The Old Eagle went to the mouth of the cave, and cried with a loud voice, "Sketupah!"

"Sketupah," answered the hoarse voice of the Evil Spirit from the hollow cave. Soon Sketupah came, and asked the Old Eagle what he wanted.

"Revenge for our sons, who have been killed by the Walkullas and their friends, who live beyond the Great Lake, and came on the back of a great bird. Revenge we must have."

"Revenge we ask, revenge we must have," said the hoarse voice in the cave.

"Will your master hear us?" asked the Old Eagle of the priest.

"My master must have a sacrifice, he must smell blood," said the ugly old man. "Then we shall know if he will give you revenge. Go in the morning to the woods, and take a wolf, a rattlesnake, and a tortoise, and bring them to me at the mouth of the cave, when the great star of day is coming out of the Suwaney."

The Old Eagle, and the other chiefs and warriors who asked revenge, did as Sketupah bade them. They went to the woods, and took a wolf, a tortoise, and a rattlesnake, and brought them, the wolf growling, the snake hissing, and the tortoise snapping his teeth, to the priest.

He bade them build a fire of pine, and the tree which bears poisonous flowers[A], and the hemlock, and the grape-vine which bears no fruit. They did as he bade them, and made the fire flame high. Then Sketupah prepared the sacrifice. First he skinned the wolf, then he shelled the tortoise. He bound the wolf's skin upon himself with the snake, and with his entrails he fastened the shell of the tortoise upon his head. Then he laid the carcasses of the wolf, and the snake and the tortoise, upon the fire, and danced around it, while he sang to his master the following song:—

Song of Sketupah.

We have slain the beasts:— The hissing snake, with poisonous fangs; The wolf, whose teeth are red with Indian blood; And the creeping tortoise, the dweller in deep fens; We have slain them. Lo! they are laid on hissing coals: Wilt thou come, Spirit of Evil, and claim thine own?

The sons of the Shawanos lie low, Far from the burial-place of their fathers; Red wounds are on their breasts, Cold and stiff are their limbs; Their eyes see not the ways of men, Nor the rising or setting of the great star, Nor the blooming of spring-flowers, Nor the glad glances of young maidens: They sleep in the vale of death.

They fell, and no revenge, No torments of foes, appease them in the land of spirits; No shoutings of brother warriors Gladden their shades; The camp of their nation is mute; They are forgotten by their women; The bright eyes of their maidens Have no tears in them: They sleep forgotten by all.

Shall they have no revenge? Shall we not plant the stake, and bind the fair-one? The beautiful maid, with her hair like bunches of grapes, And her eyes like the blue sky, And her skin white as the blossoms of the forest-tree, And her voice as the music of a little stream? Shall she not be torn with sharp thorns, And burned in fiery flames?

[Footnote A: The Magnolia, whose flowers are said to be poisonous.]

He ceased singing, and listened, but the Evil Spirit answered not. Just as he was going to begin another song, they saw a large ball rolling very fast up the hill towards the spot where they stood. It was the height of a man. When it came up to them it began to unwind itself slowly until at last a little strange-looking man crept out of the ball, which was made of his own hair. He was no higher than my shoulders. One of his feet made a strange track, the like of which the Indians had never seen before. His face was as black as the shell of the butter-nut, or the feathers of the raven, and his eyes as green as grass. And stranger yet was his hair, for it was of the colour of moss, and so long that, as the wind blew it out, it seemed the tail of a fiery star. There he stood, grinning and laughing very loud. "What do you want of me?" he asked Sketupah.

The priest answered, "The Shawanos want revenge. They want to sacrifice the beautiful daughter of the sun, whom the Mad Buffalo has brought from the camp of the Walkullas."

"They shall have their wish," said the Evil Spirit. "She shall be sacrificed. Go and fetch her to the hill."

Then the Old Eagle, and the chiefs and warriors, went to fetch the beautiful maiden to the hill of sacrifice. They found her sitting in her cabin, with the chief warrior watching at her door. He would have fought for her, and had already raised his spear to strike the foremost warrior, when Chenos commanded him to be still; "for," said he, "my master will see that she does not suffer. Before the star of day sets in the Mighty River, the nation of Shawanos shall see whose god is greatest and strongest—Sketupah's, or mine."

Then they built the fire, fixed the stake, and bound the beautiful woman to it. Till now the head warrior had stood still, for he looked that the priest of the Great Spirit should snatch her away from the Evil One. But when he saw her bound to the stake, and the flames beginning to arise, he shouted his war-cry, and rushed upon the priest of the Spirit of Evil. It was in vain; Sketupah's master did but breathe upon the face of the stern warrior, when he fell as though he had stricken him with a blow, and never breathed more. The Evil Spirit then commanded them to seize Chenos.

Then they seized the priest of the Master of Breath, to bind him for the flames. But Chenos shouted aloud, "Come, Master of Life, for the hands of the Evil One are upon me. Come, break my bands, and redeem me from the flames they have kindled for me."

As soon as he had said this, very far over the tall hills, which Indians call the Backbone of the Great Spirit, the people saw two great lights, brighter and larger than stars, moving very fast towards the lands of the Shawanos. One was just as high as the other, and they were both as high as the goat-sucker flies before a thunderstorm. At first they were close together, but as they came nearer they grew wider apart. Soon our people saw, by their twinkling, that they were two eyes, and in a little while the body of a great man, whose head nearly reached the sky(9), came after them. Brothers, the eyes of the Great Spirit always go before him, and hence nothing is hid from his sight. Brothers, I cannot describe the Master of Life as he stood before the warriors of our nation. Can you look steadily on the star of the morning? No. Nor could you look upon the mighty being whom the voice of Chenos in distress had called from beyond the River of Rivers. When you tried to do so, you were dazzled with his brightness, and turned away your eyes to look upon trees and streams.

When the Evil Spirit saw the Spirit of Good coming, he began to grow in stature, and continued swelling until he was as tall and big as he. When the Spirit of Good came near, and saw how the Evil Spirit had grown, and that he had thrown away the calumet of peace, he stopped, and, looking very angrily at the Evil Spirit, said, with a voice that shook the very hills, "You lied."

"I did not," answered the Evil Spirit.

"You did. You promised to stay among the white people, and the nations towards the rising sun, and not trouble my Indian people any more."

"Ay, ay," answered the Evil Spirit, "but this woman came from my country; she is white, she is mine. I came for her."

"You came to destroy her; do I not find her bound to a stake, and the flames kindled to destroy her? Nor was she yours, for I gave her for a wife to the warrior whom you have killed."

"I must have her," said the Spirit of Evil saucily.

"When your strength grows to be greater than mine, and your eyes see farther, and your spirit waxes stronger, and your heart fuller of justice and valour, then you may say must. Tell me no more lies, bad Manitou, lest I punish you. Go back to the nations of the East, and see you trouble my brave Indians no more."

The cowardly spirit made no answer, but shrunk down to the size he was of when he first came to our people. Then he began as before to roll himself up into his own hair, which he soon did, and then rolled away as he came into the hollow hill. When he was gone, the Great Spirit also shrunk till he was no larger than a Shawano, and began talking to our people in a soft and sweet voice:—

"Men of the Shawanos nation, I love you, and have always loved you. I bade you conquer your enemies, I gave your foes into your hands. I sent great herds of fat deer, and many bears and mooses, to your hunting-grounds, and made my suns so shine upon your fields, that your corn grew up like trees. Who lived so well, who fought so bravely, as the Shawanos? Whose women bore so many sons as yours? Is not the Suwany a lovely river? Are not the young sprouts of the oak, and the heart of the ash which grow upon its banks, the stoutest and the toughest in all the land for bows? The grass grows high, the water is cold and sweet, is it not a pleasant land? It is, and the Shawanos have been a favoured, and a happy people.

"Why did you disturb the sacrifice which the Walkullas were offering to me at the feast of green corn? Why did you fall upon them when they had laid down their weapons, and wiped off their paints to dance in my name? You even slew the priest who offered me the offering. I was angry, and gave your warriors into the hands of their enemies, only I let the head warrior escape to tell you the fate of your young men.

"Men of the Shawanos nation! The strange people, who came over the Salt Lake on the great bird, are your brothers. Though they are white, and you are red, though their hair is of the colour of the setting sun, and yours is as black as charred wood, yet you are brothers. I made you all, and I made you all alike. The Shawanos are red, because fear never enters their hearts to scare the blood from their cheeks: the heart of the white man is the heart of a bird; it is chilled with fear, therefore he is pale. I brought the Shawanos from the land of white men; then he was white, but living among bears, and snakes, and tigers, and bloody-minded warriors, has made him strong in heart, and he has lost his paleness.

"My good Shawanos! The Walkullas and their allies, from over the Great Lake, killed many of your warriors, and have thinned your nation, but I will give you other and stronger men. You have now but three tribes—soon there shall be four, and the fourth shall be great and powerful beyond all other Indians.

