USA > Pennsylvania > Northampton County > History of Northampton County [Pennsylvania] and the grand valley of the Lehigh, Volume I > Part 3
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The Delawares were noted as lovers of fancy dress; the married men took care that their wives adorned themselves in a proper manner. The men paid particular attention to the dress of the women, and on that account clothed themselves more scantily. The dress which peculiarly distinguished the women was a petticoat made of a piece of cloth about two yards long, fastened tight about the hips, and hanging down a little below the knees; this they wore day and night. Their holiday dress was either blue or red, hung all around with red, blue and yellow ribbons. Most women of rank wore a fine white linen shirt with a red collar, reaching from their necks nearly to the knees. Others wore shirts of printed cotton of various colors, decorated at the breast with a great number of buckles, which were also used by some as ornaments upon their petticoats.
The Delaware women folded their hair and tied it round with a piece of cloth ; some tied it behind them, rolled it up, and wrapped it with a skin of the rattlesnake. They never painted their faces, except a small round spot on each cheek, also red on their eyelids and top of the forehead.
For their dwellings a site well watered and containing plenty of wood was selected, and in close proximity to a low and rich soil for the raising of corn. The villages therefore were generally situated near a lake, river or creek, yet sufficiently elevated to escape the danger of inundation during periods of high water. The huts were made of bark, lined with rushes and covered with either bark, rushes or long reed grass, but for some ycars prior to their emigration to the west, log huts were much in evidence. The Indian hut was built in the following manner: they pceled trecs abounding in sap, then by cutting the bark into pieces of two or three yards in length. They laid heavy stones upon them, so they would become flat and even in drying; the frame of the hut was made by driving poles into the ground, and strengthened by cross-beams. This framework then was covered both inside and out with the bark, fastened very tight with twigs of hickory; the roof came to a point and was covered in the same manner. There was an
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opening at the extreme apex of the roof to let out smoke, and one in the side for an entrance. The door was made of a large selected piece of bark, and had neither lock nor hinges; a stick leaning on the outside was a sign that nobody was at home. All around the building were small openings with sliding shutters. There were no regular plans made for the village, but everyone built according to his own fancy; the Delawares were never known to have very large towns.
The same blanket that clothed them through the day served as a cover- ing for the night; the bed was made of bear skins or twigs. The stock of provisions and other necessaries were hung upon a pole fixed across the top of the hut, within easy reach.
Prior to the advent of the European, the Indian kindled a fire by twirling a dry stick very rapidly upon a dry board, using both hands. Their knives were made of thin flint, in a long, triangular shape, the long sides being sharpened at the edge and fastened to a wooden handle. These, how- ever, were not used for heavy work, such as the felling of trees, but only to peel them, and for warfare. They had a very ingenious manner of fasten- ing the handle to their stone hatchets; they would select the stone and a young sapling, split the latter sufficiently to admit of the stone, then fasten it securely in place, bind the sapling above and below the hatchet, cover with clay, then left to grow securely around the groove of the stone, when the sapling would be cut down and shaped satisfactorily as a handle. This process required from one to two years to complete a hatchet, but they were everlasting. Their pots and boilers were made of clay, mixed with pounded seashells and burned so hard that they were black throughout.
However, the Fork Indians in the white man's time were using the same implements and utensils as their white neighbors; formerly this outfit consisted of kettle, spoon and dish. Each would use the same spoon when eating, or most generally discard the spoon, and all ate from the same dish. Cleanliness was not common among them; dishes and spoons were never washed but left for the dogs to lick clean.
When they had no axes but those made of stone, they used to kindle a fire around a large tree and burn it so long that the tree would fall, then apply fire at certain distances apart and thus divided them into smaller pieces for use. The Indian kept a constant fire burning in his hut, and consumed much wood, also destroyed carelessly considerable more, which compelled him to move his town to other places, for he always disliked the carrying of firewood from any distance.
