ion: Fig. 70. Koonti pestles.]

The first step in the process was to reduce the washed Koonti to a kind
of pulp. This was done by chopping it into small pieces and filling with
it one of the mortars and pounding it with a pestle. The contents of the
mortar were then laid upon a small platform. Each worker had a platform.
When a sufficient quantity of the root had been pounded the whole mass
was taken to the creek near by and thoroughly saturated with water in a
vessel made of bark.

[Illustration: Fig. 71. Koonti mash vessel.]

The pulp was then washed in a straining cloth, the starch of the Koonti
draining into a deer hide suspended below.

[Illustration: Fig. 72. Koonti strainer.]

When the starch had been thoroughly washed from the mass the latter was
thrown away, and the starchy sediment in the water in the deerskin left
to ferment. After some days the sediment was taken from the water and
spread upon palmetto leaves to dry. When dried, it was a yellowish white
flour, ready for use. In the factory at Miami substantially this process
is followed, the chief variation from it being that the Koonti is passed
through several successive fermentations, thereby making it purer and
whiter than the Indian product. Improved appliances for the manufacture
are used by the white man.

The Koonti bread, as I saw it among the Indians, was of a bright orange
color, and rather insipid, though not unpleasant to the taste. It was
saltless. Its yellow color was owing to the fact that the flour had had
but one fermentation.

Industrial Statistics.

The following is a summary of the results of the industries now engaged
in by the Florida Indians. It shows what is approximately true of these
at the present time:

Acres under cultivation 100
Corn raised bushels 500
Sugarcane gallons 1,500
Cattle number owned 50
Swine do. 1,000
Chickens do. 500
Horses do. 35
Koonti bushels 5,000
Sweet potatoes do. ...
Melons number 3,000

Arts.

Industrial Arts.

In reference to the way in which, the Seminole Indians have met
necessities for invention and have expressed the artistic impulse,
I found little to add to what I have already placed on record.

_Ut