Chapter M: M. McCARVER (9)

Again, in the vast collection of historical sources into one place, as well as in the newness of the field and inspiring nature of the work, the undertaking presents a most remarkable feature. The projector of this enterprise was the first on the coast to undertake such a collection on a large scale. This fact, together with the recency of many of the events, which both rendered an unending number of eye-witnesses easily accessible for procuring personal narratives, and likewise caused those who possessed papers and books throwing light upon history, to set slight value upon them, enabled Mr. Bancroft to collect a library of material such as on the beginning and early chapters of Pacific Coast history in all probability can never again be equalled.

Finally, in the amount of material which it presents, and in the extent of ground which it covers, the Bancroft series has attained epoch-making proportions. So closely related is the history of the Pacific states and territories of the United States to that of the regions north and south, that to insure a complete understanding of it required the writing also of the History of Mexico, Texas, and Central America, as well as that of British Columbia and Alaska. When we learn that two thousand different authorities were consulted in writing the History of Central America, and ten thousand in arranging the material for the History of Mexico; that in taking out material for the History of California eight men were employed for six years; and that in merely indexing the material for the History of Mexico five men worked ten years, we are inclined to quote approvingly these words of Mr. Bancroft:

"I say, then, without unpardonable boasting, that in my opinion there never in the history of literature was performed so consummate a feat as the gathering, abstracting, and arranging of the material for this History of the Pacific States": (Bancroft's Literary Industries, 581).

The history of no American locality would be considered without some account of its aborigines. The result, then, of this Bancroft plan has been the writing of the History of the Pacific slope of the continent from Bering Sea to Darien, with a History of the Native Races in five volumes as an introduction, and a half dozen volumes of sketches and essays by way of conclusion, in all thirty-nine octavo volumes.

But this work, the greatest of the kind, few if any of whose separate divisions have been superseded by later works has suffered greatly in the estimation of historians because they do not know who is authority for the statements contained in them. Justice to the people of any state or territory whose history appears in this series demands that they should know in whose words it is related. A compliance with the reasonable expectations of the pioneers who contributed books, narrations, and documents to aid in the preparation of a standard history of their respective states calls for a public knowledge of the identity of the writer to the end that the volume in which their chief interest centers be not stigmatized as anonymous. And above all, a conformity with usage, not to mention an observance of the principles of right, requires that the author of finished work published in this series, or any other, should receive public acknowledgment of his labors and whatever of praise or blame is his due.

Ten years ago it was shown in the California press that the Bancroft histories are not the works of the man who claims to be their author. But to say that "The Works of Hubert Howe Bancroft" were written by any person other than Hubert Howe Bancroft is such a contradiction as to startle today the great majority both East and West whose attention have never been directed to the question. To determine the authorship of a work we are wont to consult its title page, and the title pages of these volumes all declare that they are "By Hubert Howe Bancroft." The advertising matter sent out by the Bancroft publishing establishment refers to them as "the writings of Mr. Bancroft," with never a suggestion that any other person wrote a line. The same course was followed in the reviews of these volumes, which at the time of their publication were scattered by the press throughout the length and breadth of the leading countries of Europe, as well as in our land, although here we must remember that book reviews may be but another name for advertising matter prepared by the publisher and inserted at advertising rates. In his Literary Industries, the volume giving an account of his literary activities, Mr. Bancroft refers to himself as the author (Lit. Ind., 361, 661), and speaks of his own writing without a clear reference to that of others (Lit. Ind., 288, 568, 571, 653) in such terms as to give the impression that he was the only writer who prepared the manuscript as it went to the printer. True, he mentions assistants, and we can easily see, as he tells us, that he must have had fifteen or twenty note takers, cataloguers, and other library aids (Lit. Ind., 582) in order to arrange so vast an amount of material. When assistants are mentioned it is usually in words which justify the reader in the inference that these aids are meant (see Central America I, preface, viii; Literary Industries, 584), and that, therefore, the assistants are in no sense authors.

By a careful reading of the Literary Industries, however, we find that there was a class of assistants who are differentiated from ordinary library aids, by the statement that they were "more experienced and able," and whose work Mr. Bancroft describes as "the study and reduction of certain minor sections of the history which I employed in my writing after more or less condensation and change": (Lit. Ind., 568). But even this passage seems to indicate that the material prepared by these writers was rewritten by Mr. Bancroft.

As a result, therefore, of the indication of the title page of these works, of the recognition of the public press, of the statements of the Literary Industries, and of Mr. Bancroft's connection with the work widely known through personal means, it happens that today he is called the "Historian of the Pacific Coast." Furthermore, he is the only person to whom such a title is given, being so recognized by newspapers, encyclopedias, and the people at large. In the minds of the great number, Hubert Howe Bancroft is the historian of the Pacific states for just the same reason that George Bancroft is the historian of the United States. Speaking in accord with this popular estimate of Mr. Bancroft's work, Wendell Phillips once called him "The Macaulay of the West."

