Local History: Chapter III: The Aborigines: Bean's 1884 History of Montgomery Co, PA Contributed for use in USGenWeb Archives by Susan Walters USGENWEB NOTICE: Printing this file by non-commercial individuals and libraries is encouraged, as long as all notices and submitter information is included. Any other use, including copying files to other sites requires permission from the submitters PRIOR to uploading to any other sites. We encourage links to the state and county table of contents. บบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบ BEAN'S HISTORY OF MONTGOMERY COUNTY, PENNSYLVANIA บบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบบ 33 (cont.) CHAPTER III. THE ABORIGINES. THREE hundred and ninety-one years have elapsed since the commercial nations of the earth first learned of the existence of the North American Indians. From whence they came remain an archaeological problem. Their numbers [See NOTE 3-1.] were the subject of conjecture until after the Revolutionary war, when they became objects of governmental solicitude and care. As a race, they have displayed rare physical powers of endurance, they have Shown indomitable courage and remarkable sagacity. The exceptional among them have been gifted with keen perceptive faculties, creating and preserving tribal relations among them- selves for centuries, recognizing the obligations of truth, virtue, and honor, the omnipotent power of a "Great Spirit," [See NOTE 3-2.] and a great "future hunting-ground." [NOTE 3-1.] Robert Proud, historian, estimated the number of fighting men of eighteen given tribes at 27,900, and total number, 139,500. Besides, in an historical account, printed in Philadelphia, of the expedition against the Ohio Indians in 1764, under command of Col. Bouquet, there is a list of the Indian nations of Canada and Louisiana, said to be from good authority, and that the account may be depended on, so far as a matter of this kind can be brought near the truth, in which it is asserted that there are 56,580 fighting men of such Indians as the French were connected with in Canada and Louisiana. Assuming this number to be one-fifth of the population, they would have had at that date 282,000. According to the latest data in the possession of the Interior Department at Washington the number of Indians in the United States is 262,000. It is claimed that with regard to all Indian tribes receiving supplies from the government reasonably accurate statistics have been obtained, as in making issues of goods to the Indians the individual receipt of each head of a family is required. The accounts division of 34 the Indian Office therefore possesses a register of the names of all heads of families to whom goods, supplies, or annuities are issued by the government. In most of the States there are remaining small communities of Indians, like the Six Nations in New York, the Eastern Cherokees in North Carolina, the Miamis in Indiana, etc. Having tribal property they maintain a tribal organization. The Indian Office exercises a sort of guardianship over them in the protection of their lands, management of their funds, limiting the contracts they may make and file fees they may pay to attorneys, deciding questions of membership in the tribe, etc.; but they are self-supporting, and receive no goods or supplies from the government. The same may be said of the "five civilized tribes" of the Indian Territory, and of the Indians of the Pacific coast, although some of the latter receive about five per cent of their subsistance from the Department. They are not dependent upon the government for the supply of their daily wants, and consequently the Indian Department is not able to obtain from them such minute and detailed reports as are required from the semi-savage tribes. In some cases the government is therefore in possession of better statistics from the the "wild" tribes than from such as are partially civilized, or at least self-supporting. Leaving the five civilized tribes of the Indian Territory out of the question, these statistics show that the Indians are not now, and for several years past have not been, decreasing in numbers. The birth is reported In all the tribes last year aggregated 2998; the number of deaths was 2478. An examination of file reports from all the agencies and, detail shows many instances of decrease, but the general result is as stated. It is not claimed that these figures are either complete or exact, but they are beyond reasonable doubt sufficient to establish the fact that the Indian race, as a whole, is spite of disadvantageous circumstances, is not dying out. The mortuary customs of most of the tribes render it improbable that many deaths should escape the knowledge of the agent. As regards the death of a relative or friend the Indian is not a stoic; morning for the deceased, whether slain in battle or dying from natural causes, is usually loud and long continued, and accompanied with ceremonies likely to make every person within the sound of beating tom-toms kind wailing voices aware of the loss the tribe has sustained. Over births no such demonstrations are made, so that the error in the figures given is probably that of reporting too small an increase in the tribal numbers. It is easy to find reports front particular tribes showing a decided de- crease during the past year. The Six Natiions, New York, lost 235 by death, while there were only 187 births. There are 5116 Indians on the several reservations in New York, the Senecas, Oneidas, Cayugas, Onondagas, Tonawandas, and Tuscaroras. These Indians are second rate farmers, as are the Pottawatomies, Kickapoos, and Munsees of Kansas, who also lost in numbers last year, the deaths among them exceeding the births by 30 per cent.; and the same is true of Indians similarly situated in Michigan, -the Chippewas, Ottawas, and Pottawatomies of the Mackinac agency. In each of these remnants of tribes there was about the same percent of loss. The Indians nearly all wear civilized dress, and they are surrounded by whites. In the Indian Territory, however, nearly all the tribes are increasing. The agent of the Cheyennes and Arapahoes reports 324 births, 110 deaths among 6769 Indians; the Kiowa, Comanche, and Wishita agency reports 149 births, 96 deaths. Reports from the twenty-one other tribes in the Indian Territory indicate a small percent of increase in all except two. The ever unfortunate Poncas and the Senecas suffered a further loss in numbers last year. Outside of the Territory, without going into detail, it maybe said generally that the Indians of the Northern plains, the great Sioux tribes and the Crows, are about stationary. There is perhaps a small increase, but reports fire not full enough to show more than that there is no decided change. Citizens of the Southwest will particularly regret to know that the Utes and the Mescalero Apaches are, annually increasing in numbers. The fishermen along the borders of Puget Sound, the Puyallup, Quillebute, Coeur d'Alene, O'Kanagans, etc., are slowly increasing while the S'kokomish and Quinalelt Indians of the same region report a decided loss last year. The generalization indicated by these reports is not a pleasant one. It will he noticed that the uncivilized Indians, or at least those living away from the direct influences of the white race, are increasing, while those living in the midst of prosperous white settlements are gradually dying out. The five civilized tribes of the Indian Territory, and especially the Cherokees, who are themselves prosperous, hold the theory that Indians can not thrive when immediately surrounded by communities of white men; that, being unable to compete with their neighbors, the Indians become hopelessly discouraged. The figures given above appear to confirm this doctrine. Fuller and more accurate statistics may, however, modify or reverse the conclusions based upon the official reports we have quoted, which afford the best data now obtainable. [FINIS NOTE 3-1.] [NOTE 3-2.] The following letter of Conrad Weiser, written to a friend, on the subject of the Indians' belief in a, Supreme Being, is of more than usual interest: "ESTEEMED FRIEND, I write this, in compliance with thy request, to give thee an account of what I have observed among the Indians in relation to their belief and confidence in a Divine Being, according to the observations I have made from 1714, in the time of my youth, to this day (about the year 1746). If, by the word religion, people mean an assent to certain creeds, or the observance of a set of religious duties, as appointed prayers, singing, preaching, baptism, or even heathenish worship, they, it may be said, the Five Nations and their neighbors have no religion. But if, by religion, we mean an attraction to the soul to God, whence proceeds a confidence in, and hunger after, the knowledge of him, then his people must be allowed to have some religion among them, notwithstanding their sometimes savage deportment. For we find among them some tracts of a confidence in God alone, and even, sometimes, though but seldom, a vocal calling upon him. I shall give one or two instances of this that fell under my own observation. In the year 1737, I was sent, the first time, to Onondaga, at the desire of the Governor of Virginia. I departed in the latter end of February, very unexpectedly, for a journey of five hundred English miles, through a wilderness where there was neither road nor path, and at such a time of the year when creatures (animals) could not be met with for food. There were with me a Dutchman and three Indians. After we had gone one hundred and fifty miles on our journey we came to a narrow valley, about half a mile broad and thirty long, both sides of which were encompassed with high mountains, on which the snow laid about three feet deep, in it ran a stream of water also about three feet deep, which was so crooked that it kept a continued winding course from one side of the valley to the other. In order to avoid wading so often through the water, we endeavored to pass along the slope of the mountain, the snow being three feet deep, and so hard frozen on the top that we could walk upon it; but we were obliged to make holes in the snow with our hatchets that our feet might not slip down the mountain, and thus we crept on. It happened that the old Indian's foot slipt, and the root of a tree, by which he held, breaking, he slid down the mountain as from the roof of a house; but, happily, he was stopped to his fall by the string which fastened his pack hitching oil the stump of a small tree. The other two Indians could not go to his aid, but our Dutch fellow-traveller did, yet not without visible danger of his own life. I also, could not put a foot forward till I was helped. After this we took the first opportunity to descend into the valley, which was not till we had labored hard for half an hour with hands and feet. Having observed a tree lying directly off from where the Indian fell, when we got into the valley again, we went back about one hundred paces, where we saw that if the Indian had slipt four or five paces further he would have fallen over a rock, one hundred feet perpendicular upon craggy pieces of rock below. The Indian was astonished and turned quite pale; then, with outstretched arms and great earnestness he spoke these words: 'I thank the great Lord and governor of this world in that he has had mercy upon me, and has been willing that I should live longer.' Which words I at that time put, down in my journal. This happened on the 25th of March, 1737. In the 9th of April following, while we were yet on our journey, I found myself extremely weak though the fatigue of a long journey, will, the cold and hunger which I had suffered. There having fallen a fresh snow, about twenty inches deep, and we being yet three days' journey Page 35 from Onondaga, in a frightful wilderness, my spirit failed, my body trembled and shook; I thought I should fall down, and die, I stept aside and eat down under a tree, expecting there to die. My companions soon missed me. The Indians came back and found me sitting there. They remained awhile silent; at last the old Indian said: 'My dear companion, thou hast hitherto encouraged us, wilt thou now quite give up? Remember that evil days are before then good days, for when we suffer much, we do not sin; sin will be driven out of us by suffering but good days will cause men to sin, and God cannot extend his mercy to them, but, contrawise, when it goeth evil with us, God hath compassion upon us.' These words made me ashamed; I rose up and traveled as well as I could. The next day I went another journey to Onondaga in company with Joseph Spanhenberg and two others. It happened that an Indian came to us in the evening who had neither shoes, stockings, shirt, gun, knife, nor hatchet; in a word, he had nothing but an old torn blanket and some rags. Upon inquiring whither be was going, he answered, 'to Onondaga.' I knew him, and asked him how he could undertake a journey of three hundred miles so naked and unprovided, having no provisions nor any arms to kill creatures for his subsistence? He answered, he