422 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Bull. 137 



employed particularly all along the lower Mississippi, cane mats 

 being hung sometimes both on the outside and the inside. Palmetto 

 thatch was particularly in evidence in Florida and southern Georgia, 

 including Guale, and along the lower Mississippi. 

 The palmetto was "of inestimable value" to the Florida Seminole. 



From the trunk of the tree the frames and platforms of their houses are 

 made; of its leaves durable water tight roofs are made for the houses; with 

 the leaves their lodges are covered and beds protecting the body from the 

 dampness of the ground are made. (MacCauley, 1887, p. 517.) 



BEDS 



In almost all of these houses, of every type, a bench extended 

 around the entire interior next to the wall, except at the doorway, 

 though in a few of the longer summer houses such benches or "beds," 

 as they were called, seem to have been confined to sections at either 

 end, as in the late Creek house described by Swan and in some of 

 the oval Quapaw houses. There is some indication that in Caddo 

 houses the beds were raised somewhat higher than was usual along 

 the Mississippi and in the territory east of it. Throughout most 

 of the region as far as the Caddo, the material out of which they were 

 made, except perhaps for the posts themselves, w^as of cane. Four or 

 six forked posts carried long canes over which were laid crosspieces 

 also of cane and above all were cane mats. The Waxhaw town 

 house had benches of fine canes. Among the Cherokee, however, 

 the more northerly Siouan tribes, and the Algonquian peoples of 

 Carolina and Virginia other materials was used. Wliite-oak splints 

 are especially mentioned and Bartram says the Cherokee also em- 

 ployed ash splints. Rush mats take the place of cane mats. The 

 bed clothing, such as there was, consisted of skins of bison, bear, 

 panther, and other animals, and in Virginia rush mats sometimes 

 served the same purpose. On the Georgia coast San Miguel says 

 that only straw was used as bedding and that the bed was raised 

 "more than a yard {varay* above the ground. Florida Seminole 

 beds were of palmetto (Garcia, 1902, p. 517). 



FIRE MAKING 



Barlowe is one of the earliest writers to describe the common 

 method of making fire, in this case among the Algonquians of the 

 North Carolina coast: 



There is one thing to be marvelled at, for the making of their fire, and not 

 onely they but also the Negros doe the same, which is made onely by two 

 stickes, rubbing them one against another: and this they may doe in any 

 place they come, where they finde sticks sufBcient for the purpose. (Salley, 

 1911, p. 120.) 



