SwANTONj INIDIANS OF THE SiOUTHE ASTERN UNITED STATES 359 



a mortar with ashes of dried bean plants and a little water. Then it is gently 

 pounded, which makes the skin burst and reduces it completely to meal. This 

 meal is crushed and dried in the sun. After this last operation this meal may 

 be transported anywhere and kept for six months. It must be observed, 

 however, that one ought not to forget to expose it to the sun from time to time. 

 In order to eat it a vessel is filled with it a third full and the rest almost 

 entirely with water, and at the end of some minutes the meal is found swollen 

 and good to eat. It is very nourishing and is an excellent provision for 

 travelers and for those who go trading, that is to say, to enter upon any 

 negotiations. (Le Page du Pratz, 1758, vol. 2, pp. 5-G ; Swanton, 1911, 

 pp. 74-75.) 



At the other end of the Gulf, and from a much later period, we 

 find Skinner giving a similar description : 



In parching corn, the kernels are placed in a kettle, the bottom of which 

 is covered thickly with sand. The grains are stirred in the sand to keep them 

 from burning. When sufficiently parched, the corn is crushed in a mortar, and, 

 with the occasional addition of sugar, makes a delicious food. A little of the 

 meal is sometimes added to water for use as a cooling drink. (Skinner, 

 1913, p. 77.) 



The rest of Dumont's 42 dishes and Adair's 40 no doubt were 

 prepared in part by mixing corn with other articles of food. A few 

 such combinations have been mentioned already and notices of others 

 may now be added. 



According to Beverley the Virginians ate their bread by itself and 

 not with meat, but they boiled both fish and flesh with their hominy. 

 We have mentioned Romans' statement to the effect that the Choctaw 

 boiled corn and beans together and mixed sunflower seed with corn 

 meal to make bread. We have also noted the use of chestnuts with 

 flour in the production of cakes wrapped in corn husks. This is re- 

 ported by Adair and probably refers to the Chickasaw. The same 

 Indians also cooked corn and venison in one dish. 



As soon as the larger sort of corn is full-eared, they half-boil it too, and dry 

 it either by the sun, or over a slow fire ; which might be done, as well, in a 

 moderately hot oven, if the heat was renewed as occasion required. This they 

 boil with venison, or any other unsalted flesh. (Adair, 1775, p. 438.) 



Hariot mentions the mixture of corn, beans, and peas in one dish 

 in describing methods of treating the two former. 



They make them victuall either by boyling them all to pieces into a broth; 

 or boiling them whole vntill they bee soft and beginne to break -^ as is vsed in 

 England, eyther by themselues or mixtly together : Sometime they mingle of 

 the wheate [corn] with them. Sometime also beeing whole sodden, they bruse 

 or pound them in a morter, & thereof make loaues or lumps of dowishe bread, 

 which they vse to eat for varietie. (Hariot, 1893, p. 21.) 



Smith and Strachey mention a dish of late unripened corn, roasted 

 in hot ashes, and eaten boiled with beans during the ensuing winter. 

 This dish was called pausarowmena or pausarawmena. Beverley 



