The daily morning journal and courier., 1901-01-22
 HABITS OF THE SERBS

Primitive Mexican Indians Who Have
 Not the Knife Instinct" The Seri Indians" said Professor
 W. J. Magee who has recently returned
 from an ethnological expedition into 1 Mexico, "are in the scale of civiliza
 ton a few degrees above the Cocopah
 lndlans whom we set out to visit; they 1 do make their own bows and arrows
 and boats, and show some cleverness in
 primitive navigating, but they still lack
 the knife instinct"
 | This commentary called forth a aues- | ton as to the meaning of the knife
 instinct" The ordinary man in civ ilized community, the professor explain ed, Is 60 familiar with the knife and it's purposes that its use has become prac tlcally automatic. At the table he cuts his food With his knife without going
 through any conscious mental process It Is as natural for him 10 do this as it
 Is 10 take his drink from q cup or other
 vessel for holding liquor. If he wishes
 to open package tied with twine in
 . hard knot, or to whittle a bit of
 stick, or to split an apple into two
 pdt tSt boNii tSpCS iilo ildliu llSliuGllte-
 ly into his pocket for his knife, and he
 car be talking or thinking about other
 things while he uses the knife for cut
 ting.
 Not so the Ser Indian, if he obtains knife in barter, he thrusts it into his
 belt as he has seen the Mexican from
 tiersman do, but in a meaningless way.
 It is a matter of imitation and not
 reasoning with him, for he has no idea of the common uses to which the Mex lean puts the knife. If deer crossed his path while his knife was in his gir- dle and with the aid of his dogs he were able to capture and kill 1t, 1t never would occur to him to use his knife for cutting up the carcass. He would tear it, like a wild beas.. If he kills q pony for food, and hangs 8 quarter near his door to be eaten as needed he will bite into the meat and pull it apart with his teeth and nails. stripping the sinews and tendons gradually till noth- ing but the bones are left. To cut the flesh away would be the last thing to occur to his mind. and the most diffl- cult thing for him tc accomplish. Civ ilized man, with whom the knife habit, pursuef from early childhood, pres ently merges into instinct, can have no idea of what it means to be without this parliamentary training. It is as | hard for him to understand as it Is for a person who has never been without | the normal complement of faculties to | the feeling of one born deaf | and dumb and blind. The knife in- stinot is sort of milestone un the road to civilization--one of the means by ! which we may measure the progress of any primitive people.
 Speaking of the condition of the Seris as regards blood thirst, Professor Ma zee says that it still remains very de- olorable, and the visitor must be not ,nly prepared, but viSibly prepared, for rouble at any hour of the day or night. The one question on which the Seris' treatment on him hangs is that of op- 1ortunity. It makes no difference whether he be Caucasian or a mixed blood, a Yankee or Mexican, or even ! member of another tribe of Indians; he sole consideration is that he is an llien. wherever or whenever found. If he alien is we'll equipped with means if protection, so that it is plainly in- to attacK nm Dbluly, He VIII | scape trouble as long as his vigilance emaina acute. The night, which would be considered the most dan- ,erous time for the stranger, is really is safest time, for by doing careful watch duty by turns, party of visit IFS can avert attack. But in the day sht there is apt to be perilous sense f security, and it is then that it be- ooyes every alien to be individually 1 n his guard. The Seris seem to have one of the sense of hospitality or onor which marks many Indians of a igher type They have some notion of ,yalty to one another, but the rest of le world is always fair game.
 Another thing differentiates the Seris 'om the Indian tribe conventionally fa- | liliar to newspaper readers, namely, leir treatment of their dead. As far s is known, they have no respect for le bodies of their warriors, leaving lem unburied wherever they happen to ,ll: but the funeral of woman is an ,casion for great pomp and ceremony. here may be some relation between lis and the fact that the Seris, like her Indians, trace descent through the