1068 WILD RICE GATHERERS OF UPPER LAKES (ETH. ANN, 19 
Marquette said that they put the rice ‘*in a skin of the form of a bag,” 
after which it was tread out in a hole.t| The Ottawa in the middle of 
the seventeenth century tread out the grain ina ditch. This thrash- 
ing was done immediately after the gathering, and it was cured after 
instead of before the thrashing: ‘‘ Quand le Canot est plein, ils vont le 
yuider A terre dans vne fosse preparée sur le bord de Peau, puis auec 
les pieds ils les foulent et remuent si longtemps, que toute la balle s’en 
detache.” Another glimpse of the worker is obtained from the Dakota 
in the early seventies of the nineteenth century. To separate the hull 
from the grain a hole about a foot wide and deep was dug in the ground 
and lined with skins. About a peck of rice was put in at a time; an 
Indian stepped in and with a half jump on one foot and then on the 
other tread the grain free.* A letter from Bad River reservation, 
Wisconsin, mentions that moccasins are worn by the Indian as he 
treads the grain in a tub.* In most places moccasins are usually worn 
in this work, but in the autumn of 1899 the men at Vermilion Lake 
reservation, Minnesota, tread their grain out barefoot, and this is 
their usual method. In the early part of the eighteenth century the 
Dakota tread out their grain in a wooden trough.’ In 1829, at Rice 
lake, Ontario, the boys tramped the grain in a hole lined with a deer- 
skin,° and of these Indians the same thing is written again in 1888. In 
neither case is the grain cured before it is threshed.* However, they 
also thrash it in another manner, to which later reference will be 
made. The curing and thrashing processes were curiously combined 
by the Ojibwa in northern Wisconsin in the middle of the nineteenth 
century. A green or fresh deerskin was staked out and stretched over 
a quantity of coals. The rice was then poured on this suspended skin 
and a small boy was put to treading it.* 
In 1822 the Menomini thrashed their rice ina hole lined with a deer- 
skin. The grain was ‘‘ pounded with a stick (having a thick end to it), 
for the purpose of disconnecting the husk from it.”* Hoffman wrote 
the same facts seventy years later, saying that the hole was 6 inches 
deep and 2 feet across.’” Again he says: ‘‘Some of the Menomini 
women make a special form of bag in which to beat out the rice. This 
bag is 2 feet wide by from 18 to 20inches deep, and is woven of bark 
strands. It resembles very much an old-fashioned carpetbag. After 
the rice is put into this, the bag is laid into a depression in the 
ground and beaten to separate the hulls.”'? In 1899 their parched 

1Shea, Discovery and Exploration, p. 9. 
2 Relations des Jésuites, 1663, p. 19. 
8 Palmer, Food Products of the North American Indians, p. 422. 
4 Patterson, letter, November 13, 1898. 
6 Neill, Memoir of the Sioux, p. 296. 
6 Jones, Life and Journals, p. 260. 
7Chamberlain, Notes on the History, Customs, and Beliefs, p. 155. 
8Stuntz, letter, November 24, 1898. 
"Morse, Report, appendix, p. 47. 
10 Hoffman, The Menomini Indians, p. 2Y1. 