"Shawanos, hear my words and forget them not; do as I bid you, and you shall see my power and my goodness. Offer no further violence to the white maiden, but treat her very kindly. If you do not so, then shall my anger be upon your nation, and you shall fall by the hands of women, and wild beasts, and the lightnings of my breath.

"Go now, and rake up the ashes of the sacrifice-fire into a heap, putting all the coals together, and gathering up the brands. When the great star of evening rises, open the ashes, put in the body of the Mad Buffalo, lay on much wood, and kindle a fire in it. Let all the nation be called together, for all must assist in laying wood upon the fire. But they must put on no pine, nor the tree which bears white flowers, nor the grape-vine which yields no fruit, nor the shrub whose dew blisters the flesh. The fire must be kept burning two whole moons; it must not go out, it must burn day and night. On the first day of the third moon, put no wood on the fire, but let it die. On the morning of the second day, the Shawanos must all come to the heap of ashes, every man, woman, and child, must come, and the aged who cannot walk must be helped thither. Then Chenos and the head chief must bring out the beautiful woman, and place her near the ashes. Be not terrified at what you see, and do what Chenos shall tell you; this is the will of the Great Spirit."

When he had finished these words, he began to swell until he had reached his former bulk and stature. Then at each of his shoulders came out a wing of the colour of the gold-headed pigeon. Gently shaking these, he took flight from the land of the Shawanos, and was never seen in those beautiful regions again.

The Shawanos did as he bade them. They put the beautiful woman into the house of the great council, and then went and raked up the coals of the fire and the unquenched brands, and covered them with ashes. When the morning came, they laid the body of the head warrior on the ashes, and built a great fire over it. They kept this fire burning two whole moons. But they were careful to burn no pine, nor the tree which bears poisonous flowers, nor the vine which yields no grapes, nor the shrub whose dew blisters the flesh. On the first day of the third moon, they let the fire go out, and with the next sun all the Shawanos, men, women, and children, even the aged whose knees trembled so much that they could not walk, came or were brought together beside the embers. Then the priest and the head chief brought the beautiful woman from the cabin, and placed her beside the ashes. The Mequachake tribe, who were the priests of the nation, stood nearest, then the Kiskapocoke tribe, who were the greatest warriors. By and by, there was a terrible puffing and blowing in the ashes, which flew towards the sun, and the great star, and the River of Rivers, and the land of the Walkullas. At last, the priests and warriors who could see began to clap their hands, and dance, crying out "Piqua!" which in the Shawanos tongue means "a man coming out of the ashes," or a "man made of ashes." They told no lie. There he stood, a man tall and strait as a young pine, looking like a Shawanos, but he was handsomer than any man of our nation. The first thing he did was to utter the war-whoop, and cry for paint, a club, a bow and arrow, and a hatchet, which were given him. But looking around he saw the white maiden, and straight dropping all his weapons of war, he walked up to her and gazed in her eyes. Then he came to the head chief, and said, "I must have that woman for my wife."

"What are you?" asked the head chief.

"A man made of ashes," he answered.

"Who made you?"

"The Great Spirit. And now let me go, that I may take my bow and arrows, and kill my deer, and come back, and take the beautiful maiden to be my wife."

The chief said to Chenos, "Shall he have her? Does the Great Spirit give her to him?"

Chenos said, "Yes, for they love each other. The Great Spirit has willed that he shall have her, and from them shall arise a tribe to be called 'Piqua.'"

Brothers, I am a Piqua, descended from the "man made of ashes." If I have told you a lie, blame not me, for I have but told the story as I heard it. Brothers, I have done!

* * * * *

Though it could not be doubted that the Indians were delighted with the tale which had just been related to them, for they relish story-telling with as much zest as the Wild Arabs, they did not express their pleasure by any of those boisterous emotions of joy and satisfaction which, in civilized countries, and among men of a less taciturn disposition, are accorded to a good story well told. They neither shouted, nor clapped their hands, nor gave any other indication of pleasure. It is a strong as well as universal trait of the Indian that he is perfectly master of his feelings, never suffering them under any circumstances to escape from his controul and management. At the stake and the feast, in the field and the council, he alike subdues his mind, and utters but a gruff "Hah!" at scenes and tales which would make an Englishman very noisy and boisterous. That they liked the stories which had been told them, could be gathered from nothing that they said or did. It would have been accounted highly disgraceful to testify their approbation by exclamations. But their perfect silence and deep stillness spoke their satisfaction as plainly as the noisiest joy could have done. The attention of an Indian is more all-absorbing than that of a white man. It is never distracted or divided, he is never listless or absent. With dilated nostrils, and in a posture slightly inclined forward, he listens with his whole soul. Not a word escapes him. While an educated white man would be continually snapping the thread of the narrative by a reference in his mind to parallel passages in his former reading, the savage sees nothing but the present speaker, hears nothing but a tale fraught with incidents to which his own recollections are not permitted to offer a parallel. The next portion of the manuscript carries us to the Tale of Pomatare, or the Flying Beaver.

NOTES.

* * * * *

(1) Mad Buffalo.—p. 1.

The name assumed by the warrior is generally expressive of something seen in the dream which follows the feast of initiation into manhood. Whatever object was then seen becomes the "medicine," and the name assumed has some relation to the guardian spirit. Thus Little Bear, Black Bear, Bender of the Pine Tree, Snapping Turtle, Guard of the Red Arrows, &c.

(2) War-spears, and bows and arrows.—p. 5.

It may interest some of our readers, especially the military, to know the manner in which the Indians arm themselves for combat. They generally go well armed, that is, they are well provided with offensive weapons. Such as have intercourse with the Europeans make use of tomahawks, knives, and fire-arms; but those whose dwellings are situated to the eastward of the Mississippi, and who have not an opportunity of purchasing these kinds of weapons, use bows and arrows and also the Casse-Tete or War-Club.

The Indians who inhabit the country which extends from the Rocky Mountains to the South Sea, use in fight a warlike instrument that is very uncommon. Having great plenty of horses, they always attack their enemies on horse-back, and encumber themselves with no other weapon than a stone of middling size, curiously wrought, which they fasten, by a string about a yard and a half long, to their right arms, a little above the elbow. These stones they conveniently carry in their hands till they reach their enemies, and then, swinging them with great dexterity as they ride full speed, never fail of doing execution. Some of these western tribes make use of a javelin, pointed with bone, worked into different forms; but their general weapons are bows and arrows, and clubs. The club is made of a very hard wood, and the head of it fashioned round like a ball, about three inches and a half in diameter. In this rotund part is fixed an edge resembling that of a tomahawk, either of steel or flint. The dagger is peculiar to the Naudowessie nation. It was originally made of flint or bone, but since they have had communication with the European traders they have formed it of steel. The length of it is about ten inches, and that part close to the handle nearly three inches broad. Its edges are keen, and it gradually tapers towards a point. They wear it in a sheath made of deer leather, neatly ornamented with porcupine quills; and it is usually hung by a string decorated in the same manner, which reaches as low as the breast.

Among the Delawares the offensive weapons formerly in use were bows, arrows, and clubs. The latter were made of the hardest wood, not quite the length of a man's arm, and very heavy, with a large round knob at one end. For other descriptions of Indian weapons of war, see Long, Loskiel, and Mackenzie—especially the latter.

(3)Since he chewed the bitter root, and put on the new mocassins.—p. 6.

The ceremony of initiation into manhood is one of the most important that occurs among the Indians, and displays in a remarkable degree the power which superstition has acquired over their minds. It varies essentially among the different tribes, but the following description will briefly exhibit the custom which has obtained in the tribes named in the tradition, and will give a tolerable idea of that in use among the more remote bands.

"At the age of from fifteen to seventeen years, this ceremony (that of initiating youth into manhood) is usually performed. They take two handfuls of a very bitter root, and eat it during a whole day; then they steep the leaves and drink the water. In the dusk of the evening, they eat two or three spoonfuls of boiled corn. This is repeated for four days, and during this time they remain in a house. On the fifth day they go out, but must put on a pair of new mocassins. During twelve moons, they abstain from eating bucks, except old ones, and from turkey-cocks, fowls, bears, and salt: During this period they must not pick their ears, or scratch their heads with their fingers, but use a small stick. For four moons they must have a fire to themselves to cook their food with; the fifth moon, any person may cook for them, but they must serve themselves first, and use one spoon and pan. Every new moon they drink for four days a decoction of the bitter snake-root, an emetic, and abstain from all food, except in the evening, when they are permitted to eat a little boiled corn. The twelfth moon they perform for four days what they commenced with on the first four days; the fifth day they come out of their house, gather corn cobs, burn them to ashes, and with these rub their bodies all over. At the end of the moon they undergo a profuse perspiration in the Sweating-house, then go into the water, and thus ends the ceremony. This ceremony is sometimes extended to only four, six, or eight, months, but the course is the same."