had been among enemies and had been obliged to save himself by flight, and so had lost all. This was true in part, for he had disposed of some of his things among the Irish for strong liquors. Upon further talk, he told me very cheerfully, that 'God fed everything which had life, even the rattle snake itself, though it was a bad creature, and that God would also provide in such a manner that he should get alive to Onondaga. He knew for certain that he, should go thither; that it was visible God was with the Indians in the wilderness, because they always cast their care upon him; but that, contrary to this, the Europeans always carried bread with them.' He was an Onondaga Indian; his name was Oriontagketa. The next day we traveled in company, and the day following I provided him with a hatchet, knife, flint and tinder, also shoes and stockings, and sent him before me to give notice to the Council at Onondaga that I was coming, which be truly performed, being got thither three days before us. Two years ago, I was sent by the Governor to Shamokin on account of the unhappy death of John Armstrong, the Indian trader (1744). After I had performed my errand, there was a feast prepared, to which the Governor's messengers were invited. There were about one hundred persons present, to whom, after we had in great silence devoured a fat bear, the eldest of the chiefs made a speech, in which he said, 'That by a great misfortune three of their brethren, the white men, had been killed by an Indian; that nevertheless the sun has not yet set (meaning there was no war); it had only been somewhat darkened by a small cloud, which was now done away. He that had done evil was like to be punished, and the land to remain in peace; therefore lie, exhorted his people to thankfulness to God, and there upon lie began to and with an awful solemnity, but without expressing any words. The others accompanied hint with their voices. After they had done the same Indian, with great earnestness or fervor, spoke these words. 'Thanks, thanks, be to thee, thou great Lord of the world, in that thou hast again caused the sun to shine, and hath dispersed the dark cloud: the Indians are thine. One more instance may no mentioned on this subject, which has come under my own observation and personal knowledge. In the summer of the year 1760 a number of religious Indians paid a visit to the Quakers in Philadelphia on a religious account. They were mostly of the Minusing tribe, and came from a town called Mahackloosing or Wyalusing, on or near the First Branch of the Susquehanna River, in Pennsylvania, about two hundred miles northwestward from the city. Their chief man, whom the rest of the company styled their minister, was named Papunehung or Papounan, and the interpreter, Job Chilloway, an Indian. On their arrival they met Governor Hamilton, to pay him in their respects, and to deliver three prisoners whom they had redeemed, having themselves, absolutely refused to join with the other Indians in the savage war which raged about that time, though their visit was principally on a different account. They had a public conference with the Governor in the State house on the occasion, in the presence of many citizens, wherein Papounan expressed the design of their visit was to principally to the Quakers, on a religious account; that they desired to do justice, to love God, and to live in peace, requesting at the same time that none of his company should be permitted to have any spirituous liquors, etc. He refused the presents offered by the Governor, said gave him the reasons, further saying, 'I think of God, who made us; I want to be instructed, in His worship and service. I am a great lover of peace, and have never been concerned in war affairs. I have a sincere remembrance of the old friendship between the Indians and your forefathers, and shall ever observe it.' After mentioning some other things, and expressing himself further on the view or design of their visit religious account, he said, 'Though what he had mentioned respecting religious affairs might appear trivial to some who thought different from him, yet he was fixed in his mind respecting them; that their young men agreed with him and wanted to love God, and to desist from their former bad course of life,' further declaring, 'I am glad to have an opportunity of mentioning these several affairs in the presence of such a large auditory of young and old people. The great God observes, all that passes in our hearts, and hears all that we say one to another etc. The Notes, etc., on, the occasion were taken from the interpreter by Secretary Peters. He then finished with a solemn act of public thanksgiving and prayer to God, with great devotion and energy in the Indian language (not being able to speak nor understand English The unusualness, force, and sound of the Indian language of, such an occasion, with the manifest great sincerity, fervor, and concern of the speaker, seemed to strike the whole auditory in an uncommon manner, as well as the Indians themselves, who all the while behaved with a gravity and deportment becoming the occasion, and appeared to units heartily with him in his devotion." "Christian nations have already, been zealous in missionary work, and yet early in the history of this country pious and devoted men, often more enthusiastic than learned in their calling, came over from Europe countries under special instruction to convert the heathen Indians. The Swedes were notable for their efforts to "Christianize the savages." [FINIS NOTE 3-2.] They have been, and still are, a subject of interesting study, and as the last of their tribes melt away before or are absorbed in the superior civilization that has dispossessed them of a continent, interest in their origin. Antiquity, habits, and customs seems unabated. Parkman, Campanus, Acrelius, Heckewelder, Penn, Gordon, Proud, and many others have written upon these red men of the forest and their occupancy of the I country we now dwell upon. It is certainly true they have nowhere left a deep or lasting impression upon the face of the country occupied by them. To them the earth seems to have had no higher utilities than a vast hunting-ground. The future archaeologist may yet find evidence of their origin and earlier conditions of life than those ascertained by writers of our age; to preserve all knowledge thus far acquired of them and, if possible, incite and facilitate further research concerning the remarkable. Race should induce writers of every century to carry forward their history. The time is not far distant when the remnant of this singular people will accept the inevitable and yield their wild and savage natures to the constant overtures of Christian civilization, when the descendants of chiefs and warriors will open mind and heart and take rank with educators of their generation. Their own race may yet furnish their archaeologists and true historians. We have reached a period in our history when Indian training-schools are no longer experimental. The school at Carlisle, Pa., in successful operation with two hundred youthful inmates of both sexes, is in pleasing contrast with the former policy of the government, which maintained a military post at the same place for the training of "regulars" to slaughter the race on the plains of the West. It may well be that from the number of these people now in course of preparation for intellectual pursuits and a higher life there will come some one or more who will fulfill 36 the hope of Humboldt, who says, "I do not participate in the rejecting spirit which has but too often thrown popular tradition into obscurity, but I am, on the contrary, firmly persuaded that by greater diligence and perseverance many of the historical problems which relate to the maritime expeditions of the Middle Ages, to the striking identity in religious traditions, manner of dividing time, and works of art in America and Eastern Asia, to the migrations of the Mexican nations, to the ancient centres of dawning civilization in Aztlan, Quivira, and Upper Louisiana, its well as the elevated plateaux of Cundinamarca and Peru, will one day be cleared up by discoveries of facts with which we have hitherto been entirely unacquainted." Professor W. D. Whitney is not so prophetic as Humboldt, but in evident sympathy with him and perhaps more practical: "What we have to do at present is simply to learn all we can of the Indian language themselves, to settle their internal relations, elicit their laws of growth, reconstruct their older forms, and ascend toward their original condition as far as the material within our reach and the state in which it is presented will allow; if our studies shall at length put us in a position to deal with the question of their Asiatic derivation, we will rejoice at it. I do not myself expect that valuable light will ever be shed upon the subject of linguistic evidence; others may be more sanguine, but all must at any rate agree that, as things are, the subject is in no position to be taken up and discussed with profit." Nevertheless, Professor Whitney insists that greater diligence should be devoted to the study of our antiquities. "Our national duty and honor," he contends, "are peculiarly concerned in this matter of the, study of aboriginal American languages as the most fertile, and important branch of American archaeology. Europeans accuse us, with too much reason, of indifference and inefficiency with regard to preserving memorials of the races whom we have dispossessed, and are dispossesing, and to promoting a through comprehension of their history. Indian scholars and associations which devote themselves to gathering together and making public linguistic and other archaeological materials for construction of the proper ethnology of the continent are far rarer than they should be among us." A recent author [See NOTE 3-3.] has brought to notice in condensed form a number of references to the possible origin of the Indian races on this continent, which fully illustrates the speculative theories indulged in by commentators upon the subject. The Indian tribes who [NOTE 3-3.] Bancroft, in his first edition, permits himself enough dalliance with the hypothesis of a Calmuck or Mongolian immigration as an attempt to show that it was not impossible, perhaps not improbable. Grotius, Do Laet, etc., speculated with less information perhaps than our historian, and with more prejudices but not more widely from the purpose. Some writers have assumed that the Phoenicians and Carthaginians, because they made adventurous voyages and passed outside the Straits of Hercules, must have come to America. Plato's myth of the Atlantides has been made to do service in buoying up a sunken continent out of the oozy depths of the ocean and the mermaiden grottoes of fantastic, legend. Mexico and Peru has been infallibly shown time and again, must have got their monuments from Egypt or from India, -Carnac, Luxor, Elephanta are reproduced at Palenque and Uxmal, at Cholula and Cuico. Aristotle is quoted to show that the ancients most have had a knowledge of an intercourse with America. Slight similarities of costume face, and habits have been seized upon as eagerly as Penn seized upon the fact that the Indians counted time by moons (as if Penn himself did not do the same thing to establish relationship for our barbarians with the children Israel, with the fugitive Canaanites. etc. The sons of Prince Madoc of course have not been neglected. White Indians in North Carolina spoke the purest sort of Cymric dialect, and some of the Shawannes are reported to have been seen carrying around Welsh bibles in the same belt along with their tomakawks and scalping-knives. Menassah Ben Israel concludes, upon the same sort of data is those which convinced Penn, that the lost tribes emerged between California and the Mississippi but Spizelius and those who followed him in the last century were content to ascribe the the origin of our Indians to a country less distant than the Levant. China, Tartary, Siberia, and Kamtshatka, with the Aleutian archipelago, afforded a natural route for immigration, though no attempt, is to explain how the hordes of savages were able to make their way through the frozen wastes of Alaska and British America. The fact that Lief, son of the Northman, Eric the Red, did discover America in the year 1000 A.D. has make work for the pseudo-ethnologists as well as the poets In the scratchings on the Dighton rocks in Massachusetts, and the old mill at Newport, R. I., and best even led to the factious discovery of supposed inscriptions upon the face of the masses of Seneca sandstone at the falls of the Potomac. The Norsemen themselves encouraged the belief that on the Atlantic coast, between Virginia and Florida, a white nation existed, who clothed themselves in long, snowy robes, carried banners on lofty poles, and chanted songs and hymns. These were supposed to be the Irish immigrants, who replied in pure Gaelic when Raleigh's seamen accosted them, and spared Owen Chapelain's life in 1669 because, he spoke to them in Welsh. Alexander Von Humboldt has condesended to listen to