122 BULLETIN 139, UNITED STATES NATIONAL MUSEUM 



saltpeter are sold as tinder. In Cuba dried bundles of corn tassels 

 served as tinder. 



Bates states in regard to fire making on the Amazon at Murucupi: 

 " Fire making on the Amazon at Murucupi * * * first scraped 

 fire sha\ ings from the midrib of a Bacaba palm leaf, struck a light in 

 his old bamboo tinder box with a piece of an old file and flint, the 

 tinder being a feltlike soft substance manufactured by an ant (Poly- 

 racJiis hifi'pinousus) . By gentle blowing the shavings ignited. " 



In British Guiana the light wood of Hernandia guianensis was used 

 for tinder. 



"Fire is maintained by the Fuegians wherever they go by carrying 

 about a piece of burning wood. Should it accidentally become extin- 

 guished, they procure it again from sparks produced by striking two 

 stones one against another. The sparks are received into tinder 

 made from the underdo wn of birds, well dried, or fine dry moss, and 

 then by fanning the lighted tinder in the aii:, a flame is produced. 

 At night the fire is fed to the fullest possible extent, and around it, 

 with their bodies almost in the ashes, lie the wretched inmates. 

 When the family is numerous they dispose themselves in a hue, one 

 pressing against the other, aiid the last one covering his back with a 

 rug of guanaco or sealskin." ^^ 



The Beothucs of Newfoundland are also said to have used down of 

 the blue jay." 



The Tehuelches of Patagonia used tinder of a fungus growing at 

 the base of the Cordilleras.^* 



Europe. — The common tinder for domestic use in England and 

 introduced into the United States in colonial times was made by burn- 

 ing linen and smothering it before it was consumed. The round 

 tinder box was supplied with a damper for this purpose. The result- 

 ing tinder was very quick. "Matches" consisting of splints of pine, 

 the ends dipped with sulphur, served as an intermediary between the 

 glowing tinder and a flame. In Scotland tinder was made from the 

 inner bark of the birch, and also from a fungus growing on the oak. 

 Amadou, a name given to tinder made from fungi, was conunonly 

 sold in Europe for use with the strike-a-light. It was called German 

 tinder, and was prepared from Polyporus igniarivs and P. fomen- 

 tarius by cutting the masses into slices and boiling them in a solu- 

 tion of saltpeter. Another European tinder chemically prepared was 

 touch paper, or paper dipped in saltpeter and dried. Gunpowder 

 moistened and rubbed into tinder improved it, and powdered char- 

 coal made tinder quicker. 



^Naturalist on the River Amazons, 1910, p. 22. 



s« Qarson. Jour. Anth. Inst., London, vol. 15, 1886, p. 145. 



" T. a. B. Lloyd. Journ. Anthrop. Inst., vol. 5, 1875, p. 226. 



58 tieutenant Musters. Journ. Anthrop. Inst., vol. 1, 1871, p. 199. 



