Part 2

“In former days the Wabanaki nation, the Indians called Megʾwek, or Mohawks, and other members of the Iroquoian Six Nations, were wont to wage bloody and unceasing war with one another. The Wabanaki nation consisted of five tribes: Passamaquoddies, Penobscots, Micmacs, Milicetes, and the tribe, now extinct, which formerly inhabited the banks of the Kennebec River. The bitterest foes of the Wabanaki were undoubtedly the Megʾwek or Mohawks, who on the slightest provocation would send bands to harry them and destroy their crops. The Mohawks invariably treated their prisoners with the most merciless severity, showing no pity even to the women and children. A favorite torture which they frequently practised was to build a large fire of hemlock coals, into the flames of which they drove their captives, compelling them to walk back and forth over the glowing embers until relieved by death. No case is on record where a brave of the Wabanaki succumbed to the fearful pain and begged for mercy. The warriors would always pace the fiery path with undaunted resolution and without uttering a sound, until nature put an end to their agony. Tortures of this sort were practised by all the tribes, but the Mohawks exceeded the others in cruelty.”

“The cause of the strife was an hereditary dispute about hunting grounds. Besides the enmity which they nourished in common against the Six Nations, the Wabanaki had also internal disputes. Thus, the Penobscots were at feud with the Milicetes and the Micmacs with the Passamaquoddies.”

“The first war between the last two tribes was brought about by the quarrel of two boys, sons of chiefs. On this occasion the Passamaquoddies were on a friendly visit to the Micmacs, during which the sons of the Passamaquoddy and Micmac chiefs went shooting together. They both shot at a white sable, killing the animal by their joint effort, but each lad claimed it as his game. Finally, the Passamaquoddy boy, becoming enraged, killed the son of the Micmac chief. The latter on hearing of the murder could think only of vengeance, and positively refused to listen to the Passamaquoddy chief’s attempt at reconciliation. The latter even offered the life of his own son who had been guilty of the murder, but all to no purpose. In consequence of this unfortunate occurrence, the celebrated ‘great war’ was then declared, which lasted many years.”

“The Micmacs although more numerous than their enemies, were inferior warriors, so that the victory was always won (_sic!_) by the Passamaquoddies. So great was the hostile spirit that the two tribes fought whenever they met, paying no heed to the time of year. On one occasion, the Passamaquoddies went to Tlancowatik, thirty miles west of St. John, N. B., with a small party consisting principally of women and children, with the chief and a few braves. At this place they met a number of Micmacs on their way to Passamaquoddy Bay. The Micmac chief being a lover of fair play ordered his men to land on an island to await the coming of a messenger. The other chief sent word that on the following day ‘the boys would come out to play.’ As the Passamaquoddy chief had very few men able to bear arms, he made the women attire themselves like warriors so that from a distance they might be mistaken for men, and directed them to play on the beach shouting and laughing as if entirely fearless. The Micmac chief, deceived by this stratagem and being afraid, summoned his braves to council, and setting forth the disasters which had been caused by the long war advised a treaty of peace. This proposition was made to the Passamaquoddies who, wearied by the perpetual state of unrest, gladly acceded to the request. A general council was accordingly called, by which it was decided that ‘as long as the sun rises and sets, as long as the great lakes send their waters to the sea, so long should peace reign over the two tribes.’

“The usual ceremonies for making peace were then observed, as follows: (1) a marriage was contracted between a brave of the challenging people and a maiden of the challenged people. This was regarded as a type of perpetual future good will. (2) A feast lasting two months was celebrated nightly; and (3) games of ball, canoe and foot races and other sports were carried on. After such ceremonies were over no breach of a treaty is on record, not even a single murder.”

