204 



FOREST AND STREAM. 



tOoT. 1, 1886. 



^fJr?ress aU commtintcati-om to the Forest and Stream Pub. On. 



INDIAN ARROW MAKING. 



Editor Forest and Stream: 



In a late issue appeared an interesting communication 

 on "Indian Ai-row Making," by H. G. Dulog. 



Stone implements are continually washed up by rains 

 or turned up by the plow and are of ' •'comparatively little 

 scientific value; it is only when they occur in considerable 

 numbers and especially when associated with other re- 

 mains, that they serve to throw much light on the man- 

 ners and customs of ancient times.'" Thus writes Sir 

 John Lubbock, in his "Prehistoric Times." 



My father, the late Prof. S. S. Haldeman, L.L.D., M.N. 

 A.S., etc. , discovered in 1876 the valuable remains of an 

 Indian habitation and workshop, the stone and pottery 

 relics, maiiy liundi'ed in number, were varied and illus- 

 trative of a restricted locahty. He considered the deposit 

 at least two thousand years old, as it was covered by a 

 vegetable mold of 30in. Dr. Abbott {A7nerican Natural- 

 ist, February, 1876) estimates that it requnes thirteen 

 centuries to accumulate lOin. of vegetable mold. My 

 father sent a pyreliminary account of his "find" to the 

 Societe des Americanistes in 1877; the following year he 

 made a verbal communication to the Academy of the Nat- 

 ural Sciences, Philadelphia, and a year later, 1878, he 

 read a paper before the American Philosophical Society. 

 This paper, illustrated by many plates, was published by 

 the society. Our home at Chickies, Pa. , stood at the foot 

 of a cUtf of Potsdam sandstone (quai-tzite), fronting on 

 the Susquehamia River. At the base of the cliff is an an- 

 ticlinal axis, and in a cave — or retreat, as my father called 

 it — so formed the treasures of aboriginal manufacture 

 were found. In his paper the locality is thus described: 



"A traveler by the railway which passes in front may 

 observe a vaulted recess open to the light of day, 

 where formerly the occupation of arrow-making w^as 

 followed. It is' about seven feet high in the middle of the 

 arch in front, whence it slopes north, south and east to 

 the ground, much as an oven declines in all directions 

 from the mouth, the space occupied by the recess being 

 about ten by f oiurteen feet in extent, and here most of the 

 implements were found, but some from the earth a few 

 feet beyond the opening have been included as pertaining 

 to the general deposit, for a fragment of pottery occim-ing 

 within ihe recesses would be matched by one or more 

 pieces outside. The cavity is due to the falling away of 

 stones, forming the anticlinal ciuve, several of which 

 were removed in clearmg the space, and, to prevent 

 accident, one which seemed ready to fall was detached 

 from the roof. No stalagmitic material was present. 

 The place was adapted for the residence of savages. The 

 base of the chff at the river margin left a defensible 

 passage-way; on the north the land spread iuto arable 

 soil; a la^ge spring about 170yds. north of the shelter 

 ofiiered good water, and near it was a trap (dolerite) boulder 

 of the drift of several tons w^eight (from the Cone- 

 wago Hills, ten miles to the north) with a depression 

 adapted for grinding corn, jperhaps in part artificial or 

 deepened byu.se. Hei'e then were shelter, defense, con- 

 venience, planting, Inmting, boating, fishing in two 

 streams, and a forest." 



Prof. Haldemans paper is divided into eleven short 

 chapters and all the articles described are illustrated. He 

 describes knives (stone implements which requne a cut- 

 ting edge), chisels, scrapers and borers. In chapter V. 

 we come to ari-owheads. To quote again: "Arrowheads 

 seem, upon both continents, to be the most common of all 

 definite stone implements. The Chickie's Retreat fm-- 

 nishes about four hundred entii-e or fragmentary exam- 

 ples, excluding mere spalls and counting the many 

 worked fragments which belong to this type. The mater- 

 ial used includes quartzite and white quartz, both miner- 

 als of the locality; limestone of the vicinity (rarely used), 

 and minerals selected from the pebbles and fragments 

 along the shore and bed of the Susquehanna, such as red 

 jasper, yellow jasper, chert, trap, indurite (indurated 

 clay) and siliceous shale hard enough to scratch glass. 

