Far higher forms are those of the
magic of the black _Takowri_ whom one meets divining about the
streets of Cairo, or of the Arab proper, which brings us fairly to the
Cabala and the Jew, Cornelius Agrippa and Eliphas Levi.
It is not difficult to understand how Shamanism with its drums and
darkened rooms, its conjuring of evil-doers and extraction of diseases
in tangible forms, should have spread from Central Asia to the
Laplanders and Eskimo, and thence to the red Indians. Very little
attention has been paid to the intercourse actually existing at the
present day between these races. I have met with a Passamaquoddy Indian
who spoke French well, who had been educated at a mission school, and
who had been among the Eskimo. As regards legends and folk-lore, no one
can read the Eskimo tales and those of this volume and not feel that
the Algonquin is to the man of the icy north what the gypsy is to the
Hindoo. As regards the early religion of both races, it is simply
_identical_, and it is far too peculiar in its many similar
details to have simply sprung up, as many might assume, from the common
likeness in customs of all savages. For there is in both a great deal
of "literary" culture, especially in the Algonquin, and it would be
little less than miraculous that this too should have assimilated by
chance. It does not help the "opposition" to point out that Algonquin
legends, declare that their ancestors came from the west.
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