some of these fables, and to repeat them in his Cosmos. The Chinese or Japanese settlement of our continent, by vessels coming over the Pacific Ocean, has found many advocates. Spanish legends are adduced to confirm this view. M de Guignes, in a memoir read before the French Academy of Inscriptions, contends that the Chinese penetrated to America A. D. 45, and adduces the description and chart Fou Sang in proof- In our own day that ripe Philadelphia scholar, Charles G. Leland, has republished the story of the so-called island of Fou-Sang and its inhabitants. De Guignes holds that the Chinese were familiar with the Strats of Magellan, and that the Coreans had a settlement on Terra del Fuego. Another Chinese immigration is assigned to A.D. 1270, the time of the Tartar invasion of the "Central Flowery Kingdom." But there are other speculations still in this subject. Thomas Morton in his "New Canaan" (A.D. 1637), argues for the Latin origin of the Indians, because he heard them use Latin words, and make allusions to the god Pan. Williamson thinks that the race unquestionably springs from a Hindoo or a Cingalese source. Thorowgood, Adair, and Boudinot agree with Penn and Rabbi ben Menasseh. Roger Williams also said, "Some taste of affinity with the Hebrew I have found." Cotton Mather thought that "probably the Devil, seducing the first inhabitants of America into it, therein aimed at the having of them and their posterity out of the sound of the silver trumpets of the gospel, then to be heard throughout the Roman empire. If the Devil had any expectation that by the peopling of America he should utterly deprive any Europeans of the two benefits, literature and religion, which dawned upon the miserable world (one just before, the other just after, the first famed navigation hither), 'tis to be hoped he will be disappointed of that expectation." As for the source of the Indians, Mather fancied them Scythians, because they answered Julius Caesar's description of "difficilius invenire quam intefiecre." But the fact of idle and comical opinions on this subject does not destroy the interest in these speculations, nor the utility of continuing our investigations, on a rational basis, into American archaeology. [The Algonkquins, the Lenni Lenapes in Pennsylvania, were also variously called Wapanacki (European corruptions: Openaki, Openagi, Abenaquis, Apenakis). The Delaware regions appear to have been their principal seat, though affiliated and derivative nations of their stock were found from Hudson Bay to Florida, and from Lake Superior to East Tennessee. Forty tribes acknowledged the Lenapes as grandfather or parent stock. Their traditions, which are not always authentic, relatethat the tribe once upon a time dwelt in the far distant wilds of the West, whence they moved eastward towards sunrise by slowstages, often passing a year in a single camp, but eventually reaching the batik of the Namesi Sipu, the River of Fish (Mississippi), where they found the Megwes or Iroquois, migrating like themselves, but who had descended from the Northwest. The Lenape scouts reported the country east of the river to be held by a people called the Allegwi (whence the name Allegheny River and Mountains), who were numerous, tall, stout, some of them giants, all dwelling in entrenched or fortified towns. The Lenape were denied leave to settle among the Allegewi, but obtained permission to pass through their country. When they were half over the river, however, the Allegewi attacked and drove them back with great loss. The Lenape now formed an alliance with the Mengwe; the two nations united forces. crossed the river, attacked the Allegewi, arid after a long and desperate war defeated them and expelled them from their country, they fleeing southward. The conquered country was apportioned between the conquerors, the Mengwes choosing the Northern part, along the lake, the Lenapes choosing the more southern section, binding on both sides of the Ohio. Moving eastward still, they came finally to the Delaware River and the ocean, and thence spread beyond the Hudson on the north and beyond the Potomac on the south. This legend, however, is full of inconsistencies and incompatibilities, and hardly answers to what was known of the condition arid location of the great Algonkid race at the time of the first settlement of the whites among them. As to their origin as members of the human family they have divers legends. They claim to have come out of a cave in the earth, like the woodchuck and the chipmunk; to have sprung front a snail that wag transformed into a human being and taught to hunt by a kind Manitou, after which it was received into the lodge of the beaver and married the beaver's favorite daughter, In another myth a woman is discovered hovering in mid-air above the watery waste of chaos. She has fallen or been expelled from heaven, and there is no earth to offer her resting-place. The tortoise, however, rose from the depths and put his broad, shield-like back at her service, and she descended upon it and made it her abode, for its dome-like oval resembled the first emergency of dry land from the waters of the deluge. The tortoise slept upon the deep, and round the margin of big shell the barnacles gathered, the mum of the sea collected, arid the floating fragments of the shredded sea-weed accumulated until the dry land grew apace, and by and by there was all that broad expanse of island which now constitutes North America. The woman, weary of watching, worn out with sighs for her lonesomeness, dropped off into, a tranquil slumber, and in that sleep she dreamed of a spirit who came to her from her lost home above the skies, and of that dream the fruits were sons and daughters, from whom have descended the human race. Another legend personifies the Great Spirit under the form of a gigantic bird that descended upon the face of the waters, and brooded there until the earth arose. Then the Spirit, exercising its creative power made the plants and animals, and lastly trial, who was formed out of the integuments of the dog, and endowed with a magic arrow that was to be preserved with great care, for it was at once a blessing arid a safeguard. But the man carelessly lost the arrow, whereupon the Spirit soared away upon its bird-like wings and was no longer seen, and man had henceforth to hunt and struggle for his livelihood. Manatiozho, relates the general Algonkin tradition, created the different tribes of red men out of the carcasses of different animals, the beaver, the eagle, the wolf, the serpent, the tortoise, etc. Manabozho, Measou, Michaboo, or Nanabush is a demi-god who works the metamorphoses of nature. He is the king of all the beasts; big father was the west wind, his mother the moon's great-grandfather, and sometimes lie appears in the form of a wolf or a bird, but is usual shape is that of the Gigantic Hare. Often Manabuzho masquerades in the figure of a man of great endowments and majestic statute, when he is a magician after the order of Prospero; but when he takes the form of some impish elf, their be it, more tricksy than Ariel, and more full of hobgoblin devices than Punk. "His powers of transformation are without limit; his curiosity and malice are insatiable :" he has inspired a thousand legends; he is the central figure in the fairy realm of the Indian, which, indeed, is not very fully nor genially peopled. Manabozho is the restorer of the wild, submerged by a deluge which the serpent mardtous have caused. Manabuzho climbs a tree, saves himself, and sends a loon to dive for mud from which he can make a new world. The loon fails to reach the bottom ; the muskrat, which next attempts the feat, returns lifeless to the surface, but with a little sand in the bottom of its paw, from which the Great Hare is able to recreate the world. In other legends the otter and beaver dive in vain, but the muskrat succeeds, losing his life it, the attempt] --Scharf's History of Phildelphia. [FINIS NOTE 3-3.] 37 dwelt among the primitive forests of Pennsylvania, as well as those of Delaware, New Jersey, and a part of Maryland, called themselves the Lenni Lenape, or the original people. This general name comprehended numerous, distinct tribes, all speaking dialects of a common language (the Algonkin), and uniting around the same great council-fire. Their grand council-house, to use their own expressive figure, extended from the eastern bank of the Hudson on the northeast to the Potomac on the southwest. Many of the tribes were directly descended from the common stock; others, having sought their sympathy and protection, had been allotted a section of their territory. The surrounding tribes not of this confederacy, nor acknowledging allegiance to it, agreed in awarding to them the honor of being the grandfathers; that is, the oldest residents in this region. There was an obscure tradition among the Lenni Lenape that in ages past their ancestors had emigrated east ward from the Mississippi, conquering or expelling on their route that great and apparently more civilized nation whose monuments, in the shape of mounds, are so profusely scattered over the great Western valley, and of which several also remain in Pennsylvania along the western slope of the Alleghany Mountains. The Lenni Lenape nation was divided into three principal divisions, the Unamis, or Turtle tribes; the Unalachtgos, or Turkeys; and the Monseys, or Wolf tribes. The two former occupied the country along the coast between the sea and the Kittatinny or Blue Mountain, their settlement extending as far east as the Hudson and as far west as the Potomac. These were generally known among the whites as the Delaware Indians. The Monseys, or Wolf tribes, the most active and warlike of the whole, occupied the mountainous country between the Kittatinny Mountain and the sources of the Susquehanna and Delaware River, kindling their council-fire at the Minisink flats on the Delaware above the Water Gap. A part of the tribe also dwelt on the Susquehanna, and they had also a village and a peach orchard in the Forks of the Delaware, where Nazareth is now situated. These three principal divisions were divided into various subordinate clans, who is assumed names suited to their character or situation. The Shawanos, or Shawanees, a restless and ferocious tribe, having been threatened with extermination by a more powerful tribe at the South, sought protection among the friendly nations of the North, whose language was observed to bear a remarkable affinity with their own. A majority of them settled along the Ohio, from the Wabash to near Pittsburgh. A portion was received under the protection of the Lenni Lenapes, and permitted to settle near the Forks of the Delaware and on the flats below Philadelphia. But they soon became troublesome neighbors, and were removed by the Delawares (or possibly by the 38 Six Nations) to the Susquehanna Valley, where they had a village at the Shawnee flats, below Wilkesbarre, on the west side of the river. During the Revolution and the war of 1812 their name became conspicuous in the history of the Northern frontier. The Lenni Lenape tribes consisted, at the first settlement of Pennsylvania, of the Assunpink, or Stony Creek Indians; the Rankokas (Lamikas or Chichequaas); Andastakas, at Christiana Creek, near Wilmington; Neshaminies, in Bucks County; Shackamaxons, about Kensington; Mantas, or Frogs, near Burlington; the Tateloes and Nanticokes, in Maryland and Virginia (the latter afterwards removed up the Susquehanna); the Monseys, or Minisinks, near the Forks of the Delaware; the Mandes and the Narriticongs, near the Raritan; the Capitanasses, the Gacheos, the Monseys, and the Pomptons, in New Jersey. A few scattered clans or warlike hordes of the Mingoes were living here and there among the Lenapes. Another great Indian confederacy claims attention, whose acts have an important bearing upon the history of Pennsylvania. This confederacy was originally known in the annals of New York as the Five Nations, and subsequently, after they had been joined by the Tuscaroras, as the Six Nations. As confederates they called themselves Aquanuschioni, or United People. By the Lenapes they were called Mengue, or Mingoes, and by the French the Iroquois. The original Five Nations were the Onondagas, the Cayugas, the Oneidas, the Senecas, and the Mohawks. In 1712 the Tuscaroras, being expelled from the interior of North Carolina and Virginia, were adopted as a sixth tribe. The language of all the tribes of the confederacy, except the Tuscaroras, was radically the same, and different from that of the Lenni Lenape. Their dominion stretched from the borders of Vermont to Lake Erie, and from Lake Ontario to the head-waters of the Allegheny, Susquehanna, and Delaware Rivers. This territory they styled their long house. The grand council-fire was held in the Onondaga Valley. The Seneicas guarded the western door of the house, the Mohawk the eastern, and the Cayligas the southern, or that which opened upon the Susquehanna. The Mohawk nation was the first in rank, and to it appertained the office of principal war chief; to the Onondagas, who guarded the grand