SwANTON] INIDIANS OF THE SOUTHEASTERN UNITED STATES 381 



not climb up, and in this way they protect their corn and squashes." 

 (Shea, 1861, p. 135 ; Swanton, 1911, p. 315.) 



The private storehouses of the Natchez seem not to have been 

 honored with a description, but Du Pratz has the following to say 

 regarding the one in which corn was stored in preparation for the 

 new corn ceremony : 



The granary which they construct for the storage of this grain Is of round 

 shape, raised 2 feet above the earth. It is provided inside with cane mats. 

 The bottom is made of large entire canes; the outside is also provided with 

 them, because the teeth of rats, however good, are unable to make an open- 

 ing in them on account of the natural varnish with which they are covered. 

 This also prevents the rats from climbing the sides of the granary to enter 

 through the covering, which, owing to the manner in which it is made, pro- 

 tects this grain from the worst storms. The French call this granary "the 

 tun," on account of its round shape. (Le Page du Pratz, 1758, vol. 2, pp. 

 363-370; Swanton, 1911, p. 113.) 



Just below he adds that on account of the relation of its height 

 to the diameter, it resembled a tower rather more than a tun, and 

 Dumont's description confirms him in this and in other particulars. 



Caddo houses had compartments near the entrance for the stor- 

 age of food and other property, but they also had storehouses out- 

 side raised on posts. Joutel speaks of them as follows : 



They have a great shelf above the door, built of sticks set upright, and 

 others laid across, and canes laid side by side and closely bound together, 

 on which they place their corn in the ear. There is another opposite where 

 they put the hampers and barrels they make of canes and of bark, in which 

 they put their shelled corn, beans, nuts, acorns, and other things, and over 

 these they store their pottery. Each family has its own private receptables. 

 . . . They also have a large platform, ten or twelve feet high, in front of their 

 houses, where they dry their ears of corn after gathering. (Joutel in Margry, 

 1875-86, vol. 3, pp. 393-394.) 



From the drawing of a Caddo village reproduced by Bolton 

 (1915, frontispiece), it appears that the separate storehouses were 

 sometimes square and sometimes round. It would hence seem that 

 round storehouses were in use in the lower Mississippi Valley and 

 to the westward, but it is not clear that they were employed in any 

 section to the exclusion of the square type, though we happen to 

 have no description of a square storehouse from the Natchez or their 

 neighbors. It is also possible that round storehouses were in use 

 in Florida and among the Eno. Elsewhere the shape was generally 

 square or at least quadrangular. 



TOBACCO 



There is no mention of tobacco in the De Soto narratives, from 

 which it seems certain that in his time the weed had not attained the 

 social significance it enjoyed in the seventeenth and eighteenth cen- 