 The numeroiis broken specimens and the abundance of 

 chips suggest that the retreat was occupied by genera- 

 tions of arrow makers; and it might be expected that 

 four hundred specimens from the same workshop would 

 exhibit many stages of the manufacture, and plate five 

 represents such an illustrative series." Most of the speci- 

 mens indicate that the point was the first jjart finished 

 and the basil notches were the last parts made. This is 

 illustrated by specimens, the points of which are finished 

 while an unremoved mass of the material remains at the 

 base. Spear heads occupy the next chapter. "Except in 

 size," he says, "there is little difference between spear 

 heads and arrow heads, and there is probably no differ- 

 ence between the heads of spears, whether used for 

 thrusting or throwing. Certaiu broad, triangular forms 

 seem intended for fish spears, the barbs being sufficiently 

 broad to hold in the soft muscle of fishes." Dr. Abbott 

 (Stone Age, of Now Jersey, Smithsonian Report for 1875) 

 distinguishes between a lance and a spear, assigning to 

 the spear head "a notched or stemmed base, or both, 

 which featm-es singtdarly or together characterize the 

 spear head i^roper, which also are smaller as a class than 

 lance heads, but too large to be of use if placed at the end 

 of an arrow." 



"As the arrow head passes into that of the spear," be- 

 gins chapter VII., on hoes and diggers, "so when the 

 form classed with spear heads is regarded as too large for 

 this weapon, its f miction is, with probable reason, con- 

 sidered to be that of a hoe." 



In Chapter 8 on sinkers, we are informed, "It has been 

 customarv to regard certain notched stones as net-sinkers, 

 and at the Centennial Exposition at Philadelphia in 1876 

 there was a wide-meshed seine (I believe from North 

 America) made of narrow thongs, the low-er edge of which 

 was weighted with such stones. Some of the larger ex- 

 amples of these stones may have been used as weights to 

 the vines, with which streams were swept to drive the 

 fish into weirs, or as anchors to long lines (out lines) set 

 during the night, with attaclied shorter lines or links bear- 

 ing the hooks." 



"The Retreat furnished about fifty stones, mostly peb- 

 bles, varying in form and size, some marked, others un- 

 marked, the latter of which, if found with river gravel, 

 would not be entitled to mention here, but being placed by 

 human hands in a human habitation, they are to be class- 



ified as implemeuts." Most of the specimens were sand- 

 stone and bore marks of adaptation or use. 



Chapter 10 is given to various articles, tomahawks of 

 honor. "Parts of five examples of these, light perforated 

 tomahawks (banner stones, scepter, or badges of author- 

 ity) were found in the retreat." the parts of two pipes 

 were dug up; one a pipestem of clay slightly biu-nt, the 

 other a "taper steatite pipe, flat below,^ convex above." 

 Shells and bones were discovered in various stages of 

 decay, but few of the former, while the latter were more 

 abundant. The hollow bones are split, according to the 

 habit of modern savages who eat the marrow. The com- 

 mon deer bones were the most abundant. 



About three hundred fragments of pottery were found 

 within or outside the Retreat, "and in some cases a piece 

 apparently thrown out when a vessel was broken, could 

 be fitted to another found inside; the finest example w^as 

 in four pieces, one from the inside and three from the 

 earth outside," 



The history of the Retreat, as shown by its contents, is 

 the same as the account of Mr. Dulog's friend who saw 

 the old Indian expei-t making his arrow head of obsidium. 

 Then- methods are the same, yet at least two thousand 

 years have intervened between the manufacturers of the 

 Cliickis Retreat and the old Digger Indian who still lives 

 at Alem. Victor M. Haldeman, 



THE SHAMAN. 