Nowhere, however, can there be found a statement by this historian in which he lays an unequivocal claim to the authorship of the works which have been published under his name. By his own words quoted above he admits that the work was, at least in part, coöperative, and that he was a compiler of the work of his assistants. And for any one man to assert authorship of the Bancroft series of histories would be preposterous. According to actual computation, the mere work of arranging the material and writing the History of the Pacific States, after a small army of note-takers had concluded their operations, represents an equivalent to the labors of one man for a hundred years: (Frances Fuller Victor in _Salt Lake Tribune_, April 14, 1893.) Moreover, the use of quotations from foreign languages, of which Mr. Bancroft had no knowledge, proves that parts of the work are not from his pen, while the different literary styles (see for example, the review of Oregon I in the _New York Tribune_, Nov. 26, 1886; in the _S. F. Argonaut_, Oct. 23, 1886; in the _Sacramento D. Record-Union_, Oct. 27, 1886; and in the _Portland Oregonian_, Oct. 28, 1886), and varying degrees of historical workmanship (Compare reviews of Oregon II in _N. Y. Tribune_, January, 1887; and in _S. F. Chronicle_, Jan. 13, 1887, with reviews of other Bancroft works) clearly reveal the work of a number of writers.

A little knowledge on this point has proved a dangerous thing for the reputation of the histories. Some of the newspapers of the coast have learned that Mr. Bancroft did not do all the writing and have even published the names of other authors of the series with statements more or less conjectural as to the writing done by them. In some cases, wild speculations as to the authorship of the works have been published. Many are under the impression that those who went about taking statements of pioneers and in other ways collecting material were themselves writing the manuscript which was published, and that consequently much of the history is no more critically written than an ordinary newspaper article, and as little known about its authorship. Furthermore, it is believed in some quarters that those who prepared narrations for Mr. Bancroft were writing history for him to publish, and that persons not connected with the Bancroft library were authors of parts of the work. In accordance with this idea, it has been claimed that a certain tone favorable to the Mormons which runs through the History of Utah is to be accounted for by the theory that the volume was written by some one connected with the Mormon church, whereas the truth is that, although the historian of that church prepared some data for Mr. Bancroft's use, the work was prepared in the library by Mr. Bancroft and one of his assistants from the annals in his possession (Frances Fuller Victor in _Salt Lake Tribune_, April 14, 1893).

In some instances, the histories have lost standing because of the assumption that Mr. Bancroft was their author. Thus statements in the History of California supposed to be, but now known not to be from his pen, have been singled out as reckless, and argument has been made upon the principle "false in one thing, false in all," that the seven whole volumes of California history are unworthy of credence (pamphlet proceedings of the Society of California Pioneers in reference to the histories of Hubert Howe Bancroft, page 10). Following this lead an attempt has been made to discredit Bancroft's Oregon on the ground that his California is said to be unreliable.

Had Mr. Bancroft made public the fact that three persons besides himself wrote the History of California, that he was in reality the author of but sixty pages in the entire seven volumes of that set, that he had not the least claim to the authorship of the History of Oregon, and that the histories of the two states were in the main written by different persons, the fallacy of this argument would have been clear, estimates of the collections of matter in these volumes would have been made on their own intrinsic merit, and their value would not have been impaired by false assumptions concerning their authorship.

A third result of this neglect of Mr. Bancroft to make public acknowledgment of the extent of the writings of his assistants has been the accusation "that he is a purloiner of other peoples' brains," (_Salt Lake Tribune_, Feb. 16, 1893) and that he has made a reputation as an author at the expense of his assistants. Concerning this charge, the most remarkable ever made in the annals of American historical writing, the reader must be the judge after weighing all the facts.

The writer's apology for this article is his desire to give such facts as he has in the hope that they will do something to clear up mistaken ideas concerning the authorship of these histories, that they may aid somewhat in forming a correct estimate of the series, and that they may secure for the other authors as well as for Mr. Bancroft whatever credit is rightfully theirs. To these ends it is to be hoped that those who have any additional facts will make them public. The late Frances Fuller Victor, one of the Bancroft corps of writers, had long collected material on the authorship of the histories. In preparing this paper, the writer has depended largely upon information furnished by her correspondence and papers, and by explanations given by her in conversation.

The statement of Mr. Bancroft in the Literary Industries to the effect that his "assistants" merely wrote up minor topics which he then used in his own writing, must be taken as applying to the work as projected rather than as actually carried out. In a letter written in 1878 before the final division of labor was made, Mr. Bancroft said, "When all the material I have is gone over and notes taken according to the general plan, I shall give one person one thing or one part to write, and another person another part": (Letter to Mrs. Victor of August 1, 1878.) Here, it will be observed, the plan is for the "assistants" to do the actual work of writing history and not to prepare material for their chief to use in his writing. And it will shortly appear that it was the "assistants" who wrote the work and Mr. Bancroft who wrote the minor parts. To understand why the intended order was thus reversed, it is necessary to study the growth of the history project and to enter into the steps through which it was evolved.

