SWANTON] INDIANS OF THE SOUTHEASTERN UNITED STATES 685 



side and seven hats under which a small stone or bullet was con- 

 cealed. The players guessed in turn (Swanton, 1928, p. 469; 1928 c, 

 p. 244; 1931 a, pp. 158-159; 1942, p. 175). 



This introduces us to stick and dice games. Beverley says of the 

 Virginia Algonquians 



They have also one great diversion, to the practising of which are requisite 

 whole handfuls of little sticks or hard straws, which they know how to count 

 as fast as they can cast their eyes upon them, and can handle with a sur- 

 prising dexterity. 



We may also quote Strachey : 



Dice play, or cardes, or lotts they knowe not, how be it they use a game 

 upon russhes much like primero (an ancient English card game), wherein 

 they card and discard, and lay a stake too, and so win and loose. They will 

 play at this for their bowes and arrowes, their copper beads, hatchets, and 

 their leather coats. (Strachey, 1849, p. 78.) 



Lawson describes the same, or a similar, game among the eastern 

 Siouans and perhaps Tuscarora : 



Their chiefest game is a sort of arithmetic, which is managed by a par- 

 cel of small, split reeds, the thickness of a small bent; these are made very 

 nicely, so that they part and are tractable in their hands. They are 51 in 

 number; their length about 7 inches. When they play, they throw part of 

 them to their antagonist. The art is, to discover upon sight, how many you 

 have, and what you throw to him that plays with you. Some are so expert 

 at their numbers that they will tell ten times together, what they throw out 

 of their hands. Although the whole play is carried on with the quickest mo- 

 tion it is possible to use, yet some are so expert at this game, as to win great 

 Indian estates by this play. A good set of these reeds, fit to play withal, are 

 valued and sold for a dressed doe skin. (Lawson, 1860, p. 288.) 



Romans observed the Choctaw women playing a game that re- 

 minds us strongly of jackstones: 



The women also have a game where they take a small stick, or something 

 else off the ground after having thrown up a small ball which they are to 

 catch again, having picked up the other; they are fond of it, but ashamed to 

 be seen at it. (Romans, 1775, p. 81.) 



Games in which objects like dice were used were of two kinds, one 

 in which the "dice" were small bits of cane or slivers of wood; the 

 other in which fruit stones, beans, grains of corn, or similar objects 

 were employed. 



To one of these types probably belonged the game which Lawson 

 observed among some Congaree women. He says : 



The name or grounds of it I could not learn, though I looked on above two 

 hours. Their arithmetic was kept with a heap of Indian grain. (Lawson, 1860, 

 p. 52.) 



The Creek women, and occasionally the men, played a game in 

 which four sections of cane were used split in half. These were 

 thrown into the air and the count depended on the relative number 