[From "Our Kew Alaska."] 



WHILE cruising in the Alaskan archipelago the voy- 

 ager often discovers, on some lone islet or low- 

 lying point projecting from a headland, what appears to 

 be a miniature house, half hidden by a luxurious under- 

 growth. Sometimes it is whitewashed and sometimes it 

 is painted in .gaudy colors. Occasionally it has a little 

 window in the side. As a rule it is remote from settle- 

 ment of any kind, and affords the only suggestion of 

 human occupation for miles. Only towering mountain 

 peaks, pine-clad and snow-capped, and tortuous water 

 channels inteiwene, and there is usually such an absence 

 of animal fife, owing to the physical formation of ang-ular 

 height and fathomless depths^ that even the scream of a 

 gull seldom disturbs the solitude. 



The stranger wonders at the apparent preference for 

 isolation for any purpose Avhatsoever; but, after having 

 been duly informed, he learns to take it for granted 

 whenever he sees them, that each of these diminutive 

 tenements is the mortuary abode of some "Shaman" or 

 Indian magician, whose suj^posed supernatural powers 

 have not availed to avert the inevitable gi-ip. Having 

 completed the mortal period of liis allotment for good or 

 evil, whichever suits his individual caprice, he has been 

 summarily shelved as it M^ere, by those who care to have 

 nothing more to do with him or his occult deahngs. They 

 have swathed his poor body in cerements of sail-cloth and 

 mats, covered it with a dance blanket, and laid it away 

 like a discarded bundle whose usefulness is done. Tliere 

 it will dry into a mummj", or molder into decay. Never- 

 theless, he has been scrupulously provided for by his 

 credulous subjects, who have carefully placed beside him 

 within his w^ooden domicile, all the 'properties and ap- 

 purtenances of his craft — his magic charms, liideous 

 masks, grotesque wooden rattles, fantastic toggery, and 

 nameless implements, w^liich it is beheved wiU serve liim 

 in some new embodiment which he is expected to assume. 

 Formerly these relics were held in superstitious awe by 

 the natives, and even the bmial site was shunned. But in 

 these days of modern civilization and vandalism the 

 graves are plundered of then contents, not only by ethno- 

 logical students and visitors in search of cm-ios, but by 

 the iiatives themselves, whose cupidity has overcome the 

 scruples of bygone days of abject barbarism, 



Tlie Shaman,* or medicine man, is an omidpresent liv- 

 ing conundrum to his unsophisticated people. He is a 

 mystery which they cannot comprehend, and a terror 

 always* for while he is a handy sort of a personage to 

 have in a community, and he is supposed to have power 

 to heal the sick, he is, nevertheless, believed to be in 

 league with the devil. The malign influence of his spells 

 is a constant menace, and no one can teU w^hen or upon 

 whom it may fall. This is a hard reputation to have, but 

 the Shaman' promotes it. He is a self -constituted buga- 

 boo, having only qualified himself for tlie role by a course 

 of ti-ying ordeals by fire, water, famine and direst tortme. 

 It 's probably his attested ability to sur\'ive infliction 

 which in ordinary course would cause death, rather than 

 absolute immunity, from any physical injmy, which in- 

 spires his people "^with superstitious fear. At the same 

 tmie he is liimseK in constant apprehension of some 

 clandestine influence at work to counteract his own. If 

 his incantations and mummeries fail of success, he charges 

 the f ailm-e and its blame to whomever he chooses. Many 

 an innocent hf e has expiated an alleged interference in 

 days gone by. Happily, his supremacy is now at an end. 

 His sway was incontinently cut short hj Capt. Beardslee, 

 in 1879, 'when he mterposed to prevent the murder of a 

 woman who had been accused by a vengeful medicine man 

 of being a witch. A witch used to have no more show in 

 Alaska than she did in the days of our disreputable Pil- 

 grim forefathers. 



