ESSAYS

AND

MISCELLANY

CHAPTER I

THE EARLY AMERICAN CHRONICLERS

Facts can be accurately known to us only by the most rigid observation and sustained and scrutinizing scepticism

-Froude

IN the North American Review for April, 1876, appeared an article by Lewis H. Morgan entitled "Montezuma's Dinner," in which the writer attempts to show that the native nations of Central and South America were not so far advanced in culture as from the evidence of priests and conquerors we have been led to suppose, were not indeed so far advanced as the Iroquois and some other northern tribes. As Mr Morgan takes for his text the second volume of my Native Races of the Pacific States, treating of the aboriginal civilization of the Mexican and Central American table-lands; and as his remarkable hypotheses affect not alone the quality of American aboriginal culture, but the foundations of early American history, and indeed of all historic evidence; and as among his disciples are found several popular writers disseminating these erroneous ideas, I deem it not out of place to views upon the subject.

express my

shall not attempt the elucidation of Mr Morgan's theories, which run through voluminous and somewhat

turbid writings, and which have been brought into some degree of notice, more by the persistent energy of the author than by any able arguments or convincing proofs. I have noticed that not every originator or supporter of a theory holds to one belief throughout the entire course of his investigations, or can himself explain exactly what he thinks he believes.

The Morgan hypothesis adopts a distinction of its own as to what constitutes a savage or a civilized nation, in which rise prominent the systems of kinship, conspicuous in particular among the Iroquois and Ojibways, together with plurality of wives and community of property, as tests of a former grade. Convinced that the American nations all belong to one family, Mr Morgan assumes that their various institutions must be practically identical, and that the social customs of extinct tribes may be best learned, not from the statements of men who wrote from actual observation, but from the study of existing tribes. Himself familiar with the Iroquois, and to some extent with other northern tribes, he arbitrarily applies the tribal organization of the Iroquois, of gentes, phratries, tribes, and confederations to the nations of Mexico and Central and South America, thus making savages of all the inhabitants of the two Americas.

With Mr Morgan's theory I have nothing to do. I cannot see that it alters the facts regarding the culture, the intellectual and social conditions of the inhabitants of the Mexican and Central American table-lands whether they are called savage or civilized, especially by those whose conception of the meaning of these words is peculiar, or at least quite different from that of the foremost scholars of the day. What alone interests me in this connection is the effect of such teachings on popular estimates of historical evidence, particularly as touching the early American chroniclers. Not that the teachings of Mr Morgan himself could exercise any great popular influence anywhere; but there is a class of writers for the million, who

THE MORGAN THEORY.

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flit in the sunshine of public favor, in the borderland between fact and fancy, caring less for the truth of what they say than for the manner in which it is said, and the money that comes to them in consequence.

Men of this stamp have taken up the Morgan theory, and by pretending that there is more in it than ever the author himself dreamed of, have exercised a most pernicious influence over the popular mind, succeeding at one time in attracting to themselves considerable attention. They claimed that the literary and monumental remains of the Aztecs, Mayas, and Moundbuilders might now be translated by skillful students; that a clew to the labyrinths of race and origin had been found; that conjecture in this direction had begun for science a new era, and that there remains little affecting American archæology which the new theory will not make plain. For not one of these statements was there any foundation in fact or reason. They even went further to astonish the world, by asserting that the early American annals are by the light of this new theory transformed, and to a great extent annulled, the eyes of the first comers having deceived them; that the aboriginal culture, its arts, literature, sciences, polities, and religions, mean not these, but other things, as is clearly shown by the "new interpretation," and that the tales of the conquerors must accordingly be written anew, written and read by this new transforming light; that there never was an Aztec or a Maya empire, but only wild tribes leagued like the northern savages; that Yucatan never had great cities, nor Montezuma a palace, but that as an ordinary Indian chief this personage had lived in the communal dwelling of his tribe; that we can see America as Cortés saw it, not in the words of Cortés and his companions, or in the monumental remains of the south, but in the reflection of New Mexican villages, and through the mental vagaries of one man after the annihilation of facts presented by a hundred men.

All that was seen and said at the time of the conquest, and all that has since been seen or said conflicting with this fancy, is illusion; reasonable, tangible evidence, such alone as could be accepted by unbiassed common-sense, was not admissible if conflicting with the preconceived idea. I was surprised that such conceits should ever assume tangible form and be received as truth by any considerable number of scholars; that such conceits should ever be disseminated as facts by men pretending to a love of truth. It seems somewhat difficult for the average mind, slowly undergoing eternal emancipation, to establish the true relative values of learned and unlearned ignorance. In the former category may be placed all those unprovable speculations destined to end where they begin, and which so largely occupy the attention of the human race. And so long as those who assume the rôles of teachers present their illusions in pleasing forms, with a fair amount of dogmatic assurance, they will find listeners.

In the present instance the disciples are far worse than the master. I fail to see the wisdom of thus attempting to sweep from the face of the earth by mere negation all persons and facts opposing a proposition. It is not by such means that reasonable hypotheses are established; blank negation never yet overthrew substantial truth. It seems a long leap, indeed, from a theory resting on a trace of certain organizations in the north, to an arbitrary conclusion. that the Mayas were identical in their institutions with the Pueblo Indians. Grant the fundamental doctrine, and there is yet a wide distance between Zuñi and Uxmal. It requires a vivid imagination to see only joint-tenement structures in the remains at Palenque. But admitting it, the radical difference in plan, architecture, and sculptured and stucco decorations, to employ Morgan's own line of argument, suggests a corresponding development and improvement in other institutions and arts, which would in

troduce some troublesome variations in the assumed identity with the Pueblos and Iroquois, even if all started together. The Maya hieroglyphs, and even certain of the Aztec, form also an obstacle by no means so easily removed. True, not being deciphered, their actual grade cannot be positively proved; yet the common picture-writing contains enough of the phonetic element to place the better class high above the line fixed by the new transforming light as the mark of civilization. Even by this bright illumination it seems scarcely possible to reconcile the testimony of existing relics, and of Spanish witnesses who came into contact with the Maya and Nahua nations, with the narrow conclusions of supporters of the all-embracing consanguinity. In the earlier life of the hypothesis the changes to what are called descriptive consanguinity and the inheritance of property were made tests of civilization; but these tests were abandoned when it was ascertained, among other things, that the Aztecs did inherit personal property, and to a certain

extent landed estate.

If this were the only theory ever advanced to prove indemonstrable propositions regarding the Americans, it might be more imposing; but it is only one of fifty, each of which has had its day and its supporters, and we cannot look forward with any degree of confidence to the fulfilment of promises based on grounds so weak and fictitious. Nor do I regard such investigation as in every respect beneficial; on the contrary, it is clearly detrimental where facts are warped to fit theories, the theory being of less importance to mankind than the fact. On the other hand it is true that great discoveries have sprung from apparently puerile conceits; and facts are sure to live, however sometimes distorted, while false doctrines are sure to die, however ably presented.

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In common with all such suppositions, the paths by which the advocate reaches his conclusions are fuller of instruction than the conclusions themselves. There