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NEW YORK STATE MUSEUM 



Picture writing- has been mentioned, and a rude map drawing 

 was in use. Champlain spoke of this in 1605, for the Indians of 

 Xew England drew quite well, with charcoal, the capes, bays and 

 mouths of rivers along the Atlantic coast. Lafitau said that the 

 northeastern Indians drew rude but accurate maps on bark or on the 

 sand. The former were kept in the public treasury for times of 

 need. 



In 1759 Sir William Johnson gave General Gage a draft of the 

 St Lawrence river made by Red Head, an Onondaga. Other 

 instances might be cited of a very primitive kind, but the most 

 curious was that seen by Van Curler at Oneida, in 1634: 



We asked them all sorts of questions about their castles and their 

 names, and how far they were away from each other. They showed 

 us with stones and maize cakes, and Jeronimus then made a chart 

 of it. And we counted all in miles how far each village was away 

 from the next. Wilson, p.94 



Champlain said of an Ottawa chief in 161 5, "I conversed with 

 him about what belonged to his country, which he drew for me with 

 a coal on a bark of a tree." 



Many accounts might be quoted of the sweating-house and of the 

 lodge used by conjurers. That of the latter by John Bartram, when 

 passing through Tioga county in 1743, will suffice: 



They cut a parcel of poles, which they stick in the ground in a 

 circle, about the bigness of hop poles, the circle about five foot 

 diameter, and then bring them together at the top, and tie them in 

 form of an oven, where the conjurer placeth himself ; then his 

 assistants cover the cage over close with blankets, and to make it 

 still more suffocating, hot stones are rolled in. . . There is 

 usually a stake drove into the ground about four foot high and 

 pointed. . . I have seen many of these places in my travels. 

 They differ from their sweating coops, in that they are often far 

 from water, and have a stake by the cage, yet both have a heap of 

 red hot stones put in. Bartram, p.32 



At the same time this author described the cooking of eels : 

 Their way of roasting eels is thus; they cut a stick about three 

 foot long, and as thick as one's thumb, they split it about a foot down, 

 and when the eel is gutted, they coil it between the two sides of 

 the stick, and bind the top close, which keeps the eel flat, and stick 

 one end in the ground before a good fire. Bartram, p.33 



