476 The Book of Woodcraft 



Paints for ornamenting robes are mixed with water. 

 (Clark: "Sign Language.") 



Paints for lodges, totem poles, etc., were made durable 

 by slowly melting or mixing into the grease enough rosin to 

 make it sticky. This formed their paint oil. 



Red. Before they had the white man's vermihon they 

 used a certain stiff yellow clay (brick clay) which, when 

 burnt, turned dull red — i. e., brick color. This they pow- 

 dered and mixed with the grease oil. 



In some parts of the country there are springs strongly 

 impregnated with iron. A log of wood dug out of this — or 

 failing that an armful of chips long soaked in it — when 

 taken out, dried and burnt yielded ashes of a beautiful 

 rosy color. These worked up into a very pretty red. 



Yellow. Yellow clay or ochres are common in clay 

 regions and furnish a dull yellow. Clark says that the 

 flower of the prairie, goldenrod, yields a good yellow: also 

 the bright yellow moss one sees on the trunks of pine trees 

 in the Rockies. When dried and powdered this makes a 

 sort of chrome yellow, and is also used as a dye. 



"The Sioux use buU-berries" for yellow. (Clark.) 



Blue. They had no good blue. Blue clays come near- 

 est to the color. Sometimes black and white mixed were 

 used. 



Black. Soot and charcoal, ground into the paint oil, 

 made a good black. 



White. For white they used white clays, which are com- 

 mon in some regions, or burnt shells, finely powdered. 



"Generally speaking. Black means joy: White, mourn- 

 ing: Red, beauty: and an excessive use of any of these or 

 other colors, excitement." 



"When painting for war, they use many stripes and rings 

 of different colors, but on returning only black-colored 

 paint is used. " 