After this they are at liberty to assume the arms of a man, and take upon themselves the quest of glory. And they have adopted one at least of the maxims of civilized life—"none but the brave deserve the fair." They are not deemed worthy to attempt the siege of the forest maiden's heart till they have been received into the fraternity of warriors. There can be no doubt whatever that this is essentially an Order of Knighthood; and as such the custom is entitled to receive a more lengthened notice than I am permitted to give it in this place.

(4) Beaver-Moon.—p. 6.

With the Indians every month has a name expressive of its season. The appellations will vary of course as the circumstance which gives the month its name is more or less hastened or deferred. The "corn-moon" of the Iroquois, on the northern lakes, would hardly be the corn-moon of the Creeks in Georgia. The Northern Indians call March, (the month in which their year begins,) the worm-month, because in this month the worms quit their retreats in the bark of the trees, where they have sheltered themselves during the winter.

April is the moon of plants.

May the moon of flowers.

June the hot moon.

July the buck-moon.

August is called the sturgeon-moon, because that fish becomes abundant in this month.

September, the corn-moon, because the corn is gathered in that month.

October, the travelling-moon; as at this time they leave their villages, and travel towards the place where they intend to spend the winter.

November, the beaver-moon; the month of commencing their hunts for the beaver.

December, the hunting-moon, because they employ this month in pursuit of game.

January, the cold moon, as this month has the most intense cold of any month.

February, the snow-moon, because most snow falls in this month.

The Delawares, while they lived on the Atlantic coast, called March the shad-moon; after they removed to the interior they called it the sap-moon; October was their corn-moon, &c.

It may be remarked, that the designations given to the months are derived from some remarkable trait of character, peculiarity of season, or extraordinary event. Were they in England, they would suit those names to the prominent circumstance occurring in the month. The March of the present year would probably have been the "Month of the Silver Cross," i.e. "The Catholic Month;" and, were they living at the West End, and frequenters of the Park, at the season when it is crowded with beautiful faces, that season would undoubtedly receive the name of the "Season of Starflowers," or the "Month of the Rainbow birds."

(5) Master of Life.—p. 7.

The belief entertained by savage nations respecting the Supreme Being, and a future state, is always entitled to a most respectful consideration, because, when it admits the existence of a supreme, over-ruling, almighty intelligence, it furnishes the believer with an unanswerable argument for his creed. I have, therefore, devoted a few pages to the subject, which I presume no one will think misapplied. Hearne says, "Religion has not as yet begun to dawn among the Northern Indians—I never found any of them that had the least idea of futurity."—(Hearne's Journey to the Northern Ocean.) And Colden, in his History of the Five Nations, says, "It is certain they have no kind of public worship, and I am told they have no radical word to express God, but use a compound word signifying the Preserver, Sustainer, or Master of the Universe; neither could I ever learn what sentiments 'they have of future existence."—(Colden's History of the Five Nations, p. 15.) I have found no other writer who has advanced a like opinion to the two quoted above, and little importance has been attached to their opinions with respect to Indians. Charlevoix, the most accurate observer of Indian manners who has yet committed his thoughts to paper, says, "Nothing is more certain, than that the savages of this continent have an idea of a First Being, but, at the same time, nothing is more obscure." They agree in general in making Him the First Spirit, the Lord and Creator of the world. "Every thing," says be, "appears to be the object of a religious worship."—(A Voyage to North America, by Father Charlevoix, vol. ii. 107.) Heckewelder affirms, that "Habitual devotion to the Great First Cause, and a strong, feeling of gratitude for the benefits which He confers, is one of the prominent traits which characterise the mind of the untutored Indian."—(Heck. Hist. Ace. p. 84.) Loskiel says, (History of the Mission of the United Brethren, p. 33) "The prevailing opinion of all these nations is, that there is one God, or, as they call Him, one Great and Good Spirit, who has created the heavens and the earth, and made man and every other creature." Mackenzie affirms that they believe in a future state of rewards and punishments. I have observed that they had not any particular form of religious worship, but, as they believe in a good and evil spirit, and a state of future rewards and punishments, they cannot be devoid of religious impressions.—(Mackenzie's General History of the Fur Trade, vol. i p. 145, 156.) The religion of the Mandans, say Lewis and Clarke, (vol. i. p. 138,) consists in the belief of one Great Spirit. As their belief in a Supreme Being is firm and sincere, so their gratitude to Him is fervent and unvarying. They are tormented by no false philosophy, led astray by no recondite opinions of controversialists, whether He is all in all, or shares a "divided throne." Simple and unenlightened sons of nature, they hold the belief which has never failed to present itself to such, that there is a God, and to be grateful and worship that God is the second innate principle of our nature. There are no people more frequent and fervent in their acknowledgments of gratitude to God. Their belief in Him is universal, and their confidence in his goodness and mercy almost exceeds belief. Their Almighty Creator is always before their eyes on all important occasions. They feel and acknowledge, his supreme power. They also endeavour to propitiate Him by outward worship or sacrifices. These are religious solemnities, intended to make themselves acceptable to the Great Spirit, to find favour in His sight, and to obtain His forgiveness for past errors and offences.

In Winslow's "Good News from England, or a relation of remarkable things in that plantation," anno. 1622, occur the following remarks on the subject of the belief of the Indians of that country in a Supreme Being.

"A few things I thought meete to add heereunto, which I have observed amongst the Indians, both touching their religion, and sundry other customes among them. And first, whereas myselfe and others, in former letters, (which came to the presse against my wille and knowledge,) wrote that the Indians about us, are a people without any religion, or knowledge of any God, therein I erred, though wee could then gather no better, for as they conceive of many divine powers, so of one whom they call Kietan to be the principall maker of all the rest, and to be made by none. Hee (they say) created the heavens, earth, sea, and all creatures contained therein."

Long says, the tribes in the shade of the rocky mountains believe the Wahconda to be "the greatest and best of beings, the creator," &c.

In conclusion it may be affirmed, that a constant, abiding, and unwavering belief in the existence of a Supreme Being, and in his goodness, is that entertained by the Western Indians.

(6)Take care of the old men.—p. 8.

The American Indians pay great respect to old age. They will tremble before a grandfather, and submit to his injunctions with the utmost alacrity. With them, especially with the young, the words of the ancient part of the community are esteemed as oracles, and their sayings regarded with the veneration paid of yore to the leaves of the Sybil. If they take during their hunting parties any game that is reckoned by them uncommonly delicious, it is immediately presented to the eldest of their relations.

From their infancy they are taught to be kind and attentive to aged persons, and never let them suffer for want of necessaries and comforts. The parents spare no pains to impress upon the minds of their children the conviction that they would draw down upon themselves the anger of the Great Spirit, were they to neglect those whom in his goodness he had permitted to attain such an advanced age. It is a sacred principle among the Indians, that the Great Spirit made it the duty of parents to maintain and take care of their children until they should be able to provide for themselves, and that, having while weak and helpless received the benefits of maintenance, education, and protection, they are bound to repay them by a similar care of those who are labouring under the infirmities of old age. They do not confine themselves to acts of absolute necessity; it is not enough that the old are not suffered to starve with hunger or perish with cold, but they must be made as much as possible to share in the pleasures and comforts of life.(Heck. 152, 153.) He goes on to remark that they are frequently carried to the chase on a horse, or in a canoe, that their spirits may be revived by the sight of a sport in which they can no longer participate. 153. "At home the old are as well treated, and taken care of, as if they were favourite children. They are cherished, and even caressed, indulged in health, and nursed in sickness, and all their wishes and wants attended to. Their company is sought by the young, to whom their conversation is considered an honour. Their advice is asked on all occasions, their words are listened to as oracles, and their occasional garrulity, nay even the second childhood often attendant on extreme old age, is never with the Indians a subject of ridicule or laughter."

Age is every where much respected, for, according to their ideas, long life and wisdom are always connected together.

Young Indians endeavour by presents to gain instruction from the aged, and to learn from them how to attain to old age. Loskiel, part I, p. 15

Age seemed to be an object of great veneration among these people, for they carried an old woman by turns on their backs, who was quite blind and infirm, from the very advanced period of her life. Mackenzie, 293.

(7) God of War.—p. 8.

The terms, Great Spirit and God of War, are synonimous with many of the Indian tribes, but not with all. The Hurons call him Areskoui; the Iroquois, by a slight deviation, Agreskoui. Other nations have adopted other names.

(8) He went to the woman, laid his hand on her, and wept.—p. 14.

Being then out of all hopes of surprising their enemies, three or four of the eldest of them laid their hands on my head, and began to weep bitterly, accompanying their tears with such mournful accents as can hardly be expressed; while I, with a very sorry handkerchief I had left, made shift to dry up their tears; to very little purpose however, for, refusing to smoke in our calumet, they thereby gave us to understand that their design was still to murder us. (Hennepin's Voyage, printed in Transactions of American Ant. Soc. Vol. I. page 83, and see page 85 of the same vol.)