Hubert Howe Bancroft, with whose name these works are linked, and who has been widely credited as their author, is a native of Granville, Ohio, where he was born May 5, 1832, a descendent of old New England families through both the paternal and maternal lines. In his own account of his life (Literary Industries, 47-244), he tells us that when but three years old he could read the New Testament without having to spell many of the words. At the school age, however, he found it difficult to learn, and after a winter at the brick schoolhouse under the tutelage of a brother of his mother, the latter became satisfied that he was not treated judiciously and fairly took him out of school.

A sister had married George H. Derby, a bookseller of Geneva, New York, subsequently of Buffalo, and at about the age of fifteen, the boy was offered the choice of preparing for college or entering the Buffalo bookstore. He at first chose the former course and spent a year in the academy of his town, but becoming discouraged in his study, entered the employ of Derby in August, 1848. Discharged from the store in six months, he returned to Ohio and acted as a sales agent for his brother-in-law's goods with such success that he was invited back to the store and became a clerk with the beginning of the year 1850. His father, influenced by the gold excitement, decided to go to California in February of that year, and with George L. Kenny, his closest friend, he was sent by Derby to handle books in the land of gold, setting out in December, 1851.

After their arrival in San Francisco, Sacramento was determined upon as a place of business, and young Bancroft worked in the mines until arrangements could be made with his brother-in-law. But Derby's death in the meantime ended the plan, and in 1853, he set out to try his fortune at the newly-boomed mining town of Crescent City. Here he was employed as bookkeeper and bookseller, and made six or eight thousand dollars, most of which he subsequently lost through investing in Crescent City property. In 1855, Mr. Bancroft made a visit to his old home in the East, and his sister, in return for his assistance in recovering the amount of Derby's California investment, let him have the sum, amounting to $5,500, with which to begin business. Obtaining credit in New York he shipped a ten thousand dollar stock of goods for San Francisco, and with Kenny organized the firm of H. H. Bancroft and Company about December 1, 1856.

From the first, Mr. Bancroft tells us, he had a taste for publishing, and it was but three years until the inception of what grew into the historical project. In 1859, Wm. H. Knight, manager of the Bancroft publishing department, while employed in preparing the Hand Book Almanac for the next year, asked for the books necessary to carry on the work. It occurred to the head of the firm that he would again have occasion to refer to books on the coast states, and he accordingly transferred to Mr. Knight a copy of each of the fifty or seventy-five books in stock that had reference to the country. Later he added to the number by purchases in second-hand stores, and when in the East secured from the bookstores of New York, Boston, and Philadelphia, volumes which fell under his observation. By 1862, he had a thousand volumes, and upon a visit to London and Paris in that year, learned that much more remained to be done. In 1866, he started on a search throughout Europe, which resulted in increasing his collection to ten thousand volumes. As to the field covered by these works, he says:

"Gradually and almost imperceptibly had the area of my efforts enlarged. From Oregon it was but a step to British Columbia and Alaska; and as I was obliged from California to go to Mexico and Spain, it finally became settled in my mind to make the western half of North America my field": (Lit. Ind. 180). He now began the collection of Mexican works and the purchase of private libraries in the United States. In 1869, after ten years' collecting, the library numbered sixteen thousand volumes, about half of which were pamphlets. In May of the next year, these were placed on one floor of the Bancroft building on Market Street, and a young New Englander named Henry L. Oak, lately editor of a religious journal published by the firm, was installed as librarian.

(The main facts of Oak's life, as learned by Mrs. Victor, are as follows: Henry Labbeus Oak was born at Garland, Maine, in 1844. His ancestry--including the family names of Oak, Merriam, Hastings, Hill, and Smith--was entirely American from a period preceding the Revolutionary War, being originally English and Welsh. He was educated at the public and private schools of his native town until, in 1861, he entered Bowdoin College, and was graduated at Dartmouth in the class of 1865. During his college course, he taught in the public and high schools of different towns in Maine; and after graduation, for a year in an academy at Morristown, New Jersey.

Mr. Oak came to California by steamer in 1866, and, after some attempts at commercial life, broken by a long illness, again became a teacher. A year was spent as principal of the public school at Haywards, and as instructor in the collegiate institute at Napa, and in the spring of 1868, he became office editor of the _Occident_, a Presbyterian paper which the Bancroft house was then publishing for an association. According to Mr. Bancroft (Lit. Ind. 219), "the whole burden of the journal gradually fell on him." But when, owing to a disagreement with the religious association, the firm declined to publish the paper any longer, the young editor was left without employment. In the meantime a somewhat erratic Englishman named Bosquetti had succeeded Knight as custodian of the Bancroft library, and Oak was appointed to assist him. Upon his decamping a few months later, at the end of 1868, Mr. Oak was appointed to the position.)

The beginning of a classification of the material in the library had been made by Mr. Knight, who saved clippings and arranged them in scrap-books and boxes. It now became Oak's duty to superintend the extraction of material from the volumes in his custody and to catalogue new books as they came in. In May, 1871, he prepared for publication by the firm, two guide-books for tourists. It was at the same time that Mr. Bancroft took another step toward the history plan.

