THE CHEROKEE

Fourth in Sania Bleeker's splendid series of tribal profiles of American Indians. Others have been on the Northwest Coast Indiana, the Apache and the Iroquois and again, we recommend that they not be overlooked as important steps to an inner understanding of Indian ways. This book starts with the story of a runner panting his way from his home village to challenge the chiefs of another to a ball game. There follows the description of the orthodox invitation ceremony- anecdotal in tone and during the course of which the author brings two or three characters to life. The situation is used as a point of departure for several chapters on Cherokee customs- marriage arrangements, nature rites, hunting, the function of shamans, the ball game itself. Customs recounted, the way in played for an earlly presented history of the tribe. The great Sequoya, born in 1770 set Cherokee down as a written language; the days of John Ross, the first president of the Cherokee Nation, saw the forming of their own constitution modelled on ours, but by mid nineteenth century, there were battles for independance tragically lost and a forced migration to the west. A solid volume and one that should hold the interest of the next age group as well.