276 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BULL. 43

around their village, very near, raised 7 feet from the earth, enveloped in cane
mats and covered with one in the shape of the roof of a house, which stink
much and gather many crows about. These savages are the most beggarly I
have yet seen, having no comforts in their houses, nor any wares. Some have
a kind of covering, made of the bark of a tree woven very neatly, as a coarse
cloth made of blanched hemp might be in France. The men all have active
bodies, well made, active figures, I think little hardened to war, keeping
their hair short, and daubing their faces and bodies. It is a gratification to
the women to blacken their teeth, which they do by means of an herb crushed
in wax [putty] ; they remain black for a time and become white again. The
young girls are attentive to the face itself. Some have the body tattooed and
marked with black on the face and breast. They have in their villages some
cocks and hens. Their open country (ddscrts) is not large for their numbers;
the land is sufficiently smooth in the neighborhood. The country is very beau-
tiful, with great trees, of all kinds mixed together, except pines. I have seen
some wild apple trees, some peaches: there are neither strawberries, nor rasp-
berries, nor mulberries."

 The following information regarding this town is contained in the
Journal of the frigate Le Mari :
 So far as the others I besides the chief are concerned, they are dressed only
in a miserable deer or bear skin, which covers them from the knees to the
shoulders, if the skin is very large. The most are entirely naked, not even
their nudity being concealed except for a little patch about their privates,
the reason for which I have been unable to discover. So far as the women are
concerned, they have a large bearskin which covers them, besides a kind of
breechcloth which covers them from the belt to the knees, leaving their breasts,
belly, and throat uncovered. All have their hair cut and indeed pulled out
around the forehead as well as the beard; they leave only a little handful of
hair at the top of the head, where they fasten many bird feathers of different
colors. They put others of these above their buttocks, which are like tails of
horses, which hang behind with rattles and miserable little pieces of copper,
like the ends of our chandeliers, bint much thinner, in such a manner that
when they dance that makes a noise so that one would say that a messenger
had just arrived in the village. They ha\e also a quantity of rings (imrMtills)
around their arms: besides that they have the face entirely daubed red with
vermilion around the eyebrows, the half of one cheek blackened and the nose
pierced, to which there hangs a piece of coral of the size of the finger, as well
as the ears, in which they put a certain piece of wood of the size of the little
finger. As to their food, they live only on corn bread and very little meat, only
eating it when they go to hunt bison and bear, which are sometimes distant
from their villages more than 20 leagues at the lower end of the river (ani bIus
dc la rivi rc). The chiefs have their hunting grounds bounded, and when one
goes upon their lands ahead of teliln wars break out. In the evening we shot off
a swivel gun, which made them all fall down in astonishment. Their village may
be 60 leagues front the mouth of the river. At every monument they say "Affcro,"
which signifies their astonishment. Then we went to see the village
and the temple, in which they have a fire which they preserve continually;
there are figures of beasts above, some marks of their sacrifices, two scalps of
their enemies, which hang there as trophies. I saw in the middle of
the village, which is like a great parade ground, two great posts. 40 feet in
height, before their temple, on which two scalps were placed. There is a chief

 a Margry, D6couvertes, iv, 19O-172, 1880.