reach; and though "Jimsen weed"[1] overruns the land, he neglected its valuable intoxicating properties. His is almost the only race that has ever existed wholly without a stimulant; the fact is a strong proof of its autochthonic origin. It is indeed incredible that man, having once learned, should ever forget the means of getting drunk. Instead of the social cup the Indian smoked. As tobacco does not grow throughout the continent, he invented kinnikinik. This Indian word has many meanings. By the hunters and settlers it is applied to a mixture of half and half, or two thirds tobacco and one of red willow bark; others use it for a mixture of tobacco, sumach leaves, and willow rind; others, like Ruxton ("Life in the Far West," p. 116), for the cortex of the willow only. This tree grows abundantly in copses near the streams and water-courses. For smoking, the twigs are cut when the leaves begin to redden. Some tribes, like the Sioux, remove the outer and use only the highly-colored inner bark; others again, like the Shoshonees, employ the external as well as the internal cuticle. It is scraped down the twig in curling ringlets, without, however, stripping it off; the stick is then planted in the ground before the fire, and, when sufficiently parched, the material is bruised, comminuted, and made ready for use. The taste is pleasant and aromatic, but the effect is that of the puerile ratan rather than the manly tobacco. The Indian, be it observed, smokes like all savages by inhaling the fumes into the lungs, and returning them through the nostrils; he finds pure tobacco, therefore, too strong and pungent. As has been said, he is catholic in his habits of smoking; he employs indifferently rose-bark (Rosa blanda?)[2] and the cuticle of a cornus, the lobelia,[3] the larb, a vaccinium, a Daphne-like plant, and many others. The Indian smokes incessantly, and the "calumet"[4] is an important part of his household goods.
- ↑ Properly Jamestown weed, the Datura stramonium, the English thorn-apple, unprettily called in the Northern States of America "stinkweed." It found its way into the higher latitudes from Jamestown (Virginia), where it was first observed springing on heaps of ballast and other rubbish discharged from vessels. According to Beverly ("History of Virginia," book ii., quoted by Mr. Bartlett), it is "one of the greatest coolers in the world;" and in some young soldiers who ate plentifully of it as a salad, to pacify the troubles of bacon, the effect was "a very pleasant remedy, for they turned natural fools upon it for several days."
- ↑ The wild rose is every where met with growing in bouquets on the prairies.
- ↑ The Lobelia inflata, or Indian tobacco, is corrupted by the ignorant Western man to low belia in contradistinction to high belia, better varieties of the plant.
- ↑ The calumet, a word introduced by the old French, is the red sandstone pipe, described in a previous page, with a long tube, generally a reed, adorned with feathers. It is the Indian symbol of hatred or amity; there is a calumet of war as well as a calumet of peace. To accept the calumet is to come to terms; to refuse it is to reject them. The same is expressed by burying and digging up the tomahawk or hatchet. The tomahawk and calumet are sometimes made of one piece of stone; specimens, however, have become very rare since the introduction of the iron axe.
real is now called as in English, "Indian corn," proving that in that continent it first was introduced from Hindostan. The Italians have named it Gran' Turco, showing whence it was imported by them. The word maiz, mays, maize, or mahiz, is a Carib word introduced by the Spaniards into Europe; in the United States, where "corn" is universally used, maize is intelligible only to the educated.