The plan of publishing a Pacific Coast encyclopedia had been under consideration for a year or two, and was now adopted. Mr. Bancroft began to look for contributors. John S. Hittell, publisher of the Commerce and Industries of the Pacific Coast, prepared a list of the principal subjects to be treated, and Oak began to gather statements from pioneers and contributors of every sort by issuing circulars and writing letters. For about a year the preparations continued. During the first half of 1872 Ora Oak, a younger brother of the librarian, together with others, extracted material on Pacific Coast voyages and travels. Walter M. Fisher, an educated young Englishman who came to the library early in the year, wrote out such travels as those of Bryant, Bayard Taylor, and Humboldt. The librarian, finding inadequate the system of indexing the library then in use, set to work to devise a more practical one, and spent three months in bringing it to perfection. This was apparently the only part of the year's work which proved abiding.

That the material in the Bancroft library was better adapted to the preparation of a history than of an encyclopedia gradually appeared to those who came in contact with it. (Walter M. Fisher was born in Ulster in 1849, and was the son of a Presbyterian clergyman, a member of an English and Scotch colony. He was educated at Queen's College, Belfast. Nemos remembered him as "a handsome fellow, a great eater, and a hard worker." Together with Harcourt, he left Bancroft's employ in 1874 to accept the editorship of the _Overland Monthly_. Returning to London in 1875, he published a clever work entitled the _Californians_. Subsequently he became a physician). After several years of suggestion, discussion, and change, Mr. Bancroft decided to reshape the entire plan of work accordingly. The history of the Pacific slope of the continent was to be written, beginning at the Isthmus of Panama with the first appearance of the Spaniards, and then taking up the successive regions to the north as their history had its beginning. This work, embracing an account of all the various republics, provinces, states, and territories along the Pacific, it was decided to designate as The History of the Pacific States.

Heretofore, Mr. Bancroft had been known only as bookseller and publisher, and manager of one of San Francisco's large business houses. His experience in writing had been limited to the preparation of some material for the proposed encyclopedia. But now, when he had reached the age of forty years, practically all of them except the first sixteen, spent in the world of business, the head of the firm of H. H. Bancroft and Company made his first venture as a literary man, writing himself and rewriting the work of others. He began by preparing what he considered a suitable introduction to the history. The task was not easy, especially for one unaccustomed to write. In fourteen weeks he had taken out material from which he wrote three hundred pages of introduction to the History of Central America which he subsequently reduced to seventy-five pages. This seems to have been the only part of the work that he considered as exclusively his own theme: (Lit. Ind., 291). But this matter subsequently had to be rewritten.

While writing on this volume, Mr. Bancroft became convinced that the history could not be complete without an account of the original inhabitants of the coast. To quote his own words, "I did not fancy them, I would gladly have avoided them. I was no archæologist, ethnologist, or antiquary, and I had no desire to become such. My tastes in the matter, however, did not dispose of the subject. The savages were there, and there was no help for me; I must write them up to get rid of them." To compile information concerning the manners and customs, the mythology, the language, and the antiquities of these aborigines, Mr. Bancroft estimated that two volumes would be required: (Lit. Ind., 301). The Native Races as completed is a work of five volumes. So much of an expansion in all of the early historical plan was necessary.

Mr. Bancroft, wrote but two hundred and seventy out of the four thousand pages of the Native Races, devoting his time while that series was in preparation largely to a rewriting of the first volume of Central America, to a continuation of a summary of early voyages for other volumes, and to a perfection of the plan and a collecting of material for the histories. His relation to this work may be likened to that of a managing editor. He decided upon the division of labor as suggested by Oak or others, and required changes in the manuscript as completed if he considered them necessary, either for the sake of treatment or style, but the extent of his writing as printed in this work certainly falls far short of that necessary to substantiate the claim which he has made to its authorship. The chapter which he wrote was that on the Hyperboreans. As to this work, he tells us in the Literary Industries that during the first half of the year 1873 he "was writing on northern Indian matter, giving out the notes on the southern division to go over the field again and take out additional notes": (Lit. Ind. 571). As to his further connection with the work, he says that in December of the same year he became convinced that the plan of treating Indian languages adopted by Goldschmidt was not the proper one, and that the latter was "obliged to go over the entire field again and re-arrange and add to the subject matter before I would attempt the writing of it." (Lit. Ind., 573.) This passage ascribes the actual preparation of the volume to Goldschmidt, and the writing referred to here must have been largely in the nature of editorial work. It is hardly to be presumed that a man of Mr. Bancroft's education and slight literary experience would have attempted at this time anything so ambitious as the complete preparation of a treatise on Indian languages.

We see, then, that although the influence of Mr. Bancroft was felt in arrangement and even in style, the Native Races was written almost entirely by other persons. But one would hardly suppose that such was the case from reading the words: "During the progress of this work I succeeded in utilizing the labors of my assistants to the full extent of my anticipations": (Lit. Ind., 304).

