DICTIONARY OP INDIANS. 



15 



Amusements. — Continued. 



and ordinary games. The games of 

 the Eskimo and extreme northern 

 tribes were chiefly athletic, such as 

 racing, wrestHng, throwing of heavy 

 stones, and tossing in a blanket. 

 From Hudson bay to the Gulf of 

 Mexico, and from the Atlantic to the 

 border of the plains, the great ath- 

 letic game was the ball play, now 

 adopted in civilization under the 

 name of la crosse. In the north it was 

 played with one racket, and in the 

 south with two. Athletes were regu- 

 larly trained to this game, which was 

 frequently played as an intertribal 

 affair. The " wheel-and-stick" game 

 in one form or another was well-nigh 

 universal. As played in the east one 

 gainester rolled forward a stone disk, 

 or wheel, while his opponent slid after 

 it a stick carved at one end in such a 

 way that the wheel, when it fell to the 

 ground, would rest within the crook 

 of the stick. On the plains a wooden 

 wheel, frequently netted, took the 

 place of the stone disk. Like most 

 other Indian things, the game has a 

 symbolic significance in connection 

 with the sim myth. A sacred variant 

 of the game was played by the priests 

 for divinatory purposes. Target prac- 

 tice with arrows, knives, or hatchets 

 thrown from the hand, as well as with 

 the bow and rifle was also universal 

 among the warriors and boys of the 

 various tribes. The gaming arrows 

 were of special design and ornamenta- 

 tion, and the game itself had often a 

 sy:nbolic purpose. Horse-races, fre- 

 quently intertribal, were prominent 

 amusements on the plains during the 

 warm season; while foot-races, often 

 elaborately ceremonial in character, 

 were common among the sedentary 

 agricultural tribes, particularly the 

 Pueblos and the Wichita. 



Games resembling dice and "hunt- 

 the-button" were found everywhere, 

 and were played by both sexes alike, 

 particularly in the tipi, or wigwam, 

 during the long winter nights. The 

 dice, or equivalents, were stone, bone, 

 fruit-seeds, shells, wood, or reed, vari- 

 ovisly shaped and marked. They were 

 thrown from the hand or from a small 

 basket bowl. One form, the "awl 

 game," confined to the women alone, 

 was played around a blanket, which 

 had various tally marks along the 

 border for marking the progress of 

 the game. The "hunt-the-button" 

 games were tisually accompanied with 

 songs and rhythmic movements of 

 the hands and body, intended to con- 

 fuse the parties whose task was to 



guess the location of the button. In- 

 vestigations by Mr Stewart Culin 

 show a close correspondence between 

 these Indian games and those of 

 China, Japan, Korea, and northern 

 Asia. 



Special women's games were shinny, 

 football, and the "deer-foot" game, 

 besides the awl gaine already noted. 

 In football the main object was to 

 keep the ball in the air as long as pos- 

 sible by kicking it upward from the 

 toes. The "deer- foot" game was 

 played with a number of perforated 

 bones from a deer's foot, strung upon 

 a beaded cord, having a needle at one 

 end. The purpose was to toss the 

 bones in such a way as to catch a par- 

 ticular one upon the end of the needle 

 in its descent. 



With the children there were target 

 shooting, stilts, slings, and tops for 

 the boys, and buckskin dolls and 

 playing house for the girls. As among 

 civilized nations, the children found 

 the greatest delight in imitating the 

 occupations of the elders. Numerous 

 references to amusements among the 

 various tribes may be found through- 

 out the Annual Reports of the Bureau 

 of American Ethnology. A special 

 memoir on the " Games of the Ameri- 

 can Indians," by Mr Culin, will ap- 

 pear in a forthcoming report. See 

 Dances. (j. m.) 



Camass, kamass, quamash. — A small 

 plant {Camassia esculenta) with edi- 

 ble roots growing in British Colum- 

 bia and neighboring portions of the 

 United States. The name has been 

 adopted from the Nootka of Van- 

 couver island, and has been applied 

 in the Latinized form to the genus to 

 which the above belongs. This is 

 related to Scilla of the Old World. 

 It has also been adopted as the name 

 of several places in Montana, Idaho, 

 and Oregon, as well as for the caniass- 

 rat {Thoiuoniys talpoides) which sub- 

 sists principally on the roots of this 

 plant. (j.R.s.) 



Cayuse. — Originally a breed of Indian 

 pony used by the Waiilatpu or Cayuse 

 Indians of Oregon, from whom it re- 

 ceives its name; but the term is 

 now generally applied in that section 

 to any Indian pony. (j.r.s.) 



Cherokee. — Properly Ts^laki' (Upper 

 dialect) or Tsaragi (Lower dialect). 

 Adair derives this word from atsild, or 

 atsira, "fire," to which he says the 

 Cherokee paid great honors. This 



