failed, a substantive or two, an
adverb, and a little pantomime generally sufficed to convey the meaning
to my hearers. In their intercourse with one another, they are, as a
rule, voluble, vivacious, showing the possession of relatively active
brains and mental fertility. Certainly, most of the Seminole I met
cannot justly be called either stupid or intellectually sluggish,
and I observed that, when invited to think of matters with which they
are not familiar or which are beyond the verge of the domain which
their intellectual faculties have mastered, they nevertheless bravely
endeavored to satisfy me before they were willing to acknowledge
themselves powerless. They would not at once answer a misunderstood or
unintelligible question, but would return inquiry upon inquiry, before
the decided "I don't know" was uttered. Those with whom I particularly
dealt were exceptionally patient under the strains to which I put their
minds. Ko-nip-ha-tco, by no means a brilliant member of his tribe, is
much to be commended for his patient, persistent, intellectual industry.
I kept the young fellow busy for about a fortnight, from half-past eight
in the morning until five in the afternoon, with but an hour and a
half's intermission at noon. Occupying our time with inquiries not very
interesting to him, about the language and life of his people, I could
see how much I wearied him. Often I found by his answers that his brain
was, to a degree, paralyzed by the long continued tension to which it
was subjected. But he held on bravely through the severe heat of an
attic room at Myers. Despite the insects, myriads of which took a great
interest in us and our surroundings, despite the persistent invitation
of the near woods to him to leave "Doctor Na-ki-ta" and to tramp off in
them on a deer hunt (for "Billy" is a lover of the woods and a bold and
successful hunter), he held on courageously. The only sign of weakening
he made was on one day, about noon, when, after many, to me, vexatious
failures to draw from him certain translations into his own language of
phrases containi