When speaking in the Literary Industries of work done for him by others, Mr. Bancroft shows a habit which is derived from his long experience as manager of a business concern. His constant tendency is to speak of work done by those in his employ as his work, neglecting a distinction between a publisher and an author, which is a vital one. The reputation of a publishing house depends upon the workmanship of its employés, but that of an author depends solely upon his own talents and the work of his own hands. While a publisher may with all propriety speak of work done by agents as his printing, for him to say that writing done for him by others is his writing is a positive misstatement. When Mr. Bancroft paid his writers for their manuscript, he became its owner with full rights of publication, but no one will say for a moment that he thereby became the author. In speaking of the Native Races, as well as the History of the Pacific States, Mr. Bancroft often does so in such terms as to indicate that writing was done by him when it was his only by purchase. (Compare statements in Literary Industries, 303, 568, 571, and in Native Races I, preface xiii, with the facts as shown by the statements of different members of Bancroft's literary corps as to the work actually done by each writer and as given later in this article.)

The division of responsibility for collating and arranging facts for the various divisions of the Native Races was made apparently toward the latter part of the year 1872. We are told that routine work was laid aside for three or four weeks in the middle of the summer, and this time devoted to placing the library in order and cataloguing the new books which had been added. This was obviously done preparatory to entering upon the new work. To a young Englishman who called himself T. Arundel-Harcourt, and who entered the library in November, was assigned the preparation of that portion of the work devoted to the manners and customs of the civilized nations. (This man's true name he did not reveal. His collaborator Nemos says that he attended a boarding school, and then continued his studies in Germany, at Heidelberg, according to his own account. He claimed to have come to America with $5,000 in pocket money, and found his way first to Montana. On his arrival at San Francisco he entered the library. Leaving in 1874 to assume editorship of the _Overland Monthly_ with Fisher, he was soon back in Bancroft's employ. Naturally he was the most able of the library corps. But while he was brilliant, handsome, and witty, he was at the same time erratic and unreliable. He died in 1884.)

Mr. Fisher's part was mythology, while the division of the work relating to language was given to Albert Goldschmidt, a German, who had been employed in the library since the end of 1871. (According to Nemos, Goldschmidt was said to have been the son of a Jewish clothing dealer at Hamburg. In early life he ran off to sea, and claimed to have become master of a vessel. He had acquired much general knowledge, and was musically inclined, often singing in church choirs. Before coming to the library Nemos says that he led a "vagarious life" in Nevada. As a linguist he had great ability, and was able to translate almost any language which he encountered, but was inclined to fritter away his time. Nemos declared him "the most systematic idler in the library." This failing brought about his discharge. Later he became a mining superintendent in Chihuahua.) Mr. Oak took the subject of Antiquities and Aboriginal History (preface to Native Races I, p. 13).

The undertaking was an enormous one, because of the vast quantities of material to be handled, as well as the inexperience of the workers, which made it necessary for them to devise their own system as they proceeded. It is said that by an actual calculation the sum total of all the labor expended upon each of the five volumes of the series represents an equivalent to the work of one man for ten years. (Literary Industries, 305). Indeed, Mr. Bancroft's own reason for entrusting this work to others is that it would have taken him a half century, leaving his main work untouched. Mr. Oak's indexing system proved a great labor saver, as by it the indexers went through all the material, classifying and making references. They were followed immediately by note-takers, who copied the facts indicated in these references. The writers then had the data placed before them for arrangement. When Mr. Bancroft's chapter on the Hyperboreans was completed he went over it with them, all making criticisms and suggestions to be adopted in the arrangement of the other divisions as well as that one. By this means was the library system perfected, a common method developed, and a corps of library workers trained: (Lit. Ind., 304).

The Native Races was very much in the nature of a compilation, and our knowledge concerning the authorship of its various parts is necessarily less exact than is true of any of the other Bancroft works. Such facts as are at hand come from two schedules--one of his own works, the other of that of the corps generally--prepared by William Nemos, a gifted Swedish writer who entered the library in 1873, subsequently becoming Oak's chief assistant, and ultimately his successor in the librarian's office; from separate information gained by Frances Fuller Victor as to the part of the work done by Oak. (This consists of three different statements, one in a letter to a friend, another in an autobiographical sketch, and a third in a statement copied by Mrs. Victor. Mr. Oak himself refuses to give testimony, doubtless on account of his former intimate personal connection with Mr. Bancroft and his acquiescence in the plan followed, as well as his poor health, which renders him unwilling to enter into a discussion of the question, and from statements in an autobiography of Thomas Savage, chief Spanish interpreter in the library after August, 1873.)

The facts as deduced from these sources show that Oak wrote more of the Native Races than any one else, two fifths of the entire work, or to be exact, fifteen hundred and ninety-seven pages out of four thousand. While engaged in this writing, it must be remembered that he also acted as "chief assistant to Mr. Bancroft, manager of all details of this work, as well as that on the History, overseer of the corps of workers, and chief proof reader," duties which so engrossed his time that he wrote principally between eight o'clock in the evening and midnight. The fourth volume on Antiquities is his work entire, as is also the fifth on Primitive History, except the introductory chapter on the Origin of the Americans, in the preparation of which it would appear that Bancroft had a hand (Lit. Ind., 570), and the last three chapters dealing with the tribes of Central America, the authorship of which the writer has no means of determining. Nemos says, however, that he prepared "a good deal of clean manuscript" for this volume as well as for some others.

