SwANTON] INDIANS OF THE SOUTHEASTEiRN UNITED STATES 461 



they covered the upper portions of their bodies only with "a mantle 

 of buffalo skin for the winter, and a lighter one of feathers for the 

 summer" (Timberlake, Williams ed., 1927, p. 77). 



Bartram, too, mentions a shirt of linen, and therefore of Euro- 

 pean origin, as worn by the Creeks a few years later, and, indeed, the 

 match-coat itself seems now to have been made of imported stuff, for 

 he says: 



Besides this attire, they have a large mantle of the finest cloth they are 

 able to purchase, always either of a scarlet or blue colour; this mantle is 

 fancifully decorated with rich lace or fringe round the border, and often with 

 little round silver, or brass bells. (Bartram, 1792, p. 500.) 



The Indians accompanying Oglethorpe in 1743 in his invasion of 

 Florida wore "a Skin or Blanket tied, or loosely cast, over their 

 Shoulders ; a Shirt which they never wash, and which is consequently 

 greasy and black to the last degree" (Kimber, 1744, p. 16). 



But the feather mantles were still in use, as shown by the quota- 

 tion from Bartram given on an earlier page. 



Adair, whose knowledge of the Chickasaw was most intimate, 

 mentions what seems to have been a really native shirt, but this was 

 probably an alternative to the feather mantle. 



They formerly wore shirts, made of drest deer-skins, for their summer visiting 

 dress; but their winter-hunting clothes were long and shaggy, made of the 

 skins of panthers, bucks, bears, beavers, and otters; the fleshy sides outward, 

 sometimes doubled, and always softened like velvet-cloth, though they retained 

 their fur and hair. (Adair, 1775, p. 6.) 



Yet the young Indians, male and female, of his time were wont to 



wrap a piece of cloth round them, that has a near resemblance to the old 

 Koman toga or praetexta. 'Tis about a fathom square, bordered seven or eight 

 quarters deep, to make a shining cavalier of the heau monde, and to keep out 

 both the heat and cold. (Adair, 1775, p. 7.) 



The shirt and blanket were also in use on the lower Mississippi. Du 

 Pratz says of the Natchez : 



When it is cold the men cover themselves with a shirt made of two dressed 

 deerskins, which resemble rather a nightgown than a shirt, the sleeves having 

 only such a length as the breadth of the skin permits. . . . Over all of these, 

 if the cold is a little severe, they wear a bison robe left uncolored on the side 

 towards the [animal's] flesh, and with the hair left on, which they place against 

 the body because it is warmer. In the country where beavers are found they make 

 robes composed of six skins of these animals. When the days begin to grow 

 finer and the cold is no longer so violent, the men and women cover themselves 

 only with a deerskin dressed white, and sometimes colored black. There are 

 some of these which have daubings in designs of different colors, as in red or in 

 yellow with black lines. (Le Page du Pratz, 1758, vol. 2, pp. 190-197; S wanton 

 1911, p. 53.) 



As was mentioned above (p. 458), when Tonti met the chief of the 

 Taensa on Lake St. Joseph, he was surrounded by more than 60 old 



