55 
Its leaves appear somewhat like those of the arrow-head, but the 
flowers are quite different, being small and arranged in a dense 
cluster with a spathe enclosing them. This plant produces a 
short, thick, corm-like root or rootstock, often weighing 5 or 6 lbs., 
which was utilized a: 
n southern ae nee grows a plant (Zamia floridana) 
belonging to the cycads. It has a thick fleshy root joined to a 
thick short stem, above which are borne leaves and fruiting cones. 
The stem and root are richly stored with starch. The roots were 
mashed in mortars, passed through strainers, washed and the 
separated starch dried on palmetto leaves. This dried flour, 
which would keep indefinitely when properly stored, was used 
in the making of a palatable as well as highly nutritious bread. 
This plant eae the chief food of the Seminole Indians in 
their long war with the whites. At the present time, the wild 
plant is utilized to some extent by the white race. Several small 
mills make flour. The entire product of one mill is shipped to 
the National Biscuit Company = is used in the manufacture 
of the so-called arrowroot biscui 
In the lily family there are a a number of species whose 
bulbs were included in the diet of the Indians. Perhaps the most 
important of these is the camas or quamash (Camassia oo 
a plant with bright blue flowers, abundant in the region west of 
the Rocky Mountains. The bulb resembles a Sai onion. 
Raw it is mucilaginous and rather of insipid taste. When baked 
it acquires the flavor of a roasted chestnut. These bulbs were 
gathered in great quantities in the spring and stored for future 
use. The bulbs were roasted in pits and eaten entire, they were 
boiled in a soup, and they were made into a sort of bread-cake. 
Several ieee closely related to this plant, as well as various 
wild onions or wild leeks, species of smilax and other plants of 
the lily ae yielded root products. 
If we turn now to the fleshy fruits, we may say that the Indians 
ate all the native fruits which we eat and have in some cases 
improved, and also many others which we do not consider worth 
eating. 
To the Indians of the southwest the fruits of various species of 
