Native Ingenuity
It is surprising how much ingenuity the Indians displayed in contriving ways for accomplishing their various purposes, without any of the means or facilities which we should should have considered essential. They had no iron, and could, of course, have no good cutting tools. All the tools and implements of every kind which were used by the Indians of the eastern part of the country were formed of stone, or wood, or bone, or something of that sort, and although working with such tools was an exceedingly slow and tedious process, still the results that they finally attained were, in some cases, truly wonderful.
Some tribes, especially those that lived in the neighborhood of the great lakes, made certain tools and implements of copper, which metal, it is said, they had some means of hardening, so that it would cut wood tolerably well. But they had no iron. Accordingly, when the Europeans first came to this country, one of the things that principally struck the Indians was their possession of knives. It is said that the name by which the foreigners were designated among some of the tribes was knife men. Columbus found, too, when he first landed in the West India Islands, that the natives would barter almost anything in their possession for a needle.
Manufacture of Weapons
The work upon which most of the skill and ingenuity of the Indians was displayed was the manufacture of instruments to be used in hunting and in war. The bow and arrow was the principle weapon, although they likewise used spears and clubs of various kinds. Their spears and arrows they tipped with heads formed of a stone nearly as hard as flint, which they could shape very exactly by splitting off portions of the mass in a peculiar way, by a process similar to that in which gun-flints are fashioned at the present time. These heads were fastened to the shafts of the spear or of the arrow by means of very slender thongs of hide put on green. These, in shrinking as they dried, would bind the stone to the wood in the firmest manner imaginable. Great numbers of these arrow-heads and spear-heads have been found in mounds and in old Indian encampments, and are now preserved in museums in all parts of the country.
These weapons were much more efficient than it would be supposed possible that such rude contrivances could be. Of course, in throwing an arrow from a bow everything depends upon the strength of the arm which discharges it. But it is said that some of the western Indians could shoot an arrow swifter than a bullet could be thrown from a gun, and one of them has been known to pass entirely through the body of a buffalo - at least so it is stated on what seems to be very good authority. When De Soto landed in Florida his horse was shot under him, in an attack from the Indians, by an arrow which passed through the covering of the saddle, and entered seven or eight inches into the animal's side.
In one case, too, when a man was killed by one of these arrows, the head of it was found imbedded in the solid part of the bone of his leg, so that it could not be pulled out again.
After all, however, the immense superiority of the European fire-arms became immediately apparent, when the comparison came to be made between the two classes of weapons. Some very amusing accounts are given by the early explorers of the American Continent, of the astonishment of the Indians sometimes manifest when they first witnessed the effects produced by a discharge of musketry. They were not always pleased to find how immensely superior the weapons of the white man were.
Superiority of Fire-Arms
A party of French explorers under the command of a certain officer named Laudonniere, whose adventures will be narrated in full in the third volume of this series, when making an excursion in boats up a certain river in Florida, and landing from time to time to communicate with the Indians, and to trade with them, were received at one time by a chieftain in his village, who in the course of the interview proposed a trail of the muskets of the visitors against the bows and arrows of his warriors. Laudonniere gives an account of the affair in the following language:
"In our discoursing with one another wee entered into speach as touching the exercise of armes. Then the chief caused a corselet to be set on end and prayed me to make a proofe of our Harguebuzes and their bowes. But this proofe, when we had made it, pleased him very little. For as soon as he knew that our Harguebuzes did easily pearce that which all the force of their bowes could not hurt he seemed to be sorie, musing, with himselfe how this thing might be done."
Curious Modes of Making Handles
One of the nicest operations with us, in the practice of the mechanical arts, is that of putting a handle to a tool in such a manner that it shall be firm and strong, and capable of standing the heavy usage to which many tools are subject. The Indians had several ingenious modes of accomplishing this purpose. Sometimes, as has been stated in another place, they made the handle of a withe, which was wound around the took, in a groove hewn in the stone for the purpose. The withe was put on when green, and by this means it could be closely fitted, and then when dry it became perfectly rigid and firm.
