Aboriginal America

by Jacob Abbott

  The final result was, in many cases, a canoe of very large size and of quite an elegant appearance.

  Of course, a canoe like this is only produced after considerable progress has been made by a tribe in the mechanical arts. At first, it is said, the Indians used the trunks of trees which they found already hollowed by decay, in places where they grew. To prevent the water coming in at the ends in such a case, they used to stop them with masses of clay, which they kneaded in at the bow and stern.

  Clearing Land

  The Indians had many clearings when the Europeans first came into the country. These clearings were made for the purpose of raising corn, and they were considered of great value--each one remaining in the same family or tribe from generation to generation, for ages. It was very difficult to make these clearings, since the only way of felling trees was by fire. Then besides, when the tree was down the work of getting out the roots was one of great labor. Thus absolutely new clearings were seldom made. The old ones remained, and each generation enlarged them a little when any increase of population required an enlargement, by burning down trees along the margin of them. The method was to dig about the tree so as to expose the roots as much as possible, and then to build a fire around it so as to burn it off. But this was a very slow and toilsome work, for if it was a living tree the wood was green, and after the outside had burned away it was difficult to get the fire in, so as to make it take effect up the heart of the stem. To promote the burning as much as possible they used to pick off the charred portion as fast as the fire formed it, with sharp stones fastened to the end of poles. In this way, and by constantly bringing fresh supplies of fuel, the tree was at length made to fall.

  Then to take off the branches and to divide the stem into lengthes small enough to enable them to drag them away--all by the action of fire alone--required great additional toil. It is not surprising, under these circumstances, that the work of clearing land proceeded slowly.

  Tilling the Land

  The work of tilling the land after it was cleared belonged wholly to the women. The men reserved their strength for the immensely more difficult and dangerous duty of hunting and fishing, and of defending the country in case of war.

  In planting their fields the women used clamshells for hoes, and sticks sharpened in the fire for picks and shovels. When the crop was ripe the corn was gathered, and it was stored for winter in holes made in the ground for the purpose. The bottom and sides of the holes were protected by a lining of bark, or of wooden poles set up close together all around them. When the hole was filled it was covered over, and not opened again until the corn was required for use.

  Preparing the Corn for Food

  Instead of mills to grind the corn the Indian women used mortars to pound it. These mortars were stones with hollows in them. For the pestle another stone was a smooth and round surface at the bottom was used. At first such stones were employed for these purposes as were found of nearly the proper form in their natural state; but in process of time the people acquired the art of fashioning them so as to make mortars of very good shape, and of considerable capacity. Many such mortars, with pestles belonging to them, have been dug up in ancient mounds, or found buried just beneath the surface around old and abandoned encampments in the western country.

  The women sometimes made cakes of their corn and baked them in the ashes, but, more commonly, they made a sort of porridge of it, or rather soup, for they usually put in a part of some animal, which the husband had brought home from the chase, to enrich and flavor it. The pounded corn and the piece of meat were boiled in the same vessel until they were sufficiently cooked, and then the whole was eaten together.

  Mode of Boiling

  The mode of boiling this mess was singular enough. They had no vessels which would bear to be exposed directly to the action of fire. They could fashion copper into some very ingenious forms by beating it with smooth stones and grinding it upon rough ones, but they could not make anything like a vessel of it. Nor could they make any pottery that would hold water and stand the fire. But, strange as it may seem, they could fashion a vessel of osiers, coiling them round round in a spiral manner, and sewing each coil to the one below it, in such a manner as to make the work water-tight or nearly so. Any small amount of leakage was probably not of much consequence.

  The way in which they boiled their soup in these vessels--it is obvious that it would not answer to put one over the fire--was very curious. It was by setting the vessel on the ground by the side of the fire and putting red-hot stones into it. A single red-hot stone would keep the contents boiling longer than one would suppose, and when one became cool another was put in to take its place. Of course, a great deal of soot and ashes went in with the stone, and white men who, in traveling among the Indians, have been invited to partake of a meal so prepared, have not represented the soup as exhibiting a very attractive appearance when it was ready to be served.

