96 USES OF PIJ^NTS BY INDIANS [f.tu. A.vsf. S3 



to tlu-ir own use. Tl.o Pawnee formerly inhabited the larger part 

 of N.-l,n.sku with villages on the Loup, the Platte, and the Republi- 

 ean River-. In isT.". thev were removed to Oklahoma, where they 

 now resi.le. Mr. James K. Murie, of that tribe, in a letter of Febru- 

 ary 1.1. l!»i:{. referring to Fiilrutu. a specimen of which had been sent 



iiini, sitid : 



W,- .nil tli.Mii alikunini . . . Tlie I'lnvnoes iite tlu'in. In winter time the 

 women rnl.li.Ml nits' [sic I nests iin.l si„t l)iK piles of them. .NOwiuUiys when 

 the ..I.I w.iinun see lima beaas tliey say they look like atikuraru in Nebraska. 



Women of the Dakota Nation say that they not only obtained the 

 large ground beans of this species, garnered by the voles, or " wood 

 mire." but that they also gathered the small beans produced in large 

 <iuantity on the upi)er branches of the same vine from petaliferous 

 blos.sonis. These smaller beans are about the size of lentils. The 

 large lieans. produced from cleistogamous blossoms on leafless 

 bi-aiiches spreading prostrate on the ground under the cover of the 

 upper branches, are about the size of lima beans, and grow at a depth 

 of an inch or two under the ground in the manner of peanuts. 



A most interesting item in coimection with this food plant is the 

 statement of the women of the Dakota Nation that they did not take 

 the ground beans from the stores of the little animals which gathered 

 them without giving some food commodity in return. They said it 

 was their custom to carry a bag of corn with them when they went 

 to look for the stores of beans gathered by the animals, and when 

 they took out any beans they put in place of them an equal quantity 

 of corn. They say that sometimes instead of corn they put some 

 other form of food acceptable to the animals in place of the beans 

 which they took away. They said it woidd be wicked to steal from 

 the animals, but they thought that a fair exchange was not robbery. 



Kather De Smet, the indefatigable Christian missionaiy to the 

 tribes of the upper Missouri, makes the following observation: 



The earth \wa and bean lire also delicious and nourishing roots [sic], found 

 (■..iiiiniinly In low and alluvial lands. The above-named roots form a con- 

 slderublp portion of the .sustenance of these Indians dnrinf; winter. They 

 Keek them In the places where the mice and other little animals, in particular 

 the K''ound-.s(iuirrel. have piled them in heaps.' 



PiiASKoi.rs \Ti.0ARis Tj. Garden Bean. 



O'mn'irhd (Dakota). 



Hi''hthl"(je (Omalia-Ponca). 



Iloni"li (Winnebago). 



A tit (Pawnee). 



The garden bean in all its many types and varieties is one of the 

 gifts of the Western Hemisphere to the world. The earliest ex- 



' Dc pmct, Life and Travels, vol. ii, p. 655. 



