390 



USES OF PLANTS BY THE CHIPPEWA INDIANS [bth. ann. 44 



tipis, and sometimes on the roof of the lodge in which maple sugar 

 was made, this lodge having a frame like that of a house. 



Meat bag. — This was commonly made of birch bark covered with 

 soft tanned leather (pi. 54), but was also made of rawhide. It was 

 carried on a pack strap and was used for carrying dried meat or 

 other provisions needed on a journey. It was customary to open the 

 bag and allow the flap to become a sort of table, from which the 

 fragments of food were easily returned to the bag, a custom which 

 illustrates the lack of wastefulness among these people. 



Fans. — These were made in the woods whenever needed, two pieces 

 of bark being sewed together and slipped into a cleft stick, which 

 served as a handle. (PI. 55. b.) A man might carry a fan orna- 

 mented with feathers, one specimen having the bark cut off squarely 

 and a row of stiff feathers forming the upper portion of the fan. 

 (PL 55, c.) Plate 55, a, shows an owl-feather fan with handle of 

 birch bark. A woman never used an ornamented fan. 



Torches and tinder. — Various forms of torches were made by twist- 

 ing birch bark into cylinders, some of which would last an entire 

 night, and were used by travellers. Slender torches, which could be 

 stuck on the end of a stick that was upright in the ground, were used 

 by women when working around the camp. A woman kept a supply 

 of scraps of thin birch bark for use in kindling fires. 



Figures. — A variety of figures were cut from birch bark. (Pis. 

 52, of 56.) Some appear to have been for pleasure, while others 

 represent dream symbols and totem marks (clan symbols). 



Patterns. — Every woman who did beadwork had patterns cut from 

 stiff birch bark which she laid on the material to be decorated. Mrs. 

 English said that she remembered when patterns were pricked with 

 a stiff fishbone around the outline and then cut with scissors. In this 

 way the pattern was evident to the eye before the cutting was begun. 

 With very few exceptions the cut patterns collected by the writer 

 show no trace of a marking implement, the appearance being that 

 the patterns are cut without tracing. (PI. 57.) 



Transparencies. — The most primitive form of Chippewa art is 

 that in which the only material is a broad leaf or thin piece of birch 

 bark and the only tools are human teeth and deft fingers. The leaf 

 or birch bark is folded and indented with the teeth, this process being 

 repeated according to the elaborateness of the design. The result 

 is a transparency, the surface of the leaf or bark forming the back- 

 ground and the tooth marks forming the pattern. The native word 

 for this is composed of two words, one meaning picture, and the 

 other he bites, or gnaws. The leaf and bark are not wholly opaque 

 and the tooth marks do not cut entirely through them, so the finished 

 work shows a heavier and a lighter density of material which is 



