94 NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



Puffballs were peeled and sliced and mushrooms peeled and fried 

 entire in grease, sunflower or bear oil, though sometimes deer tallow 

 was used. 



Rale^ mentions the use of tree fungi and says that they were 

 " white as large mushrooms ; these are cooked and reduced to a sort 

 of porridge, but it is very far from having the flavor of porridge." 



Lichens have been eaten but rarely within the memory of my 

 oldest informants. Hunters when pressed by hunger, they remem- 

 bered, had sometimes scraped the lichens from a tree or rock and 

 boiled them with grease. In preparing them the lichens were first 

 washed in a mixture of camp ashes and water to remove the bitter- 

 ness. In times of great emergency, however, with hunger- pressing, 

 the cook did not stop to soak the lichens but cooked them as they 

 were. The Jesuit Rale, in his letter to his brother mentions lichens 

 and calls them " rock tripe." ^ When cooked, he says, they made a 

 black and disagreeable porridge. 



In Iceland for centuries lichens have been an. important food and 

 other peoples have not despised them. The nutritive value lies in 

 the lichenin and starch which the plant contains. 



XV FRUIT AND BERRYLIKE FOODS 



The Iroquois considered fruits and berries a necessary part of 

 everyday diet. Long before the Revolutionary War they had, in 

 many places, extensive orchards of apples, peaches and plums. It 

 is probable that at that period they cultivated fruit trees to a greater 

 extent than any other native American people. The Iroquois loved 

 the apple above other fruits, a fact which several writers mention.^ 

 General Sullivan in his famous raid against the hostile Iroquois cut 

 down a single orchard of 1500 trees.* 



A list of the principal fruits used by the Iroquois follows : 



« , r. / N r2:anyu"oya 



Apple Pyrus (var. sp.) {eya"odji'ya 



Crab apples Pyrus coronaria djoikMowa 



Thorn apples Crataegus (var. sp.) awe'owek 



1 Jesuit Relations, 67 1223. 



2 Jesuit Relations, 67 -.223. 



^See Schoolcraft. Senate Document 24. Albany 1846. "The apple is 

 the Indian's banana." 



4 History of New York during the Revolutionary War. New York 1879. 

 11:334. Life of Brant. Albany 1865. v. II, ch. I. 