council-fire, appertained in like manner the office of principal civil chief, or chief sachem. The Senecas, in numbers and military energy, were the most powerful. The peculiar location of the Iroquois gave them an immense advantage. On the great channels of water conveyance, to which their territories are contiguous, they were enabled in all directions to carry war and devastation to the neighboring or to the more distant nations. Nature had endowed them with a height, strength, and symmetry of person which distinguished them at a glance among the individuals of other tribes. They were as brave as they were strong, but ferocious and cruel when excited in savage warfare; crafty, treacherous, and over-reaching when these qualities best suited their purpose. The proceedings of their grand council were marked with great decorum and solemnity. In eloquence, in dignity, and profound policy their speakers might well bear comparison with the statesmen of civilized assemblies. By an early alliance with the Dutch on the Hudson they secured the use of fire-arms, and were thus enabled not only to repel the encroachments of the French, but also to exterminate or reduce to a state of vassalage many Indian nations. From these they exacted an annual tribute or acknowledgment of fealty, permitting them, however, on that condition to occupy their former hunting grounds. "The humiliation of tributary nations was, however, tempered with a paternal regard for their interests in all negotiations with the whites, and care was taken that no trespasses should be committed on their rights, and that they should be justly dealt with." To this condition of vassalage the Lenni Lenape or Delaware nation had been reduced by the Iroquois, as the latter asserted, by conquest. The Lenapes, however, smarting under the humiliation, invented for the whites a cunning tale in explanation, which they succeeded in imposing upon the worthy and venerable Mr. Heckewelder, the Moravian missionary. Their story was that by treaty and by voluntary consent they had agreed to act as mediators and peace-makers among the other great nations, and to this end they had consented to lay aside entirely the implements of war, and to hold and to keep bright the chain of peace. This, among individual tribes, was the usual province of women. The Delawares therefore alleged that they were figuratively termed women on this account; but the Iroquois evidently called them women in quite another sense. "They always alleged that the Delawares were conquered by their arms, and were compelled to this humiliating concession as the only means of averting impending destruction." In the course of time, however, the Delawares were enabled to throw off the galling yoke, and at Tioga, in the year 1756, Teedyuseung extorted from the Iroquois chiefs an acknowledgment of their independence. This peculiar relationtion between the Indian nation that occupied, and that which claimed a paramount jurisdiction over, the soil of Pennsylvania tended greatly to embarrass and complicate the negotiations of the Proprietary government for the purchase of lands, and its influence was seen and felt both in the civil and military history of Pennsylvania until after the close of the Revolution. George Alsop, in his tract called "A Character of the Province of Maryland" (London, 1666), devotes a chapter to "A Relation of the Customs, Manners, Absurdities, and Religion of the Susquehannock Indians in and near Maryland." These were the Mengwes of Campanius, and the Susquesahannoughs 39 of Capt.Smith. Alsop says they are regarded as "the most Noble and Heroick Nation of Indians that dwell upon the confines of America; also are so allowed and lookt upon by the rest of the Indians, by a submission and tributary acknowledgment, being a people cast into the mould of a most large and warlike deportment, the men being for the most part seven foot high in altitude and in magnitude and bulk suitable to so high a pitch; their voyce large and hollow, as ascending out of a Cave, their gate and behavior straight, steady, and majestick, treading on the Earth with as much pride, contempt, and disdain to sordid a Centre as can be imagined from a creature derived from the same mould and Earth." They go naked summer and winter, says Alsop, "only where shame leads them by a natural instinct to be reservedly modest, there they become cover'd. The formality of Jezabel's artificial Glory is much courted and followed by these Indians, only in matter of colours (I conceive) they differ." They paint their faces in alternate streaks of different colors, and Alsop thinks, with other early writers, that their skins are naturally white but changed to red and cinnamon-brown by the use of pigments. Their hair is "black, long, and harsh," and they do not permit it to grow anywhere except upon the head. The Susquehannas tattooed their arms and breasts with their different totems, "the picture of the Devil, Bears, Tigers, and Panthers. They are great warriors, always at war, and keep their neighbors in subjection." Their government is complex and hard to make out; "all that ever I could observe in them as to this matter is, that be that is most cruelly Valorous is accounted the most Noble," which is a very good approximation of the fact that the war-chief derives his rank or influence from his deeds. Our author adds that when they determine to go upon some Design that will and doth require a consideration, some six of them get into a Corner and sit in Juncto, and if thought fit their business is made popular and immediately put in action; if not, they make a full stop to it, and are silently reserved. On the war-path they paint and adorn their persons, first well greased; their arms, the hatchet and fusil, or bow and arrows. Their war parties are small; they march out from their fort singing and whooping; if they take prisoners they treat them well, but dress them and anoint them so that they may be ready for the stake and torture when their captors return home. Alsop gives a full account of the process of torture, and declares that prisoners are hacked to pieces and eaten by the warriors. The religion of the Susquehannas Alsop regarded as an absurd and degrading superstition, they being devil worshipers; but he admits that, "with a kind of wilde imaginary conjecture, they suppose from their groundless conceits that the World had a Maker." They sacrifice a child to the devil every four years, and their medicine-men have great influence among them. Their dead are buried sitting, face due west, and all their weapons, etc., around them. The houses of the Susquehannas "are low and long, built with the bark of trees arch-wise, standing thick and confusedly together." The hunters go on long winter hunts; the women are the menials and drudges, and yet they are commended for their beauty of form, and their husbands are said to be very constant to them. "Their marriages," says Alsop, in conclusion, "are short and authentique; for after 'tis resolv'd upon by both parties, the Women sends her intended Husband a kettle of boil'd Venison, or Bear, and he returns in lieu thereof Beaver or Otter Skins, and so their Nuptial Rites are concluded without other Ceremony." The Rev. John Campanius, Swedish chaplain of Governor Printz, and who resided on Tinicum Island, near the month of the Schuylkill, from 1642 to 1648, gives us in his "Nya Swerige" an excellent account of the Indians, which contains information we have been unable to find in any other work. What adds to the interest of his description is, that he wrote it from his own actual observations, and that, too, at a period dating back nearly to the first landing of the Europeans in this part of the country. His arrival here was forty years previous to the first landing of Penn, or two years before the founder of the colony was born. On account of the rarity of Mr. Campanius' work and its appropriateness, we give place to the following extract: "Their way of living was very simple. With arrows, pointed with sharp stone, they killed the deer and other creatures. They made axes from stones, which they fastened to a stick, to kill the trees where they intended to plant. They cultivated the ground with a sort of hoe made from the shoulder-blade of a deer or a tortoise-shell, sharpened with stones and fastened to a stick. They made pots of clay, mixed with powdered mussel-shells burned in fire, to prepare their food in. By friction they made fire from two pieces of hard wood. The bees they burnt down and cut into pieces for firewood. On journeys they carried fire a great ways in spunk, or sponges found growing on the trees. They burned down great trees, and shaped them into canoes by fire and the help of sharp stones. Men and women were dressed in skins;the women made themselves under-garments of wild hemp, of which also they made twine to knit the feathers of turkeys, eagles, etc., into blankets. The earth, the woods, and the rivers were the provision stores of the Indians; for they eat all kinds of wild animals and productions of the earth, fowls, birds, fishes, and fruits, which they find within their reach. They shoot deer, fowls, and birds with the bow and arrow; they take the fishes in the same manner; when the waters are high the fish run up the creeks and return at ebb-tide, so that the Indians can easily shoot them at low water and drag them ashore." "They eat, generally, but twice a day, morning and afternoon; the earth serves them for tables and chairs. They sometimes broil their meat and their fish, other times dry them in the sun, or in the amoke, and thus eat them. They make bread out of the maize or Indian corn, which they prepare in a manner peculiar to themselves: they crush the grain between two great stones, or on a large piece of wood; they moisten it with water, and make it into small cakes, which they wrap up in corn-leaves, and thus bake them in the ashes. In this manner they make their bread. The Swedes made use of it when they first came. They can fast, when necessity compels them, for many days. When traveling, or lying in wait for their enemies, they take with them a kind of bread made of Indian corn and tobacco julep to allay their hunger and quench their thirst in case, they have nothing else at hand. The drink, before the Christians came into this country, was nothing but water, but now they are very fond of strong liquors. Both men and women smoke tobacco, which grows in their country in great abundance. They have, besides corn, beans, and pumpkins, a sort of 'original dogs' with short pointed ears." "The American Indians had no towns or fixed places of habitation. They mostly wandered about from one place to another, and generally went to those places where they could find the most likely means of support. In spring and summer they preferred the banks of rivers, where they found plenty of fish; but in winter they went up into the country, where they found abundance of venison. When they travel, they carry their game with them wherever they go, and fix it on poles, under which they dwell. When they want fire they strike it out of a piece of dry wood, of which they find plenty; and in that manner they are never at a loss for fire to warm themselves, or to cook their meat. Their principal articles of furniture are a kettle, in which they boil their meat, and some dishes or plates of bark and cedar-wood, out of which they eat; for drinking they use commonly the shell of the calabash. "When a Christian goes to visit them in their dwellings, they immediately spread on the ground pieces of cloth and fine mats or skins; then they produce the best they have, as bread, deer, elk, or bear's meat, fresh fish and bear's fat, to serve in lieu of butter, which they generally broil upon the coals. These attentions must not be despised, but must be received with thankfulness, otherwise their friendship will turn to hatred. When an Indian visits his friend, a Christian, he must always uncover his table at the lower end, for the Indian will have his liberty; and he will immediately jump upon the table, and sit on it with his legs crossed, for they are not accustomed to sit upon chairs; be then asks for whatever he would like to eat of. When the Swedes first arrived the Indians were in the habit of eating the flesh of their enemies. Once on an occasion they invited a Swede to go with them to their habitation in the woods, where they treated him with, the best the house afforded. Their entertainment was sumptuous; there was broiled, boiled, and even hashed meat, all of which the Swede partook with them, but it seems it did not well agree with him. The Indians, however, did not let him know what he bad been eating; but it was told him some time after by some other Indians, who let him know that he had fed on the flesh of an Indian of a neighboring tribe with whom they were at war." The earliest purchase by Penn of any part of what now constitutes Montgomery County was made the 25th of June, 1683, of Wingebone, for all his right to lands lying on the west side of the Schuylkill, beginning at the lower falls of the same, and so on up and backwards of said