  Varied Occupations of the Women

  From what has been said it will be seen that all the duties of every kind relating to the home of the family and its surroundings devolved upon the woman--it being her province to relieve her husband of every care except that of hunting, of fishing, and of war. When he brought home the animals that he had killed it was her province to take care both of the skin and of the flesh. The skin she stretched upon a frame and scraped the fleshward side of it with a sharp stone, so as thoroughly to cleanse it, and then made various applications to it and subjected it to a particular course of treatment, which took with them the place of tanning. The effect was to make it soft and plaint and to preserve it from future decay.

  The flesh, in summer, they preserved by smoking it. They would dig a hole in the ground and make a fire in it. The fire, being at the bottom of the hole, would, of course, not burn freely, but would only smolder away and make a great deal of smoke. Over and around this hole they would hang the pieces of meat, and then build a sort of inclosure, with mats, around them, in order to confine the smoke. The mats formed, in fact, a species of funnel through which all the smoke must pass as it ascended into the air.

  The holes for these fires they dug with their sharpened sticks and clam-shell hoes.

  Moccasins

  It was the duty of the women to make clothing from the skins after they were cured. The clothing consisted of moccasins for the feet, tight leggins for the legs, and a sort of a double apron, with one flap behind and another before, which was worn both by the women and the men. There was also a looser garment for the shoulders when the weather required it.

  All these garments were made with great care, and often a vast deal of labor was bestowed upon them. They were adorned with fringes made of hair dyed of various colors, and with feathers of eagles and of other great birds, and porcupine quills, and with embroidery worked in different colored threads.

  The moccasins were made of one piece of skin, the center of the piece forming the sole, and the sides being drawn up and gathered over the foot above. Some of them were finished in a very ornamental manner. The fashion of them was very different according to the purpose for which they were intended. Those made for men, which were, of course, destined to endure the wear and tear of long tramps through the woods on hunting expeditions of military campaigns, were made of very stout leather, and sometimes two or three additional thicknesses were put upon the soles.

  Those of the women, which were, of course, to be subjected to much gentler usage, were made lighter and of less substantial material; and there was a kind intended to be worn by young women on the occasion of their marriage, for which a skin was prepared by a long and careful process that made it almost as soft as kid. These bridal moccasins were cut in a peculiar fashion, and they were embroidered with hair of different colors, and gaudily ornamented in other ways.

  Excursions of the Women

  As everything connected with the management of the household devolved upon the woman, it became her duty from time to time to make excursions along the streams or in
the woods to procure birch bark to make new rolls, or bullrushes for mats of other such things. Accordingly, sometimes, when the man had gone away before sunrise, or perhaps even before the dawn, on some distant hunting or fishing excursion, the woman, after breakfast, would prepare for an expedition of her own. In some cases she would take the children, and at others she would leave them at home under the care of an older brother or sister. The number of children was, however, seldom large enough to make this last arrangement desirable, as the Indian families were almost always small. It has been ascertained that the average number of children was only two.

  The mother then would usually take her little ones with her and would embark in her canoe. The baby, if there was one, would be tied to a board and lashed to her back; or by means of being thus secured to a board it could be laid down in the bottom of the boat, or placed in an inclined position against one of the thwarts. It seldom or never cried. There were two reasons for this extraordinary quietness--first, the extremely imperturbable and unexcitable character of the Indian temperament, and in the second place, the fact that the poor child found by experience that he never gained anything by crying.

  Having taken her place in her boat the Indian woman would paddle her way up or down the stream, or along the shores of a pond, into retired coves or inlets where the rushes grew, and would gather the supply that she required; and then toward evening would paddle home again, so as to be ready to receive her husband on his return.

  Sometimes the object of these excursions was to collect and bring home fuel for the fire. In these cases, in order to prevent the sticks of wood from injuring the canoe, she would first lay poles along the bottom of it to protect the framework and the bark covering. For cutting these poles the Indians had stone hatchets, with handles formed of withes bound round the head, like the handles of the hammers already described. Small saplings could be cut off pretty easily with these tools, by first bending them over in such a way as to bring the fibres of the wood near the ground into a state of high tension, when an inconsiderable blow, even with a dull instrument, would cause the stem to snap off at once.

  The fuel itself consisted of such dried fragments of wood as could be found already lying in pieces of a convenient size to be removed, or else so far decayed that they could be easily broken into such pieces.