To Harcourt the division of the field as already given points as the author of the second volume. Oak wrote the introductory chapter entitled General View of the Civilized Nations, and also the chapter on the Aztec Picture Writing and Maya Arts Calendar and Hieroglyphics. Bancroft is the author of the chapter on Savagism and Civilization, and Nemos is to be credited with the writing of some parts. As Harcourt wrote six hundred and thirty-six pages of the Native Races, and there appears but one reference to his writing in connection with another volume, and that a chapter of a hundred and fifty pages, we may conclude that the remainder of Volume II is from his pen.

With Fisher rests the credit for the authorship in the main of the Mythology portion of the third volume. Nemos relates that Fisher sought his aid for this work soon after he came to the library, believing that his previous training in philosophy fitted him for mythology, and that Fisher obtained for him the continuation of the volume, when in October, 1874, he left it "half finished" to accept the editorship of the _Overland Monthly_. Nemos then being new to the work, Harcourt revised his manuscript.

To Goldschmidt had been assigned the task of writing the treatise on Indian languages for the third volume. The evidence of Nemos shows that Goldschmidt prepared this part of the work, although the quotation from the Literary Industries already given seems to show that it was revised throughout once, and afterward rewritten, in part, at least, by Bancroft. Goldschmidt also prepared the ethnographical map of the coast.

Of the first volume, Oak wrote about half of the preface, and the chapter on the Columbians, Harcourt the chapter on the Californians, and Nemos and Savage the remainder, with the exception of a few slight parts prepared by others.

In a compilation like the Native Races, there was of necessity much matter printed in such a form that those who prepared it could not claim the authorship. Of this character were the contributions of Mr. Savage, the Spanish expert. Nemos also claimed to be the author of parts of every volume except the fourth, but from his own statements we learn that much of his work, like Savage's, consisted in making translations.

The public acknowledgment made in the introduction of this work concerning the part done by the several writers would be fair, if we overlook the fact that its wording tends to give an exaggerated idea of Mr. Bancroft's part in it--were the name of the latter but printed on the title page as editor or compiler. But by omitting either word he has announced himself to the world as author. His own explanation for this seems to be that he considers himself responsible for the work in treatment and style (Native Races I, Preface XIII), but the real reason is no doubt to be found in a desire to give the work standing in the literary world by ascribing it to one name already quite widely known among book dealers and publishers.

As regards scientific merit these volumes can not make great claims. No serious attempt was made to collect facts concerning the American Indians of the West at first hand. Mr. Bancroft made no pretensions as an antiquarian or ethnologist, content with compiling what others had written and thus discharging his duty toward the introductory part of his work that he might the sooner take up the more serious task of writing the histories. Different parts of the Native Races differ greatly in value. Oak was habitually scholarly and always made an effort at honest research. Nemos was likewise thoroughly reliable. Goldschmidt was noted for his shiftlessness, and Fisher and Harcourt are charged with such uncritical methods as the incorporation in their writings of statements found in magazine articles which were nowhere verified. (Mrs. Victor had learned of this.) The last three must, therefore, be considered clever and brilliant writers rather than critical historians.

The chief value of the Native Races consisted in the fact that it presented in accessible form a classified collection of all the facts known concerning the Indians of the Pacific slope. Philosophers who made use of these facts in their generalizations, while prizing the work highly, were not, however, especially concerned as to how it was written. In the East and in Europe the discovery was not made that it is merely a compilation. The Native Races was regarded as a work of great learning (see Literary Industries, 335, 356) and its authorship ascribed to Hubert Howe Bancroft in accordance with a literal reading of its title page. The five volumes were published at three-month intervals between October 1, 1874, and Christmas, 1875. Just before the first volume appeared, Mr. Bancroft made what he called a literary pilgrimage to the Eastern States to bring himself and the work to the notice of the great literary men there. He also made arrangements for publication in France and Germany simultaneously with the issuing of the volumes in New York. This was the result as told in his own words: "Never probably was a book so generally and so favorably reviewed by the best journals in Europe and America. Never was an author more suddenly or more thoroughly brought to the attention of literary men everywhere": (Lit. Ind., 361.)

As director and manager of the Native Races, Mr. Bancroft performed a literary service of great importance and in such a capacity richly deserved the unsparing praise which was showered upon him. But the commendation and honor bestowed upon him as author of the work we must in all fairness regard as quite a different matter. According to his own statement (Lit. Ind., 361), this must be considered as the status generally assigned him and the basis upon which he was presented with a number of complimentary certificates and honorary diplomas, among them being honorary membership in the Massachusetts Historical Society, the American Antiquarian Society, and the Buffalo Historical Society, and the honorary degree of Master of Arts at Yale.

