Till' T.iFE OF Primitivic Woman 



1699 



SCENE OF THE FESTIVAL 



The scene is laid by the side of Lake Beebc in a Cayuga Indian 

 village of the Wolf clan. Some women and young girls are busy at their 

 daily work, while most of the men are absent on a hunting expedition. 

 Preparations are being made for the annual strawberry festival, which 

 is one of thanksgiving to the Great Spirit for the " first fruits of the earth." 



Fig. 51. — Some of the actors cooking supper after the Indian play was over 



Some small children are playing in canoes near the shore. One is listening 



intently to the old chief who smokes and dozes by tunis near the long 



house, or talks in snatches to the boy. Some of the children are picking 



strawberries ; others are watching the woman and the girls who are working 



at pottery, basketry, and the dressing of skins. An old arrow maker 



is teaching one boy who seems likely to become an apt learner. A matron, 



busy hoeing in the cornfield, is keeping watch of her papoose and of the 



little girls near-by v/ho are amusing both themselves and the papoose 



with coni-husk dolls. 



TIME OF THE FESTIVAL 



The spring of 1737. 



NARRATIVE 4 



The afternoon quiet of the Httle Cayuga village is suddenly disturbed 

 by a sound of shots and loud calls in the woods on the opposite shore. 

 The women and children remain more or less indifferent to the noise, 

 however, until they see a band of men, two white men in European dress 



•• Since the action must necessarily be in pantomime it is thought best to give a key to the action and 

 a brief narrative of the actual historical events on which that is based. Interested readers can find the 

 details in Schoolcraft's Archives of Aboriginal Knowledge, Vol. IV, p. 324-341, and in Beauchamp's History 

 of the New York Iroquois, p. 274-278. 