The Delawares married early in life, the men at eighteen and the women at fourteen. When an Indian wished to marry he first sent a present of blankets, cloth, linen and a few belts of wampum, according to his wealth, to the nearest relative of the person he had fixed upon. If they happened to be pleased, both with the present and with the character of the suitor, they proposed the matter to the girl, who generally decided agreeably to the wish of her parents and relations, and was afterward led to the dwelling of the bridegroom without further ceremony. But if the other party wished to decline the proposal, the presents were returned by way of a friendly neigh- bor. After the marriage the presents made by the suitor were divided
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amongst the friends of the bride. These returned the civility by a present of Indian corn, beans, kettles, dishes, spoons, baskets, hatchets and other useful articles brought in solemn procession into the hut of the newly mar- ried couple. The housekeeping of the Delawares was to a great extent better than among all other North American nations. A Delaware Indian hunted and fished, provided meat for the household, kept his wife and chil- dren in clothing, built and repaired the hut, made fences around the planta- tion. The wife cooked the victuals, brought firewood and labored in the field or garden. Occasionally the husband would assist in field work, but in managing the affairs of the family the husband left the whole to his wife, and never interfered in things committed to her. She cooked meals twice a day ; if she neglected to do it in proper time, or even altogether, the husband never said a word, but would go to some friend, being assured that he would find something to eat there. If the wife desired meat, he went out early in the morning without eating, and seldom returned minus some game. When he returned with a deer he dropped it in front of the door, walked in, said nothing; but his wife, who heard him lay down his burden, gave him something to eat, dried his clothes, then went out and brought in the game. She was then entitled to do with it what she pleased; he said nothing if she chose to give the greatest and best part away to friends. This giving to friends was a very common practice among all Indians. Whatever the husband got by hunting belonged to the wife, therefore as soon as he brought the skins and meat home he considered them the property abso- lutely of the wife. On the other hand, whatever the wife reaped from the garden and plantation belonged to the husband, from which she had to provide him with the necessary food, both at home and abroad. Some men would keep the skins and purchase clothes for the wives and children. The cows belonged to the wife, but the horses to the husband, who generally made his wife a present of the finest one for her own use. The children were always considered as the property of the wife. If a divorce occurred, they all followed her; those grown up could, if they chose, go with the father. Both parties were very desirous of maintaining the love of their children, as shown by their conduct toward them, never opposing their incli- nation, so they would not lose their affection. Education was somewhat neg- lected, consequently the children had their own way generally. The parents were very careful not to beat or chastise them for any fault, fearing lest the children might remember it and revenge themselves on some future occasion. Yet many wellbred children were found among them who paid great atten- tion and respect to their parents and were civil to strangers. Very little attention was bestowed upon the dress of their children, and boys went naked until about six or seven years of age. The father generally named the child when it reached the age of six years, which was done with great ceremony, but if it was left to the mother to name, the ceremony was omitted. She would call the name after what struck her as peculiar. as beautiful ; if they did not love the child they would choose a disagreeable name.
As the girls grew up the mothers endeavored to instruct them in all kinds of work, first taking them as assistants in the housekeeping and by
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degrees making them acquainted with every part of a woman's business. But the boys were never obliged to do anything; they would loiter about, live as they pleased and follow their own faneies. If they did mischief to others they were gently reproved, and the parents would prefer to pay twice or three times over for any damage done than punish them for it. They were destined for hunters and warriors; they exercised themselves very early with bows and arrows, and in shooting at a mark. As they grew up they acquired a remarkable dexterity in shooting birds, squirrels and small game. When the parents saw their children provided for, or able to provide for themselves, they no longer cared for their support; they never thought of saving a good inheritance for them. Every Indian knew that whatever he would leave at his death would be divided among his friends. If a woman became a widow, the relations of the deceased took everything belonging to him, and gave to their friends. Thus the children had no more claim upon any inheritance than the widow and other near relatives. But if a dying Indian left his gun or any other pieces of his furniture to a par- ticular friend, the legatee was immediately put into possession of it, so no one would dispute his right thereto.
