The Seminole Indians of Florida | Page 3

8| 9|112|96|208 {|
+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+----+--+--+---+--+---- {|22 | 25 | 19 | 30 |
33 | 84 | 17 | 208 |
--------------+---+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+--+----+--+--+---+--+----

a One mixed blood. b One black.
Or, for the whole tribe--
Males under 10 years of age 21 Males between 10 and 20 years of age
45 Males between 20 and 60 years of age 38 Males over 60 years of
age 8 -- 112 Females under 10 years of age 23 Females between 10 and
20 years of age 18 Females between 20 and 60 years of age 46 Females
over 60 years of age 9 -- 96 --- 208
In this table it will be noticed that the total population consists of 112
males and 96 females, an excess of males over females of 16. This
excess appears in each of the settlements, excepting that of Fish Eating
Creek, a fact the more noteworthy, from its relation to the future of the
tribe, since polygamous, or certainly duogamous, marriage generally
prevails as a tribal custom, at least at the Miami River and the Cat Fish
Lake settlements. It will also be observed that between twenty and sixty
years of age, or the ordinary range of married life, there are 38 men and
46 women; or, if the women above fifteen years of age are included as
wives for the men over twenty years of age, there are 38 men and 56
women. Now, almost all these 56 women are the wives of the 38 men.
Notice, however, the manner in which the children of these people are
separated in sex. At present there are, under twenty years of age, 66
boys, and, under fifteen years of age, but 31 girls; or, setting aside the
12 boys who are under five years of age, there are, as future possible
husbands and wives, 54 boys between five and twenty years of age and
31 girls under fifteen years of age--an excess of 23 boys. For a
polygamous society, this excess in the number of the male sex certainly
presents a puzzling problem. The statement I had from some cattlemen
in mid-Florida I have thus found true, namely, that the Seminole are
producing more men than women. What bearing this peculiarity will
have upon the future of these Indians can only be guessed at. It is
beyond question, however, that the tribe is increasing in numbers, and
increasing in the manner above described.
There is no reason why the tribe should not increase, and increase
rapidly, if the growth in numbers be not checked by the non-birth of
females. The Seminole have not been at war for more than twenty years.

Their numbers are not affected by the attacks of wild animals or
noxious reptiles. They are not subject to devastating diseases. But once
during the last twenty years, as far as I could learn, has anything like an
epidemic afflicted them. Besides, at all the settlements except the
northernmost, the one at Cat Fish Lake, there is an abundance of food,
both animal and vegetable, easily obtained and easily prepared for
eating. The climate in which these Indians live is warm and equable
throughout the year. They consequently do not need much clothing or
shelter. They are not what would be called intemperate, nor are they
licentious. The "sprees" in which they indulge when they make their
visits to the white man's settlements are too infrequent to warrant us in
classing them as intemperate. Their sexual morality is a matter of
common notoriety. The white half-breed does not exist among the
Florida Seminole, and nowhere could I learn that the Seminole woman
is other than virtuous and modest. The birth of a white half-breed
would be followed by the death of the Indian mother at the hands of her
own people. The only persons of mixed breed among them are children
of Indian fathers by negresses who have been adopted into the tribe.
Thus health, climate, food, and personal habits apparently conduce to
an increase in numbers. The only explanation I can suggest of the fact
that there are at present but 208 Seminole in Florida is that at the close
of the last war which the United States Government waged on these
Indians there were by no means so many of them left in the State as is
popularly supposed. As it is, there are now but 17 persons of the tribe
over sixty years of age, and no unusual mortality has occurred,
certainly among the adults, during the last twenty years. Of the 84
persons between twenty and sixty years of age, the larger number are
less than forty years old; and under twenty years of age there are 107
persons, or more than half the whole population. The population tables
of the Florida Indians present, therefore, some