Another mode was to make a cleft in a young and growing stem and carefully insert the tool into is in such a manner that the two parts of the stem should closely embrace the groove of the tool, and then leave the whole until the wood should grow over the stone so as to hold it securely. The stem was then cut off and the shaft of it fashioned into the proper form.
Stone-Headed Mace
Some of the tribes had an ingenious way of fastening a round stone to the end of a long handle for the purpose of forming a mace or war-club. They would draw a piece of green hide over the stone, and bring the edges of it down round the handle, and lash it there by means of a thong of the same material wound round and round it, in a close spiral. The result was that the hide, in drying, would shrink and harden, and bind the stone in the firmest possible manner to the handle. By this means a weapon of a very formidable character was produced.
Military Ornaments
The Indians displayed a great deal of skill in making ornaments of various kinds with which to decorate their chiefs when going to war. These ornaments were made of the horns of animals, the feathers of birds, porcupine quills, and of long hair dyed of various brilliant colors. They particularly prized the feathers of eagles for these decorations, on account of the fierce and terrible courage of that bird, which they seemed to imagine imparted an expression of martial prowess to his very plumes.
For the same reason the great warriors chose for their clothing the skins of the fiercest and most formidable beasts of prey. A warrior dressed in full in these habiliments - his spear, his head-dress, his sleeves, and the borders of his garments all adorned with feathers and fringes of hair dyed of the most gaudy colors - presented sometimes a most extraordinary spectacle.
Indian Chief in his Military Dress
It is quite a remarkable fact that, among all Indian tribes, it was the prevailing fashion for the men to wear the finery. The women were all accustomed to dress in a very plain and unostentatious manner. It is curious to observe, too, that among all the animals inferior to man it is the male usually that monopolizes the gaudy decorations.
Hunting and Fishing
Great was the ingenuity which the Indians displayed in hunting and trapping game and in catching fish, both from the inland waters and from the sea. In hunting they depended mainly on stratagem. Indeed, their weapons were so few and the range attainable by them was so limited, that artifice and wiles became almost necessarily their main resource.
They were very ingenious, too, in contriving traps to set for wild animals. The most common mode of setting a trap was by poising one end of a log of wood, larger or smaller according to the size and strength of the animal to be taken, in such a manner that, on touching a stick to which the bait was attached, the log would fall down and crush the victim beneath it. An Indian would go forth in the morning from his wigwam, and take a great circuit through the forest, setting traps of this kind at different places along the way. He would keep his bow in his hand all the time, with an arrow ready at any moment to be adjusted to the string, and would creep along stealthily as he advanced, looking out in every direction, both on the ground and upon the trees, and noticing every indication, however slight, of any animals being near. He looked carefully for tracks, for marks of browsing upon the trees, for branches bent or broken down, and for every other sign or token which a passing animal might leave.
Solitary Habit of the Indian
In his march through the woods on these expeditions the Indian was always alone. Even if, for any reason, two or more persons were going the same way, they did not walk together, making their observations in common, and beguiling the gloom and solitude of the forest by conversation. That would have diverted their attention and interfered with their work. So in such cases they walked at a a distance from each other, each making his own observations and keeping his own watch. It is a general law of nature, as has already been remarked, that wild animals seeking prey are silent and solitary in their habits, prowling about stealthily and avoiding their own kind while watching for their victims. In these hunting excursions the Indian himself was little else than a wild animal seeking his prey, and he was endowed by nature with the qualities that pertain to such a condition.
Summer Hunting
In summer hunting the Indian killed animals for the sake of their flesh, to be used for food, for in the summer, and especially in the latter part of it, all such animals are fat, and their flesh is in the best possible condition to be eaten. If the hunter took more than he needed at this season for his immediate wants, his wife preserved the surplus by smoking or drying it in the manner already explained.