This "imposition of hands," accompanied with tears, was for the purpose of exciting compassion for the recent loss of their relations in conflict, and thus procuring revenge.

I am by no means certain that the above is a correct explanation of the practice, though, in the tale or tradition in which I have introduced it, I have considered it so. Tonti, in his relation of De La Salle's Expedition, supposes it to arise from a more subdued feeling. The passage, as the reader will see, is replete with poetical beauty. His words are—"We arrived in the midst of a very extraordinary nation, called the Biscatonges, to whom we gave the name of weepers, in regard that upon the first approach of strangers, all these people, as well men as women, usually fall a-weeping bitterly: the reason of this practice is very particular; for these poor people imagining that their relations or friends deceased are gone a journey, and continually expecting their return, the remembrance of 'em is renewed upon the arrival of new passengers; but forasmuch as they do not find in their persons those whose loss they lament, it only serves to increase their grief. That which is yet more remarkable, and perhaps even very reasonable, is that they weep much more at the birth of their children than at their death, because the latter is esteemed only by 'em, as it were a journey or voyage, from whence they may return after the expiration of a certain time, but they look upon their nativity as an inlet into an ocean of dangers and misfortunes."

(9) A great man whose head nearly reached the sky.—p. 26.

The God of the Indians has always a corporeal form, and is generally of immense stature. He is chiefly represented as a man possessed of great dimensions and mighty corporeal strength. Sometimes however he takes the shape of a beast. Charlevoix says: "Almost all the Algonquin nations have siren the name of the Great Hare to the first spirit. Some call him Michabou, i.e. God of the Waters; others Atoacan, the meaning of which I do not know. The greatest part say that, being supported on the waters with all his court, all composed of four-footed creatures like himself, he formed the earth out of a grain of sand taken from the bottom of the ocean, &c. Some speak of a God of the Waters, who opposed the design of the Great Hare, or at least refused to favour it. This God is, according to some, the Great Tiger." Charlevoix, ii, 107, 108. And see tradition supra. The Hurons believe him to be the sun. Ibid. The same author remarks (page 109) that "the Gods of the savages have, according to their notions, bodies and live much in the same manner as we do," &c.

Carver says "the Indians appear to fashion to themselves corporeal representations of their Gods, and believe them to be of a human form." Wennebea, one of the Indian chiefs seen by Long in his expedition to the source of St. Peter's River, thought the Great Spirit had a human form, and wore a white hat. It surely cannot after this be held that the "ideas of an Indian have always a degree of sublimity."

I have never seen an Indian who believed the Supreme Being to have other than a human form, or to be of less than Almighty power and dimensions. An Indian, who was in the service of the Author during the entire period between childhood and manhood, and used to delight and astonish him with his sublime though most natural conceptions of Infinity and the Godhead, always called him the Great Good Man. The "Prince of the power of the air," he very appositely called the "Little Bad Man."



POMATARE, THE FLYING BEAVER.

Pomatare rose and said:—"Brothers, a very great while ago, the ancestors of the Shawanos nation lived on the other side of the Great Lake, halfway between the rising sun and the evening star. It was a land of deep snows and much frost; of winds which whistled in the clear cold nights, and storms which travelled from seas no eye could reach. Sometimes the sun ceased to shine for moons together, and then he was continually before our eyes for as many more. In the season of cold, the waters were all locked up, and the snows overtopped the ridge of our cabins; then he shone out so fiercely that men fell down stricken by his fierce beams, and were numbered with the snow which had melted, and run to the embrace of the rivers. It was not like the beautiful lands, the lands blessed with soft suns and ever-green vales, where we now dwell. Yet it was well stocked with deer, and the waters with fat seals and great fish, which were caught just when the people pleased to go after them. Still our nation were discontented, and wished to leave their barren and inhospitable shores. The priests had told them of a beautiful world beyond the Great Salt Lake, from which the glorious sun never disappeared for a longer time than the duration of a child's sleep, where snow-shoes were never wanted—a land clothed with eternal verdure, and bright with never-failing gladness. The Shawanos listened to these tales till their minds came to loathe their own simple comforts; they even forgot the spot which contained the ashes of their ancestors; all they talked of, all they appeared to think of, was the land of the happy hunting-grounds.[A]

[Footnote A: Place of souls after death—the Indian elysium.]

"Once upon a time, in the season of opening buds, and the singing of birds, and the whistling of the breeze among the wild flowers, the people of our nation were much terrified at seeing a strange creature, much resembling a man, riding along the adjacent waves upon the back of a fish. He had upon his head long green hair, much resembling the coarse weeds which the mighty storms of the month of falling leaves root up from the bottom of the ocean, and scatter along the margin of the feathery strand where we now dwell. Upon his face, which was shaped like that of a porpoise, he had a beard of the colour of ooze. Around his neck hung a string of great sea-shells, upon his forehead was bound another made of the teeth of the cayman, and in his hand was a staff formed of the rib of a whale. But, if our people were frightened at seeing a man who could live in the water like a fish or a duck, how much more were they frightened when they saw, that from his breast down he was actually a fish, or rather two fishes, for each of his legs was a whole and distinct fish. And, when they heard him speak distinctly in their own language, and still more when he sang songs sweeter than the music of birds in spring, or the whispers of love from the lips of a beautiful maiden, they thought it a being from the Land of Shades, a spirit from the happy fishing grounds beyond the lake of storms, and ran into the woods like startled deer. And this was his song:

SONG OF THE MAN-FISH.

I live in the depths of brine, Where grows the green grass slim and tall, Among the coral rocks; And I drink of their crystal streams, and eat The year-old whale, and the mew; And I ride along the dark blue waves On the sportive dolphin's back; And I sink to rest in the fathomless caves, Beyond the sea-shark's track.

I hide my head, in the pitiless storm, In caverns dark and deep; My couch of ooze is pleasant and warm, And soft and sweet my sleep. I rise again when the winds are still, And the waves have sunk to rest, And call, with my conch-shell, strong and shrill, My mate to the Salt Lake's breast.

"And there he would sit for hours, his fish-legs coiled up under him, singing to the wondering ears of the Indians upon the shore the pleasures he experienced, and the beautiful and strange things he saw, in the depths of the ocean, always closing his strange stories with these words, shouted at the top of his lungs: "Follow me, and see what I will show you!" Every day, when the waves were still, and the winds had gone to their resting-place in the depths of the earth(1), to get sleep that they might come out refreshed for their race over the green vales and meadows, the monster was sure to be seen near the shore where our tribe dwelt. For a great many suns, they dared not adventure upon the water in quest of food, doing nothing but wander along the beach, watching the strange creature as he played his antics upon the surface of the waves, and listening to his charming songs, and to his invitation, "Follow me, and see what I will show you!" But the longer he stayed, the less they feared him. They became used to him, and as, the oftener the tiger glares upon you from the thicket, the oftener you hear the whoop of death, the more you come to despise them, so in time they began to think him a spirit who was neither made for harm, nor wished to injure the poor Indian. Then they grew hungry, and their wives and little ones cried for food. And as hunger does away all fear, except that which relates to the satisfying it, in a few days three canoes, with many men and warriors, no longer decorated with war-paint, no longer armed with bows and arrows and sharp spears, but with the pale cheeks of men of peace, and bearing the implements of fishermen, ventured off to the rocks in quest of the finny brood.

"When our fathers reached the fishing-place, they heard, as before, the voice shouting, "Follow me, and see what I will show you!" Presently the Man-Fish appeared, sitting on the water, with his legs, or the fins which served for legs, folded under him, and his arms crossed on his breast, as they had usually seen him. There he sat, eyeing them attentively, while they tried to bring up the fat things of the deep. When they failed to draw in the fish they had hooked, he would make the very water shake, and the deep echo with shouts of laughter, and would clap his hands with great noise, and cry, "Ha! ha! my boy, there he fooled you!" When they caught any he was very angry, and would scold like an old woman when her husband returns from hunting and brings no meat. When they had tried long and patiently, and taken little, and the sun was just hiding himself behind the dark clouds which skirted the Region of Warm Winds,[A] the strange creature, popping up his head within a few paces of the canoe, cried out still stronger than before, "Follow me, and see what I will show you!" Kiskapocoke, who was the head man of the tribe, asked him what he wanted, but he would make no other answer than "Follow me!" Kiskapocoke said, "Do you think I will be such a fool as to go, I don't know with whom, and I don't know where?"

[Footnote A: Region of Warm Winds—the South and South-west.]

""Ah! but see what I will show you," cried the Man-Fish, throwing up one of his odd legs, and flirting the water all over the speaker in the boat.

""Can you show us any thing better than we have yonder?" asked the warrior, pointing to their cabins on the shore—"good wives, good children, good dogs—plenty of deer, plenty of train-oil, plenty of every thing?"