“After the great Micmac war was ended, the Passamaquoddies lived at peace except for occasional raids of Mohawks, but the latter finally received a blow from which they never recovered, the details of which are as follows: It was the custom of the Mohawks to make night attacks, and at one time, when the Passamaquoddies were at the head of Passamaquoddy Bay, the Mohawks approached the camp, which was called Quenasquamcook, with the purpose of utterly destroying it. On this occasion, however, they were seen by a Passamaquoddy brave whose people lay in ambush for them. It was the custom of chiefs to wear medallions of white wampum shells which were visible at a long distance, particularly in the moonlight. Picking out in this way the person of the Mohawk chief whose name was Lox (‘Wolverine’) the watching braves shot him first, owing to which calamity the Mohawks were thrown into confusion and fled. The Passamaquoddies followed them as soon as day broke, but the tracks were so scattered that they could not find the refugees. It was ascertained afterwards that the Mohawks had quarrelled among themselves, one party being in favor of making peace with the enemy, while another faction was strongly opposed to such a measure. The discussion of the question ended in a fierce combat. This was the final blow to the Mohawk cause, so that the nation ever afterward sought to be at peace with the Passamaquoddies.”

“After this battle the Passamaquoddies were never again molested, but the Penobscot tribe was still at war with the Milicetes and Mohawks and, in fact, was nearly destroyed three times by their ruthless foes.”[8]

After this period of intertribal enmity came the ratification of the Wampum Laws preserved in the so-called “Wampum Record,” part of which is given in the Appendix. This _Wababi Agʾnodmâgon_, as I received it, is really an historical account transmitted orally by elderly men whose memories had been especially trained for the purpose from early youth. The laws themselves are not given in my version. It was customary for these keepers of tribal history from time to time to instruct the younger members of their clan in the annals of the people. The Passamaquoddy accounts were kept in the memory of the historians by means of wampum shells arranged on strings in such a manner that certain combinations suggested certain sentences or ideas to the narrator or “reader” who, of course, already knew his record by heart and was merely aided by the association in his mind of the arrangement of the wampum beads with incidents or sentences in the tale, song, or ceremony which he was rendering. This explains such expressions as “marriage wampum” or “burial wampum,” which are common among the Passamaquoddies, and simply mean combinations of wampum which suggested to the initiated interpreter the ritual of the tribal marriage and burial ceremonies. Passamaquoddy tradition has it that the Wampum Records (i.e., the actual laws) were read ceremonially every year at Caughnawauga, the Iroquois headquarters.

This custom of preserving records by means of a mnemonic system was peculiar to all the tribes of the Algonkin race as well as to the Iroquoian clans. Brinton refers to the record or tally sticks of the Crees and Chippeways as the “rude beginning of a system of mnemonic aids.” It seems to have been customary in early times to burn a mark or rude figure on a stick, suggestive of a sentence or idea. Brinton adds: “In later days, instead of burning the marks upon the stick, they were painted, the colors as well as the figures having certain conventional meanings. The sticks are described as about six inches in length, slender, although varying in shape, and tied up in bundles.” Among the more cultured tribes the sticks were eventually replaced by wooden tablets, on which the symbols were engraved with a sharp instrument, such as a flint or knife. The Passamaquoddies, however, appear never to have advanced beyond the use of wampum strings as mnemonic aids.

I obtained the Wampum Records at Bar Harbor, Me., in 1887, from the Passamaquoddy Indian mentioned above by Mr. Leland, Mr. Louis Mitchell, who was at that time Indian member of the Maine Legislature. The manuscripts which he sent me contained both the Indian text and a translation into Indian-English, which I have rearranged in an idiom I trust somewhat more intelligible to the general reader.[9]

The Penobscot Indians of Maine number at present not more than three hundred and fifty, most of whom are resident at the Indian village of Oldtown on Penobscot River, near Bangor. These people still speak a characteristic Algonkin language which bears more resemblance to the idiom of the Abenakis at St. Francis, near Pierreville, Quebec, than it does to that of the nearer Algonkin neighbors of the Penobscots, the Passamaquoddies. Moreover, a philological examination of Penobscot and Abenaki shows that both of these forms of Algonkin speech are sister dialects, which have sprung from a common original at a comparatively recent date.[10] It is well known that the Abenakis of Canada are the direct descendants (of course with some admixture of French and other blood) of the majority of the savages who escaped from the great battle of the Kennebec in Maine, where the English commander Bradford overthrew their tribe on December 3, 1679. Many of the survivors at once fled to French Canada, where they settled themselves in their present village of St. Francis, near Pierreville, Quebec (_Alsigontegok_, “river of empty habitations”). Others again may have wandered into Canada at a slightly later date. There can be little doubt that the Indians now called Penobscots from their residence near the river of that name are the descendants of those of the early Abenakis who, instead of fleeing to French dominions, eventually submitted themselves to the victorious English. It is interesting to notice that the Canadian Abenakis are the only one of the Wabanaki clans which calls itself by the generic name (_Abenaki-Wabanaki_).

