CHAPTER IV 



THE ACORN AS HUMAN FOOD AND 

 SOME OTHER WILD NUTS 



Happy age to which the ancients gave the name of golden. . . . 

 None found it needful, in order to obtain sustenance, to re- 

 sort to other labor than to stretch out his hand and take it from 

 the sturdy live-oak, which liberally invited him. 



Don Quixote. 



CERTAIN nuts growing wild in the United 

 States, such as the chestnut, the hickories, the 

 pecan, the beech-nut and the walnuts, have secured 

 so fimi a place in our civilized dietar}^ that every- 

 one knows them, and they need not be discussed here. 

 Perhaps, though, we have not exhausted all their 

 culinary possibilities. For instance, William Bar- 

 tram tells us that the Creek Indians in his dav 

 pounded the shellbark nuts, cast them into boiling 

 water and then passed the mass through a veiy fine 

 strainer. The thicker, oily part of the liquid thus 

 preserved w^as rich like fresh cream, and w^as called 

 by a name signifying ^Miickory milk." It formed 

 an ingredient in much of their cookery, especially in 



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