FIEE AS AN AGENT IN HUMAN CULTURE 65 



Beverly decribes fire fishing, commonly called "gigging" in Virginia, 

 where it was practiced up to a few years ago. 



"They have also another way of fishing, like those on the Euxine 

 Sea, by the help of a blazing fire by night. They make a hearth in 

 the middle of their canoe, raising it within 2 inches of the edge; upon 

 tliis they lay their burning lightwood spht into small shivers, each 

 splinter whereof will blaze and burn end for end, like a candle. 'Tis 

 one man's work to attend the fire and keep it flaming." ^ 



The Senecas used, when deer went into the river to get rid of mos- 

 quitos, to come at night in their canoes with a candle of wax at the 

 bow, and the deer seemed bUnded. The Indian could go very close 

 to shoot them 8' (pi. 25). 



Squier decribes fisliing on the Mosquito Coast by torchlight. The 

 torches are made of bundles of fat pine fastened at the top of a long 

 pole. He says that the fish are attracted to the hght and are har- 

 pooned, the man standing in the bow of the craft. ^^ 



The Indians of the Antilles also used torches in fishing with dip 

 nets, in the rivers at night. 



In Sweden capercailzie were shot by torchlight. *^ 



The aborigines of Victoria, Austraha, speared fish by torchhght. 

 They carried a bark torch and walked around in the water armed 

 with a spear.^* 



In Burma deer are stalked by light. A lamp is put in a pot with 

 a hole in one side and deer are "jacked" by the hght.^^ 



CLEARING AND AGRICULTURE 



Man and vegetal nature have always been locked in struggle. 

 On the one hand there is subsistence, protection, and a supply for 

 numerous needs, and on the other repression and hmitation of effort. 

 If the j«ngle is accepted we find men living close to nature not many 

 removes from the forest denizens, as the Sakais and Chowpal, "wild 

 men" of the Malay Peninsula. If the jungle is combated, the seeds 

 of progress are sown and man emerges to a better condition. Against 

 vegetation man sets fire and makes an important step in the preag- 

 ricultural period toward true agriculture. There is seen a period in 

 which man consciously or imconsciously aids the trees on which he 

 depends for food at bearing. Trees approaching the ripening of 

 fruits are carefully watched. There are some references, not to hand, 

 and offered with reserve, concerning the building of fires under bear- 

 ing trees to ripen the crop. Such a custom was said to obtain in 

 the Philippines in regard to mango trees. The natives of Guam 



•» Beverly's History of Virginia, 1855, p. 131. See figure. 

 ■ " Western Reserve Tract, No. 50, p. 100. 

 •*E. O. Squier. Mosquito Shore, London, 1887, p. 74. 

 M Forest and stream, vol. 8, 1877, p. 278. 



" W. T. Hutchinson. Aborigines of Victoria, Chambers Journal, November, 1903, p. 712. 

 •* C. P. Wooley. Big Game Shooting, London, 1894, vol. 1, p. 209. 



