FIRE-MAKING APPARATUS. 579 



flint was pressed against the rapidly revolving wheel and a shower of 

 sparks fell into the tinder. The tinder pistol, whose name suggests its 

 use, was another device.* 



Other devices were intended to be carried in the pocket, and were 

 probably brought out by the introduction of tobacco and the need of 

 smokers for a convenient light. 



The pocket strike-a-ligbt is still used. The one shown (fig. 50) was 

 bought in 1888 by Mr. E. Lovett, at Boulogne-sur-mer. They are still 



Fig. 50. 

 Strikk-a-light (Briquet). 



(Cat. No 12',i693, U. S, N. M. Boulogne-sur-mer. France. Collected by Edwnrd Lovett. ) 



used by the peasants and work-people of France. An old specimen 

 in the Museum of this character is from Lima. The roll of tinder, or 

 "match," is made of the soft inner bark of a tree. 



Among many of our North American tribes the flint and steel super- 

 seded the wooden drills as effectually as did the iron points the stone 

 arrowheads. 



Some of these tribes were ripe for the introduction of many modern 

 contrivances. Oivibzed methods of fire-lighting appealed to them at 

 once. Among the Chukchis, Nordeuskiold says, matches had the honor 

 of being the first of the inventions of the civilized races that have been 

 recognized as superior to their own.t It was so among our Indian 

 tribes ; the Mandan chief " Four Bears " lighted his pipe by means of a 

 flint and steel taken from his pouch when George Catlin visited him 

 in 1832.1 



The Otoes (Siouan stock) made nse of the flint and steel shown in 

 fig. 51. The flint is a chipped piece of gray chert, probably an ancient; 

 implement picked up from the surface. 



The steel is a very neatly made oval, resembling those of the Albanian 

 strike-a-lights,§ or the Koordish pattern, ( fig. 54). Here arises one of 

 the perplexities of modern intercourse, perhaps both of these steels 

 were derived from the same commercial center. 



* See figure in D. Bruce Peebles's address on Illumination, in Trans. Roy. Scottish 

 Society of Arts, Edinburgh, xii., part i, p. 96. 

 i Nordenskiold. — Voyage of the Fer/a. n, p. 122. 



t The George Catlin Indian Gallery. Smithsonian Report. 1885. ii, p. 456. 

 § See figure in Jour. Anthrop. Inst. Great Britain, xvi, 1886, p. 67. 