""Yes, and plenty of storms in the moons of falling leaves and melting ice, and plenty of snow in the time between them; and oftentimes plenty of hunger, and always plenty of danger from bears, and wolves, and painted warriors. But go with me, and see what I will show you—a land where there is a herd of deer for every one that skips over your ice-bound hills, where there are vast droves of creatures larger than your sea-elephants, called, in the language of the people of the land, bisons, where there is no cold to freeze you, where the glorious sun is always soft and smiling, where the trees and the fields are always in bloom, where the men always grow tall as stately pines, and the women beautiful as the stars of night."

"Our fathers began now to be terrified, and wished themselves on the land. But, the moment they tried to paddle towards the shore, some invisible hand would seize their canoes, and draw them back, so that an hour's labour did not enable them to gain the length of their boat in the direction of their parted friends and relatives. Then there was much laughing all around them, and fins of all sizes, shapes, and colours, flirted the water over them, till they were as wet as if they had been swimming. At last Kiskapocoke said to his companions, "What shall we do?"

""Follow me!" said the Man-Fish, popping up his head as before.

"Then Kiskapocoke said to his companions, "Let us follow him, and see what will come of it." So they followed him, he swimming and they paddling, until night came. Then a great wind and deep darkness prevailed, and the Great Serpent commenced hissing in the depths of the ocean. They were terribly frightened, and thought not of living till another sun, but of perishing in the great deep, far from the lands of their fathers, and without glory. But the Man-Fish kept close to the boat, and bade them not be afraid, for nothing should hurt them, if they only followed him and saw what he would show them. And thus they continued, amidst the raging of the winds and the waves, and the thunders and the lightnings, to paddle their slender canoes till the sun arose.

"When morning came, nothing could be seen of the shore they had left. The winds still raged, the seas were very high, and the water ran into their canoes like melted snows over the brows of the mountains in the months of spring. But the Man-Fish handed them large shells, wherewith they were enabled to bale it out. As they had brought neither food nor water with them, and had caught neither fish nor rain, they had become both hungry and thirsty. Kiskapocoke told the strange creature they wanted to eat and drink, and that he must enable them to do both. "For," said he, "since you brought us here, you would be a very bad fish to let us starve or die of thirst."

""Oh! very well," answered the Man-Fish; "stop where you are then, while I go down, and get you victuals and water; and be sure, this time, that you do not follow me." With that he made a plunge into the depths of the wave. Down he went, how far our fathers could not say, only this they knew that, when he came back again, he puffed and blew like a whale, and said, he was very tired. He brought with him a great bag full of parched corn, not at all wet, a great shell full of good sweet water, and a big piece of roasted fish. "I am confoundedly tired, and I got scorched into the bargain," said he, muttering to himself. "So much for having a cross wife."

"Thus they went on paddling and paddling, day and night, wet, cold, and sometimes hungry, for two moons and a half, till at last, one morning, the Man-Fish cried out "Look there!" Upon that they rubbed up their eyes, and, looking sharp in the direction he pointed, saw land, high land, covered with great trees, and glittering as the sand of the Spirit's Island(2). Behind the shore rose tall mountains, from the tops of which issued great flames, which shot up into the sky as the forks of the lightning cleave the clouds in the Hot Moon. The waters of the Great Salt Lake broke into small waves upon its shores, which were covered with seals sporting, and wild ducks pluming themselves, in the beams of the warm and gentle sun. Upon the shore stood a great many strange people, but, when they saw our warriors step upon the land, and the Man-Fish coming up out of the water, and heard his cry, "Follow me!" they all ran into the woods like startled deer, and our fathers saw no more of them.

"When our fathers were all safely landed, the Man-Fish told them to let the canoe go, "for," said he, "you will never need it more." They had travelled but a little way into the woods when he bade them stay where they were, while he told the Spirit of the land that the strangers he had promised were come, and with that he descended into a deep cave near them. Soon he returned, and with him a creature as strange as himself, or still stranger. His legs and feet were those of a man; he had leggings and mocassins like an Indian's, tightly laced, and beautifully decorated with wampum; but his head was like a goat's, even to the huge horns and long beard; his hands were a goat's fore-feet, and the upper part of his body was covered with moss-coloured hair, soft and shining, like that of the goats which browse upon the steeps of the Spirit's Backbone. Yet he talked like a man, though his voice was the voice of a goat, and his language was one well understood by our fathers. He stood up, with his feet or hands, whichever they might be called, resting upon a little rock before him, like a goat which clambers up to nip the loftier buds, and made them a long speech.

""You are going to a beautiful land," said he, "to a most beautiful land, men from the Clime of Snows. There you will find all the joys which an Indian covets. The beasts you will see will be fat, tame, and numerous as the trees of the forest, and the fowls and birds which will cover your waters and people your woods will be sleek as the forehead of a young girl. Then, how lovely and kind are its maidens, how green and gay its hills and valleys, how refreshing the winds which sweep over the bosom of the great lake on its border, how sweet, clean, and cool, the beautiful streams which wind along its corn-littered vales! Oh, it is a lovely land, and the strangers have done well to leave the misery which awaited them in the regions of the star that never sets, for the peace and happiness which will be theirs in the land of unceasing summer."

"Brothers and chiefs! our ancestors travelled many moons under the guidance of the Man-Goat into whose hands the Man-Fish had put them when he retraced his steps to the Great Lake. They came at length to the land which the Shawanos now occupy. They found it, as the strange spirits had described it, a fit abode for the Great Spirit, a land of good and happy enjoyments to his creatures. They married the beautiful and affectionate maidens of the land, and their numbers increased till they were so many that no one could count them. They grew strong, swift, and valiant, as panthers, bold and brave in war, keen and patient in the chace. They overcame all the tribes eastward of the River of Rivers,[A] and south to the further shore of the Great Lake[B]. The dark-skin, whose eye beheld their badge of war, fawned on them, or fled, became women before them, or sought a region where neither their war-cry nor the twanging of their bows was heard breaking the silence of the dark night.

[Footnote A: River of Rivers. Mississippi.]

[Footnote B: Great Lake, the ocean.]

"Brothers, we are called Shawanos from the name of the river which runs through our hunting-grounds. This is all I have to say."

NOTES.

* * * * *

(1) The winds had gone to their resting-place in the depths of the earth.—p. 50.

The Indians think that a calm is caused by the winds' steeping. They believe that it is quite as necessary for them to be refreshed by rest and slumber, as for man to have his periodical exemptions from fatigue. I never met with an Indian who entertained any thing like the opinion of their cause current among philosophers. Attempting once to explain the phenomenon to a groupe of Indians, I found myself treated with as much contempt and abhorrence as a company of pious Christians would express for an Atheist who broadly avowed his creed.

(2) Glittering at the sand of the Spirit's Island.—p. 55.

The Chipewas say, that some of their people, being once driven on the bland of Maurepas, which lies towards the north-east part of lake Superior, found on it large quantities of heavy, shining, yellow sand, that from their description must have been gold-dust. Being struck with the beautiful appearance of it, in the morning, when they reentered their canoe, they attempted to bring some away; but a spirit of amazing size, according to their account sixty feet in height, strode into the water after them, and commanded them to deliver back what they had taken. Terrified at his gigantic stature, and seeing that he had nearly overtaken them, they were glad to restore their shining treasure; on which they were suffered to depart without further molestation.



THE ALARM OF THE GREAT SENTINEL.

A TRADITION OF THE DELAWARES.

Once upon a time, a young Indian of the Delaware nation, hunting in the lands which belonged to his tribe, had the good fortune to take captive an old white owl, who had for his lodge a hollow oak in which he dwelt with his family. As it was a time of great scarcity among the Indians, all their late hunts having been singularly unsuccessful, the hunter determined to kill the owl and make a present of its flesh to the maiden he loved, who had tasted no food for many suns. As he was rubbing his knife upon a stone, that it might be sharp and do the murder easily, the owl, who, with his leg tied to a tree, was looking on with a very curious and knowing air, turning his head first one way and then another, now scratching it with his untied claw and now shaking it as the beams of the sun came into his eyes, asked him what he was doing. The young hunter, who, being a good and brave warrior, scorned to tell a lie(1) even to an owl, answered that he was making ready to cut off his head.

"Poh, poh," said the cunning old fellow, "if you kill me, what will my wife, and my daughters, and my little ones, do? My woman is old and blind, and the rest are but so-so. Who will catch mice for them, pray?"

"They will be adopted into other families, I suppose," answered the hunter, "or the old woman will get another husband."

"Such may be the Indian custom," said the owl, "but it is not the custom of my nation. Besides, the woman is so old and ugly that the Evil One would not take her for a second wife. No, no, if you take my life, the little ones will starve. Their eyes are very weak in the day time, and they are too young and shy to go out by night. If you kill me they will starve," repeated the owl.

"I am very hungry," said the hunter. "Neither fish nor flesh has been taken by my nation for many days; the maiden whom I love is dying for want of food. You would be a nice dish for her."