Whatever the husband gave to his wife during her lifetime remained her property. Therefore, married persons held very little in common, for otherwise the wife, after her husband's death, would be left destitute, and the husband would lose all when his wife died. According to an ancient rule the widow was not to remarry within a year after her husband's death, furthermore was compelled to live by her own industry, and often suffered in consequence. She was prevented from buying meat, owing to a supersti- tious fear of the seller failing in his luck to shoot straight in the future. As soon as the first year of her widowhood was past, the friends of her deceased husband clothed and provided for her and her children; they also proposed another husband, or at least told her that she was now at liberty to choose for herself; but if she had not attended to the prescribed rule but married within the year, they never troubled themselves about her again. The same rule was observed with respect to the widower by the friends of his deceased wife, for they still considered him as belonging to their family. The family connections often became very extensive, owing to frequent marriages or changing of wives.
The Delawares always cooked their meat, but never used salt. They were never known to eat meat raw; in roasting meat they fastened it to a stick made of hard wood and held it before the fire. They were also fond of mussels and oysters, and could subsist for weeks on them; land turtles were also a luxury, and once a year they would enjoy a feast of loeusts. Of the produets of the soil, corn was their staple product; this they would prepare in twelve different ways: I. They boiled it in the husk till soft and fit to eat. 2. Parboiled it in the husk, then removed the husk; washed and boiled it again until done. 3. Roasted the whole ear in hot ashes, then removed the husk. 4. Pounded it small and then boiled it soft. 5. Ground it fine in a mortar with a pestle, cleared it from the husks, and made a thick pottage of it. 6. Kneaded the flour with cold water and made cakes about the size of a hand and about one inch thick; these they enclosed in leaves
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and baked in hot ashes. 7. Mixed dried berries with the flour to give the cakes a better relish. 8. Chopped roasted or dried deerflesh, or smoked eels into small pieces and boiled them with corn. 9. They boiled the grits made of it with fresh meat, and this was one of the most common meals with which they ate the bread described above. 10. They roasted the corn in hot ashes till it became thoroughly brown; then they pounded it to flour, mixed it with sugar, and pressed it down forcibly into a bag; this was a delicacy. II. They took the corn before it was ripe and let it swell in boiling water, then dried and laid it by for future use. The white people purchased it in this form from the Indians and made soup of it, or soaked it again, then used it with oil and vinegar ; this they found a very palatable salad. 12. They roasted the whole ear when grown but still full of juice; this was a well flavored dish, but wasted much corn in producing it. They also cultivated the peanut; these they would eat after boiling them thoroughly. The com- mon bean was also grown and cooked with bear meat. The common white potato was one of their products; it was among the Delawares that Sir Walter Raleigh discovered the tuber and introduced it into Europe. They had four kinds of pumpkins and two kinds of melons. Parsnips, turnips, cabbage and some other roots grew wild and needed but little attention in their cultivation; a bread was made from the parsnips.
They preserved their crops through the winter in round holes in the ground, lined and covered with dry leaves and grass; they commonly kept the situation of these magazines very secret, knowing that if they were discovered it would be necessary to supply the wants of every needy neigh- bor as long as there was a supply left. This might occasion a famine, for some were so lazy that they would not plant at all, knowing that the more industrious could not refuse to divide their store with them. The industri- ous therefore, not being able to enjoy more from their labor than the idle, by degrees contracted their plantations. If the winter happened to be severe and the snow prevented them from hunting, a general famine ensued, by which many died; they were then driven by hunger to dress and eat the roots of grass or the inner bark of trees, especially of young oaks.
Wild fruits grew in abundance, and strawberries were large and very abundant; these they used baked in a mixture of flour and water. Goose- berries, black currants, blackberries, raspberries and bilberries grew in plenty ; two kinds of cranberries were the varieties that grew on low bushes. The chokeberry, mulberry on trees, along with the wild cherry, were given over to the wild turkey. The grapes were left to the bears. The common black cherry was a delicacy, and these they dried both with and without the stone. There were plums, both red and green; peaches, crab-apples, all the nuts common at the present time; but the tree that was the most esteemed was the maple, from which they extracted sugar. Sugar boiling was the employ- ment of the women; they would extract about eight pounds of sugar and as many more of treacle from one tree. Tobacco was cultivated among them. and for smoking they used it with dried leaves of the sumac or bark of the red willow sprouts; very often they mixed it with the leaves of the drywood, or for variety all three would be used in connection with the narcotic leaf. The Indian was an insistent smoker. The common drink of NORTH .- 1-2.
