58 
methods to rid the acorn meal of these injurious substances. 
This was accomplished by a method of filtration—finely ground 
meal was placed in porous baskets and set in sand. Water 
forced into the meal gradually soaked through into the sand 
filtering out the injurious substances. Certain sweet acorns do 
not need this special treatment. Acorn meal was used in making 
soups or ip baking bread 
Th 
f the stately trees of eastern United States, 
forming almost pure forests over areas of considerable size. 
With the Indians the nuts formed an important article of food 
and were gathered in large quantities. 
The beech tree is also abundant over the eeu pe ? 
eastern United States. The burs which it 
like those of the chestnut, but the nuts are ach smaller. They 
were, however, gathered as an article of food. The various oaks, 
the chestnut and the beech are members of the same family. 
e mesquite (Prosopis glandulosa) is a small tree or often a 
mere shrub abundant in the dry desert regions of the southwest. 
The large tap root of the plant often extends to a remarkable 
depth in search of water, a habit which enables the plant to live 
in desert regions. Pods are produced by this plant. The seeds 
of the pods are enclosed in a sweet pulp so that the ripe pods form 
an important article of food 
The maple sugar industry is of Indian origin. The earliest 
extended notice of maple sugar is ‘‘ An Account of a Sort of Sugar 
the Juice of the Maple in Canada,” published by the 
Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society for 1684-85. In 
this article it states that the savages had practiced the art longer 
b T 
than any now living among them can remember. e methods 
of tapping trees, collecting the sap and Lala the sugar are 
the same in principle today as in early times. In the southwest 
regions, sugar was obtained from the juices of the willow, the 
agave and from the pulpy fruits of certain cacti. 
Bark of trees furnished food for many tribes especially in 
spring, when there was often a period of great need. e name 
Adirondack means ‘they eat trees’’ and was applied to certain 
tribes of the Algonquin Indians because of their custom of eating 