"Old and tough, old and tough," said the owl, winking very knowingly. "But does not the Lenape hunter know that there are things to be worse feared than death? The warrior should fear captivity and disgrace before the evils of an unsatisfied appetite."

"The Delawares are men," said the hunter, proudly. "They are the masters of the earth, they are never captured. They will themselves take care that no disgrace falls upon them. The owl must be cooked for the dinner of the Lenape maiden."

"The youngest son of the head chief of the Gray Owls is this night to marry my daughter," said the captive. "May I not go to the feast? The guests are assembled, the food is prepared, they wait but my presence."

"No," answered the hunter.

"Then will a warrior of the Delawares be a greater fool than the Mingo who married a rattlesnake[A], and forgot to cut off her tail. He will be deaf to the voice of a Great Medicine[B]; the owl bids him beware."

[Footnote A: See the Tradition in the third volume.]

[Footnote B: Medicine means Spirit—Great Medicine, Great Spirit.]

"Is my brother a Medicine?" asked the alarmed hunter.

"He is," answered the grave old bird, shaking his head. "If now the Delaware hunter will suffer the owl to return to his family in the hollow oak, the good deed shall never be forgotten by my tribe. There shall be two eyes watching for the safety of the Delawares upon every tree around their lodges. While they, wearied out by war or the chase, are sleeping in darkness and imagined security, the owl shall stand sentry, and warn them if danger should be nigh. When they hear the voice of the owl, calling out in the depths of the night, 'Up! up! danger! danger!' let them grasp their bows and war-spears, and be men."

"Go," said the hunter, cutting the string which bound the prisoner to the tree of death. So the old white owl, with a couple of mice in his claws, went back to his lodge in the hollow oak, to comfort his old woman whom the Evil One would not have, and to see his daughter married to the young gray owl, while the youthful hunter departed to pursue a deer, which that moment appeared in a glade of the neighbouring forest.

Many seasons had passed away, flowers had sprung up to wither, and the sprouts from the seed of the oak had become lofty trees that bent not with the weight of the panther. The young hunter married the maiden for whose sake he would have killed the old white owl; their children were many and good; and the hunter himself had become head chief of the Unamis or Turtles, the most potent tribe of Delawares, and who reckon themselves the parent of all other Indians. They had fought many great battles; they had warred with the nations of the North and the South, the East, and the West, with the Shawanos of the Burning Water[A], the Mengwe of the Great Lakes, the Sioux who hunt beyond the River of Fish[B], and the Narragansetts who dwell in the land of storms: and in all and over all they had been victorious. The warriors of the Smoking Water had confessed themselves women, the Sioux had paid their tribute of bear-skins, the Narragansetts had sent beautiful shells for their women, and the Mengwees had fled from the war-shout of the Delawares, as a startled deer runs from the cry of the hunter. Our warriors had just returned from invading the lands of the latter tribe, and had brought with them many scalps. They were weary and exhausted, but an Indian warrior never admits that he is either. So they feasted and rejoiced loud and long. They sung in the open ears of their people their exploits, the foes by their valour laid low, or duped by their cunning, or victims to their patience in awaiting the proper moment for attack, or to their speed and celerity in pursuit. And they danced the dance of thanksgiving in honour of their protecting Wahconda,[C] and gave the scalp-yell for every scalp taken, as is the custom of Indian warriors when returned from a successful expedition.

[Footnote A: Burning Water, the river Walkulla, in Florida, near the source of which there is, or was, a burning spring. See the Tradition.]

[Footnote B: River of Fish, another name for Mississippi, from the Indian words naemes a fish, sipu, a river.]

[Footnote C: Wahconda, Great Spirit, the Supreme Being.]

The song and the dance finished, the Unamis, who are the grandfather of nations, were sleeping quietly in their lodges on the beautiful banks of the Lenape wihittuck[A], dreaming of no danger, keeping no watch. Buried in deep slumber, and communing with the Manitou[B] of Dreams(2), they lay, one in the arms of his wife, another by the couch of his beloved maiden, one dreaming over dreams of war and slaughter, another of love and wedded joys, one in fancy grasping the spear and the war-club, another and a younger the bosom of a dusky maiden of his tribe. Over their heads the tall forest tree waved in the night wind, giving the melancholy music of sighing branches; beside them ran the clear waters of the river, slightly murmuring as they rolled away to the land, which our nation gave to their good brother Miquon[C]. All was so hushed in the camp of the Unamis that the lowest note of the wren could have been heard from limit to limit.

[Footnote A: Lenape wihittnck, the "river of Delawares," the Delaware.]

[Footnote B: Manitou, a subordinate spirit, or tutelar genius.]

[Footnote C: Miquon, William Penn, the Founder of Pennsylvania.]

Hark! what noise is that? I hear a rustling of the dry grass and low bushes, at the distance of three bowshots from the camp of the sleeping Unamis. I behold the grass bowed down, I see the bushes yielding to some heavy creature is pressing through them. Is it the buffalo? No, he has neither the power nor wit to hide himself. Is it the deer? No, he has gone to drink of the salt waters of the Great Lake. Is it the cougar? No, for he never crouches except when he springs on his victim. Hush! I see one of the unknown beasts raising itself above the copse. Slow and warily, first appears an eagle's leather, then a black scalp-lock, then a pair of shining eyes, but they are neither the wolfs, nor the wild cat's. Oh! I know him now, and I know his band. It is they who let the Leni Lenape fight the Allegewi[A] while they looked on, it is the dogs of the lakes, the treacherous Mengwe. Slowly they dropped again into the copse, and the band moved onward to gain that fatal station which should give into their power the unsuspecting Unamis. But they did not know that two curious eyes were watching their every movement; they did not know that perched on the limb of a decayed tree in front of their hiding-place sat an old white owl.

[Footnote A: See the Tradition of the Fall of the Leni Lenape.]

Nothing said the owl, it was not time yet, and he suffered the treacherous Mengwe to approach within two bowshots of the sleeping warriors. All at once, with a voice that penetrated every glade of the forest, this great sentinel over mankind shouted "Up! up! danger! danger!" All the birds of the species were alert at their posts, and all within hearing of the shout of their chief repeated the words of alarm. "Up! up! danger! danger!" rung through the hollow woods, and reverberated among the hills. Up sprung the Unamis, and sallied cautiously out to find the cause of alarm. They were just in time to discover the backs of the flying Mengwe, from whose treacherous spears they were saved by the timely cry of their vigilant and grateful sentinel, the old white owl.

Since that time, the hunters of the Delawares never harm this wise and good bird(3). When in the night it is heard sounding its notes, or calling to its mate, some one in the camp will rise, and taking some glicanum, or Indian tobacco, will strew it on the fire, that the ascending smoke may reach the bird, and show him that they are not unmindful of his kindness to them and their ancestors.

NOTES.

* * * * *

(1) Scorned to tell a lie.—p. 61.

The Indians pay a most scrupulous attention to truth, not because they attach any peculiar moral virtue to it, or think the breach of it will be punished, but because they esteem the telling a lie a mark of cowardice. Civilized nations view lying as both unmanly and criminal; the Indian, as indicating the fear of the liar to meet the consequences of disclosing the truth. It has been adduced by more than one writer to prove the existence of an innate love of truth in the human breast.

(2) Manitou of Dreams.—p. 66.

The life of an Indian is regulated by his dreams. There is not a single enterprise of any importance undertaken till the Manitou of sleep has been consulted. When a child is born, the nature of his future occupation is taught by dreams; when he arrives at manhood, the name by which he is in future to be known is given in consequence of what is seen in the dream which follows the feast of initiation into manhood.

There is nothing in which they have shown more superstition and extravagance, than in what regards their dreams; but they differ much in the manner of explaining their thoughts on this matter. Sometimes it is the reasonable soul that wanders out, while the sensitive soul continues to animate the body; sometimes it is the familiar genius that gives good advice about future events; sometimes it is a visit they receive from the soul of the object they dream of. But, in whatsoever way they conceive of a dream, it is always regarded as a sacred thing, and as the means which the Gods most usually employ to declare their will to men.

"Prepossessed with this idea," says Charlevoix, (a writer I delight to quote) "they cannot conceive that we should take no notice of them. For the most part they look upon them as desires of the soul inspired by some spirit, or an order from it. And, in consequence of this principle, they make it a duty of religion to obey these commands. A savage, having dreamt that his finger was cut off, really had it cut off when he awoke, after he had prepared himself for this important action by a feast. Another, dreaming that he was a prisoner in the bands of his enemies, was greatly embarrassed. He consulted the jugglers, and, by their advice, got himself tied to a post, and burned in various parts of the body."—Charlevoix, ii. 18.

Dreams are resorted to for the purpose of procuring a proper Manitou or guardian spirit for the child. This is the most important affair of life. They begin by blacking the face of the child; then it must fast for eight days, without baring the least nourishment; and, during this time, his future guardian genius must appear to him in his dreams. Every morning, they take great care to make him relate them. The thing the child dreams of most frequently is supposed to be his genius; but no doubt this thing was considered at first only as a symbol or shape under which the spirit manifests itself.