So far as the question of authorship was concerned, all reviews and general press mention of subsequent Bancroft publications followed along the same line as the reviews of the Native Races, recognizing Mr. Bancroft alone as the author. We may, therefore, conclude as does he himself (Lit. Ind., 361, 661) that it was his being accredited with the authorship of the Native Races which made for him his literary reputation. It has been shown that this credit depended in turn upon the fact that his own name was on the title page as author instead of managing editor. The facts show, therefore, that Mr. Bancroft was assisted largely by his corps of writers even in the revision of manuscripts, that due credit has never been given Oak, Fisher, Harcourt, Goldschmidt, and Nemos, who, aided by a number of compilers and writers of fragmentary bits, are the true authors of the work, and that the rise of the fame of Hubert Howe Bancroft as an historical writer was founded upon a popular misconception, both as to the nature of his first work and his connection with that work.

Just as fast as the members of the library force ended their respective labors on the Native Races, they were set to work taking notes for the history, Mr. Oak continuing to act as manager of detail as heretofore. The system of note-taking was perfected by Mr. Nemos and now included a boiling down process by which new members could so prepare rough material as to permit writers to turn out manuscript more quickly.

Laying aside for the time being the work on Central America and Mexico, Bancroft and Oak decided to direct the activities of a library force now thoroughly trained to the material on California, since California history is the starting point for that of a number of other states, including Northern Mexico, Arizona, Nevada, and Utah, and more especially because the mass of original material collected for this state was greater than for any other, a fact necessitating the reduction to a minimum of the possibility of its accidental destruction while yet unused: (Lit. Ind., 583.) The actual organization of the material on the Southwest, including the writing of the history of the Northern Mexican states and Texas down to 1800, together with the Spanish and Mexican annals of Arizona, New Mexico, California, and the Northwest Coast, was entrusted to Oak as his special field.

The story of the collection of this California material as told by Mr. Bancroft (Lit. Ind., 365 and sq.) is one of the most interesting connected with the history enterprise. In October, 1873, there had entered his service one Enrique Cerruti, an erratic individual, born in Italy, but intimately acquainted with the ways of Spanish-Americans through a long residence in Bolivia, under the government of which state he had served in a diplomatic capacity. Cerruti's diplomacy was turned toward the securing of historical facts in the possession of the old Spanish residents of California, and the first task set for his craft was to gain the coöperation of General Vallejo, a native Californian, early alcalde at San Francisco, and colonizer of Sonoma. After several months' negotiations, his efforts were rewarded by a personal narrative from Vallejo, by the gift of his papers, and by his enthusiastic support in gaining the aid of other Californians of his own race. Among those who furnished dictations at his instance were two of his brothers, and his nephew Alvarado, Governor of California under Mexican rule. For two years Cerruti and Vallejo worked together collecting, their time being divided between Sonoma, San Francisco, and Monterey, from which centers they made divers excursions. It seems that the wily Italian, together with other representatives of Mr. Bancroft, sometimes gained possession of valuable manuscripts by such indirection as to cause much dissatisfaction on the part of the original owners.

The official Spanish records of the country which had been turned over to the United States Surveyor General at San Francisco consisted of four or five hundred volumes. To copy these, twelve Spaniards worked for a year under the direction of Mr. Savage,[40] "the greatest single effort" ever made in connection with the Bancroft enterprise. The mission records in possession of the archbishop of San Francisco were copied by Mr. Savage and three assistants in a month. In quest of data on Southern California, Bancroft and Oak took a trip to San Diego early in 1874, returning overland and visiting depositories of records. On this tour, Judge Benjamin Hays of San Diego turned over to Mr. Bancroft his historical collections, and subsequently directed the collecting in the south. The most efficient of the assistants employed by him was Edward F. Murray who, among other services, copied the records of the Santa Barbara missions. In March, 1877, Mr. Savage began work on the civil and ecclesiastical archives at Salinas, continuing the work at San José, Santa Cruz, and Sacramento. With others, he obtained dictations of the highest importance from native Californians and others, and in 1877 and 1878 spent eight months in that work, visiting all the missions from San Diego to San Juan Bautista with the exception of San Fernando and Purisima.

While his aids were thus gathering the material upon which the History of California is founded, Mr. Bancroft, as he tells us (Lit. Ind., 657-663), was devoting his attention more especially to the gaining of information concerning the proceedings of the two vigilance committees that held sway in San Francisco in the "fifties," by no means an easy task, since the acts of both of these organizations were illegal and their surviving members could not be expected to talk very freely, even after a lapse of twenty years. After considerable urging, however, those who had custody of the records were induced in the interest of history to turn them over for Mr. Bancroft's inspection. This material was made use of in the supplemental volumes on Popular Tribunals; in the first writing of which Mr. Bancroft was himself engaged from 1875 to 1877. Like his manuscript for Central America, however, this work had to be revised before its publication ten years later.

At an early date, Mr. Bancroft tells us (Lit. Ind., 623-628), he had corresponded with the heads of governments lying within his territory. The presidents of the Mexican and Central American republics and the governors of all the states had accorded him every facility. In 1874, especially favorable letters were received from the presidents of Salvador, Guatemala, and Nicaragua, the latter appointing a special commissioner to secure and ship documents.