stream as far as his right goes. The next purchase was made the 14th of July of the same year, from Secane and Idquoquehan and others, for all the land lying between the Manayunk or Schuylkill River and Macopanackhan or Chester River, and up as far as the Conshohocken Hill, which is opposite the present borough of that name. On the same day another purchase was made of Neneshickan, Malebore, Neshanocke, and Oscreneon for the land lying between the Schuylkill and Pennepack streams, and extending as far northwest as Conshohocken, but now better known as Edge Hill. On the 3d of June, 1684, all the right of Maughhongsink to the land along the Perkiomen Creek was duly sold and conveyed. On the 7th of the same month and year, Mettamicont relinquished all his right to lands on both sides of the Pennepack. July 30, 1685, Shakhoppa, Secane, Malebore, and Tangoras conveyed all their right to lands situated between Chester and Pennepack Creeks, and extending up into the country, in a northwest direction from the sources of those streams, two full days'journey. This almost takes in the whole of the county, excepting only that portion lying east of the Pennepack Creek. July 5, 1697, another purchase was made from Tamany, Waheeland, Wehequeekhon, Yaqueekhon, aud Quenamockequid for all their right to lands lying between the Pennepack and Neshaminy Creeks, and extending in a northwest direction from the Delaware as far as a horse could travel in two days. Thus was finally extinguished by purchase all the right and title of the Indians to any portion of the soil now embraced within the limits of Montgomery County. An Indian council was held by previous appoint ment at the house of Edward Farmer, where is now the village of White Marsh, on the 19th of May, 1712. The Governor, Charles Gookin, was present, with the sheriff, John Budd, Conrad Richard Walker, and others. A delegation of eleven Delaware Indians was present, Sassunan being the principal chief, accompanied by Ealochelan and Scholichy, the latter being speaker. Edward Farmer, who was quite familiar with the Indian language, performed the duties of interpreter. Scholichy, in his address to the Governor, mentioned that as the Delawares had been made tributary to the Mingoes, or Five Nations, many years ago, 41 they had thought proper, to call on him previous to their seeing those tribes, and that they had brought their tribute along, which was duly pre sented to the Governor, and consisted of thirty-two belts of wampum, [See NOTE 3-4.] of various figures, and a long Indian pipe called the calumet, made of stone, the shaft of which was adorned with feathers resembling wings, besides other ornaments. Their business was amicably adjusted to the entire satisfaction of all parties. On this occasion the Governor and his friends, thirteen in number, came from Philadelphia on horseback. [NOTE 3-4.] Wampum passed as current money between the early whites mud Indians. There were two kinds of it, the white and purple. They were both worked into the form of beads, generally each about half an inch long, and one-eighth broad, with a hole drilled through them so an to be strung on leather or hempen strings. The white was made out of the great conch or seashell, and the purple out of the inside of the mussel-shell. These beads, we shall call them, after being strung, were next woven by the Indian women Into belts, sometimes broader than a person's hand, and about two feet long. It was these that were given and received at their various treaties as scale of friendship; in matters of less importance only a single string was given. Two pieces of white wampum were considered to equal in value one of the purple. The calumet was a large smoking-pipe, made out of some soft stone, commonly of a dark-red color, well polished, and shaped somewhat In the form of a hatchet, and ornamented with large feathers of several colors. It was used in all their treaties with the whites, and they considered it as a flag of truce between contending parties, which it would be a high crime to violate. In fact, the calumet by them was considered as sacred and as serious art obligation as an oath among the Christians. The value of Indian lands at that time to the savages may be gathered from the price paid In 1677 for twenty miles square on the Delaware between timber and Oldman's Creeks, to wit.: 30 match-coats (made of hairy wool with the rough side out), 20 guns, 30 kettles, 1 great kettle, 30 pair of hose, 20 fathoms of duffels (Duffield blanket cloth, of which match-coats were made), 30 petticoats, 30 narrow hoes, 30 bars of lead, 15 small barrels of powder, 70 knives, 30 Indian axes, 70 combs, 60 pair of tobacco tongs, 60 pair of scissors, 60 tinshaw looking-glasses, 120 awl-blades, 120 fish-hooks, 2 grasps of red paint, 120 needles, 60 tobacco boxes, 120 pipes, 200 bells, 100 jews-harps, and 6 anchors of rum. The value of these articles probably did not exceed three hundred pounds sterling. But, on the other hand, the Indian titles were really worth nothing, except so far as they served an a security against Indian hostility. It has been said that there is not an acre of land in the eastern part of Pennsylvania the deeds of which cannot be traced up to an Indian title, but that in effect would be no title at all. Mr. Lawrence Lewis, in his learned and luminous "Essay on Original Land Titles in Philadelphia," denies this absolutely, and says that it is "impossible to trace with any accuracy" the titles to land In Philadelphia derived from the Indians. Nor is it necessary to trace a title which is of no value. The Indians could not sell land to individuals and give valid title for it in any of the colonies; they could sell If they chose, but only to the government. Upon this subject the lawyers are explicit. All good titles in the thirteen original colonies are derived from land-grants, made or accepted not by the Indians, but by the British crown. Thus Chalmers (Political Annals, 677) says, "The law of nations sternly disregarded the possession of the aborigines, because they had not been admitted into the society of nations." At the Declaration of Independence (see Dallas' Reports, ii. 470) every acre of land in this country was held, mediately or immediately, by grants from the crown. All our institutions (Wheaton, viii. 588) recognize the absolute title of the crown, subject only to the Indian right of occupancy, and recognize the absolute title of the crown to extinguish that right. An Indian conveyance alone could give no title to an individual. (The references here given are quoted from the accurate Frothingham's "Rise of the Republic.") [FINIS NOTE 3-4.] Of their true character, tribal relations, habits of daily life and customs, William Penn has given us graphic pictures. His colonial enterprise necessarily comprehended contact with the race possessing the territory granted to him by his royal benefactor; his intercourse wtih them was studied to the extent of acquiring a knowledge of their language, hence his obsevations are of more than usual interest. PICTURE OF DELAWARE INDIAN APPEARS HERE. [Ed. NOTE: The original spelling of Penn has been retained for the most part. The use of the letter "y" is the old English THONG. Pronounced "th". Example: ye = the. Vowels are frequently omitted.] "The natives are proper and shapely, very swift, their language lofty. They speak little, but fervently and with elegancy. I have never seen more naturall sagacity, considering them without ye help was going to say ye spoyle -of tradition. The worst is that they are ye wors for ye Christians who have propagated their views and yielded them tradition for ye wors & not for ye better things, they believe a Deity and Immortality without ye help of metaphysicks & some of them admirably sober, though ye Dutch & Sweed and English have by Brandy and Rum almost Debaucht ym all and When Drunk ye most wretched of spectacles, often burning & sometimes murdering one another, at which times ye Christians are not with out danger as well as fear. Tho' for gain they will run the hazard both of yt and ye Law, they make their worshipp to consist of two parts, sacrifices which they offer 42 of their first fruits with marvellous fervency and labour of holy sweating as if in a bath, the other is their Canticoes, as they call them, which is performed by round Dances, sometimes words, then songs, then shouts, two being in ye middle yt begin and direct ye chorus; this they performed with equal fervency but great appearances of joy. In this I admire them, nobody shall want what another has, yet they have propriety (property) but freely communicable, they want or care for little, no Bills of Exchange nor Bills of Lading, no Chancery suits nor Exchequer Acct, have they to perplex themselves with, they are soon satisfied, and their pleasure feeds them, --I mean hunting and fishing." This letter is made much more full in the one to the Free Society of Traders, written in August of the same year. The, natives, Penn says, are generally tall, straight in their person, "well built, and of singular proportion [i.e., of symmetry]; they tread strong and clever, and mostly walk with a lofty chin. [See NOTE 3-5.] [NOTE 3-5.] Penn had noted a singularity in the Indians' gait, yet did not detect what it was; yet it is so obvious that a few years back, in Kentucky, where the people still walk like the Indians, even a school-boy would recognize a person from the East by differences in his way of walking from the way of those to the manner born. The Indian steps with a perfectly straight foot and without turning his toes out, so that if the sun were upon his back the shadow of his shanks would entirely cover his feet. This tread is the antithesis of that of the sailor, who walks with his toes very much turned out, and the European and the Eastern man walks like him. In both cases convenience and propriety are suited: the sailor, by his mode of locomotion, is enabled to tread more firmly and safely upon an uncertain deck that is alwys uneasy, the Indian, by his mode, is able to walk more safely the narrow forrest path, and to step also with greater stealth and softness in pursuit of his enemy and his game where leaves to rustle and twigs to break are numerous. But the difference is that the sailor "rolle" in his gait and his shoulders swing from side to side, while the Indian's walk makes him carry himself singularly staright, his shoulders never diverging from a perpendicular. This little circumstance added materially to the outward appearance of gravity in the savage's general demeanor. [FINIS NOTE 3-5.] Of complexion black, but by design, as the gipsies in England. They grease themselves with bear's fat clarified, and using no defence against sun and weather, their skins must needs be swarthy. Their eye is livid and black, not unlike a straight-looked Jew. The thick lips and flat nose, so frequent with the East Indians and black, are not common to them; for I have seen as comely European-like faces among them, of both sexes, as on your side the sea; and truly an Italian complexion hath not more of the white; and the noses of several of them have as much of the Roman. Their language is lofty, yet narrow; but, like the Hebrew, in signification full. Like short hand in writing, one word serveth in the place of three, and the rest are supplied by the understanding of the hearer; imperfect in their teases, wanting in their moods, participles, adverbs, conjunctions, and interjections. I have made it my business to understand it, that I might not want an interpreter on any occasion; and I must say that I know not a language spoken in Europe that bath words of more sweetness or greatness, in accent and emphasis, than theirs; for instance, Octockekon, Rancocas, Oricton, Shak, Marian, Poquesian, all which are names of places, and have grandeaur in them. Of words of sweetness, anna is mother; issimus, a brother; neteap, friend; usqueret, very good; pane, bread; metsa, eat; mattu, no; hatta, to have; payo, to come; Sepassen, Passijon, the names of places; Tamane, Secane, Menanse, Secatarcus are the names of persons. If one ask them for anything they have not, they will answer, matta ne hatta, which, to translate, is 'not I have,' instead of I have not. Of their customs and manners there is much to be said. I will begin with children. So soon as they are born they wash them in water, and while very young and in cold weather to choose, they plunge them in the rivers to harden and embolden them. Having wrapt them in a clout, they lay them on a strait thin board a little more than the length and breadth of the child, and swaddle it fast upon the board to make it straight; wherefore all Indians have flat heads; and thus they carry them at their backs. The children will go [walk] very young, at nine months commonly. They wear a small clout around their waiste till they are big. If boys, they go a-fishing till ripe for the woods, which is about fifteen. There they hunt; and having given some proofs of their manhood by a good return of skins, they marry; else it is a shame to think of a wife. The girls stay with their mothers, and help