48 ANNUAL REPORT SMITHSONIAN INSTITUTION, 1917. 



gress bearing on the early Spanish history of Florida, finding many 

 important items for incorporation in his " History of the Southeast- 

 ern Tribes." In September Dr. S wanton visited the Newberry 

 Library in Chicago, where other valuable early documents were found 

 in the Edward E. Ayer collection, which subsequently were copied 

 for the bureau's use by the courtesy of the librarian. These latter 

 manuscripts include a report on the Indians of Louisiana by Bien- 

 ville, a Louisiana memoir with an extended description of the Choc- 

 taw, and a memoir by the French captain Berenger, containing, 

 besides historical and ethnological information, vocabularies of the 

 extinct Karankawa and Akokisa tribes. A Spanish census of the 

 Indians of Florida after the period of the English invasions should 

 also be mentioned. For some months after his return Dr. Swanton 

 was engaged in adding to his monograph the historical notes thus 

 obtained, and in copying and translating the more important parts 

 of the manuscripts mentioned, including all of the Berenger memoir. 



Although Dr. Swanton's History of ,the Southeastern Tribes had 

 been completed a year ago, so far as the information was then 

 available, the manuscript discoveries described have enabled him to 

 augment and to improve it substantially, and more recently he has 

 obtained some supplementary notes from the Louisiana Historical 

 Society. The preparation of the maps to accompany the monograph, 

 chiefly from early sources, did not progress as satisfactorily as was 

 hoped, owing largely to pressure of other illustration work, but they 

 are now practically finished. 



Dr. Swanton's second paper, also referred to in last year's report, 

 remains as then practically complete so far as the available material 

 is concerned, but it awaits further data respecting the social organi- 

 zation of the Chickasaw and the Choctaw. A third paper, on the 

 religious beliefs and medical practices of the Creeks and their con- 

 geners, has been brought to the same stage as the last, namely, with 

 all the available material incorporated and arranged, and the foot- 

 notes added. 



With a view of furnishing the basis of a general study of the 

 social organization of the tribes north of Mexico, Dr. Swanton spent 

 a few weeks collecting material bearing on Indian economic life, but 

 this has been laid aside temporarily on account of the greater urgency 

 of a closer comparative study of the Indian languages of the south- 

 eastern part of the United States, particularly as indications of re- 

 lationship between some of them have already been noted. As a 

 basis for this work Dr. Swanton has recorded a comparative vocabulary 

 of Creek, Choctaw, Alabama, Hitchiti, Natchez, Tunica, Chitimacha, 

 Atakapa, Tonkawa, Comecrudo, Cotoname, Coahuilteco, and Karan- 

 kawa. Of these languages about 500 words were chosen, but as the 

 lexical material from several of the tribes is scanty, the comparison 