In these summer excursions the Indian often went in his canoe, following the streams or the shores of a lake or pond, and landing here and there in secluded places, to go in among the thickets and set his traps, or examine those set the day before. Generally he was alone in his canoe. If, however, he had a companion, they both preserved the same silence and caution as when on the land. Each would, in his own part of the canoe, ply his paddle, watching the shores of the stream and the trees which overhung the bank, as the boat went on, and looking earnestly into every hidden recess. Thus they would glide on without a word. On such excursions they deemed it necessary that silence, vigilant and constant circumspection, and a readiness that was never off its guard to spring forward in an instant, whenever an emergency might arise requiring sudden action, should be maintained without any intermission; for besides the danger that by inattention they might miss their game, their own personal safety was at stake. A wild beast might at any moment spring upon them from a thicket, or a shower of arrows from a party of human enemies come whistling through the air from some unobserved ambuscade.
All their faculties were thus kept, on these excursions, in a state of close and constant tension, and being engaged as they were, for a great portion of their time, in these pursuits, they acquired the habit of being silent, grave, watchful and cunning, in all their demeanor.
Night Hunting
Among some tribes a practice prevailed of hunting deer in a very singular way, and one in which there must sometimes have been produced a very striking and picturesque effect. The method was by fascinating the deer, as it were, by means of a bright fire made to float down at night on a solitary stream. The fire was built upon the bow of a canoe - a small platform covered with sand having first been made there to serve as a fire-place. Behind the fire a thick screen, made of the branches of evergreen trees, was placed, and behind this screen the hunter was concealed, armed with his bow and arrow, and ready for instantaneous action. The deer, seeing this bright light upon the water, would come down to the brink and gaze at it, under the influence of a sort of fascination, by which he was spell-bound, as it were, and held motionless on the shore until the boat came near enough for the hunter to transfix him with his arrow.
Snow Shoes
The snow shoe which the hunter used in winter was substantially a flat piece of basket work, of an oval form, which formed a broad extension of the sole of his moccasin, and prevented his foot from sinking beneath the surface of the snow, whether it was the light, powdery drift of a fresh fall that he was walking upon, or the damp, heavy mass into which the beams of the sun transform the old snow of the woods and fields in the spring.
A snow shoe, such as the Indians used, is made as follows: First, a strip of flexible wood is bent into an oval from for the outside frame. Two bars are then carried across from side to side and lashed to their places by thongs of green hide. These bars serve the double purpose of bracing the outer rim and keeping it to its form, and also as points of support for the heel and toes. The interstices of the frame thus made are then filled by stretching a
Walking on Snow Shoes
skin over them and sewing it to the outer rim, or by weaving in, over the intervening space, a sort of basket-work of thongs.
When the shoe is to be put on, the toe is slipped under a strap attached to the front bar and is fastened there. The heel is not fastened, but rises from the shoe when the foot is lifted, so that the shoe is raised and moved by the toe alone. Indeed, the heel of the snow shoe is not raised at all in the act of walking. The toe only is lifted, and the heel is dragged along upon the snow till the toe is put down again. Of course, it is only a very inconvenient and shuffling kind of walking that can be performed in this way, but it is much better than sinking at every step two or three feet into the snow.
Adventures in the Woods
Of course the Indians, in their excursions in the forests, were sometimes themselves attacked by wild beast that had been made fierce by hunger or had become excited in other ways. The forests which they traversed were inhabited by bears, wolves, wild cats, and other ferocious beasts of prey, that often, when hungry, would attack men. And even the more gentle and peaceable animals, such as the buffalo and the moose, during certain seasons and in certain states of excitement, sometimes became formidable. The Indian was generally prepared for these encounters, and, notwithstanding the inferiority of his weapons, he almost always came off victorious from them.
A story is related of a young Indian who had been setting traps in the woods and was returning home, when suddenly he saw among the trees a large moose coming toward him with a very threatening air. He had nothing with him but a knife - one probably made of stone. He retreated behind a tree; the moose advanced. He watched his opportunity and fell behind another tree - the moose advancing all the time and tearing up the ground with his hoofs, evidently in a state of great excitement. The Indian contrived, while dodging about from one tree to another, to get out his knife and cut a pole. He also pulled off one of his moccasins and drew out the string which tied it. By means of this string he lashed his knife to the end of his pole, thus forming a rude sort of spear.
