316 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Bull. 18T 



animal by making the same cry that these animals make when they call one 

 another, which very often makes the deer come toward the hunter. Then 

 he shows the head, which he holds in his hand, and causes it to make the 

 movements of a deer when it browses and looks up from' time to time. The 

 hunter while waiting always keeps himself concealed behind the thicket until 

 the deer has approached within gunshot, and although the hunter sees little 

 of its side he shoots it in the shoulder and kills it. It is in this way that a 

 native without hunting companions, without dogs, and without chasing, by 

 means of a patience which we do not have, finally succeeds in killing a deer, 

 an animal whose speed is exceeded only by the incitements which seize upon 

 it at every instant and tend to bear it away to some place where the hunter 

 is obliged to follow to hunt it with patience for fear lest a new fantasy will 

 carry it away forever and its enemy lose time and trouble. (Le Page du Pratz, 

 1758, vol. 2, pp. 69-72; Swanton, 1911, p. 70.) 



The Choctaw deer decoy and deer call were well-remembered down 

 into the middle of the nineteenth century. Says the missionary 

 Cushman : 



They made a very ingeniously constructed instrument for calling deer to them, 

 in the use of which they were very expert; and in connection with this, they 

 used a decoy made by cutting the skin clear round the neck, about ten inches 

 from the head of a slain buck having huge horns, and then stufl^g the skin 

 in one entire section up to the head and cutting off the neck where it joins the 

 head. The skin, thus made hollow from the head back, is kept in its natural posi- 

 tion by inserting upright sticks ; the skin is then pulled upwards from the nose 

 to the horns and all the flesh and brains removed ; then the skin is repulled to 

 its natural place and laid away to dry. In a year it has become dry ; hard and 

 inoffensive, and fit for use. All the upright sticks are then taken out except 

 the one next to the head, which is left as a hand-hold. Thus the hunter, with 

 his deer-caller and head decoy, easily enticed his game within the range of his 

 deadly rifle; for, secreting himself in the woods, he commenced to imitate the 

 bleating of a deer ; if within hearing distance, one soon responds ; but, perhaps, 

 catching the scent of the hunter, stops and begins to look around. The hunter 

 now inserts his arm into the cavity of the decoy and taking hold of the upright 

 stick within, easily held it up to view, and attracted the attention of the doubting 

 deer by rubbing it against the bushes or a tree ; seeing which, the then no longer 

 suspicious deer advanced, and only learned its mistake by the sharp crack of 

 the rifle and the deadly bullet. (Cushman, 1899, p. 52.) 



According to Eomans, lone stalkers among the Chickasaw, and prob- 

 ably the Choctaw also, held the deer head in their left hands, whereas 

 Dumont de Montigny plainly indicates that the Natchez hunters he 

 had seen employ this method, used their right hands. This difference 

 is probably attributable to cases of right- and lef t-handedness, though 

 individual choice or possibly tribal custom might have been involved. 



Speck thus describes the Yuchi deer call used in late times : 



The deer call, we'y«i°kan6, mentioned before, which is used in calling deer 

 within range, is a rather complex instrument and probably a borrowed one, 

 at least in its present form. A hollow horn is fitted with a wooden mouthpiece 

 which contains a small brass vibrating tongue. When blown this gives a 

 rather shrill but weak sound which can be modified greatly by blowing softly 

 or violently. A tremulous tone like the cry of a fawn is made by moving 