It is the professional business of the Shaman to scare 

 people and to keep them scared. It pays. Whenever he 

 wants money, instead of "holding a man up," he sliakes 

 his rattle at him. One shake will impoverisli an ordinary 

 Siwash, two wiW clean him out. It is the same with 

 bodily ailments. As a medical practitioner he despises 

 the use of nostrums, and discards all physic. His method 

 is to frighten disease away. When summoned in a 

 case of sickness he ri^s himself out in a garb that would 

 scare a hobgoblin and increase the pallor of a ghost. An 

 invahd must be in gi-eat extremity indeed when he will 

 consent to send for a doctor. An appointment with a 

 nightmare woirld not require half the nerve. The patient 

 lioiows just what to expect. He has prepared himself to 

 be frightened by a long course of mental enervation, and 

 he feels that it is merely a toss-up Avhich shall stand the 

 infernal racket the longer, himself or the ailment. In 

 fact if he should fail to be frightened at all, the enchant- 

 ment Ls kidtus — no good — and the doctor withdraws, a 

 mortified and dtsgruntled Shaman. 



Such dilemma is alarming, but the medicine man is 

 prepared to wrestle with it. He at once dons a frightful 



♦"Shaman" is the name applied to the sorcerer or magician 

 among the Kalmuks and other trihes of Northern Asia, and the 

 word, theiefoie, adds another evidence to confii-m the heliel that 

 the Paciflc coast trihes have an Asiatic origin. 



headgear of mountain-goat horns, Avith a mask of hideous 

 device; and down his naked spine a row- of horns, jet 

 black and polislied, extends in abnormal development to 

 the very base. Long pendants made of diied skimk skins 

 and assorted intestines dangle from his head, armlets and 

 anklets equally repulsive encircle his shriveled limbs, and 

 his whole body glows with an ocher of green, yellow and 

 red. Armed with a huge wooden rattle, fashi'oned in the 

 form of a stork, with a demon carved on its back piiUing 

 out a man's tongue with its teeth or some other collateral 

 symbol still more repulsive, and caiTying a long mystic 

 rod or wand in his hand, he advances into the room with 

 a series of postures and jerks, which impressively em- 

 phasize lus aggressiveness, overpoweruig the patient and 

 leaving him limp and paralyzed with teiTor. If, how^- 

 ever, the disease should prove recalcitrant, the Shaman 

 seats himself on the earth in the center of tlie room wdth 

 his back to the fire, and proceeds to beat the ground with 

 his stick, shaking his rattle and singing with all his 

 might. He seems in dead earnest, and, if there is anv- 

 thing in the logic of sympathy, the patient ought to get 

 well instanter. But death too often plays the stronger 

 hand, can-ying off the victim and the rnalady together, 

 much to the disgust of the doctor, who is very apt to 

 make some outsider the scapegoat of liis bad luck. Quite 

 likely he marvels that man should die at all. and it must 

 be even a greater surprise to him when he is called to 

 shuffle off his own mortal coil; for a magician so capable 

 to heal, and to forefend death, would be IDvely to suppose 

 himself exempt from the common fate. But the inevit- 

 able end comes, and, in view of his peculiar relationship 

 as middleman between mortality and the devil, it is Uttle 

 wonder that he is buried apart from his people, and that 

 the site of his grave is slumned. In something of the 

 strain sung of an abdicated monarch. 



He sleeps his last sleep, he has sprung his last rattle, 

 No call can awake him to mischief again. 



Charles Hallock. 



WILD TURKEY DOMESTICATION. 



Editor Forest and Stream: 



I have two turkeys — a hen and a gobbler — ^which were 

 hatched out of -wild tm-key eggs found in the woods, and 

 far from any human residence or from any tame turkeys. 

 They are now about two months old and doing nicely. 