to hoe the ground, plant corn, and carry burthens; and they do well to use them to that, while young, which they must do when they are old; for the wives are the true servants of the husbands; otherwise the men are very affectionate tothem. When the young women are fit for marriage they wear something upon their heads for an advertisement, but so as their faces are hardly to be seen but when they please. The age they marry at, if women, is about thirteen and fourteen, if men, seventeen and eighteen. They are rarely older. Their houses are mats or harks of trees, set on poles in the fashion of an English barn, but out of the power of the winds, for they are hardly higher than a man. They lie on reeds or grass. In travel they lodge in the woods about a great fire, with the mantle of daffils they wear by day wrapt about them and a few boughs stuck round them. Their diet is maize or Indian corn divers ways prepared, sometimes roasted in the ashes, sometimes beaten and boiled with water, which they call homine. They also make cakes not unpleasant to eat. They have likewise several sorts of beans and peas that are good nourishment, and the woods and rivers are their larder. If an European comes to see them, or calls for lodging at their house or wigwam, they give him the best place and first cut. If they come to visit us they salute us with an Itah! which is as much as to say, 'Good be to you!' and set them down, which is mostly on the ground, close to their heels, their legs upright; it may be they speak not a word, but observe all passages [all that passes]. If 43 you give them anything to eat or drink, well, for the will not ask; and, be it little or much, if it be with kindness, they are well pleased; else they go away sullen, but say nothing. They are great concealers of their own resentments, brought to it, I believe, by the revenge that hath been practiced among them. In either of these the Italians do not exceed them. A tragical instance fell out since I came into the country. A king's daughter, thinking herself slighted by her husband in suffering another woman to lie down between them, rose up, went out, plucked a root, out the ground, and ate it upon which she immediately died; and for which, last week, he made an offering to her kindred for atonement and liberty of marriage, as two others did to the kindred of their wives, who died a natural death; for till widowers have done so they must not marry again. Some of the young women are said to take undue liberty before marriage for a portion but when married, chaste. When with child they know their husband no more till delivered; and during their month they touch no meat, they eat but with a stick, lest neither they should defile it; nor do their husbands frequent them till that time be expired. But in liberality they excel; nothing is too good for their friend; give them a fine gun, coat, or other thing, it may pass through twenty hands before it sticks light of heart, strong affections, but soon spent. The most merry creatures that live, feast and dance perpetually; they never have much, nor want much ; wealth circulateth like the blood; all poets partake; and though none shall want what another hath, yet exact observers of property. Some kings have sold, others presented me with several parcels of land; the pay or presents I made them were not hoarded by the particular owners; but the neighboring kings and their clans being present when the goods were brought out the parties chiefly concerned consulted what and to whom they should give them. To every king then, by the hands of a person for that work appointed, is a proportion sent, so sorted and folded, and with that gravity that is admirable. Their that king subdivideth it in like manner among his dependants, they hardly leaving themselves an equal share with one of their subjects: and be it on such occasions as festivals, or at their common meals, the kings distribute, and to themselves last. They care for little; and the reason is, a little contents them. In this they are sufficiently revenged on us; if they are ignorant of our pleasures, they are also free from our pains. . . . Since the Europeans came into these parts they are grown great lovers of strong liquors, rum especially, and for it they exchange the richest of their skins and furs. If they are heated with liquors they are restless till they have enough to sleep, -that is their cry, Some more and I will go asleep; but when drunk one of the most wretched spectacles in the world! "In sickness, impatient to be cured; and for it give anything, especially for their children, to whom they are extremely natural. They drink at these times a tisan, or decoction of some roots, in spring-water; and if they eat any flesh it must be of the female of any creature. If they die they bury them with their apparel, be they. man or woman, land the nearest of kin fling in something precious with them as a token of their love. Their mourning is blacking of their faces, which they continue for a year. They are choice of the graves of their dead, for, lest they should be lost by time and fall to common use, they pick off the grass that grows upon them and heap up the fallen earth with great care and exactness. These poor people are under a dark night in things relating to religion; to be sure the tradition of it; yet they believe a God and immortality without the help of metaphysics, for they say, 'There is a Great King that made them, who dwells in a glorious country to the southward of them, and that the souls of the good shall go thither where they shall live again.' Their worship consists of two parts, sacrifice and cantico. Their sacrifice is their first fruits; the first and fattest buck they kill goeth to the fire, where he is all burnt, with a mournful ditty of him that performeth the ceremony, but with such marvellous fervency and labor of body that he will even sweat to a foam. The other part is their cantico, performed by round dances, sometimes words, sometimes songs, then shouts, two being in the middle that begin, and by singing and drumming on a board direct the chorus. Their postures in the dance are very antick and differing, but all keep measure. This is done with equal earnestness and labor, but great appearance of joy. In the fall, when the corn cometh in, they begin to feast one another. There have been two great festivals already, to which all come that will. I was at one myself. Their entertainment was a great seat by a spring under some shady trees, and twenty bucks, with hot cakes of new corn, both wheat and beans, which they make up in a square form in the leaves of the stem and bake them in the ashes, and after that they fall to dance. But they that go must carry a small present in their money; it may be sixpence, which is made of the bone of a fish; the black is with then as gold. the white silver; the call it all wampum. "Their government is Kings, which they call Sachama and these by succession, but always on the mother's side. [See NOTE 3-6.] For instance, the children of [NOTE 3-6.] Notwithstanding this mode, of succession of their kings, yet for extraordinary reasons it was sometimes altered, of which appears an instance in S. Smith's "History of New Jersey," in the case of the old king Ockanickrin, who died at Burlington, in that province, about the year 1681. Before his death he altered the succession, and instead of Sheoppy and Swampis, who, in regular order, were to have succeeded him, he, for reasons in his speech there given, appointed his brother's son, Fahkurfoe, to succeed him, giving him some excellent advice on the occasion. This king, as there related, soon after this made a good and pious exit, and his remains were interred in the Quakers' burying ground at that place, being attended to the grave with solemnity by the Indians, in their manner, and with great respect by many of the English settlers, to whom he had been a true friend. [FINIS NOTE 3-6.] 44 him who is now king will not succeed, but his brother by the mother, or the children of his sister, whose sons (and after them the children of her daughters) will reign, for woman inherits. The reason they render for this way of descent is that their issue may not be spurious. Every King hath his Council, and that consists of all the old and wise men of his nation, which, perhaps, is two hundred people. Nothing of moment is undertaken, be it war, peace, selling of land, or traffick, without advising with them, and, which is more, with the young men too. It is admirable to consider how powerful the Kings are, and yet how they move by the breath of their people. I have had occasion to be in council with them upon treaties of land, and to adjust the terms of trade. Their order is thus: The king sits in the middle of an half moon, and hath his council, the old and wise, on each hand; behind them, or at a little distance, sit the younger fry in the same figure. Having consulted and resolved their business, the King ordered one of them to speak to me; he stood up, came to me, and, in the name of his King, saluted me; then took me by the hand and told me,'He was ordered by his King to speak to me, and that now it was not he, but the King that spoke; because what he should say was the King's mind. He first prayed me to excuse them, that they had not complied with me the last time, he feared there might be some fault in the Interpreter, being neither Indian nor English; besides, it was the Indian custom to deliberate and take up much time in council before they resolve, and that if the young people and owners of the land had been as ready as he, I had not met with so much delay. Having thus introduced his matter, he fell to the bounds of the land they had agreed to dispose of and the price, which now is little and dear, that which would have bought twenty miles not buying now two. During the time that this man spoke not a man of them was observed to whisper or smile, the old grave, the young reverent in their deportment. They speak little but fervently, and with elegance. I have never seen more natural sagacity, considering them without the help (I was going to say the spoil) of tradition, and he will deserve the name of wise that outwits them in any treaty about a thing they understand. When the purchase was agreed great promises passed between us, of kindness and good neighborhood, and that the Indians and English must live in love as long as the sun gave light, which done, another made a speech to the Indians in the name of all the Sachemakers or Kings, first to tell what was done, next to charge and command them 'to love the Christians, and particularly live in peace with me and the people under my government; that many governors had been in the river, but that no Governor had come himself to live and stay here before, and having now such an one, that had treated them well, they should never do him or his any wrong,' at every sentence of which they shouted and said Amen in their way. The justice they have is pecuniary. In case of any wrong or evil fact, be it murder itself, they atone by feasts and presents of their wampum, which is proportioned to the quality of the offence, or the person injured, or of the sex they are of. For in case they kill a woman they pay double, and the reason they render is, 'that she breedeth children, which men cannot do.' It is rare they fall out if sober, and if drunk they forgive it saying, 'It was the drink, and not the man, that abused them.' "We have agreed that in all differences between us six of each side shall end the matter. Do not abuse them, but let them have justice and you win them. The worst is that they are the worse for the Christians, who have propagated their vices and yielded their traditions for ill and not for good things. But as low an ebb as these people are at, and as inglorious as their own condition looks, the Christians have not outlived their sight, with all their pretensions to an higher manifestation. What good, then, might not a good people graft where; there is so distinct a knowledge left between good and evil? I beseech God to incline the hearts of all that come into these parts, to outlive the knowledge of the natives, by a fixed obedience to their greater knowledge of the will of God, for it were miserable indeed for us to fall under the just censure of the poor Indians' conscience, while we make profession of things so far transcending. "For their original, I am ready to believe them of the Jewish race; I mean, of the stock of the ten tribes, and that for the following reasons: First, they were to go to a 'land not planted nor known'; which, to be sure, Asia and Africa were, if not Europe, and He that intended that extraordinary judgment upon them might make the passage not uneasy to them, as it is not impossible in itself, from the easternmost parts of Asia to the westernmost of America. In the next place, I find them of the like countenance, and their children of so lively resemblance that a man would think himself in Duke's Place, or Berry Street, in London, when he seeth them. But this is not all: they agree in rites; they reckon by moons; they offer their first