584 TRIBES OF THE UPPER MISSOURI [eth. anx. ie 



Parts or Buffaloes Not Eaten 



Bull's pizzle. 



Horns, hoofs, and hair. 



Glands of the neck. 

 Sinews. 



Every other part, inside and out, is eaten, even to the hide. 



Sugar is made from the sap of the maple. Wild rice is gathered by 

 the Cree and Chippewa on Red River and the adjacent lakes, but 

 not by the upper Missouri tribes. In times of great scarcity old 

 bones are collected by the nations of whom we write, pounded, and 

 the grease extracted by boiling, and eaten together with any of the 

 foregoing roots or berries that can be found. But these sad times 

 always happen when the snow is deep, the ground frozen, and they 

 can not be found. Then those who have not laid up a stock of some 

 of these roots the previous summer are driven to the necessity of 

 killing and eating their horses and dogs, which being exhausted and 

 nothing more to be found they are compelled to eat human flesh.- 1 ' 



Garments; Dresses 



In the materials of their clothing, as far as the cold climate will 

 admit, articles of European manufacture have been substituted for 

 their skins, but there being no fabric as yet introduced equal to or 

 even approaching the durability and warmth of the buffalo skin, 

 all hunters and travelers in the winter season must be clothed with 

 the latter to preserve life or prevent mutilation by frost. Still in 

 the summer season these are laid aside, being full of vermin and 

 saturated with grease and dirt, and the Indian steps proudly around 

 in his calico shirt, blanket, and cloth pantaloons. Their hair also, 

 formerly tangled and matted, has been unraveled by the use of differ- 

 ent kinds of combs, and the livestock, which found " a living and a 

 home there," has, by these instruments, been torn from their com- 

 fortable abode, thus rendering useless their original method of dis- 

 posing of these vermin, viz, extracting them with their fingers and 

 masticating them in turn for revenge. 



Most of the clothing used by these tribes is made of skins of their 

 own procuring and dressing, the process of which has already met 

 with attention. They have different dresses for different seasons, 

 also various costumes for war, dancing, and other public occasions, 

 some of which have been described. In the summer seasons, when 

 comparatively idle, the clothing traded from the whites is preferred 

 on account of its superior texture and color, but in their usual occu- 

 pations, in winter, at war, in the chase, or any public ceremonies 

 among themselves, very few articles of dress thus obtained are seen, 

 if we except some blankets, undercoats, scarlet cloth, and ornaments. 



^ We have only witnessed one season in 21 years where they were driven to this 

 necessity. 



