398 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1897. 



from 1^ to 2 inches, the interior of the tube being one-third of an inch, 

 or even less, across. 



The tube figured is 6 inches long with a greatest diameter of 2 

 inches, gradually diminishing to 1^ inches. The contractions of these 

 tubes often have bauds encircling them, made at times in imitation of 

 a rope or cord. Sometimes there are two or even three bands of dif- 

 ferent widths, intended apparently as ornamentation. The perfora- 

 tions are comparatively straight iu these hourglass tubes, though 

 there is a cast of a specimen in the U. S. National Museum which, upon 

 the exterior, shows a decided curve. The curve once given to a tubular 

 pipe, whether accidentally or by design, would be quickly recognized 

 as an improvement upon the straight tube, thereby enabling one to 

 smoke it with less discomfort than would necessarily result from the 

 use of a straight pipe. It is difficult to believe that the white man, 

 who has traded in stone implements from the time of John Smith's first 

 voyage to the present day, did not also trade in pipes, especially as 

 they, of all his possessions, appear to have been the objects for which 

 the Indian had the greatest veneration and to which he attached the 

 greatest value, and consequently for which he would pay the most 

 liberal prices. The numbers of trade pipes found in Indian burial 

 places strongly attest the extent to which the trade between the 

 whites and the Indians eventually extended. There is scarcely an 

 account of a treaty between whites and Indians in which the pipe and 

 tobacco tongs do not appear. among the presents exchanged, and there 

 are records of " great pipes " being presented, by both French and Eng- 

 lish governors, to their red allies as symbols of amity and pledges of 

 good will. As noted in reference to other tubes, those of the hourglass 

 form appear to have been originally drilled by means of solid i)oints, 

 the perforation being subsetiuently enlarged by gouging out each 

 end, and leaving a narrow hole or channel connecting the two bowls 

 or ends. These tubes have been suj>posed to have served among other 

 purposes as astronomical instruments, a suggestion hardly deserving 

 serious consideration. This type, the writer thinks, were emj^loyed as 

 pipes, a belief iu which many now concur. It appears that tubular 

 pipes were not invariably smoked by placing the smaller end in the 

 mouth, for Dr. Fewkes found the Moki Indians lighting conical pipes 

 and placing the larger end to the mouth, blowing smoke through the 

 smaller end until the lighted material was consumed. When it is 

 remembered how persistently customs are handed down among the 

 Indians, and particularly pipe customs, or quasi-religious invocations, 

 which are conducted by societies of men whose function is to act in 

 conformity with traditional rituals, we can well believe that similar 

 implements, even in remote antiquity, were put to like uses. The 

 resemblance of pipe customs from the most widely separate parts of 

 the continent appear to attest the auti(iuity of the practices. 



The interiors of the hourglass tyj^e of tubes and of many of the 