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the Indians at their meals was nothing but the broth of the meat they had boiled or spring water, but they prepared a liquor of dried bilberries, sugar and water. The taste was very agreeable to them, and when rum was introduced they found it very intoxicating and also very strong. They soon overcame this objection by adding wild cherries and doubling with water, so as to increase the quantity and also the delights of intoxication.
The common season for hunting generally began in September for deer and buffalo; from January to May was the best season for bear. The beaver was hunted all the year around on account of the value of its skin. Next to hunting, the Indian loved to fish, and he was seldom without a fishhook. Little boys waded in shallow water and shot fish with bow and arrow, but the great fishing season was March, when the shad was moving upward in the stream. They formed parties, and each party would select a section of the river where it was shallow and proceed to build a dam of stones across the stream, not in a straight line but in two parts, verging toward each other in an angle. An opening was left in the middle for the water to run off. At this opening they placed a large box, the bottom of which was full of holes; a rope of the twigs of the wild vine was made, reaching across the stream, upon which boughs of about six feet in length were fastened at the distance of about two fathoms from each other. A party would then proceed about a mile above the dam with this rope and its appendages and begin moving gently down the current, some guiding one, some the opposite end, while others kept the branches from sinking with wooden forks. Thus they proceeded, frightening the fishes into the opening left in the middle of the dam, where a number of Indians were placed on each side, drove the fish with poles and a hideous noise through the opening into the box. Here they would lie, the water running off through the holes in the bottom, Indians on each of the box would spear them and fill the canoes and convey them to the shore; it was only a few hours' work to catch a thousand fish.
The goods sold to the Indians by the European traders consisted of the following articles : Cloth, linen, readymade shirts, blankets, cottons, calicoes, thread, worsted and silk lace, powder and shot, guns, wampum, knives, wire, brass kettles, silver and other buttons, buckles, bracelets, thimbles, needles, rings, looking-glasses, combs, hatchets and all kinds of tools. For these they exchanged deer, beaver, otter, racoon, fox, wildcat and other skins. Most goods in trade had a fixed price, yet an Indian had often been tempted to purchase an article at a very exorbitant price; but if in a short time he should repent of his bargain he was likely to return it, and the fixed price repaid. It was a difficult matter for an Indian to deceive a trader, but they were greatly pleased if they could deprive a trader of his goods; they were also fond of buying upon credit, promising to pay when returned from hunting, and on their return, if they found other traders in the country, they bartered with them, and troubled themselves no longer about their creditors; if the latter reminded them of their debts they were easily offended, for the paying of old debts seemed to them to be giving away their goods for nothing. The most ruinous part of the Indian trade was the use of rum; in peace, and especially about the time of their annual sacrifices, the dealers in rum infested the country, contrary to the established law, abusing the
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simplicity of the Indians, all for gain. An Indian, when once having suc- cumbed to drink, would sell all he possessed, for nothing is so useful or precious which he would not part with for rum. The traders' method of inducing the Indians to drink against his will is fully illustrated here: A dealer in rum placed himself upon a spot of ground where many Indians were assembled, with a small barrel, into which he had put a straw, invited any one to come and taste some through the straw; an Indian man ap- proached with pensive mien and slow steps, but suddenly turning about, ran away, soon returned again and did the same thing, but the third time he suffered the trader to induce him to taste a little. He had hardly tasted it before he began to barter all the wampum he had for a dram; after this he parted with everything he had, even his gun and the blanket he wore, to purchase more.
They were generally moved to sorrow and regret after recovery from their drunken stupors for the loss of their property, and would petition the European authorities to prohibit traders from selling rum, but all legislation on the traffic, the repeated resolution and order of their own chiefs and captains prohibiting the use of it, failed to prevent the evil. The reason advanced why the Indians were so fond of strong drink was their living almost entirely on fresh meats and green vegetables, such as corn, pumpkins, squashes, potatoes, cucumbers, which caused a longing in their stomachs for some seasoning, as they seldom if ever used salt. They were eager for any acid substance; vinegar they would drink in large quantities; they thought nothing of going thirty or forty miles for cranberries, whether in season or not, crab-apples, wild grapes, and the bitter bark of trees.
