The ceremony is held in a large cabin in winter and in summer in an open field. The place being chosen, it is surrounded with branches to shade the company. In the center is spread a large mat of canes dyed in various colors, which serves as a carpet.[23] Frequent mention is made of the use of mats in burial. Two brief extracts will serve to illustrate this use. Butel-Dumont makes the following statement regarding tribes of the lower Mississippi: The Paskagoulas and Billoxis do not inter their chief when he dies, but they dry the corpse with fire and smoke in such a way that it becomes a mere skeleton. After it is reduced to this state they carry it to the temple (for they have one as well as the Natchez) and put it in the place of its predecessor, which they take from the spot it occupied and place it with the bodies of the other chiefs at the bottom of the temple, where they are arranged one after the other, standing upright like statues. As for the newly deceased, he is exposed at the entrance of the temple on a sort of altar or table made of cane and covered with a fine mat very neatly worked in red and yellow squares with the skin of the canes.[24] Brackenridge[25] says that a few years ago, in the state of Tennessee, "Two human bodies were found in a copperas cave in a surprising state of preservation. They were first wrapped up in a kind of blanket, supposed to have been manufactured of the lint of nettles, afterwards with dressed skins, and then a mat of nearly 60 yards in length." [17] A Brief and True account of the New Found Land of Virginia, Thomas Hariot, p. 24. [18] A Brief and True account of the New Found Land of Virginia, Thomas Hariot, p. 137. [19] William Bartram's Travels, etc. London, 1792, p. 302. [20] Joutel, in B. F. French's Historical Collections of Louisiana. New York, 1846, p. 149. [21] Hist. de l'Amer. Sept., Bacqueville de la Potherie. Paris, 1722, vol. III. Plate opposite p. 24. [22] Hist. Louisiana, Du Pratz. English translation. London, 1763, vol. II, p. 227. [23] Hist. de l'Amer. Sept., vol. II, p. 17. [24] Mem. sur la Louisiane, vol. I, pp. 240-241. [25] Views of Louisiana, H. M. Brackenridge, 1817, p. 178. PLIABLE FABRICS. DEVELOPMENT OF SPINNING AND WEAVING.