Nor is this potency of dreams peculiar to one tribe or nation; it obtains, both as a belief and practice, throughout the entire continent, over which that perfect anomaly in the human kind, the red men, are scattered. Equally among the Esquimaux of the regions of eternal ice, and the Abipones of Paraguay, dreams are reckoned the revelations of the God of the Universe.

(3) Wise and good bird.—p. 68.

It is singular that the owl should be the symbol of Wisdom, Minerva's bird, alike with the classic Greeks and Romans, and the American savages. This is one of the many arguments to be drawn from existing manners and customs, to prove that the peopling of the western continent by the race who at present occupy it took place at a period, which may well have permitted their drawing upon classic models for a portion of their beautiful figures and allegories. Unhappily, our desire to know them thoroughly and truly has only been awakened since their minds have been corrupted, and the strong traits of their character blunted by a participation in our enervating and demoralising comforts! They can now be studied only in the reports made of them by early travellers.



THE MOTHER OF THE WORLD.

A TRADITION OF THE DOG-RIBS.

In the frozen regions of the North, beyond the lands which are now the hunting-grounds of the Snakes and Coppermines, there lived, when no other being but herself was, a woman who became the mother of the world. She was a little woman, our fathers told us, not taller than the shoulders of a young maiden of our nation, but she was very beautiful and very wise. Whether she was good-tempered or cross, I cannot tell, for she had no husband, and so there was nothing to vex her, or to try her patience. She had not, as the women of our nation now have, to pound corn, or to fetch home heavy loads of buffalo flesh, or to make snow-sledges, or to wade into the icy rivers to spear salmon, or basket kepling, or to lie concealed among the wet marsh grass and wild rice to snare pelicans, and cranes, and goosanders, while her lazy, good-for-nothing husband lay at home, smoaking his pipe, and drinking the pleasant juice of the Nishcaminnick by the warm fire in his cabin. She had only to procure her own food, and this was the berries, and hips, and sorrel, and rock-moss, which, being found plentifully near her cave, were plucked with little trouble. Of these she gathered, in their season, when the sun beamed on the earth like a maiden that loves and is beloved, a great deal to serve her for food when the snows hid the earth from her sight, and the cold winds from the fields of eternal frost obliged her to remain in her rude cavern. Though alone, she was happy. In the summer it was her amusement to watch the juniper and the alders, as they put forth, first their leaves, and then their buds, and when the latter became blossoms, promising to supply the fruit she loved, her observation became more curious and her feelings more interested; then would her heart beat with the rapture of a young mother, whose gaze is fixed on her sleeping child, and her eyes glisten with the dew of joy which wets the cheeks of those who meet long parted friends. Then she would wander forth to search for the little berry whose flower is yellow, and which requires keen eyes to find it in its hiding-place in the grass, and the larger[A] which our white brother eats with his buffalo-meat; and their progress, from the putting forth of the leaf to the ripening of the fruit, was watched by her with eager joy. When tired of gazing upon the pine and stunted poplar, she would lie down in the shade of the creeping birch and dwarf willow, and sink to rest, and dream dreams which were not tinged with the darkness of evil. The sighing of the wind through the branches of the trees, and the murmur of little streams through the thicket, were her music. Throughout the land there was nothing to hurt her, or make her afraid, for there was nothing in it that had life, save herself and the little flower which blooms among thorns. And these two dwelt together like sisters.

[Footnote A: The cranberry.]

One day, when the mother of the world was out gathering berries, and watching the growth of a young pine, which had sprung up near her friend the flower, and threatened, as the flower said, "to take away the beams of the sun from it," she was scared by the sight of a strange creature, which ran upon four legs, and to all her questions answered nothing but "Bow, wow, wow." To every question our mother asked, the creature made the same answer, "bow, wow, wow." So she left off asking him questions, for they were sure to be replied to in three words of a language she could not understand. Did he ask for berries? no, for she offered him a handful of the largest and juiciest which grew in the valley, and he neither took them nor thanked her, unless "bow" meant "thank you." Was he admiring the tall young pines, or the beautiful blossoms of the cranberry, or the graceful bend of the willow, and asking her to join him in his admiration? She knew not, and leaving him to his thoughts, and to utter his strange words with none to reply, she returned to her cave.

Scarcely was she seated on her bed of dried leaves when he came in, and, wagging his tail, and muttering as before, lay down at her feet. Occasionally he would look up into her face very kindly, and then drop his head upon his paws. By and by he was fast asleep, and our mother, who had done no evil action, the remembrance of which should keep her awake, who never stole a beaver-trap(l), or told a lie, or laughed at a priest, was very soon in the same condition. Then the Manitou of Dreams came to her, and she saw strange things in her sleep. She dreamed that it wan night, and the sun had sunk behind the high and broken hills which lay beyond the valley of her dwelling, that the dwarf willow bowed its graceful head still lower with the weight of its tears, which are the evening dew, and the dandelion again imprisoned its leaves within its veil of brown. So far her dreams so closely resembled the reality, that for a time she thought she was awake, and that it was her own world—her cave, her berries, and her flowers, which were before her vision. But an object speedily came to inform her that she dwelt in the paradise of dreams—in the land of departed ideas. At the foot of her couch of leaves, in the place of the dog which she had left there when she slept, stood a being somewhat resembling that she had beheld in the warm season, when bending over the river to lave her bosom with the cooling fluid. It was taller than herself, and there was something on its brow which proclaimed it to be fiercer and bolder, formed to wrestle with rough winds, and to laugh at the coming tempests. For the first time since she was, she turned away to tremble, her soul filled with a new and undefinable feeling, for which she could not account. After shading her eyes a moment from the vision, she looked again, and though her trembling increased, and her brain became giddy, she did not wish the being away, nor did she motion it to go. Why should she? There was a smile upon its lip and brow, and a softness diffused over every feature, which gradually restored her confidence, and gave her the assurance that it would not harm her. She dreamed that the creature came to her arms, and she thought that it passed the season of darkness with its cheek laid on her bosom. To her imagination, the breath which it breathed on her lips was balmy as the juice of the Sweet Gum Tree, or the dew from her little neighbour, the flower. When it spoke, though she could not understand its language, her heart heaved more tumultuously, she knew not why, and when it ceased speaking, her sighs came thick till it spoke again. When she awoke it was gone, the beams of the star of day shone through the fissures of her cavern, and, in the place of the beautiful and loved being lay the strange creature, with the four legs and the old "bow, wow, wow."

Four moons passed, and brought no change of scene to the mother of the world. By night, her dreams were ever the same: there was always the same dear and beloved being, each day dearer and more beloved, coming with the shades, and departing with the sun, folding her in its arms, breathing balm on her lips, and pressing her bosom with its downy cheek. By day, the dog was always at her side, whether she went to gather berries or cresses, or to lave her limbs in the stream. Whenever the dog was there, the more beloved being was not; when night came, the dog as surely disappeared, and the other, seen in dreams, supplied his place. But she herself became changed. She took no more joy in the scenes which once pleased her. The pines she had planted throve unnoticed; the creeping birch stifled the willow and the juniper, and she heeded it not; the sweetest berries grew tasteless—she even forgot to visit her pretty sister, the rose. Yet she knew not the cause of her sudden change, nor of the anxiety and apprehension which filled her mind. Why tears bedewed her cheeks till her eyes became blind, why she trembled at times, and grew sick, and feinted, and fell to the earth, she knew not. Her feelings told her of a change, but the relation of its cause, the naming to her startled ear of the mystery of "the dog by day, and the man by night," was reserved for a being, who was to prepare the world for the reception of the mighty numbers which were to be the progeny of its mother.

She had wandered forth to a lonely valley—lonely where all was lonely—to weep and sigh over her lost peace, and to think of the dear being with which that loss seemed to her to be in some way connected, when suddenly the sky became darkened, and she saw the form of a being shaped like that which visited her in her sleep, but of immense proportions, coming towards her from the east. The clouds wreathed themselves around his head, his hair swept the mists from the mountain-tops, his eyes were larger than the rising sun when he wears the red flush of anger in the Frog-Moon, and his voice, when he gave it full tone, was louder than the thunder of the Spirit's Bay of Lake Huron. But to the woman he spoke in soft whispers; his terrific accents were reserved for the dog, who quailed beneath them in evident terror, not daring even to utter his only words, "bow, wow." The mother of the world related to him her dreams, and asked him why, since she had had them, she was so changed—why she now found no joy in the scenes which once pleased her, but rather wished that she no longer was, her dreams being now all that she loved. The mighty being told her that they were not dreams, but a reality; that the dog which now stood by her side was invested by the Master of Life with power to quit, at the coming in of the shades, the shape of a dog, and to take that of MAN, a being who was the counterpart of herself, but formed with strength and resolution, to counteract, by wisdom and sagacity, and to overcome, by strength and valour, the rough difficulties and embarrassments which were to spring up in the path of human life; that he was to be fierce and bold, and she gentle and afraid. He told her that the change she complained of, and which had given her so much grief, wetted her cheek with tears, and filled her bosom with sighs, was the natural result of the intimate connection of two such beings, and was the mode of perpetuating the human race, which had been decreed by the Master of Life; that before the buds now forming should be matured to fruit, she would give birth to two helpless little beings, whom she must feed with her milk, and rear with tender care, for from them would the world be peopled. He had been sent, he said, by the Good Spirit to level and prepare the earth for the reception of the race who were to inhabit it.

