[27] Grinnell, Story of the indian, p. 54, says:—Traces of the fear in which buffalo “were held may still be discovered in the traditional stories of certain tribes, which set forth how, in those days,” [i. e. in the stone age] “before men were provided with arms, the buffalo used to chase, kill, and eat the people. Such tales show very clearly how greatly the buffalo were dreaded in ancient times, and such fear could hardly have arisen save as the result of actual experience of their power to inflict injury and death.” Pliny informs us how the Romans kept the wolf out of their fields, see Grimm, Teutonic Mythology, III. 1241. Whether the Indians lived on the steppes, in the woods, on the coast, or in the mountains, the animals were their whole study. They moved with the animals, followed them for food.
Very soon various ingenious contrivances were devised for trapping them. No doubt one primitive method was the use of decoys to lure animals into a trap. Some could be lured by baits, others more easily by their kind. Occasionally masks were used,[29] and similarly, another form of the original decoy was no doubt simply the stuffed skin of a member of the species, whether animal or bird, say for example a wild duck.[30] Of course the hunter would soon hit on the plan of himself putting on the animal skin, in the case of larger animals; that is, an individual dressed for example in a wolf’s skin could approach near enough to a solitary wolf to attack it with his club, stone or other weapon, without exciting the wolf’s suspicion of the nearness of a dangerous foe.[31] So the animal disguise, entire or partial, was used by early man acting in the capacity of a decoy, firstly, to secure food and clothing. Secondly, he would assume animal disguise, whole or partial, in dancing and singing; and both these accomplishments seem to have arisen from the imitation of the motions and cries of animals,[32] at first to lure them, when acting as a decoy. With growth of culture came growth of supernaturalism, and an additional reason for acquiring dance and song was to secure charms against bodily ills,[33] and finally enlivenment.[34] In both dance and song, when used for a serious purpose, the performers imagined themselves to be the animals they were imitating,[35] and in the dance they wore the skins of the animals represented.[36]