Hardly a nation on the
continent but seems to have had some vague tradition of an origin from
four brothers, to have at some time been led by four leaders or princes,
or in some manner to have connected the appearance and action of four
important personages with its earliest traditional history. Sometimes
the myth defines clearly these fabled characters as the spirits of the
winds, sometimes it clothes them in uncouth, grotesque metaphors,
sometimes again it so weaves them into actual history that we are at a
loss where to draw the line that divides fiction from truth.
I shall attempt to follow step by step the growth of this myth from its
simplest expression, where the transparent drapery makes no pretence to
conceal its true meaning, through the ever more elaborate narratives,
the more strongly marked personifications of more cultivated nations,
until it assumes the outlines of, and has palmed itself upon the world
as actual history.
This simplest form is that which alone appears among the Algonkins and
Dakotas.
Pages:
115
116
117
118
119
120
121
122
123
124
125
126
127
128
129
130
131
132
133
134
135
136
137
138
139