ing.]

[Illustration: FIG. 6.--Analysis of the weaving of fringed skirt. Threads
natural size.]

The two pieces just described would seem to correspond pretty closely
with the garments formerly worn by women and girls of the lower
Mississippi country, as illustrated by Du Pratz in a plate facing page
310, volume II, of his Histoire de la Louisiane. His plate is reproduced
in figure 7. The following are translations of his descriptions of the
garments delineated:

The women in warm weather have only a half ell of limbourg,
with which they are covered; they fold this cloth around the
body and are well clothed from the waist to the knees; when
they have no limbourg they use in the same way a deer
skin.[54].

When the girls reach the age of eight or nine years they are
clothed from the waist to the ankles with a fringe of threads
of mulberry bark, fastened to a band

[Illustration: BUREAU OF ETHNOLOGY THIRTEENTH ANNUAL REPORT PL. IV
FRINGED SKIRT.]

which is attached below the abdomen; there is also another
band above the abdomen which meets the first at the back;
between the two the body is covered in front by a network
which is held there by the bands, and at the back there are
merely two large cords, each having a tassel.[55]

[Illustration: FIG. 7.--Former costumes of woman and girl in Louisiana
(after Du Pratz).]

Of equal interest to the preceding is the badly frayed bag shown in
plate V. It is 20 inches in length and 13 inches in depth. The style of
weaving is the same as that of the two preceding examples; a peculiar
open effect is produced by the rotting out of certain strands of dark
color, which were arranged in pairs alternating with eight lighter
threads. The construction of the border or rim of this bag is quite
remarkable. As shown in figure 8, the upper ends of the vertical

strands are gathered in slightly twisted groups of four and carried up
free for about two inches, when they are brought together and plaited
with remarkable neatness into a string border. As if to convey to the
curious investigator of modern times a complete knowledge of their
weavers' art, the friends of the dead deposited with the body not only
the fabrics worn during life but a number of skeins of the fiber from
which the fabrics were probably made. This fiber has been identified as
that of the _Cannabis sativa_, or wild hemp. Two of the skeins are shown
in plate V.

T