All the time while he was making these preparations the moose was hotly pursuing him, and he could only keep out of his way by running from one tree to another, by which means, however, he could only gain a moment's shelter at a time. When at length the weapon was completed he attacked the moose in his turn, aiming his thrusts at the animals' throat, and still seeking shelter behind a tree after every blow. At length, after a long contest, during which many wounds were given, the moose became exhausted with his frantic exertions and his loss of blood, and he was finally killed
When afterwards the friends of the Indian came with him to the place, to secure the carcass, they found the grass and the underbrush trampled down and covered with blood for a great distance around.
Fishing
The Indians evinced a great deal of ingenuity in their contrivances for fishing. They could make a sort of twine by twisting together the fibers of a certain kind of bark, and with this they could make nets. In setting these nets they used pieces of wood for floats, and stones for sinkers. In the winter they would sometimes set these nets beneath the ice by making a row of holes in the ice along the line where they wised the net to be placed, and then they would contrive by some means to pass the net underneath from one hole to another, till it extended the whole length of the line, and when in this position the stones would carry it down to the bottom.
Bow and Arrow Fishing
Sometimes in the summer they used to take fish by shooting them with an arrow while they were swimming in the water, they themselves standing on the bank and watching till they saw the fish come sufficiently near. In such cases a string was attached to the arrow, by means of which the fish could be drawn to the land and the arrow also recovered. Note: Any young reader of this book, who may feel disposed to ascertain practically what degree of difficulty attends this mode of fishing, may easily make the experiment by heating a large fish-hook in the fire, in order to take out the temper, and then carefully straightening it and inserting it into the end of his arrow, and shooting at any fishes which he may see swimming near the shore. Before he succeed in hitting many of them, he will have to learn something about the refraction of light, as affecting the apparent position of objects seen under water, which boys are not all supposed to understand.
It is astonishing to what perfection of workmanship some of the Indians attained in the fabrication of their bows and arrows. The bows were formed of various materials, and sometimes, as, for example, when they were made of substances like horn, they were spliced and strengthened in a very ingenious manner. A western traveler saw one a few years since in the hands of a chief which was worth the price of two horse, and he actually bought two horses, at twenty-five dollars a piece, to give in exchange for the bow. The string was made of the sinews of a deer. The arrows, too, were very nicely made. There were two kinds, one for hunting and one for war. A good quiver would contain a hundred arrows, and an expert hunter could, if necessary, draw and shoot fifteen or twenty in a minute, running all the time at the top of his speed, either toward or from his enemy or his game.
Sometimes, instead of shooting the fish with arrows, the Indians speared them through the ice. In this latter case they would first make a hole in the ice, and then lie down upon their faces over it, so as to look into the water. They would then cover their heads with a mat or with evergreen boughs, in order to protect their eyes from the glare of the sun, and in this way they could see almost or quite to the bottom. They would then put down through the hole a little fish on the end of a pointed stick for bait. They would hold this stick in the left hand, and with the right they would hold the spear, and when the fish came to the bait, with a sudden and very dexterous thrust of the spear they would impale him.
They had a very ingenious sort of spear which they used on this and on other occasions. it had several prongs, and each prong was armed with a sharp point made of bone or of horn, and dexterously fastened to the wood in such a manner that it could be thrust into the fish, and yet so slightly fastened that when the fish struggled to escape, the point would come off and remain sticking in his flesh. There was a cord attached to the point, which passed up into the hand of the fisherman. Thus, when the fish was pierced and attempted to swim away, the fisherman could control his motions by the line, just as an angler does at the present day, and so finally, when he became exhausted, bring him to the land. This was the nearest approach to our contrivance of a fish-hook which they were able to accomplish. Some of these spear-heads were very nicely made, and were barbed by means of a second point delicately lashed to the principal one at the proper angle. Sometimes these points were made of thorns.
