572 REPORT OF NATIONAL MUSEUM, 1889 



grain twelve or fifteen skins in a day. After a skin is grained it is 

 thrown into a basket of water. This water has a lot of roots cut up in 

 it that causes the water to lather like soap. In fact it is called soap- 

 root, and is used not only for tanning, but for washing clothes, etc. 

 The hide is allowed to remain in this soapy water from three to four 

 days. It is then taken out and rubbed and pulled dry. This completes 

 the tanning of a skin. If, though, it be a very large one, the same pro- 

 cess is gone through with, except the graining, the second time, which 

 invariably leaves the skin soft and nice. This rule is slightly varied by 

 some of the tribes. For example, the brains will be taken from the 

 deer's head and cooked about half. This keeps it from spoiling. The 

 skin is soaked longer to raise the grain, sometimes a little ashes being 

 sprinkled on the skin, which makes the grain slip. After graining the 

 skin is thrown into brain-water and soaked, instead of using the soap- 

 root water. It is then worked as before described until soft. We now 

 have buckskin. To prevent this from becoming stiff and hard when 

 wet it is thoroughly smoked. This smoking process is also practiced 

 by the settlers here, but I think the idea originated with the Indians. 

 A ditch is cut in the ground about 2 feet deep and 20 or 25 feet long. 

 At one end of this ditch a rough fire-place is made, being usually walled 

 up with rock. Over the other end of the ditch is a large hollow log, 

 something like a bee-gum, only larger and taller. In this the buckskins 

 are hung, and the top of the gum pretty well closed. Sticks are laid 

 cross-wise close together from one end of the ditch to the other and 

 covered completely over with dirt. This makes a blind ditch from fire- 

 place to the gum. A fire is now built in this fire-place, and the smoke 

 naturally follows the ditch, there being an escape for the smoke in the 

 top of the gum. The idea of having the ditch long is a good one ; the 

 smoke becomes cool in its passage through the ground, and there is no 

 danger of burning the buckskin. A buckskin is smoked two or three 

 days. After this it can be washed like a piece of cloth, and when dry 

 is equally as soft. 



The tribes belonging to the Shoshonian stock inhabiting the Great 

 Interior Basin were formerly most expert manufacturers of buckskin 

 leather. Clothing, tents, and much of their paraphernalia were made 

 of three kinds — the white, the yellow, and the brown. The processes 

 of preparing were identical in the main with those described. How- 

 ever, the hair was removed in many cases by rolling up the hide in ashes 

 wet with warm water for a few days. The hair was then removed by 

 means of a wooden knife, a rib, or in later times with an old case-knife 

 or bit of hoop-iron. The yellow and the brown skins received their 

 tint by drying them over a smoldering fire of dry willow for the former 

 and green willow for the latter color. The skins were vigorously pulled 

 and stretched in every direction while the drying and smoking were 

 going on. (Compare Plates XCI, XCII, XCIII.) 



Tanning among the Pawnees is thus effected : The hide is extended 



