In a great measure this same story of The Indians’ food supply was told by the scattered bits found mingled with the ashes of an ancient hearth. Such fireplaces or cooking sites were simple in construction, but none the less readily recognized as to their purpose. A few flat pebbles had been brought from the bed of the river near by, and a small paved area some two feet square was placed upon or very near the surface of the ground. Upon this the fire was built, and in time a thick bed of ashes accumulated. Just how they cooked can only be conjectured, but the discovery of very thick clay vessels and great quantities of fire-cracked quartzite pebbles leads to the conclusion that water was brought to the boiling-point by heating the stones to a red heat and dropping them into the vessel holding the water. Thomas, as we have seen, says corn was “boyl’d with Water.” Meat also was, I think, prepared in the same manner. Their pottery probably was poorly able to stand this harsh treatment, which would explain the presence of such vast quantities of fragments of clay vessels. Traces of vegetable food are now very rarely found. A few burnt nuts, a grain or two of corn, and, in one instance, what appeared to be a charred crab-apple, complete the list of what, as yet, have been picked from the mingled earth and ashes. This is not surprising, and what we know of vegetable food in use among the Delaware Indians is almost wholly derived from those early writers who were present at their feasts. Kalm mentions the roots of the golden-club, arrow-leaf, and ground-nut, besides various berries and nuts. It is well known that extensive orchards were planted by these people. It may be added that, in all probability, the tubers of that noble plant, the lotus, were used as food. Not about these meadows, but elsewhere in New Jersey, this plant has been growing luxuriantly since Indian times. Turning now to the consideration of what animal food they consumed, one can speak with absolute certainty. It is clear that the Delawares were meat-eaters. It needs but little digging on any village site to prove this, and from a single fireplace deep down in the stiff soil of this sinking meadow have been taken bones of the elk, deer, bear, beaver, raccoon, musk-rat, and gray squirrel. Of these, the remains of deer were largely in excess, and as this holds good of every village site I have examined, doubtless the Indians depended more largely upon this animal than upon all the others. Of the list, only the elk is extinct in the Delaware Valley, and it was probably rare even at the time of the European settlement of the country, except in the mountain regions. If individual tastes varied as they do among us, we have certainly sufficient variety here to have met every fancy.