Page:Firemaking Apparatus in the U.S. National Museum.djvu/67

 FIRE-MAKING APPARATUS. 579 flint was pressed ligainst the rapidly revolving wheel and a shower of sparks fell into the tinder. The tinder pistol, whose name suggests its use, was another device.* Other devices were intended to be carried in the pocket, and were probably brought out by the introduction of tobacco and the need of smokers for a convenient light. The pocket strike-alight is still used. The one shown (fig. 50) was bought in 1888 by Mr. E. Lovett, at Boulogne-sur-mer. They are still Fig. 50. Strikk-a-ught (Briquet). (Cat. No 12H693, U S. N. M. Boulogne-sur-mer. France. Collected by Kdward Lovett. ) used by the peasants and work-people of France. An old specimen in the Museum of this character is from Lima. The roll of tinder, or Among many of our North American tribes the flint and steel super- seded the wooden drills as eftectually as did the iron points the stone arrowheads. Some of these tribes were ripe for the introduction of many modern contrivances. Civilized methods of fire-lighting appealed to them at once. Among the Ohukchis, Nordeuskiold says, matches had the honor of being the first of the inventions of the civilized races that have been recognized as superior to their own.t It was so among our Indian tribes ; the Mandan chief '* Four Bears " lighted his pipe by means of a flint and steel taken from his pouch when George Oatlin visited him in 1832.1 The Otoes (Siouan stock) made use of the flint and steel shown in fig. 51. The flint is a chipped piece of gray chert, probably an ancient implement picked up from the surface. The steel is a very neatly made oval, resembling those of the Albanian strike-a-lights,§ or the Koordish pattern, ( fig. 54). Here arises one of the perplexities of modern intercourse, perhaps both of these steels were derived from the same commercial center. Society of Arts, Edinburgh, xii., part i, p. 96. f Nordeuskiold.— Voyage of the Fega. u, p. 122. I The George Catlin Indian Gallery. Smithsonian Report. 1885. h, p. 45^^ $ Sep figure in Jour, Antil^rop. Inst, Grreat Britain, XVI, 1886, p. 67.
 * match," is made of the soft inner bark of a tree.
 * See figure in D. Bruce Peebles's address on Illumination, in Trans. Roy. Scottish