The Indians were very sensible of the state of degradation to which they had been brought by the abuse of strong liquors, and whenever they spoke of it they never failed to reproach the whites for having enticed them into that vicious habit. The traders would endeavor to shift the blame from themselves in order to fix it upon the poor, deluded Indians. The following anecdote fully illustrates the situation : Some years after the Moravians had made their settlement in the Forks, an Indian from a distance having come to Bethlehem with his sons to dispose of his peltry, was accosted by a trader from a neighboring settlement who addressed him thus: "Well, Thomas, I really believe you have turned Moravian." "Moravian," answered the Indian, "what makes you think so?" "Because," replied the other, "you used to come to us to sell your skins and peltry, and now you trade them away to the Moravians." "So," rejoined the Indian, "now I understand you well, and I know what you mean to say. Now hear me. See, my friend, when I come to this place with my skins and peltry to trade, the people are kind, they give me plenty of good victuals to eat and pay me in money or what- ever I want, and no one says a word to me about drinking rum, neither do I ask for it. When I come to your place with my peltry all call to me, 'Come, Thomas, here's rum, drink heartily, drink! It will not hurt you!' All this is done for the purpose of cheating me. When you have obtained from me all you want, you call me a drunken dog and kick me out of the room. See, this is the manner in which you cheat the Indians when they come to trade with you, so now you know when you see me coming to
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your place again, you may say to one another: 'Ah, there is Thomas coming again ! He is no longer a Moravian, for he is now coming to us to be made drunk, to be cheated, to be kicked out of the house and be called a drunken dog!'"
The Delawares never took bread of Indian corn for a long journey, for in summer it would spoil in three days and be unfit to eat, but they took the flour of the Indian corn; this they mixed with sugar and water, or ate the flour dry; meat they could obtain on the way. Prior to the white man's arrival, they would carry with them when traveling a fire lighter; this was made of the pith of the elder or other pithy woods; this was kept afire until they returned. This method became obsolete after the introduction of the flint and steel. They were never in a great hurry when traveling, as they always felt at home in the forests; always fond of sleeping late in the morn- ing, then lingering around, eating a hearty meal, and examining their clothes, which nearly always needed mending; this had to be attended to before proceeding on the day's journey, but when they once started they seldom stopped until sunset, when they would look for some convenient place for the night's lodging. If it was rainy they would build a shelter by peeling bark from the trees and placing it overhead on posts stuck in the ground. When they reached a river that had swollen so that a European would think it impossible to cross even in a boat, these Indians would swim it without any hesitancy.
When at home, they amused themselves with diversions of various kinds, in which the women joined them as much as their time would permit. Danc- ing was the most favorite amusement; all solemn meetings were celebrated with a dance, and seldom did a night pass without some kind of a dance. The common dance was held either in the largest houses or on the outside around a fire. In dancing they formed a circle, and always had a leader, whom the whole company followed; the men went before, and the women closed the circle. The latter danced with great decency, as if engaged in the most serious business; they never spoke a word to the men, much less joke with them; this would injure their character. They would neither jump or skip, moved one foot lightly forward and then backward, yet so as to ad- vance until they reached a certain spot and then retired in the same manner. They kept their bodies straight and their arms close to their sides; the men would shout, leap and stamp with such violence that the ground trembled under their feet. Their extreme agility and lightness of foot were never displayed to greater advantage than in dancing. The whole music consisted of a single drum ; this was made of an old barrel or kettle, or the stump of a tree covered with a thin deer skin and beaten with a stick; its sound was very disagreeable and served only to keep time, which the Indians when dancing even in the greatest numbers kept with due exactness. There were various dances for various occasions ; some for the men only, others for the women only, but the one dance that the white people were best pleased to behold was what they called their dance of peace or calumet or pipe dance. This was in quite a contrast from the one just described, and is only by the men, when the old were supposed to also take part to make it unanimous. The dancers joined hands and leaped in a ring for some time; suddenly the
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