INDIAN GAMES. 181 



follows : in the middle of an open space is set up a tree 

 some eight or nine fathoms high, with a Square frame 

 woven of twigs at the top ; this is to be hit with the ball, 

 and he who strikes it first gets aprize." The cage in this 

 game was fixed, and in the Illustration given by De Bry, it 

 is evident that the cage could not easily be turned. In 

 this respect this description differs f rom that given by Lafi- 

 tau. 



Strachey informs us that foot-ball was found in the 

 South. He bears testimony to the honorable spirit in 

 which the game was conducted : "Likewise they have 

 the exercise of foot-ball, in which they only forceably en- 

 counter with the foot to carry the ball the one from the 

 other, and spurned yt to the goale with a kind of dexterity 

 and swift-footmanship, which is the honour of yt ; bat they 

 never strike up one another's heels, as we doe, not ac- 

 compting that praiseworthie to purchase a goal by such an 

 advantage." 



Roger Williams describes this game as it was played 

 among the Narragansetts. His account is relieved from 

 the absurdities which occur in the description given by 

 Wood in " New England's Prospect." "Besides, they have 

 great meetings of foot-ball playing, onely in Summer, 

 towne against towne upon some broad, sandy shoare, free 

 from stones or upon some soft, heathie plot, because of 

 their naked feet, at which they have great stakings, but 

 seldom quarreil." 



Colonel Dodge in "Our Wild Indians"^^records the fact 

 that amon«: the Nez Perces and other western tribes the 

 women are extremely fond of a game of ball similar to our 

 "shinny " or "hockey," and Boller in "Eight Years in the 



27 Our Wild Indiana, by Colonel Richard Irving Dodge. Hartford, 1882, p, 344. 