Hitherto the world had lain a rude and shapeless mass—the great, man now reduced it to order. He threw the rough and stony crags into the deep valleys—he moved the frozen mountain to fill up the boiling chasm. When he had levelled the earth, which before was a thing without form, he marked out with his great walking-staff the lakes, ponds, and rivers, and caused them to be filled with water from the interior of the earth, bidding them to be replenished from the rains and melted snows which should fall from the skies, till they should be no more.

When he had prepared the earth for the residence of the beings who were to people it, he caught the dog, and, notwithstanding the cries of the mother of the world, and her entreaties to him to spare its life, he tore it in pieces, and distributed it over the earth, and the water, and into air. The entrails he threw into the lakes, ponds, and rivers, commanding them to become fish, and they became fish. These waters, in which no living creature before moved, were now filled with salmon, trout, pike, tittymeg, methy, barble, turbot, and tench, while along the curling waves of the Great Lake the mighty black and white whale, the more sluggish porpoise, and many other finny creatures, sported their gambols. The flesh he dispersed over the land, commanding it to become different kinds of beasts and land-animals, and it obeyed his commands. The heavy moose, and the stupid we-was-kish, came to drink in the Coppermine with the musk-ox, and the deer, and the buffalo. The quiquehatch, and his younger brother, the black bear, and the wolf, that cooks his meat without fire,[A] and the cunning fox, and the wild cat, and the wolverine, were all from the flesh of the dog. The otter was the tail of the dog, the wejack was one of his fore-paws, and the horned horse, and the walrus, were his nose.

[Footnote A: It is a prevalent opinion with the savages, that the wolf cooks his meat before he eats it.]

Nor did the great man omit to make the skin furnish its proportion of the tribes of living beings. He tore it into many small pieces, and threw it into the air, commanding it to become the different tribes of fowls and birds, and it became the different tribes of fowls and birds. Then first was seen the mighty bird which builds its nest on trees which none can climb, and in the crevices of inaccessible rocks—the eagle, which furnishes the Indians with feathers to their arrows, and steals away the musk-rat and the young beaver as his recompense. Then was the sacred falcon first seen winging his way to the land of long winters; and the bird of alarm, the cunning old owl, and his sister's little son, the cob-a-de-cooch, and the ho-ho. All the birds which skim through the air, or plunge into the water, were formed from the skin of the dog.

When the great man had thus filled the earth with living creatures, he called the mother of the world to him, and gave to her and her offspring the things which he had created, with full power to kill, eat, and never to spare, telling her that he had commanded them to multiply for her use in abundance. When he had finished speaking, he returned to the place whence he came, and has never been heard of since. In due time, the mother of the world was delivered of two children, a son and a daughter, both having the dark visage of the Indian race, and from them proceeded the Dog-ribs, and all the other nations of the earth. The white men were from the same source, but the father of them, having once upon a time been caught stealing a beaver-trap, he become so terrified that he lost his original colour and never regained it, and his children remain with the same pale cheeks to this day.

Brothers, I have told you no lie.

NOTE.

* * * * *

(1) Never stole a beaver-trap.—p. 76.

Thieving is considered disreputable among the Indians; that is, it is highly criminal and infamous to steal from each other. Thieves are compelled to restore what they have stolen, or to make satisfactory amends to the injured party; in their default, their nearest relations are obliged to make up the loss. If the thief, after sufficient warning, continues his bad practices, he is disowned by his nation, and any one may put him to death the next time he is caught in the act of stealing, or that a theft can be clearly proved to have been committed by him. "I once," says Heckewelder, "knew an Indian chief who had a son of a vicious disposition, addicted to stealing, and would take no advice. His father, tired and unable to satisfy all the demands which were made upon him for the restitution of articles stolen by his son, at last issued his orders for shooting him, the next time be should be guilty of a similar act"—Heckew., 328.

Theft is always looked upon as a blot which dishonours a family, and every one has a right to wash away the stain with the blood of the delinquent. "Father Breboeuf," says Charlevoix, (vol. ii. p. 28) "one day saw a young Huron who was killing a woman with a club; he ran to him to prevent him, and asked him why he committed such violence. 'She is my sister,' replied the savage; 'she is guilty of theft, and I will expiate by her death the disgrace she has brought upon me and all my family.'"



THE FALL OF THE LENAPE

The Delawares are the grandfather of nations, the parent stock from which have proceeded the many tribes who roam over the woods of this vast island. From them are descended the red men of the east and the west, of the shores of the Great Sea and of the northern lakes. Among these the Mengwe was a favoured grandchild. In the days that are gone, the Delawares fought his battles, his war was theirs; and the hostile shout that woke in his woods was answered by the defiance of the sons of the Leni Lenape.

But the Mengwe was ungrateful, and forgot these benefits; he was treacherous, and raised his hand against his benefactors and former friends. His hostile bands invaded the lands of his grandfather, but they were defeated, and fled howling to their wilderness. The Mengwe, by their cunning and duplicity, had brought all the tribes of the land upon the Lenape, whose sons nevertheless continued in possession of their hunting-grounds, for they were very brave. Still their enemy continued his arts. He first sought to raise quarrels and disturbances, which in the end might lead to wars between the Lenape and the distant tribes who were friendly to them, for which purpose they privately murdered people on one or the other side, seeking to make the injured party believe that some particular nation or individual had been the aggressor. They left a war-club painted as the Lenape paints his[A] in the country of the Cherokees, where they purposely committed a murder, and that people, deceived by appearances, fell suddenly on the Lenape, and a bloody and devastating war ensued between the two nations. They frequently stole into the country of the Lenape and their associates, committing murders and making off with plunder. Their treachery having at length been discovered, the Lenape marched with a powerful force into their country to destroy them. Finding that they were no match for the brave Delawares, Thannawage, an aged and wise Mohawk, called the different tribes of the Mengwe to the great council-fire. "You see," said he, "how easily the sons of our grandfather overcome us in battle. Their pole is strung full of the scalps of our nation, while ours has but here one and there one. This must not be; the last man of the Mengwe is not yet prepared to die. We must become united, the Mohawks, the Oneidas, the Onondagos, the Cayugas, and the Senecas, must become one people; they must move together in the conflict, they must smoke in one pipe, and eat their meat in one lodge." The people listened to the words of Thannawage, and the five nations became one people.

[Footnote A: The different tribes are known by their manner of painting their war-clubs.]

Still, though united they did not prevail over the Lenape and their connexions; the latter were most usually victorious. While these wars were at their greatest height, and when neither could decidedly pronounce themselves conquerors, the Big-knives arrived in Canada, and a war commenced between them and the confederated Iroquois. Thus placed between two fires, and in danger of being exterminated, they resorted to their old cunning and knavery. They sent a deputation of their principal warriors, with the sacred calumet (1) and the belt of peace, to the sons of their grandfather. But they appeared not to wish for peace, but to be guided by wisdom and compassion alone, and to be fearful only of being considered as cowards. "A warrior," said they, "with the bloody weapon in his hand should never intimate, a desire for peace, or hold pacific language to his enemies. He should shew throughout a determined courage, and appear as ready and willing to fight as at the beginning of the contest. Will a man who would not be thought a liar threaten and sue in the same breath; will he hold the peace-belt in one hand, and smoke the unpainted calumet, while his other hand grasps a tomahawk? Will he strike his breast, and say 'I am brave and fearless,' yet shew that he is a mocking-bird? No, men's actions should be of a piece with their words, whether good or bad; good cannot come out of evil, neither can the brave man feel faint-hearted, or the fawn become a tiger. The Mengwe were brave: they would not abase themselves in the eyes of the Lenape by admitting that they were vanquished, or proposing peace. They made use of their women to soften the hearts of our nation. They said to their wives and the wives of the Lenape, Are you tired of the fathers of your children?—to the mothers, Does the Lenape hate her sons?—to our young women, Do the eyes of the maidens turn with aversion from the youths of your nation? if the wife is tired of her husband, if the mother hate her sons, if the dark-eyed maiden feels no grief when the Lenape youth goes forth to battle and certain death, nor sheds a tear when he paints his face, and dresses his hair, and fills his quiver with arrows, then let them remain silent, and the messengers of the Mengwe will return to their nation."