  Education of the Children

  The children of these families received no education at all until they came to be old enough to learn to set little traps in the woods for small game, or if girls, to begin to help their mothers to make mats or leggins or mocassins. Sometimes they were stationed in the corn-field while the corn was coming up, in order to drive away the crows and other such plunderers with sticks and stones. The boys would usually take to the woods as soon as they were old enough to find their way among the trees. Their fathers would make bows and arrows for them adapted to their strength, and show them how to set traps for squirrels, rabbits, foxes, and other similar game, and great was their exultation and joy when they found anything taken in them.

  There is an account of a small boy who set a trap in the woods, and his uncle, who was visiting at the wigwam where the boy lived, went out secretly and put a rabbit in it which he had caught himself in another place. So when the boy went to his trap he found to his great pride and joy that there was a rabbit there. It was the first he had ever caught. He brought it home in triumph and gave it to his mother, and she made a soup of it, and the family with their guest, ate the soup together, leaving the boy to think all the time that it was really the fruit of his hunting that furnished the meal.

  Stories for Children

  The mothers were accustomed to talk very little with their children. Indeed, the Indians were extremely taciturn on all occasions. They, however, sometimes explained to the children the principles of duty, and told them stories to illustrate and enforce what they taught. Some of these stories are to be found reduced to writing, among other legends and tales which travelers who have visited Indians in their wigwams, or have lived among them, have recorded. The scenes of these stories were laid, of course, always in the woods, and wild animals figured very conspicuously in them. Here is one which will serve as a specimen. It was intended, we must suppose, to teach older children to be faithful, kind and true to the younger ones.

  The Child that Turned into a Wolf

  Once there was a man who lived with his wife in a lonely place on the borders of a lake. They had two children nearly grown up. The oldest was a boy. The other was a girl. Besides these there was a third child, a boy, who was very young.

  The mother was more anxious about this little child than about either of the others, for as she and her husband were considerably advanced in life, she was afraid that they might not live long enough to take care of him until he should grow up and be able to take care of himself.

  At last, one day when the father was hunting in the forest he was killed by wild beasts. The mother, with the help of her oldest boy, continued to maintain the family for some time, but at length she fell sick and could do no more. When she found that she was about to die she called her two oldest children to her and charged them to be kind to their little brother after she was gone, and never forsake him. They promised that they would obey. Soon after this the woman died.

  For a time the oldest boy remained at home and took care of his sister and brother. But at last he grew tires of hunting and fishing every day to procure food for them, and so he went away and left them.

  The girl remained at home for some time after the boy had gone away, but at last she grew tired of taking care of her little brother, and so she went away too.

  The child was now left all alone in the wigwam. He staid there a day or two without anything to eat, wondering all the time where his brother and sister had gone. At last, being almost starved, he thought he would go into the woods and see if he could not find what had become of them.

  He wandered about all day, and at length toward evening he became so weak that he could go no further, and he sank down upon the ground ready to die. But suddenly he observed near him a she wolf feeding her young ones with the flesh or a rabbit, or some other such animal which she had caught. The little boy crept toward her, and the wolf, seeing how pale and exhausted he looked, gave him some of the meat. This food revived and strengthened him so that he became quite like himself again, and he began to play with the little wolves, and tumble about with them upon the ground.

  After this the old wolf, every day when she came home with food for her young ones, gave the boy some of it took, and he continued living with this wild family for some time in peace and plenty.

  At length, one day while he was playing with the young wolves upon the shores of the lake, and singing a song, his brother, who was fishing on the lake in his canoe, at some distance from the shore, heard his voice, and he at once recognized it as that of his little brother. His conscience had often reproached him for having forsaken the child, and he was now overjoyed to find that he was still alive. He paddled his canoe toward the shore, and began to call his brother by name.

  But from living so long with the wolves, and partaking the same sustenance with them, the child's nature had been gradually undergoing a change, and he was growing like a wild animal. In a word, he was turning into a wolf himself; so when he saw his brother approach, and heard his voice, instead of coming down to the shore to meet him, he gave a wild cry and ran off into the woods with the young wolves that he was with. As he went he sang a song, the burden of which was:

  “I am changing into a wolf, and I cannot come;/I am changing into a wolf, and I cannot come.”

  His brother went away, feeling very sorrowful and sad. He found his sister and told her what he had seen, and during all the rest of their lives they were both rendered very unhappy by the remorse and anguish which they suffered at the thought of having abandoned their little brother in his helplessness, and of having thus been the cause of his turning into a wolf.

  Mechanic Arts
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br />   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.