JENKS] WILD RICE AS A FOOD 1087 
During the period when the food supply depended upon almost con- 
stant effort, meals were partaken of whenever the individual could 
obtain food. 
In this section will be brought together some facts as to the time of 
day and year when wild rice is consumed. It is natural to expect 
that most of it will be eaten immediately after harvest, for the Indian 
does not often save in large quantities or for a long period, especially 
in the case of food that he relishes greatly. However, since the fall 
hunts begin soon after the harvest, wild rice is generally quite exten- 
sively saved by those Indians whose hunting grounds are fruitful. 
Hunter says of the Osage Indians: ‘*The usual times of taking their 
meals, are at sunrise, noon, and sunset.” When the days are long and 
the food abundant, the grown people eat three meals daily, when the 
days are shorter but two meals are eaten, and when food is scarce 
they eat but one, and sometimes not even that.!_ According to School- 
craft the Dakota Indians have no regular mealtime.’ 
Pokagon, the late Potawatomi chief from the St Joseph river valley, 
Michigan, wrote in regard to this subject: ‘* Indians eat when hungry.” 
His people ate their rice in the fall and all the year if it lasted.* The 
Leech Lake Indians, in 1863, garnered their wild rice for use in mid- 
winter, when other food could not be obtained.* In 1843 the Menomini 
stored their wild rice in the ground *‘to be taken therefrom, and used, 
during the winter, as their necessities require. In times of scarcity 
of game, they subsist entirely upon it.”° Radisson says that wild rice 
is the food of the Dakota ‘+ for the moft part of the winter.’ 
Pike wrote of the ** Minowa Kantongs” (the Mdewaka"to"wa" band of 
the Dakota) that they cultivated a small quantity of maize and beans, 
but, although he was with them in September and October, he never saw 
one kettle of either, as they always used wild rice for bread. This 
production, he said, nature has furnished to all of the most unculti- 
vated tribes of the Northwest, so that they may gather enough, which, 
together with the products of the chase and the net, will insure them 
subsistence throughout the entire year.’ 
Of the wild-rice district in 1820, we read: ‘‘A few provident 
Indians save a little [wild rice] for the spring of the year to eat with 
their sugar, though generally by the time they have done curing it, 
the whole is disposed of for trinkets and ornaments.” The author 
continues: ** Thus by gratifying their vanity, they are left nearly des- 
titute of provisions for the winter—choosing rather to endure hunger 
and the greatest misery, than to mortify their pride.”® 

1 Hunter, Captivity, pp. 259-260. ‘Indian Affairs Report, 1863. 
2 Schoolcraft, Indian Tribes, vol. Ivy, p. 67. 5Tbid., 1843, p. 434. 
%Pokagon, letter, November 16, 1898, 6 Radisson, Voyages, p. 215. 
7Coues, Pike, vol. 1, p. 344. 
®Edward Tanner, Detroit Gazette, December 8, 1820; reprinted in Wisconsin Historical Collections, 
vol. vil, p. 199 et seq. 
