426 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [Hull. 137 



kindling, but my Alabama informant stated that it made too much 

 smoke to be employed in any other manner. A discordant note is, 

 however, struck by Beverley in sj)eaking of the Virginia Indians: 



Their Houses or Cabbins, as we call them, are by this ill method of Build- 

 ing, continually Smoaky, when they have Fire in them; but to ease that in- 

 convenience, and to make the Smoak less troublesome to their Eyes, they 

 generally burn Pine, or Lightwood, (that is, the fat knots of dead Pine) the 

 Smoak of which does not offend the Eyes, but smuts the Skin exceedingly, 

 and is perhaps another occasion of the darkness of their Complexion. (Bev- 

 erley, 1705, bk. 3, p. 12.) 



He adds that "burning Light- Wood, split into small Shivers, 

 each Splinter whereof will blaze and burn End for End, like a 

 Candle" was used to attract fish (Beverley, 1722, p. 33), and the 

 use of pine torches in fire fishing is also mentioned by Lawson 

 (1860, p. 341). 



For the illumination of their Square Grounds the Creek Indians 

 usually depended on a single central fire and in later times the 

 same kind of fire seems to have been kindled in the town hot house, 

 but at an earlier day, at least when important business was being 

 conducted, canes were arranged spirally about the central post and 

 the fire led along this, fresh canes being added at the end before 

 the fire reached it. From Lawson we learn that the Waxhaw, and 

 probably other Siouan tribes of the Catawba group, had the same 

 custom. The tribes along the lower Mississippi, however, illumi- 

 nated their grounds by means of a circle of cane torches around the 

 periphery. In one of the Natchez grounds Du Pratz asserts that 

 more than 200 such torches were used. 



While De Soto's army was occupying one of the Chickasaw towns, 

 the Indians made a night attack, and, in apparent emulation of the 

 tactics of Gideon, brought fire in earthen pots with which to set fire 

 to the houses (Bourne, 1904, vol. 2, pp. 22-23). In his account 

 of this, Garcilaso (1723, p. 166) says they employed fire-arrows, and 

 the use of such arrows was common among the eastern Indians, being 

 described and illustrated by Le Moyne as observed in Florida in 

 1564-65. But, in the same connection, Garcilaso speaks of "flam- 

 beaux" which the attackers bore in their hands, and remarks : 



These torches, which seemed to be of wax because they illuminated well, were 

 made of a certain herb which grows in that country, which, when it is twisted 

 and lighted, preserves the fire like a wick, and shaken emits a very brilliant 

 flame. (Garcilaso, 1723, p. 166.) 



This "herb" may in reality have been nothing more than pine splint- 

 ers or pieces of cane. 



House fires were usually built in the middle of the cabin, and this 

 usage was general in the winter house and in all of the others so far 

 as we have any record. In the warmer parts of the south, however, 



