GATSCHET — KAS. LEG. — COMMENTARY. [79] 47 



or "large turtle liver." Cf. Pickering, '^ History of Plants," pp. 

 776. 777. 



Tola or tiila, commonly called ^^ szvect-bay," is Magnolia glauca 

 L. (W. R. Gerard), Ch. Pickering, ''History of Plants," p. 908, 

 identifies this magnolia with Strachey's " tree that beareth the 

 rind of black synamon," which he had seen in Virginia (p. 142). 

 Mentioned among the four plants exhibited by the hayayalgi, 

 and also among the fourteen plants composing the ritual mixture 

 drunk on the eighth day of the Kasi'hta busk ; Hawkins, Sketch, 

 p. 77. The term is Creek, and has passed into the Timucua lan- 

 guage ; it signifies ''felled," since beavers are in the habit of gnaw- 

 ing it to serve them in damming up water-courses (tiilas I fell ^ 

 cut dozvn). 



The fourteen 7nedicinal plants (vol. i. 178. 179) entering into 

 the composition of the liquid drunk from the medicine pots have 

 been partly identified by Mr. W. K. Gerard. Kapapaska is the 

 spice-wood, Lindera benzoni Meisn. ; u-i lani is Tvorm-seed, Che- 

 nopodium ambrosioides L., var. anthelminticum Gray, and the 

 Jerusalem-oak belongs to the same genus. He further conjectures 

 that No. 8 is the cinque/oil, Potentilla canadensis, and No. 10 the 

 angelica, Ligusticum actseifolium. The list of plants was then 

 submitted by Mr. Gerard to Mrs. A. E. W. Robertson, a success- 

 ful missionary teacher among the Creeks, whose results, after 

 consulting with the natives, were as follows : 



No. 6 should be written tiikfun lasti ; it is bur marigold, Bidens fron- 

 dosa L. No. 7 is the cardinal Jlower, Lobelia cardinalis L. No. 10 is 

 g-insetiff, Panax quinquefolium L. (The Creeks ascribe special virtue to 

 the forked root, and Charlevoix reports a belief of the Northern Indians, 

 that it rendered their women fertile; its Aigonkin name is inini waga- 

 nashk, herb in ike shape of a man (Cuoq), its Mohawk name tekarento- 

 Ven, separated legs and thighs, G.) No. 11 is \\\.&xM.y fir e-7noutk- hair, 

 fire-beard, and is a fungus, not a moss. No. 13 is literally "something 

 with which salt may be used"; the use of salt is prohibited during the 

 busk. No. 14 is the "young and tender cane" of Arundinaria macrosper- 

 ma Michx., called koni in Cha'hta.* 



Scalping was a general war-custom among all tribes of North 

 America east of the Rocky Mountains, and is also traceable to some 

 Oregonian and Shoshoni tribes, while it was not practiced by the 



Correspondence of Mr. Gerard, dated New York, Jan. »4, and Feb. 24, 18S4. 



