WAMPUM AND SHELL ARTICLES 4II 
of an inch long, about as large as a small pipestem and hollow, 
strung, woven and wrought with sinews of deer, and bark. 
Mr Clark’s dimensions of beads and belts are too large, but his 
account may be compared with those more definite and later. The 
rapid decrease in the number of belts may also be noted. They 
were not seen again by a white man till the summer of 1878, when 
the writer examined them at Thomas Webster’s house. That fall 
Gen. J. S. Clark obtained small photographs under difficulties, and 
from these were made large drawings to illustrate W. H. Holmes’s 
excellent paper on the shell articles of North America. Since that 
time the writer has had several ample opportunities of examining 
all these belts, and the widest two were secured by him for the 
state museum. ‘There were but I2 remaining when he first saw 
them, and, if Clark is correct, more than half had disappeared within 
30 years. Some fine belts were certainly lost. 
During his knowledge of them various and conflicting interpre- 
tations of these belts have come before the writer. Some will be 
given to show how little is certainly known. Fig. 252 is the reputed 
original record of the formation of the league, and the tradition is 
constant. Clark had this interpretation, but exaggerated the belt’s 
dimensions. Instead of being 4 feet long by 16 inches broad, it 
was 10.5 inches wide by 23 long in 1878, showing a great loss at 
each end. The width of course had not suffered. When exhibited 
in Syracuse in 1886 it was said: “ This belt was used at the great 
council which met to ratify the union of the Five Nations. The 
age is unknown; nothing but the tradition of the council remains.” 
Gen. Carrington, who obtained this from the Onondagas, calls it 
“the official memorial of the organization of the Iroquois con- 
_federacy, relating back to the middle of the 16th century.” It is 
sometimes called the Hi-a-wat-ha belt, and has been in controversy 
in our courts over a question of ownership. It is a fine modern 
belt of 38 rows, made on buckskin thongs, the outer ones braided, 
and is strung with flax or hemp thread. The beads were made 
with modern tools and are mostly purple. ‘There is a conventional 
heart in the center, and four open castles remain in white beads. 
As the pattern shows that there were others beyond these on either 