 Next spring I suppose the hen will lay a quantity of egg-s, 

 and if there be any among your readers w-ho would like 

 to infuse a httle wild blood in their turkey stock, I will 

 take pleasm-ein exchanging eggs with them — they giving 

 me eggs of the White HoUand and brown tm'key for my 

 wild ones, egg for egg. I have no other turkeys but 

 these two, and none of my neighbors have any; so there 

 need not be any doubt that the eggs will be of tlie genuine 

 wild stock. Whether the tame stock would be improved 

 by the mixture I cannot say; but certainly the wild 

 turkeys are far more hardy and easy to rear than tlie 

 tame stock. 



I knew a party years ago who reared quite a flock of 

 turkeys from wild tm'key eggs foimd m the woods. Just 

 after they were hatched, they broke and run like a blue 

 streak, all seeking a hiding place. The old mother had 

 a time of it gathering them about her again and to com- 

 fort them. They were then put with the mother in a 

 close coop, Avith cracks too small for the little fellows to 

 squeeze tlirough, and there they were kept for several 

 days, becoming at last tolerably tame. Then they were 

 turned loose, staying about the premises with the 

 other poultry and flourishing finely. Not one of them 

 died or ever grew sick. They became very familiar, feed- 

 ing out of the hand and walking boldly into the house 

 as if they owned it. Still they always had a dash of 

 Avildness about them, which demonstrated itself in various 

 ways. For instance, sometimes when a stranger came 

 about they would take a sudden scare and dart for cover. 

 Again, they would seek the tallest tree for a roosting 

 place, going up to its topmost branches, whUe their tame 

 cousins would be content to go only a few feet above the 

 ground. Then they had an unconquerable disijosition to 

 wander. At last they would stay out at night, and finally 

 they got to staying two or three nights at a time. When 

 they got down to this sort of business, it was not long be- 

 fore their wild blood got the complete mastery of them. 

 Finally every son-of-a-gun of them took to the woods and 

 never returned. But this was years ago, in a portion of 

 Texas which was then very thinly settled, and full of 

 wild turkeys. Had they been in a thickly settled country, 

 with no wild turkeys to'temjit them, no doubt they would 

 have staid at home. I noticed that these wild fellows 

 kept quite to themselves, refusing the society of the tame 

 tm-keys, and always fighting them when they came about. 

 They evidently looked upon the tame tui'keys as scrubs 

 and' far inferior as a race to themselves. I believe that 

 nearly all the domesticated tm-keys of Western Texas are 

 derived recently from the Avild stock. They sJiow this 

 distinctly, particularly in their blue heads. N. A. T. 



Abit.bne, Texas, Sept. 22. 



Dog-Wolf Hybrid.— Ottawa, Ont., Sept. SO.— Editor 

 Forest and Stream: Mr. John Deslaimers, a well-known 

 sportsman of this place, has just brought back from the 

 West, where he has been on a shooting trip as far as Van- 

 couver Island, a hybrid wolf, a bitch, half Gordon setter, 

 hah' prairie wolf. She was bred by Mr. Bedson, of the 

 Stony Mountain Penitentiary, widely known for his herd 

 of domesticated buffaloes. She is six months old and is 

 about twenty -fom- inches high at the shoulder, and is 

 slightly built; is of a tawny yellow, plentifully sprinkled 

 on the back with black hahs. Her coat is soft to the 

 touch, but does not he flat. The tail is very long and 

 carried low, "sickle" -fashion. Her head looks just what 

 it is— half wolf, half setter — and is carried high on a long 

 neck. The ears are carried up straight, but are not sharp 

 at the top, and look heavy. She is very playful and 

 affectionate, just like a puppy. I had my Clumber, 

 Johnny, with me when I went to see her. As soon as he 

 caught sight of her he ran into the house and could not 

 be induced to come out, although he is anything but a 

 timid dog ordinarily. At last I dragged him out and 

 within reach of the anunal. She nearly went crazy with 

 delight, squirming aU round him, Hcking him, and trying 

 to induce him to play w^ith her. He stood, not moving a 

 muscle, but not seeming to enjoy it by any means, and 

 was very much delighted when I gave him leave to go. I 

 wUl let you know how she gets on. — Clumber, 



