286 BUREAU OF AMERICAN ETHNOLOGY [BULL. 43

with different colors, bearing feathers in their hands, which served them as
fans or to keep time, their hair neatly plaited with bunches of feathers. The
young men were naked, having only a belt like the girls, which concealed
them in part, they being well daubed with paint and their hair well provided
with bunches of feathers. Many had pieces of copper in the form of flattened
plates, two and three together fastened to their belts, and hanging as far
down as the knee, which made a noise and assisted in marking the time. They
danced like thatofor three hours in a very active and sprightly manner.
Night having come, the chief made us lodge in his cabin or house which he
had prepared. After having supped on hominy made of Indian corn, they
brought in and lighted a torch of canes, 15 feet long, bound together, 2 feet in
circumference, which they planted in the middle, afire at the top, and which
lighted sufficiently well. All the youth of the village repaired there with their
bows and arrows, war clubs, and warlike instruments, and some women and
girls, where they began to dance anew until midnight war dances which I
found very pretty, and then all retired except the chief, who remained and
slept with us in his cabin along with all the Bayogoulas, to whom they paid
the same honors as to ourselves, regarding them as French, having brought
the latter to their homes. These two chiefs harangued each other; the Bayo-
goula harangued the Ounia for me. This village is on a hill, where there are 140
cabins; there may be 350 men there at most, and many children. All the cabins
are on the edge of the hill, in a double row in places, and arranged in a circle.
There is a square 200 paces across, very neat. The cornfields are in the
valleys and on the other hills in the neighborhood. This entire country is
nothing but hills of quite good black earth; no rocks; I have seen none since
leaving the sea. This village is 21 leagues from the river toward the north;
the woods there are open, a mixture of all kinds of oaks; above all there are
many canes in the bottoms. I did not see any fruit tree there. They gave me
two kinds of nuts; one, like those of Canada, hard nuts, and the other, little,
made like olives and no larger. They have not yet cultivated anything else
except melons and have sowed tobacco.a
 The next day Iberville returned to his boats, and the IIouma pro-
vided him with bread, flour, and corn for the continuance of his
journey. Being convinced, however, by the renewed testimony of a
Tainsa Indian that there was no fork in the Mississippi such as had
been represented by Membr6, he soon decided not to attempt to ascend
higher that year and returned to the Houma landing. Here he pro-
cured more corn, along with pumpkins and chickens, and after some
difficulty induced the Bayogoulas who had remained at the village
to join him. When he embarked, he says: The chief of the Oumas
and one of the most important personages of his people led me to
my shallop, holding me under the arms to aid me in walking, for
fear that some accident would happen to me on their land. The
chief of the Oumas," he adds, is a man 5 feet 10 inches in height
and large in proportion, having a very flat forehead, although the
other men of his nation do not have it, at least very few of the old
men. This custom is changing among them. He is about 70 years
old, having a son of about 25 to 30, well formed, who succeeds to his
 SMargry, D6couvertes, iv, 174-177, 1880.