The great mass of California matter, at first so voluminous as to be appalling, was now in hand, and in 1878 Mr. Bancroft turned his attention to the Northwest. Upon a visit to British Columbia in that year, he obtained access to the official records of the province, took the reminiscences of many old fur traders, secured the papers of others, and had help from several who had undertaken to write a history of the country: (Lit. Ind., 534; Hist. N. W. Coast, preface, viii). It was from this data that Mr. Bancroft in the years immediately following wrote, with the aid of some other writers, the History of the Northwest Coast, and the History of British Columbia, volumes constituting the great part of the work of which he can claim the actual authorship: (See Lit. Ind., 549.)

The history seeker had already secured the writings of Gov. Elwood Evans of Washington Territory. Crossing the straits from Victoria, he made some collections about Puget Sound, and then went to Portland and Salem, accompanied by Amos Bowman, a stenographer who subsequently became one of the writers in the library and prepared some manuscript for the History of British Columbia. (Bowman was a Canadian with some experience in government surveys and mining explorations. Before joining Mr. Bancroft on this expedition, he was located at Anacortes, Washington.) The Oregon Pioneer Association was then in session at Salem, and a number of its members furnished dictations. The secretary, J. Henry Brown, was engaged to copy documents in the state archives (Lit. Ind., 540-546). He subsequently made this matter the basis of a book which he himself published on Oregon history.

After dictations had been secured in passing through Southern Oregon, the Oregon material at Mr. Bancroft's disposal was further increased on his return to San Francisco by the employment of Frances Fuller Victor, a writer of experience and author of several books on Oregon, who, during a residence of more than ten years in the state, had collected data with the intention of herself writing and publishing its history. As by her researches she had become familiar with the history of the entire northwestern part of the United States, the working up of this field was assigned her just as the southwest had been assigned to Oak.

(Frances Fuller was born in the township of Rome, New York, May 23, 1826. She was a near relation of Judge Reuben H. Walworth, Chancellor of the State of New York, and through her ancestor, Lucy Walworth, wife of Veach Williams, who lived at Lebanon, Connecticut, in the early part of the eighteenth century, claimed descent from Egbert, the first king of England. Veach Williams himself was descended from Robert Williams, who came over from England in 1637, and settled at Roxbury, Massachusetts.

When Mrs. Victor was thirteen years of age, her parents moved to Wooster, Ohio, and her education was received at a young ladies' seminary at that place. From an early age she took an interest in literature, and when but fourteen years old, wrote both prose and verse for the county papers. A little later the _Cleveland Herald_ paid for her poems, some of which were copied in English journals.

Mrs. Victor's younger sister, Metta, who subsequently married a Victor, a brother of Frances' husband, was also a writer of marked ability. Between the two a devoted attachment existed, and in those days they were ranked with Alice and Phoebe Carey, the four being referred to as Ohio's boasted quartet of sister poets. The Fuller sisters contributed verse to the _Home Journal_ of New York City, of which N. P. Willis and George P. Morris were then the editors. Metta was known as the "Singing Sybil." Both sisters were highly eulogized by Willis, who regarded them as destined for a great future as writers.

In her young womanhood Frances spent a year in New York City, amid helpful literary associations. Being urged by their friends, the two sisters published together a volume of their girlhood poems in 1851. In the more rigorous self-criticism of later years, Mrs. Victor often called it a mistaken kindness which induced her friends to advise the publication of these youthful productions. But in these verses is to be seen the true poetic principle, and their earnestness is especially conspicuous.

Metta Fuller Victor, after her marriage, took up her residence in New York City, and continued her literary work both in prose and in verse. Frances' husband, Henry C. Victor, a naval engineer, was ordered to California in 1863. She accompanied him, and for nearly two years wrote for the San Francisco papers, her principal contributions consisting of city editorials to the _Bulletin_, and a series of society articles under the _nom de plume_ of Florence Fane, which, we are told, by their humorous hits, elicited much favorable comment.

About the close of the war, Mr. Victor resigned his position and came to Oregon, where his wife followed him in 1865. She has often told how, upon her first arrival in this state, she recognized in the type both of the sturdy pioneers and of their institutions something entirely new to her experience, and at once determined to make a close study of Oregon. As she became acquainted with many of the leading men of the state, and learned more and more about it, she determined to write its history, and began to collect material for that purpose.

Her first book on the history of Oregon was The River of the West, a biography of Joseph L. Meek, which was published in 1870. Many middle-aged Oregonians tell what a delight came to them when in boyhood and girlhood days they read the stories of Rocky Mountain adventures of the old trapper Meek as recited by this woman of culture and literary training, who herself had taken so great an interest in them. The book was thumbed and passed from hand to hand as long as it would hold together, and today scarcely a copy is to be obtained in the Northwest. Intensely interesting as The River of the West is, the chief value of the work does not lie in this fact, but rather in its value to the historian. Meek belonged to the age before the pioneers. It was the trapper and trader who explored the wilds of the West and opened up the way for the immigrant. Later writers freely confess their indebtedness to Mrs. Victor's River of the West for much of their material. The stories of the Rocky Mountain bear killer, Meek, romantic though many of them are, check with the stories given by other trappers and traders, and furnish data for an important period in the history of the Northwest.