3917. INDIANS, Fire-hunting by.—
You ask if the usage of hunting in circles has
ever been known among any of our tribes of
Indians? It has been practiced by them all;
and is to this day, by those still remote from
the settlements of the whites. But their numbers
and enabling them like Genghis Khan's
seven hundred thousand, to form themselves
into circles of one hundred miles diameter,
they make their circle by firing the leaves fallen
on the ground, which gradually forcing the
animals to a centre, they there slaughter them
with arrows, darts and other missiles.—
To John Adams. Washington ed. vi, 122.
(M.
1813)
