[Illustration: “BANNER-STONE,” TENNESSEE] CHAPTER XII WORKS AND AGRICULTURE For a long time it was believed by the whites that the “Indians” were incapable of doing anything beyond weaving baskets, and from this condition of ignorance much of the confusion concerning the Amerinds has arisen. The line of reasoning was based on some such syllogism as this: The “Indian” never worked; The Cliff-dweller and the Moundbuilder worked at building houses and mounds; Conclusion, The Cliff-dweller and the Moundbuilder were not “Indians.” Short, in his excellent book on the Amerinds,[296] applies unfortunately this method of reasoning to the copper-mine workers of the Lake Superior district, saying: “The labour involved in a journey of a thousand miles from the Ohio valley to the copper regions, the toil of the summer’s mining, and the tedious transportation of the metal to their homes upon their backs, and by means of an imperfect system of navigation, indicates either industry and resolution such as no savage Indian ever possessed, or a condition of servitude in which thousands occupied a position of abject slavery.” This seems a complete misunderstanding of the people and conditions existing on this continent. Without consuming space in discussing these errors, I think my preceding pages have demonstrated that far from lacking industry and resolution, the “savage Indian” was applying himself in his way to a solution of the life problems which surrounded him. He knew nothing of the rules of commerce, book-keeping, and exchange, but there are other things in the world besides figures and accounts. The Amerind’s game-supply and clothing, and the soil about him, were not overtaxed, at least not north of Anahuac, till the whites arrived with their mania for “killing something,” and introduced on this continent the destructive practice of hunting for the fun of seeing how many animals could be killed in a certain time; or of killing for a special part of an animal, as for the tongues, or the hides and tallow, of the bison. When I first went to the Far West bison were spread over the plains by thousands. Not a single specimen can to-day be found alive outside of some private herd or the Yellowstone Park. Hunting, as before mentioned, was with the Amerind labour, not amusement, but in conjunction with their hunting most tribes carried on farming operations. It has often been asserted that the “Indian” did no work, even leaving the cultivation of the corn and squashes to the women. That the women in some of the tribes tended the crops, is true, but in others, like the Pueblos, they seldom or never touched hoe or spade. The Eastern men were hunting or building boats, or were on the warpath, hence it was necessary for the women to look after the fields.