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APPENDIX, 



Charlevoix observes, that " the Indians of Canada are more expert in erecting 

 their fortifications than in building their houses." He represents that their villages 

 were surrounded by double and frequently by triple rows of palisades, interwoven 

 with branches of trees, and flanked by redoubts. — {Canada, Vol. II., p. 128.) 

 Champlain also describes a number of fortified works on the St, Lawrence, above 

 Trots Rivieres, which "were composed of a number of posts set very close 

 together." He also speaks of " forts which were great enclosures, with tiers 

 joined together Hke pales," within which were the dweUings of the Indians. — 

 (Purchas, Vol. IV., pp. 1612, 1644.) Says La Hontan, "their villages were for- 

 tified with double palisades of very hard wood, which were as thick as one's thigh, 

 fifteen feet high, with little squares about the middle of the courtines (curtains). — 

 (Vol. II., p. 6.) The Indians on the coasts of Virginia and North Carolina are 

 described as possessing corresponding defences. " When they would be very 

 safe," says Beverly, " they treble the pales." — (Hist. Vir., p. 149. See also Amidas 

 and Barlow, in Pink., Vol. XII., p. 567; Heriot, ib. p. 603; Lafitau, Vol. Ill, p. 

 228, etc. etc.) 



Among the Floridian tribes, the custom of fortifying their villages seems to have 

 been more general than among the Indians of a higher latitude. This may readily 

 be accounted for from the fact that they were more fixed in their habits, con- 

 siderably devoted to agriculture, and less averse to labor than those of the north. 

 The chronicler of Soto's Expedition speaks of their towns as defended by " strong 

 works of the height of a lance," composed of " great stakes driven deep in the 

 ground, with poles the bigness of one's arm placed crosswise, both inside and out, 

 and fastened with pins to knit the whole together." Herrara, in his compiled 

 account of the same expedition, has the following confirmation. " The town of 

 Mabila or Mavila (Mobile) consisted of eighty houses seated in a plain, enclosed 

 by piles driven down, with timbers athwart, rammed with long straw and earth 

 between the hollow spaces, so that it looked like a wall smoothed with a trowel ; 

 and at every eighty paces was a tower, where eight men could fight, with many 

 loop-holes and two gates. In the midst of the town was a large square." — {Hist. 

 America, Vol. V., p. 324.) Du Pratz also gives a corresponding account of the 

 defences of the Natchez and neighboring tribes. " Their forts are built circularly, 

 of two rows of large logs of wood, the logs of the inner row being opposite to the 

 joinings of those of the outer row. These logs are about fifteen feet long, five 

 feet of which are sunk in the earth. The outer logs are about two feet thick, the 

 inner ones half as much. At every forty paces along this wall, a circular tower 

 juts out, and at the entrance of the fort, which is always next the river, the two 

 ends of the wall pass beyond each other, leaving a side opening. In the middle of 

 the fort stands a tree, with the branches lopped off within a short distance of the 

 trunk, and this serves as a watch-tower. — {Hist. Louisiana, p. 375.) The sub- 

 joined description and illustrative engraving, copied from De Bry, no doubt convey 

 a correct idea of the character of the Floridian defences. 



" Solent Indi hac ratione sua oppida condere. Delecto aliquo loco secundunj 

 torrentis alicujus profluentem, eum quantum fieri potest complanant ; deinde sulco 

 in orbem ducto, crassos et rotundos palos duorum hominum altitudinis conjunctim 



