AMERICAN ABORIGINAL PIPES AND SMOKING CUSTOMS. 633 



smoker; and where an excei^tion is noted, it is eoniiiionly observed that 

 the stems on the front end have been brolceii. The figures beyond, being 

 of men, beasts, birds, and reptiles,. are seldom of determinable species. 

 The tinding of pipes of this type made of catlinite is indicative of 

 modern intliiences, though by no means proof of it. The area of dis- 

 tribution of this type conforms to the route of the early French 

 voyageur and of the missionary. 



The double conoidal pipes commonly found along the Lower Missis- 

 sippi and in the southern United States generally have large bowls 

 and stems bored at right angles one to the other, the oi)enings of 

 which art; an inch or more in diameter. They are almost always of 

 stone, and are bored by means of a solid drill, though pottery specimens 

 are known. These pipes vary enormously in exterior shape, all the way 

 from the unornamented cube to the most elaborate animal form. Upon 

 the bases of pipes of this type, which invariably face from the smoker 

 and are often made of a gritty sandstone, are commoidy noticed deep 

 grooves, apparently made for the purpose of sharpening some tool, 

 though what, it is impossible to say. The frog is a form commonly en- 

 countered in pipes of this type, though animal ligures are often found; 

 where iu imitation of men, they are usually in crouching positions. 



A most elaborate type of pipe, which has been designated as the 

 ''idol pipe," and found in the mounds and stone graves of Georgia, 

 Tennessee, and Arkansas, has some features suggesting a kinship with 

 ])ipes from the Etowah Mound, Georgia; but while these pipes appear 

 to belong to a distinct type, too few of them are known to justify any 

 definite opinion concerning them. 



During the colonial period there are often encountered references to 

 "great pipes," which appear to have been pipes of large proportions 

 compared with those of the usual type, and were the property of the 

 tribe rather than of the clan or of the individual. Some few specimens 

 of these pipes are known, which seem to have been made by the 

 whites, of whose manufacture of pipes of this type one or more records 

 are preserved. The Northwest Fur Company are said to have traded 

 stone pipes with the Indians in exchange for furs; and John Smith, in 

 Virginia, is known about 1008 to have asked permission of Powhatan 

 to go through his territory to obtain stone for making axes, and the 

 presumption forces itself upon one that the trade and manufacture of 

 stone implements has been greater than is generally sui)posed. 



The natives certainly of a part of the far Northwest appear to have 

 seen the first white people during the present century and to have first 

 learned from them the smoking habit. Pipes of the Northwest coast 

 are for the most part comparatively modern and made for sale, and 

 consequently their shapes are as varied as the materials from which 

 they are manufactured. The natives of Queen Charlottes Islands carve 

 with metal tools most elaborate pipes from a blue slate, with most 

 artistic and typical figures, though the pipes of this material are so 