Various Manufactures
The Indians were accustomed to fabricate various other articles of simple construction and use, such as a sort of awl, or rather stiletto, from a thorn, by which, in sewing, they made holes for the thread, in the skin, or the birch bark, or whatever the material might be that they were at work upon. Besides leggins and moccasins, they made a number of other useful articles by means of these needles, such as pouches to told tobacco, and small bags called paint-bags, to contain ochres and other pigments which they used to paint their faces with, and also quivers to contain their arrows. Some of these things were made plain, but others were ornamented with embroidery, fringes of dyed hair, feathers, porcupine quills, and other such things, in a most elaborate manner.
In weaving mats they used a long, slender piece of bone for working in the filling - the rushes forming the warp. This bone served the purpose of a shuttle, and the mats woven by it were very compact and strong. The shuttle had a cleft formed in each end, so that the thread that was used for the filling could be wound upon it.
They manufactured also a great variety of pipes, some of them considerably artistic in form and finish. The material of these pipes was usually some sort of stone soft enough to be worked by such tools as they could command, but often they were made of clay and baked in the fire. When made of stone the bowls were ground out by means of a hard-pointed stick, of the shape of the intended cavity, worked with sand and water.
Painting the Face
The custom of painting the face and other parts of the body seems to have originated in that of oiling the skin, which, it is said, produced a salutary effect in the summer by checking the perspiration in some degree, and defending the person from the attacks of insects. This latter end was the better attained when some foreign substance was mixed with the oil, and in choosing the substance to be applied it was natural that savages should soon learn to fancy something that was ornamental as well as useful. In certain tropical countries, where the natives are in a state of great barbarism, a custom prevails of anointing the body with a wash of thin mud or clay, which, when it is dried and hardened, forms a coat that the proboscis of gnats and midges cannot penetrate. The Indians, with their colored ochres ground in oils which they had obtained from the beavers and the bears, considered themselves doubtless on a far higher level of refinement and civilization than such poor savages as these, daubed with a mere paste of clay.
The Tikkinagon
Although the women were very little in the habit of decorating themselves, but surrendered all fringes and feathers and other such finery to their husbands and sons, they sometimes expended a great deal of time and labor in making and decorating the little cradle, if cradle it may be called, which was prepared for the baby. In the language of some of the tribes it was called a Tikkinagon.
This contrivance, as has already been said, was formed of a board, or of some flat fabric of their own make equivalent to a board. Near the foot of it was a projection like a shelf to support the baby's feet. This projection was often curved so as to come up a little way on each side of the legs, in order to support them laterally. There was a socket made for the head, which was padded with soft moss, and there was a strap which came over the forehead when the baby was put into its place, so as to stay the head and keep it from rolling about. There were other bands which passed across from side to side over the breast and thighs of the baby. The whole was often very elaborately made, and all the bands and borders were ornamented with carvings and embroidery in a very curious manner.
The position of the poor baby, when put into a Tikkinagon, was, of course, fixed and immovable, for his head and limbs were fastened in every part, so that he could not move them at all. In this condition he looked more like an Egyptian mummy that had been three thousand years embalmed, then like a living child just coming forward into being. He bore the confinement, however, with a stoicism characteristic of his race. Whether in his rigid and unyielding couch he was strapped to his mother's back upon a journey, or laid down upon the bottom of a goat, or hung up in a tree, he was silent, patient, motionless, and, to all appearance, totally unconcerned; thus showing that the very low degree of sensibility, both to excitement and to pain, and the emotionless and passive taciturnity which so strongly mark the race, were qualities native and hereditary, not acquired.
The Tikkinagon, however, sometimes contained a slight recognition of the baby's claim to be provided with something to occupy and amuse him, as a strip of elastic wood was not unfrequently attached to the board, with certain little shells and pebbles fastened to the end of it, in such a manner that, when the board was swinging from a tree, the little nursling would have those toys jingling before him.
Fire
The Indians manifested much ingenuity in their mode of obtaining fire. It was very seldom that it was necessary to do this by artificial means, for they were very careful not to allow the fires in their wigwams to go out; and if at any time one went out the others were at hand from which to renew it. Preserving their fires was thus an object of special attention. At certain places where councils were held provision was made, as in the case of the vestal temple in Rome, for keeping up a perpetual fire.
