SwANTON] INDIANS OF THE SOUTHEASTERN UNITED STATES 279 



finger, and are very tough. Their root is a round ball which the Indians boil 

 as we do garden roots and eat them. (Lawson, 1860, p. 169.) 



Service berries ("services") {Amelanchier canadensis?) and a kind 

 of huckleberry growing upon trees "ten and twelve feet high," ap- 

 parently the tree huckleberry (Batodendron arboretum)^ are men- 

 tioned, as also a variety of black gum which "bears a black, well 

 tasted berry, which the Indians mix with their pulse and soups" 

 (Lawson, 1860, p. 160). Lawson is our earliest authority to men- 

 tion specificaly the use of live-oak acorns {jQuercus virg^niana). 

 He says: 



The acorns thereof are as sweet as chestnuts, and the Indians draw an oil 

 from them, as sweet as that from the olive, though of an amber color ... I 

 knew two trees of this wood among the Indians, which were planted from the 

 acorn, and grew in the freshies, and never saw anything more beautiful of that 

 kind. (Lawson, 1860, p. 156.) 



Lawson (1860, p. 174) confirms our impression regarding the ex- 

 traction of maple sugar in the higher parts of Virginia and the 

 Carolinas. 



Besides describing the "common Indian plum," he gives us the 

 following interesting information regarding peaches ; 



I want to be satisfied about one sort of this fruit, which the Indians claim 

 as their own, and aflSrm they had it growing amongst them before any Europeans 

 came to America. The fruit I will describe as exactly as I can. The tree 

 grows very large, most commonly as big as a handsome apple tree ; the flowers 

 are of reddish, murrey color, the fruit is rather more downy than the yellow 

 peach, and commonly large and soft, being very full of juice. They part freely 

 from the stone, and the stone is much thicker than all the other peach stones 

 we have, which seems to me that it is a spontaneous fruit of America ; yet in 

 those parts of America that we inhabit, I never could hear that any peach trees 

 were ever found growing in the woods; neither have the foreign Indians, those 

 that live remote from the English, any other sort. And those living amongst 

 us have a hundred of this sort for one other. They are a hardy fruit, and 

 are seldom damaged by the north-east blast, as others are. Of this sort we 

 make vinegar; wherefore we call them vinegar peaches, and sometimes Indian 

 peaches. (Lawson, 1860, p. 182.) 



There can be little doubt that this "Indian peach" was a true peach, 

 and it follows almost certainly that it was obtained from the Spaniards, 

 probably from the Spanish colonists in Florida. 



To the list of animal foods given by Lawson in his general account 

 of Indian diet, he has little to add elsewhere except that he enumer- 

 ates specifically bluefish, white guard fish [garfish], alewives, rock- 

 fish or bass, herring, and trout among the fish caught. He mentions 

 oysters, cockles, and mussels among shellfish, and remarks tersely of 

 the last-mentioned, that they "are eaten by the Indians, after five 

 or six hours boiling to make them tender, and then are good for 

 nothing." His judgment of crawfish is different and he gives an 



