GATSCHET KAS. LEG. COMMENTARY. [9 I ] 5& 



A. N. Cabe^a de Vaca describes in chap. 26 of his interesting Naufra- 

 gios the coiling and drinking of the cassine upon the Texan coast by men 

 only, and the superstitions connected with it when women approached or 

 passed by. 



Jean Ribaut, the P'rench explorer of Eastern Florida, mentions in his 

 report, first printed at Lyons in 1566, his own experience in tasting the 

 beverage : "Leur boisson, qu'ils appallent cassinnet, se fait d'herbes com- 

 posees, et m'a semble de telle couleur que la cervoyse de ce pays [French 

 beer] ; i"en ay gouste et ne I'ay point trouve fort estrange." Ternaux- 

 Compans, Coll. xx. p. 263; and French, Hist. Coll. La., iii. p. 208. Cf. 

 also Pareja, Timucua Grammar, Paris 1886, pp. xii. xiii. 



" Our hearts are white, and yours must be white," etc. 

 Ceremonial allocutions embodied in standing formulas, which 

 generally point to a high antiquity by the quaintness of their 

 wording, were frequent among the Creeks and southern Indians. 

 They served as exordiums of ceremonial speeches delivered on 

 various occasions, e.g. at the commencement of the busk cere- 

 monies, before playing ball, etc. The following was the usual 

 formula at the beginning of a peace-speech held to arrange diffi- 

 culties between towns or tribes, to stop warfare between belliger- 

 ents, etc. : Antiifkita hatkusin, tchafiki hatkusin, tchanki hatku- 

 sin, 'tchimwayes (abbr. from atchimwayas) — fny spittle is wkite^ 

 my heart is zuhite^ ivy hand is white ; I extend it to you. 

 Another formula was used in council-speeches, being also intended 

 to show peaceful intentions : amatchiilaki intiifkitan ak'hui'lat — 

 the spittle of my forefathers., I sta?zd in it. When the dual of 

 the verb hiii'las was used, it meant that he and the whole tribe or 

 nation were unanimous in the feelings expressed by him. The 

 colonists of the Salzburger Protestant settlement near Savannah, 

 Georgia, observed among the Creek Indians there, or their affili- 

 ated tribes, a peculiar mode of salutation, which was accompanied 

 by a motion of the right hand to the left breast, or by the ofler of 

 the calumet (Urlsperger, ''Nachrichten," i. p. S62) : tchahokpi 

 tchihokpi itapomis ; tsanadsi tchinadsin hamgusit o's ; tchafigi 

 tchifigin hamgusit o's; tchafigi tchifigin itiladshi; hi'lit o's — my 

 breast is like your breast., mine and your chest is one chest., 

 mine and your heart is one heart., my heart is intimately joined 

 to your heart.* 



* Retranslated from the English into Creek by Gen. Pleasant Porter. The two next 

 allocutions I obtained from G, W. Stidham. 



