CONCLUSION 



137 



the luit.u-al supply sliould suffice, the present restriction in ranee 

 and movements of the Indians wouUl prevent them fn.m ohtaining 

 adequate quantities. This restriction results fron. the ciiaufred .„„ 

 ditions of hfe and occupation, which nece.s«itate tlieir remaining 

 at home attendmg to the staple agri.-ultural crops or working at 

 whatever other regular employment they have chosen. As a con- 

 sequence, I have found in every tribe the incipient stage of domesti- 

 cation of certain wild fruits, roots, and other plant products for 

 food or medicinal use, for smoking, <>r perfume. I have thus been 

 prnileged to see the beginnings of culture of certain plants which 

 m future time may yield staple crops. In this way a lively con- 

 ception can be formed of the factors which in jH-ehistoric time 

 brought about the domestication in P^urope and Asia of our present 

 well-known cultivated plants. 



CONCLUSIOX 



From tliis partial survey of the botanical lore of the tribes of 

 the region under consideration we may fairly infer, from the general 

 popular knowledge of the indigenous plants, that the tribes found 

 here at the European advent had been settled here already for 

 many generations and that they had given close attention to the 

 floral life of the region. From the number of species from the 

 mountain region, on one hand, and the woodland region, on the 

 other, and also from the distant southwestern desert region, which 

 they imported for various uses, we know they must have ti'aveled 

 extensively. 



The several cultivated crops grown by the trii)es of Nebraska are 

 all of southwestern origin, i)robal)ly all indigenous to Mexico. From 

 this fact we can see that there was widely extended borrowing of 

 culture from tribe to tribe. 



The present study suggests the human agency as the efficient factor 

 in the migration of some species of wild plants, or ])lants growing 

 without cultivation. If this be the true explanation it atl'ords the key 

 to the heretofore puzzling isolation of areas occupied by certain 

 species. 



From the floral nomenclature of each tribe we find that tiiey had 

 at least the meager beginning of taxonomy. The names aiii)lied to 

 plants show in many instances a faint sense of relationship of species 

 to species. 



My informants generally showed keen jjowers of jjerceiUion of 

 the structure, habits, and local distribution of plants throughout a 

 wide range of observation, thus numifesting the incipiency of phyto- 

 geography, plant ecology, and morphology. The large numi)er of 