Still it would often happen that hunting parties far away from home, and sometimes the inhabitants of a solitary wigwam, would be without fire, and without any means at hand of obtaining it except by some artificial process. It is well known that all friction produces heat, and that the friction of two dry pieces of wood, if sufficiently violent and long continued, will inflame them, but it is very difficult, without some appropriate machine, to maintain a powerful friction long enough to produce the effect. Very few civilized men can get fire from dry wood by such a process.
The way in which the Indians managed it was this: They would first make a small cavity in a piece of very dry wood of a certain kind - it was only wood of a certain kind that would answer the purpose. They made the cavity by boring into the wood with the point of a sharp stone. Then they would select a long, round stick - which must be also perfectly dry - and from the end of it to a point rudely fitting the cavity which they had bored. To perform the operation, after the arrangements were thus made, required three men. Setting the stick upright in the hole, one of the men would take hold at the top, and by rolling it to and fro between his two hands would cause the point to turn rapidly this way and that in the cavity. He would bear down also with his hands as he rolled the stick between them, in order to keep the point of the stick in the hole and also to increase the friction. But, in consequence of this bearing down, his hands would gradually descend as he rolled. When he had nearly reached the bottom the second man stood ready to begin at the top by taking the stick between hishands in the same manner. By this means the rotation of the point of the stick in the hole was kept up without any intermission until at length smoke, and soon afterward sparks of fire, would appear.
The third person engaged in the operation stood by all the while watching the process, and holding apiece of punk, or spunk, as it is sometimes called, in his hand, ready to catch the first spark as soon as it should appear. As soon as his punk was on fire he would blow it with his breath, and finally, by means of it, set fire to a little heap of dried leaves and sticks which he had previously collected for the purpose.
Wampum
One of the most curious things connected with Indian ingenuity and art was wampum. Wampum served many important purposes in the domestic and social economy of all the tribes. It was used as a material for ornaments, as money, and also as a means of making records and documents of all kinds.
It consisted of strings of what might be called beads. These beads were made of shells found upon the sea shore, and worn to a proper form by being rubbed on stones of a sandy texture. They were flat and round, about half an inch in diameter, and perhaps an eighth of an inch thick. There was a hole in the center of each by which it could be put upon a string. There was a certain number which formed what was called a string and a number of strings fastened together, side by side, formed a belt.
There were two principal kinds of beads, the white and the purple. The white were made from any shell that would furnish material of that color, and were of much less value than the others, which were made of shells that were more rare.
The strings and belts of different colored beads, variously intermingled, were used a great deal for ornaments, in the form of bracelets, necklaces, and the like. They were also used as money. For a small purchase a string was sufficient, and for a larger one a belt. Sometimes, to adjust the payment exactly to the price agreed upon, one or more strings would be attached to a belt, or additional beads to a string.
After the white men came into the country, and by their dealings with the Indians established, in some sort, the relative value of these beads and English money, six beads of the common sort were reckoned at one penny.
In the treaties made by the early settlers with the Indian tribes, and in various other transactions in which they were mutually concerned, we read of great quantities of wampum being passed from one party to another in making payments. In such cases the amount was reckoned by fathoms, and many hundreds of fathoms were sometimes stipulated for, to be received or paid in important transactions. When the Indians had these large amounts to pay, it sometimes required many months for them to make up the sum, and in such cases they would often pay a portion on account, and ask an extension on the balance due.
Of course, the wampum so paid to the colonists was of no use to them except to pay back to individual Indians again in exchange for baskets, furs, skins, and other articles that were really useful to the settlers.
Wampum Used for Records and Documents
Another very important use to which wampum was applied was for records and accounts, and indeed for documents of all kinds. The people had a way of arranging beads of various kinds. For example, one arrangement denoted a beaver skin, another a certain amount of corn. Another combination would denote a promise to give or to pay, and others still would represent the persons who were parties to the transaction. On the same principle there were symbols to denote days, or weeks, or months, and others representing different numbers. it is obvious that by combining these symbols in a proper manner a rude memorandum might be made of any simple transaction, which, if it could not be perfectly understood without explanation by a third person, was at least a very good memorial for the use of parties to it.
