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Show OF THE BUREAU OF ETHNOLOGY. XLV expression, but may be partially indicated by the fact that, apart from the linguistic and sociologic problems involved, the mere mechanical compilation has produced over twenty thousand cards of synonymy. The present condition of this interconnected work is encouraging. Col. GARBICK MALLERY was engaged during the year in the continued study of sign language and pictographs. A number of important collections of gesture signs were procured from parts of the United States not before thoroughly explored in this respect. Collections of great value were also obtained from Japan, Asiatic Turkey, and from several of the Polynesian groups. These increase the probability of preparing a useful monograph on the gesture speech of man. The amount of material now collected, with its collation and study, confirms the view stated in a former report, that while a general system of gesture speech has long existed , among the North American Indians it is not to be regarded as one formal or definite language. Several groups, within which there is a considerable body of distinctive signs, with their centers of origin, are indicated, though, as before explained, the fundamental character of sign language permits of communication by its means between all the groups. Five of these groups appear, from pres-entinformation, to be defined as follows: First, the Arikara, Dakota, Mandan, Gros Ventre or Hidatsa, Blackfeet, Crow, and other tribes in Montana and Idaho; second, Arapaho, Cheyenne, Pani, Kaiowa, Caddo, Wichita, Apache of Indian Territory, and other tribes in the Southwest as far as New Mexico, and possibly portions of Arizona; third, Pima, Yuma, Papago, Maricopa, Hualpai ( Yumarf), and the tribes of Southern California; fourth, Shoshoni, Banak, Pai Uta of Pyramid Lake, and the tribes of Northern Idaho and Lower British Columbia, Eastern Washington, and Oregon; fifth, Alaska, embracing the Southern Eskimo, Kenai ( Athabaskan), and the Iakutat, and Tshilkaat tribes of the T'hlinkit or Koloshan stock. The gestures of Alaskan tribes present some distinctive features as compared with those of any of the southern groups. The collections of the gestures still used by the Indians of British Columbia and of the northern part of Vancouver's Island, also |
