Note 243 — Chapter II · HUNTERS AND FISHERS.

Grinnell enumerates the branches of industry existing among them. “Food supply and defence against enemies depended on the warrior’s weapons. These were his most precious possessions, and he gave much care to their manufacture. Knowing nothing of metals, he made his edge tools of sharpened stones.” “The most important part of the warrior’s equipment was the bow, and over no part of it was more time and labour spent.” “The stone axe, the maul, and the lance were all simple weapons.” “A very important part of the warrior’s outfit was the shield, with which he stopped or turned aside the arrows of his enemy. It was usually circular in shape, and was made of the thick, shrunken hide of a buffalo bull’s neck.” “Clothing was made of skins tanned with or without the fur.” “Many tribes—especially those to the south—made a simple pottery.… Among the northern tribes, where pottery was least known, ladles, spoons, bows, and dishes were usually formed from horn or wood”. “The different tribes had but slight knowledge of the textile art, and this knowledge seems to have been greatest in the south and on the coast.” “Three vehicles were known to the primitive Indian—the travois in the south and the sledge in the north for land travel, and the canoe wherever there were water ways.” “The Indian’s ideas of art are rude.” “It is in the art of carving, however, that the greatest skill was shown”243. So these tribes do not seem to have attained to a high industrial development; the less, as most of the instances Grinnell gives of their skill in carving relate to tribes of the Pacific Coast.