The Seminole Indians of Florida: Fifth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1883-84, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1887, pages 469-532MacCauley, Clay
History
The Seminole Indians of Florida: Fifth Annual Report of the Bureau of Ethnology to the Secretary of the Smithsonian Institution, 1883-84, Government Printing Office, Washington, 1887, pages 469-532
MacCauley, Clay
Seminole Indians -- History; Seminole Indians -- Social life and customs
Read the bill of fare from which the Florida Indians may select, and
compare with that the scanty supplies within reach of the North Carolina
Cherokee or the Lake Superior Chippewa. Here is a list of their meats:
Of flesh, at any time venison, often opossum, sometimes rabbit and
squirrel, occasionally bear, and a land terrapin, called the “gopher,”
and pork whenever they wish it. Of wild fowl, duck, quail, and turkey in
abundance. Of home reared fowl, chickens, more than they are willing to
use. Of fish, they can catch myriads of the many kinds which teem in the
inland waters of Florida, especially of the large bass, called “trout”
by the whites of the State, while on the seashore they can get many
forms of edible marine life, especially turtles and oysters. Equally
well off are these Indians in respect to grains, vegetables, roots,
and fruits. They grow maize in considerable quantity, and from it make
hominy and flour, and all the rice they need they gather from the
swamps. Their vegetables are chiefly sweet potatoes, large and much
praised melons and pumpkins, and, if I may classify it with vegetables,
the tender new growth of the tree called the cabbage palmetto. Among
roots, there is the great dependence of these Indians, the abounding
Koonti; also the wild potato, a small tuber found in black swamp land,
and peanuts in great quantities. Of fruits, the Seminole family may
supply itself with bananas, oranges (sour and sweet), limes, lemons,
guavas, pineapples, grapes (black and red), cocoa nuts, cocoa plums, sea
grapes, and wild plums. And with even this enumeration the bill of fare
is not exhausted. The Seminole, living in a perennial summer, is never
at a loss when he seeks something, and something good, to eat. I have
omitted from the above list honey and the sugar cane juice and sirup,
nor have I referred to the purchases the Indians now and then make from
the white man, of salt pork, wheat flour, coffee, and salt, and of the
various canned delicacies, whose attractive labels catch their eyes.
These Indians are not, of course, particularly provident. I was told,
however, that they are beginning to be ambitious to increase their
little herds of horses and cattle and their numbers of chickens and
swine.
Camp Fire.
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