Part 4 (1/2)

EMBROIDERY.

The use of beads, quills, and other articles to beautify the surfaces of fabrics and skins was as common, no doubt, with the ancient as with the modern native inhabitants of the Mississippi valley. In discoursing on the dress of native women of Louisiana Butel-Dumont says that the young girls wear--

* * * a sort of network attached to the waist and terminating in a point, * * * both sides of which are ornamented with ribbons of thread made from lime-tree fiber, also made into network. From the waist to the knees hang several cords of the same thread, to the ends of which are attached claws of birds of prey, such as eaglets, crows, etc., so that when the girls walk these make a rattling noise which is highly pleasing to them. This kind of ornament does not illy resemble those nets which we use to cover our horses to protect them from flies.[48]

From Du Pratz we have the following:

The women make also designs in embroidery with the skin of the porcupine; they remove for this purpose the skin of this animal, which is white and black; they split it very fine to use as embroidery thread, dye a part of the white skin a red color, another part yellow, and a third part is left white; they usually work on black skin, and dye the black a reddish brown; but if they work on bark, the black [threads] remain the same. Their designs are very similar to some of those found in Gothic architecture; they are composed of straight lines which form right angles at their conjunction, which is commonly called the corner of a square. They also work similar designs on mantles and coverings which they make with the bark of the mulberry tree.[49]

John Smith testifies to the same practices in Virginia as shown in the following lines:

For their apparell, they are sometimes covered with the skinnes of wilde beasts, which in Winter are dressed with the hayre, but in Sommer without. The better sort use large mantels of Deare skins, not much differing in fas.h.i.+on from the Irish mantels. Some imbrodered with white beads, some with Copper, other painted after their manner. * * * We haue seene some use mantels made of Turky feathers, so prettily wrought and woven with threads that nothing could be discerned but the feathers.[50]

[26] Travels in North America, Peter Kalm. English translation, London, 1771, vol. II, pp. 131, 132.

[27] Ibid., pp. 148-149.

[28] Hist. de l'Amerique, Sept., vol. III, p. 34.

[29] Hist. Virginia. Richmond, 1819, pp. 132-133.

[30] History of the American Indians. London, 1775, pp. 422, 423.

[31] Narratives of the Career of Hernando de Soto in the Conquest of Florida as told by a Knight of Elvas. Translated by Buckingham Smith. New York, 1866, p. 52.

[32] Ibid., p. 63.

[33] Narratives of the Career of Hernando de Soto in the Conquest of Florida as told by a Knight of Elvas. Translated by Buckingham Smith. New York, 1866, p. 160-70.

[34] Ibid., p. 164.

[35] Hist. Louisiana, op. cit., vol. II, p. 23.

[36] Memoirs of a captive among the Indians of North America, John D. Hunter. London, 1823, pp. 289-290.

[37] Hist. of Carolina, John Lawson. London, 1714; reprint, Raleigh, N. C., 1800, pp. 293-294.

[38] Histoire de l'Amerique Septentrionale, Bacqueville de la Potherie, vol. III, pp. 33-34.

[39] Ibid., vol. II, pp. 60-61.

[40] Ibid., vol. II, p. 80.

[41] Histoire de la Louisiane, vol. II, pp. 179-180.

[42] The Textile Art, W. H. Holmes, p. 231.

[43] Hist. Virginia, John Smith. Richmond, 1819, vol. I, p.