INDIANS 



29CC 



INDIANS 



THE BABY 



How the "papoose" is car- 

 ried on the back of the mother, 

 even to-day, in the North- 

 west. The illustration is 

 from a photograph taken in 

 1916. 



War was not frequent among the Indians be- 

 fore the arrival of white men. But as the coast 

 areas were occupied by the newcomers from 

 over the ocean, 

 the natives were 

 crowded toward 

 the interior. 

 Each tribe en- 

 croached upon 

 the lands of its 

 western neigh- 

 bors, who, if de- 

 feated, were in 

 turn driven far- 

 ther inland. To 

 this almost con- 

 tinuous strife the 

 intrigues of the 

 Europeans added. 

 The French, to 

 gain the favor of 

 the Algonquins, 

 aided them 

 against the Iro- 

 quois, with the 

 first guns known 

 to the natives. 

 The English then 

 took the side of the Iroquois. In the War of 

 1812 the British incited the tribes to attack the 

 Americans, and in later days individual white 

 outlaws stirred them to frequent fighting. 



Ceremonies featured by the smoking of the 

 calumet, a stone pipe, marked the beginning 

 and end of war, which could only be declared 

 by a council of all the men and women in the 

 tribe. The warriors daubed their bodies with 

 bright paint and donned war-bonnets of eagle 

 feathers. The type of bonnet worn by the old 

 brave in the illustration at the head of this 

 article frequently has a queue of feathers ex- 

 tending nearly to the ground. Of course all 

 customs varied from tribe to tribe, so that what 

 is said of one tribe or group of tribes is not 

 necessarily true of another. 



In an Indian community no individual owned 

 land r but the right of each to the plot which he 

 cultivated was respected. A man's weapons 

 were his own, but generally the tools and often 

 the food, and among the tribes of the plains 

 even the tepee, belonged to the women. Per- 

 sonal belongings were buried with their owner, 

 that their souls might accompany his to the 

 future home. Other property was distributed 

 in the tribe or bestowed upon heirs. A man's 

 children generally belonged to their mother's 



clan, and they inherited from her brothers 

 instead of from their father. Wealth was some- 

 times an honor, but generosity was still more 

 esteemed. The most common form of money 

 was wampum. 



Agriculture and Industry. It is a mistake to 

 regard the Indians merely as fishers, hunters 

 and fighters. North America has never been 

 as thoroughly a country of farmers as it was 

 before its discovery by Europeans. It is said 

 that corn must have been developed from grass 

 by many centuries of cultivation, and tobacco* 

 beans, squashes, pumpkins, sweet potatoes, pea- 

 nuts, gourds, sunflowers and cotton were raised 

 by many of the tribes. Irrigation was exten- 

 sively practiced in the Southwest, and some of 

 the tribes of the Canadian and New England 

 coasts fertilized their fields with uneaten bits 

 of fish. Agricultural implements were of the 

 rudest character of wood, with perhaps a stone, 

 shell, or bone digging point. 



In basket-work and pottery most of the 

 tribes were skilful, and many practiced weav- 

 ing. Of metals those north of Mexico knew 

 little, though copper was crudely mined and 

 melted and hammered in the Lake Superior 



CRADLES 



(a) Moki wicker cradle 



(6) Apache woman carrying child 



(c) Ute cradle 



(d) Arikara carrying basket for the "papoose" 



The illustrations are drawn from specimens in 

 the National Museum of the United States, at 

 Washington. 



regions, and after the appearance of the Span- 

 iards some of the Indians along the Mexican 

 border became skilful silversmiths. Decora- 

 tions were nearly always symbolical, because 

 of the belief that something of the power of 

 the animal or other deity represented was pres- 

 ent in the symbol. As a rule women did the 