fruits; they have a kind of feast of tabernacles; they are said to lay their altar upon twelve stones; their mourning a year; customs of women, with many other things that do not now occur." The researches of John Gilmary Shea, Francis Parkman, and others who have given a special and intelligent attention to the subject, have established the fact that the tribe called Minquas or Minquosy by the Dutch (in the Latin of De Laet, Machoeretini), Mengwes by the Swedes (the English corruption of which was Mingoes), Susquehannocks or Susquehannoughs (Sasquesahannogh is the rendering by Capt. John Smith) by the Marylanders, and Andast้s or Gandastogues (corrupted in Pennsylvania into Conestogas) was a branch of the Iroquois nation, settled 45 above tide on the Susquehanna and Potomac Rivers. This ambitious race of savages, inspired with a conquering instinct which put them on a par with the ancient Romans, not only consolidated its strength at home by a political and military confederacy, but extended its power and influence abroad by the establishment of military colonies, just as republican Rome was in the habit of doing. One of these colonies constituted the tribe of the Tuscaroras, occupying part of North Carolina and Georgia, upon the flanks of the Cherokee nation. Another was the Nottaways, south of the James River, in Virginia. A third colony was the tribe of the Nanticokes, afterwards (in Pennsylvania) known as the Conoys, who held the Delaware and Eastern Shore of Maryland peninsula from the Brandywine southward. They were joined on the north by the Minquas or Susquehannas, whose "fort" was on the Susquehanna River at or near the mouth of Conestoga Creek. The Huron Iroquois of Canada were of this same nation, which thus occupied a belt of territory from north to south extending from Lake Simcoe to the southern limits of North Carolina, all in the country of the Algonkins, yet as distinctly separate from them by difference of language, character, and habit as, a vein of trap rock in a body of gneiss or granite. The Andast้s (to call them by their own tribal name, Andasta meaning a cabin-pole, and the tribe wishing to imply by it that they were housebuilders rather than dwellers in lodges), like the Lenapes, claimed a Western origin, and they were the most warlike race upon the continent, proud and haughty as the Romans whom they so closely resembled, and, like them, enabled to conquer by their compact military and civil organization. Other tribes were split into small bands, between which there was only a feeble and defective concert and unity of action. The Iroquois, on the other hand, were a nation, and wherever we find them we discover that they lived and acted together in co-operative union. In Pennsylvania, for example, in all the land purchases made by Dutch, Swedes, and English, we find the Minquas acting as one tribe, dealing as one people and one name, whereas with the Lenapes each petty chief seemed to do what was best in his own sight. Tamine or Tamanend was probably the great chief of the Lenapes in the time of Penn, and his supreme authority was manifest inslay the councils, but when it came to selling land he was no more than on a level with the twenty or thirty sachems who signed their marks to the deeds of conveyance for the various tracts. Their industrial arts were of the most primitive character. Their tools and implements were made of stone, many of which are models of proportion, design, and neatness of finish. Campanius says, -"They make their bows with the limb of a tree, of about a man's length, and their bow-strings out of the sinews of animals ; they make their arrows out of a reed a yard and a half long, and at one end they fix in a piece of bard wood of about a quarter's length, at the end of which they make a hole to fix in the bead of the arrow, which is made of black flintstone, or of bard bone or horn, or the teeth of large PICTURE OF DELAWARE INDIAN FAMILY APPEARS HERE [From Campanius' "New Sweden."] fishes or animals, which they fasten in with fish glue in such a manner that the water cannot penetrate; at the other end of the arrow they put feathers. They can also tan and prepare the skins of animals, which they paint afterwards in their own way. They make much use of painted feathers, with which they adorn their skins and bed-covers, binding them with a kind of network, which is very handsome, and fastens the feathers very well. With these they make light and warm clothing and covering for themselves; with the leaves of Indian corn and reeds they make purses, mats, and baskets, and everything else that they want. . . . They make very handsome and strong mats of fine roots, which they paint with all kinds of figures; 46 they hang their walls with these rusts, and make excellent bed-clothes out of them. The women spin thread and yarn out of nettles, hemp, and some plants unknown to us. Governor Printz bad a complete set of clothes, with coat, breeches, and belt, made by these barbarians with their wampum, which was curiously wrought with figures of all kinds of animals. . . . They make tobacco-pipes out of reeds PICTURE OF INDIAN SIGNATURES APPEARS HERE. about a man's length; the bowl is made of horn, and to contain a great quantity of tobacco. They generally present these pipes to their good friends when they come to visit them at their houses and wish them to stay some time longer; then the friends cannot go away without having first smoked out of the pipe. They make them, otherwise, of red, yellow, and blue clay, of which there is a great quantity in the country; also of white, gray, green, brown, black, and blue stones, which are so soft that they can be cut with a knife. . . . Their boats are made of the bark of cedar and birch trees, bound together and lashed very strongly. They carry them along wherever they go, and when they come to some creek that they want to get over they launch them and go whither they please. They also used to make boats out of cedar trees, which they burnt inside and scraped off the coals with sharp stones, bones, or muscle shells." Charles Thompson, [See NOTE 3-7.] who enjoyed the confidence of the Indians, and whose good offices in effecting purchases of land were often invoked, and who frequently spent days and weeks among them unattended, refers to their want of knowledge in the metallic arts. He says,- "They were perfect strangers to the use of iron. The instruments with which they dug up the ground were of wood, or a stone fastened to a handle of wood. Their hatchets for cutting were of stone, sharpened to an edge by rubbing, and fastened to a wooden handle. Their arrows were pointed with flint or bones. What clothing they wore was of the skins of animals took in hunting, and their ornaments were principally of feathers. They all painted or daubed their face with red. The men suffered only a tuft of hair to grow on the crown of their head; the rest, whether [NOTE 3-7.] He was in fact adopted by them. He took minutes of the conference procedings in short-hand, and these were so accurate as to preferred by the commissioners to the official record, and so just to the Indians as to win their profound gratitude. They adopted him in to the Lenape nation, and gave him the name of Wegh-um(?) law-wo-end, "the man who tells the truth." [FINIS NOTE 3-7.] 47 on their head or faces, they prevented from growing by constantly plucking it out by the roots, so that they always appeared as if they were bald and beardless. "Many were in the practice of marking their faces, arms, and breast by pricking the skin with thorns and rubbing the parts with a fine powder made of coal (charcoal), which, penetrating the punctures, left an indelible stain or mark, which remained as long as they lived. The punctures were made in figures according to their several fancies. The only part of the body which they covered was from the waist half-way down the thighs, and their feet they guarded with a kind of shoe made of hides of buffaloes or deerskin, laced tight over the instep and up to the ankles with thongs. It was and still continues to be a common practice among the men to slit their ears, putting something into the hole to prevent its closing, and then by hanging weights to the lower part to stretch it out, so that it hangs down the cheek like a large ring. They had no knowledge of the use of silver or gold, though some of these metals were found among the Southern Indians. Instead of money they used a kind of beads made of conch-shell, manufactured in a curious manner. These beads were made, some of the white, some of the black or colored parts of the shell. They were formed into cylinders about one-quarter of an inch long and a quarter of an inch in diameter. They were round and highly polished and perforated lengthwise with a small hole, by which they strung them together and wove them into belts, some of which, by a proper arrangement of the beads of different colors, were figured like carpeting with different figures, according to the various uses for which they were designed. These were made use of in their treaties and intercourse with each other, and served to assist their memory and preserve the remembrance of transactions. When different tribes or nations made peace or alliance with each other they exchanged belts of one sort; when they excited each other to war they used another sort. Hence they were distinguished by the name of peace belts or war belts. Every message sent from one tribe to another was accompanied with a string of these beads or a belt, and the string or belt was smaller or greater according to the weight and importance of the subject. These beads were their riches. They were worn as bracelets on the arms and like chains around the neck byway of ornaments." When and how the Indians acquired the art of producing fire by friction, prior to the use of flint and steel, remains a great mystery. This element was absolutely essential to their existence in the northern latitudes, and must of necessity have been in use by them. Nature may have supplied them by volcanic eruptions, and once in their possession they may have retained perpetual fires. The discovery of heat, generated by friction, may have been accidental in fallen forest trees moved or swayed by the wind. "Gen. George Crook has described a fire-stick used by the Indians of the Sierra Nevada and Cascade ranges. 'The fire-stick,' he says, 'consists of two pieces. The horizontal stick is generally from one foot to a foot and a half long, a couple or three inches wide, and about one inch thick, of some soft, dry wood, frequently the sap of the juniper. The upright stick is usually some two feet long and from a quarter to half an inch in diameter, with the lower end round or elliptical, and of the hardest material they can find. In the sage-brush country it is made of greasewood. When they make fire they lay the first piece in a horizontal position with the flat side down, and place the round end of the upright near the edge of the other stick; then taking the upright between the hands they give it a swift rotary motion, and as constant use wears a hole in the lower stick, they cut a nick in its outer edge down to a level with the bottom of the hole. The motion of the upright works the ignited powder out of this nick, and it is there caught and applied to a piece of spunk or some other highly combustible substance, and from this the fire is started.'" Of their tribal relations and intercourse Mr. Thompson seems to have been a close observer: "Almost every nation being divided into tribes, and these tribes subdivided into families, who from relationship or friendship united together and formed towns or clans; these several tribes, families, and towns have commonly each a particular name and chief, or head man, receive messages, and hold conferences with strangers and foreigners, and hence they are frequently considered by strangers and foreigners as distinct and separate nations. Notwithstanding this, it is found upon closer examination and further inquiry that the nation is composed of several of these tribes, united together under a kind of federal government, with laws and customs by which they are ruled. Their governments, it is true, are very lax, except as to peace and war, each individual having in his own hand the power of revenging injuries, and when murder is committed the next relation having power to take revenge, by putting to death the murderer, unless he can convince the chiefs and head men that he had just cause, and by their means can pacify the family by a present, and thereby put an end to the feud. The matters which merely regard a town or family are settled by the chiefs and bead men of the town; those which regard the tribe, by a meeting of the chiefs from the several towns; and those that regard the nation, such as the making war or concluding peace with the neighboring nations, are determined on in a national council, composed of the chiefs and head warriors from every tribe. Every tribe has a chief or head man, and there is one who presides over the nation. In every town they have a council-house, where the chief assembles the old