In one respect this mode of executing bonds and promissory notes was superior to ours, inasmuch as in the case of the failure on the part of the promissor to perform his promise, the obligation which he had given was not, as with us, waste paper, but, so far as it went, it was cash in itself, and could be spent as such like any other money.
Treaties and Public Records
Treaties were made in this way, and records kept of all important events and transactions in the history of the tribes; and it is said that at stated periods the great sachems were accustomed to assemble around their council fires and look over the public wampum, to refresh their memories in respect to the meaning of the different strings , and to explain it to the young chieftains, in order that a proper understanding of the facts and transactions recorded by them might be handed down from generation to generation.
It is obvious that without some precaution of this kind the precise significancy of these rude records would soon be lost. And yet it was found that the memory of the to any transaction, when assisted by a memorandum of this kind, was exceedingly tenacious. A story is told of a European who, having received some favor from an Indian, gave him a string of wampum, saying that it was a pledge that he was the Indian's friend, and that if any occasion should ever arise he would serve him to the utmost of his power. Forty year afterward the Indian, being then old, friendless and destitute, came to the gentleman, bringing the wampum with him, and claimed the performance of the promise, offering the wampum at the same time as proof that the promise had been given. The gentleman at once acknowledged the obligation and honorably fulfilled it.
Pictorial Writing
A great number of the Indian tribes had another mode of recording transactions and events besides this contrivance of wampum, and that was by rude drawings representing pictorially the transaction or event which they wished to describe. The material on which these drawings were made was usually birch bark, which makes a very good paper for such a purpose. But sometimes the figures were painted upon the smooth surface of a rock by the wayside, or upon the stem of a tree, the rough outer bark having been first scraped away.
For the purpose of making these records, every considerable hunter had a certain symbol, usually the form of some animal, which stood for his name, and was known to all his acquaintances. There was some sign to show when the figure of the animal was to be understood in this symbolic sense and when it was to be taken literally. All visible objects were represented, of course, in rude drawings, in outline, of the objects themselves. Then there were certain principles of arrangement, and various arbitrary signs, that were well understood among the people, which, in connection with the use of these figures, enabled them to communicate quite a complicated piece of information in a comparatively simple yet intelligible manner. This mode of communicating ideas will be best illustrated by an example.
Specimen of the Writing
The engraving is the exact copy of a notice posted up on a pole in the woods by the Indians of a certain company that had encamped there during the night and which was left in order to give information respecting themselves to others who might afterwards visit the spot. It was a company consisting chiefly of Europeans, though there were two Indian chiefs who acted as guides, and it was these two Indians who posted the notice. The European portion of the party consisted of a commander and five persons appointed to various functions under him, such as secretary, surveyor, mineralogist, and the like. These are represented by a row of figures in the center of the picture, reading them from right to left in the order in which such a column would march. The first man is the commander, as is denoted by his sword. The others are represented by appropriate symbols - the secretary with a book, the mineralogist with a hammer, the surveyor with instruments, and so on. These objects which appear small and indistinct in the engraving, which is much reduced, were large enough to be distinct in the original. That these men were Europeans is denoted by their wearing hats.
Next to them, at the end of the middle line, to the left, are two Indians, shown to be such by their being bare-headed. Beyond is a fire, showing that these persons formed one mess at their encampment.
Above is a line of figures denoting that the party was escorted by eight soldiers armed with muskets, who together formed another mess, as is denoted by their fire. The men and the muskets are represented separately. This was to simplify the work of making the drawing - it being less difficult to draw the guns by themselves than in the hands of the men. On the corner below are delineated the figures of two animals which had been killed the day before for food.
This document, executed upon a large piece of birch bark, was attached by the Indians that made it to a pole which was set in the ground in a slanting direction, the top of the pole pointing out the course which the party making the record had taken in continuing their journey.
It is curious to observe in the work, especially in the mode of drawing, the men, how ingeniously the artists contrived to make their delineations as much as possible by straight lines, and with very few of these in each figure. This was quite necessary, considering the intractable nature of the materials which they had at command, and the very moderate degree of skill which they were able to exercise in using them.