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Page 46
[Illustration: TOM THUMB SINGLE DAHLIAS.]
There are no peculiarities of culture to contend with, and the
unusually dwarf habit of the plants specially fits them for
comparative small beds and borders. One good way would be to fill a
single bed with one or more decided colors, as is now done with the
tuberous begonia, for the reason that these dahlias have flowers
similar in size to those of the tall-growing single varieties, and
bear them on stiff stalks well above the stems. A mass of the crimson
variety would produce a rich glow of color infinitely finer than a
mixture of undecided hues. We anticipate a high degree of popularity
for these dwarf single or Tom Thumb dahlias, and there is a
possibility of double varieties equally dwarf which would be also
welcome. The great fault of the majority of dahlias already in
cultivation is the tall habit of the plants, but here we have
dwarfness, a profusion of finely formed flowers, and varied and
attractive colors.--_The Gardeners' Magazine_.
* * * * *
SOME WINNEBAGO ARTS.
In the Proceedings of the New York Academy of Sciences an abstract is
given of a paper on the above, read by Dr. Frederick Starr:
It is well known that a tribe may have peculiarities in speech, in
manners, in arts, that distinguish it at once from its neighbors. The
Haida carves slate as no other tribe does. The elegant blankets of
mountain sheep wool from Chilcat are characteristic. The Hebrews
tested the enemy with the word _shibboleth_, and found that he could
only say _sibboleth_. A twist of the tongue in pronouncing a word is a
small matter, but, small as it is, it may be perpetuated for ages.
Such a perpetuation of a tribal peculiarity has been aptly called an
ethnic survival. Some of the advanced linguists of the present day are
beginning to query whether the group of modern languages of the Aryan
family are not examples of such ethnic survival; whether the
differences between French and Italian and Spanish, Latin, Greek and
Slavonic, are not due to the difficulty various ancient tribes found
in learning to speak the same new and foreign language. To draw an
example of ethnic survival from another field of science, consider the
art of the French cave men. The arch�ologist finds in the caverns
bones of various mammals, teeth of cave bear, and antlers of reindeer
carved with animal figures. The art is _good_ for a barbarous people,
but it is certainly barbarian art. The range of designs is quite
great: horses, bears, mammoths, reindeer, are among the figures. The
people who did this work were an artistic people. To carve and
represent animal forms was almost a mania with them. An ethnic impulse
seems to have driven them on to such work, just as a similar impulse
drives the Haida slate carver to-day; just as a similar impulse has
driven the Bushman to cover the walls of his caves in South Africa
with pictures whose boldness and fidelity are the amazement of all who
see them.
We have, then, in the French cave dwellers a people who had a well
defined art, and who, as art workers, were isolated and unlike all
neighbors. An eminent English scientist believes that neither they nor
their art are gone. There is a people who to-day lives much as a cave
man of France lived so long ago, who hunts and fishes as he did, who
dresses as he did, who builds houses in whose architecture some think
they can see evidence of a cavern original, who above all still carves
batons from ivory, and implements from bone, adorning them with
skillfully cut figures of animals and scenes from the chase. This
people is the Eskimo. If Dawkins' view is true, we have in the Eskimo
carvings of to-day a true ethnic survival--an outcropping of the same
passion which displayed itself in the mammoth carving of La Madelaine.
Scarcely anything in the range of American antiquities has caused more
wonder and led to more discussion than the animal mounds of Wisconsin.
We do not pretend to explain their purpose. Perhaps they were village
guardians; perhaps tribal totems marking territorial limits; some may
have been of use as game drives; some may even have served as fetich
helpers in the hunt, like the prey gods of Zu�i. We may never know
their full meaning. It is sufficient here for me to remind you what
they are and where. They are nearly confined to a belt of moderate
width stretching through Wisconsin and overlapping into Minnesota and
Iowa. Within this area they occur by hundreds. Dr. Lapham published a
great work on the effigy mounds in 1855, in which he gave the results
of many accurate surveys and described many interesting localities.
Since his time no one has paid so much attention to the effigies as
Stephen D. Peet, editor of the _American Antiquarian_, whose articles
have during this year been presented in book form. Mr. Peet has paid
much attention to the kind of animals represented, and has, it seems
to us, more nearly solved the question than any one else. He
recognizes four classes of animals--land animals or quadruped mammals,
always shown in profile; amphibians, always shown as sprawling, with
all four feet represented; birds, recognized by their wings; and
fishes, characterized by the absence of limbs of any kind. The land
animals are subdivided into horned grazers and fur bearers. Of the
many species he claims to find, it seems to us the most satisfactorily
identified are the buffalo, moose, deer, or elk; the panther, bear,
fox, wolf and squirrel; the lizard and turtle; the eagle, hawk, owl,
goose and crane; and fishes. One or two man mounds are known, although
most of those so-called are bird mounds--either the hawk or the owl.
Sometimes, too, "composite mounds" are found. Nor are these mounds all
that are found. Occasionally the same forms are found _in intaglio_,
cut into the ground instead of being built above it, but just as
carefully and artistically made. Notice, in addition to the form of
these strange earth works, that they are so skillfully done that the
attitude frequently suggests action or mood. Nor are they placed at
random, but are more or less in harmony with their surroundings.
Remember, too, their great number and their large size--a man 214 feet
long, a beast 160 feet long, with a tail measuring 320 feet, a hawk
240 feet in expanse of wing.
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