Limitations of the race's genius or experi ence may be exemplified in the department of music. The Inca musicians used drums which °were made by stretching a skin over a hoop of wood or over one end of a short section of the trunk of a tree which had been hollowed out to a thin cylinder." (Compare
Mu sisal Instruments of the Incas,' by Charles W.
Mead assistant Department of
Museum of Natural History). Other musical instruments of percussion in common use were copper bells, in form resembling sleigh-bells; rattles, made of small shells, gourds and nuts, often strung together and attached to the wrists, ankles or other parts of the body, in dancing; also cymbals of rudi mentary form. Wind instruments were the syrinx or pan-pipe, consisting of reeds of graduated lengths, held in position by a cross piece of split cane lashed to the reeds with a cord made of llama wool—the reeds being sometimes closed at the lower end, sometimes open. and occasionally arranged in double rows, yielding octaves; flutes, made of cane or bone, °simply tubes, open throughout their length, and all belonging to the class known as
And, as in music a great volume of sound not harmony—was the desideratum, so in architecture they neglected beauty and strove to attain resistant mass, with walls as solid and homogeneous as possible — the prime essentials in a country shaken by destructive earthquakes; and their solicitude in this respect suggests that the tribe, before the migration to which old legends refer, may have dwelt in the volcanic western part of the Sierra. (See Pfau). Hence
the so-called ((cyclopean" walls of the temples and palaces, structures built to endure, for which the builders utilized enormous stones of irregular shapes, fitted together so skilfully that mortar was not required.
It is safe to say that nearly all features of the ancient industrial life of the tribes inhabit ing the Andean Sierra and Peruvian coast strip are either intimated or plainly shown by speci mens in the archaeological collections of the United States and Europe. (See article ANcON). With the utmost care products which are not properly to be classified as mean have been separated from those showing the activities of the dominant race; and such care is obviously indispensable, for the Incan objects do not stand out from the rest quite unmistakably.
One finds practically nothing to support the theory that there was ever a nearly unrelated, or a wholly distinct and marvelously superior, Inca civilization. Especially instructive are the examples of the potter's art which have been secured in great numbers — representing such different social classes as the warrior, musician and water-carrier. Costumes, weapons, occupa tions, etc., are depicted faithfully, though with out artistic charm. Fabrics of cotton, or woven from the wool of the llama, vicuna and alpaca; looms, spindles and colored threads, bear wit ness to the wide extension of the industry of weaving so often mentioned by early writers. Offerings made to the dead in the graves which have been discreetly rifled recall the fact that agriculture shared with warfare the distinction of being the chief occupation of able-bodied men. Inca women are shown to have been eminently domestic in their tastes and employ ments, ruling supreme in the house, taking no part in public affairs. Gold and silver appear to have been not less abundant — perhaps they were even more abundant — in the lowlands than in the highlands: at any rate vessels formed from the precious metals are found more commonly in the burial places near the coast. It is not to be supposed that the natives failed to appreciate the beauty and utility of silver, gold and copper. An ingrained prefer ence for the clumsy methods of barter pre vented them from adopting any medium of ex change or setting apart one or more of the metals to be used as