men and advises what is best. In every tribe there is a place, which is commonly the town in which the 48 chief resides, where the head men of the towns meet to consult on the business that concerns them; and in every matter there is a grand council, or what they call a council-fire, where the heads of the tribes and chief warriors convene to determine on peace or war In these several councils the greatest order and decorum is observed. In a council of a town all the men of the town may attend, the chief opens the business, and either gives his opinion of what is beat or takes the advice of such of the old men as are heads of families, or most remarkable for prudence and knowledge. None of the young men are allowed or presume to speak, but the whole assembly at the end of every sentence or speech, if they approve it, express their approbation by a kind of hum or noise in unison with the speaker. The same order is observed in the meetings or councils of the tribes and in the national councils." Like all barbarous nations, the North American Indiana were superstitious. Parkman says, "The sorcerer, by charms, magic songs, magic feats, and the beating of his drum, had power over the spirits and those occult influences inherent in animals and inanimate things. He could call to him the souls of his enemies. They appeared before him in the shape of stones. He chopped and bruised them with his hatchet; blood and flesh issued forth; and the intended victim, however distant, languished and died. Like the sorcerer of the Middle Ages, he made images of those he wished to destroy, and muttering incantations, punctured them with an awl, whereupon the persons represented sickened and pined away." Subjects of fear as they were under the sorcerer's arts and magic when in health, and pliant patients in the hands of the conjurer, when stricken with disease, yet their ruling passion seems to have been that of hate and revenge in the redress of insults and injuries. To gratify this passion of their savage souls time, distance, suffering, peril were but food to feed upon; disappointment and delay only served to increase their thirst for blood when in pursuit of vengeance. "The stealthy blow, the reeking scalp torn from the prostrate victim, the yell of triumph when the deed was done-this was compensation for all. Nor did death suffice; the enemy, public or private, must be tortured, and nothing but his agony and his, groans could satiate the wolfish thirst of the savage for blood. His warfare was conducted by stealth and strategy and surprise; be imitated the panther, not the lion, in his assaults, and be lay by his victim and mangled him like the tiger. Sometimes he ate his victims if he was renowned, that all of the valor and virtue of the slain might not be lost, but some of it pass into the slayer's own person. If conquered or wounded to death his stoicism was indomitable; his enemy might see his back in flight, bat never behold him flinch under torture; when his finger-nails were plucked out one by one, and the raw skull from which his scalp was torn seared with live coals, and red-hot gun-barrels thrust into the abdominal cavity after he had been disemboweled, he would still sing his deathsong and gather breath to hurl a last yell of defiance at his enemy as he expired." It seems, however, that limitations were imposed upon this passion, at least among themselves, by rules or customs of restraint. Often" were chiefly against the person, as there were but few property rights to be sinned against among them. Every crime could be condoned. This was possible in ewe of murder. If murderer and victim belonged to the same clan, it was looked upon as a family quarrel, to be settled by the immediate kin. As a rule, public opinion compelled the acceptance of the atonement in lieu of bloodshed. If the murderer and victim were of different clans, the whole tribe went to work to prevent a feud from arising and leading to more bloodshed. Every effort was made to get the victim's clan to accept the atonement offering. Thirty presents was the price of a man's life, forty for a woman. If the victim belonged to a foreign tribe, the danger of war led to council meetings, formal embassies, and extensive making of actual and symbolical presents. That the Indians should place a higher estimate upon the life of a woman that the life of a man is strange contrast with their general character, --perhaps it was because of her greater value to them as a drudge or laborer. A wild and singular people were the Indians who met our forefathers on the shores of the Delaware and Schuylkill Rivers. Evidences of friendship and comity towards our race they certainly manifested, as also a consciousness of our superior condition PICTURE OF A DELAWARE INDIAN FORT APPEARS HERE [From Campanius' "New Sweden."] but, withal, their adult people, rule is and ruled, never yielded to the temptations of wealth, the greater power or higher enjoyments of life as seen in the line of civilization, before which they protestingly retreated, league by league, to the Ohio and Mississippi. For almost four centuries they have stolidly looked on the amazing progress and development of the continent over which they roamed as its proud possessors. Eye-witnesses to the plain and simple forms of government 49 established in their very midst upon lands purchased from them, in daily contact with a number of different languages, all far superior to theirs, they remained unaffected; not even war, with all its potentialities, with all its destructive agencies, and in which they were used as factors by their cunning and adroit allies, could wake them from their barbarous inertia. One hope still remains; it is for the youth of the race, who can be educated. Through these there may be a final redemption of the tribes now on the Pacific Slope. NOTE. -About the year 1710 a Swedish missionary preached a sermon at an Indian treaty hold at Conestogae, in Pennsylvania, in which sermon be set forth original sin, the necessity of a mediator, and endeavored by certain arguments to induce the Indians to embrace the Christian religion. After be had ended his discourse one of the Indian chiefs made a speech in reply to the sermon, and the discourses on both aides were made known by interpreters. The missionary, upon his return to Sweden, published his sermon and the Indian's answer. Having written them in Latin, be dedicated them to the University of Upsula, and requested them to furnish him with arguments to confute such strong reasoning of the Indians. The Indian speech, translated from the Latin, is as follows: "Since the subject of his (the missionary's) errand is to persuade us to embrace a new doctrine, perhaps it may not be amiss, before we offer him the reasons why we cannot comply with his request, to acquaint him with the grounds and principles of that religion which he would have us abandon. Our forefathers were under a strong persuasion, as we are, that those who act well in this life shall be rewarded in the next, according to the degree of their virtue; and, on the other hand, that those who behave wickedly here will undergo such punishments hereafter as are proportionate to the crimes they were guilty of. "This hath been constantly and invariably received and acknowledged for a truth through every successive generation of our ancestors. It could not have taken its rise from fable for human fiction, however artfully and plausibly contrived, can never gain credit long among any people where free inquiry is allowed, which was never denied by our ancestors, who, on the contrary, thought it the sacred, inviolable, natural right of every man to examine and judge for himself. Therefore we think it evident that our notion concerning future rewards and punishments was either revealed immediately from heaven to some of our forefathers, and from them descended to us, or that it was implanted in each of us at our creation by the Creator of all things. Whatever the methods might have been whereby God hath been pleased to make known to us His will, it is still in our sense a divine revelation. Now we desire to propose to him some few questions. Does he believe that our forefathers, men eminent for their piety, constant and warm in the pursuit of virtue, hoping thereby to, merit ever lasting happiness, were all damned? Does he think that we who are their zealous imitators in good works, and influenced by the same motives as they were, earnestly endeavoring with the greatest circumspection to tread the paths of integrity, are in a state of damnation? If these be his sentiments they, are surely impious as they are bold and daring. "In the next place, we beg that he not explain himself more particularly concerning the revolution he talks of. If he admits no other than what is contained in his written book, the contrary is evident from what has been shown before. But If he says God has revealed Himself to us, but not sufficient for our salvation, then we ask to what purpose should he had revealed Himself to us in anywise? "It is clear that a revelation insufficient to save cannot put us in a better condition than we should be in without any revelation at all. We cannot conceive that God should point out to us the end we ought to aim at without opening to us the way to arrive at that end. But supposing our understandings to be so far, illuminated as to know it to be our duty to please God, who yet hath left us under an incapacity of doing it, will We missionary, therefore, conclude that we shall be eternally damned? Will he take upon him to pronounce damnation against us for not doing those things which he himself acknowledges were impossible by us to be done? "It is our opinion that every man is possessed of sufficient knowledge for his salvation. The Almighty, for anything we know, may have communicated the knowledge of himself to a different race of people in a different manner. Some say they have the will of God in writing: be it so; their revelation has no advantage above ours, since both must be equally sufficient to save, otherwise the end of the revelation would be frustrated. Besides, if they both be true they must be the same In substance, and the difference ran only he in the mode of communication. He tells us there are many precepts in his written revelations which we are entirely ignorant of. But these written commands can only be designed for those who have the writing; they cannot possible regard us. Had the Almighty thought so much knowledge necessary for our salvation His goodness would not long have deferred the communication of it to us, and to say that in a manner so necessary he could not at one and the same time equally reveal Himself to all mankind is nothing less than an absolute denial of His omnipotence. "Without doubt He can make his will manifest without the help of any book or the assistance of any bookish man whatever. We shall in the next place consider the arguments which arise from a consideration of providence. If we are the work of God (which I presume will not be denied), it follows from thence that we are under the care and protection of God; for it cannot be supposed that the Deity should abandon his own creatures and he utterly regardless of their welfare. Then to say that the Almighty hath permitted us to remain in a fatal error through so many ages is to represent Him as a tyrant. "How is it consistent with His justice to force life upon a race of mortals without their consent and then damn them eternally, without ever opening to them the door of salvation? Our conceptions of the gracious God are wore noble, and we think that loose who teach otherwise do little than blaspheme. Again, it is through the care and good new of the Almighty that from the beginning of time, through many generations to this day, our name has been preserved, unblotted out by enemies, unrecognized to nothing. "By that same care we now enjoy our lives, are served with the necessary means of preserving those lives. But all these things are trifling compared with our salvation. Therefore, since God hath been so careful of us in matters of little consequence, it would be absurd to affirm that He has neglected us in cases of the greatest importance. Admit that He hath forsaken us, yet It could not have been without a just cause. Let us suppose that an heinous crime was committed by one of our ancestors like to that which we are told happened among another race of people. In such case God would certainly punish the criminal, but would never involve us, who are innocent in his guilt "Those who think otherwise must make the Almighty a very whimsical ill-natured being. Once more, are the Christians more virtuous, or, rather, are they not more vicious than we are? If so, how came it to pass that they are the objects of God's beneficence, while we are neglected? Does the Deity confer His favors without reason, and with so much partiality? In a word, we find the Christians much more depraved in their morals than ourselves, and we judge of their doctrine by the badness of their lives." FACSIMILE OF THE LORD'S PRAYER IN THE LANGUAGE OF THE SIX NATION INDIANS APPEARS HERE. END