The Micmacs are the easternmost and by far the most numerous of the Wabanaki remnants. They are to be found in various places in the Canadian provinces of Quebec, New Brunswick, Nova Scotia, Prince Edward’s Island, and Newfoundland. Their grade of intelligence is much lower than that of the other members of the same family, but they still have a vast store of folk-lore, legends, and poems which is perishing for want of interested collectors. Their language differs so greatly from the dialects of the Penobscots, Abenakis, and Passamaquoddies that the members of these clans always use English or French when communicating with their Micmac neighbors, while an intelligent Passamaquoddy can without difficulty understand a Penobscot or Abenaki, if the dialect is pronounced slowly.

The story of the enforced westward wanderings of the ill-fated Delawares or Lenâpe has been told in detail by my late friend Dr. Brinton (“The Lenâpe and their Legends,” pp. 122–6).

At the present day this famous tribe, whose three clans--the Minsi, the Unami, and the Unalachtigo--were once the dominant native race in Delaware, New Jersey, Pennsylvania, and parts of New York State is represented by but a few bands living on scattered reservations, some in Indian Territory and some in Ontario, Canada. The Delawares of Indian Territory have quite lost their identity as a tribe of Indians, as they have been incorporated with the Cherokee Nation, by whose chief and council they are governed. The last recognized Delaware chief of this division of the tribe was Charles Jurney-cake, whose daughters are now married to white men. These Indians occupy lands in the Muskogee Agency, situated in the northwestern part of the Cherokee Nation. There are still about eight hundred Delawares in this region, all of whom moved to the Cherokee country from Kansas, in 1867. I am informed that a few members of the race linger on at New Westfield, near Ottawa, Kansas, most of whom are under the charge of the Moravian Church.

In Ontario, Canada, there are only about three hundred in all; one hundred at Hagersville, on the Six Nations’ (Iroquois) Reserve (Chief Nelles Montour), one hundred at Munceytown, and the same number at Moraviantown, which is the seat of a Moravian mission. The Canadian Delawares are all Protestants, belonging, for the most part, either to the Church of England or to the Moravians.[11]

Brinton (_op. cit._, pp. 91 ff.) has pointed out the chief differences between the two ancient dialects of the Lenâpe, viz.: the Unami-Unalachtigo and the Minsi. Of these, the Minsi is spoken by all the Canadian Delawares. In this connection, however, it is interesting to note that, in a letter to Dr. Brinton, dated Moraviantown, 1884, Chief Gottlieb Tobias states that three aged persons were then living who could still talk the other dialect. It is evident that most of the Delawares of Indian Territory use the Unami-Unalachtigo, since Chief Montour, of Hagersville, Ont., writes that, when he visited the Cherokee settlement of his race some years ago, he could only understand with difficulty the speech of his congeners resident there. On the other hand, he asserts that the Delawares near Ottawa, Kansas, use pure Minsi.

Chief Montour is a highly intelligent and well educated Indian who takes a deep interest in the language and lore of his tribe. The Delaware witchcraft tale given in the following collection about the Muttóntoe was sent to me by him.

The lore of the Maine and eastern Canadian Wabanaki may be said to center chiefly around the clown-like being known to the Passamaquoddies as Kulóskap and to the Penobscots as Klûskâbe. My coadjutor, Mr. Leland, has ably treated of the nature of this purely American creation in his Algonquin Legends, pp. 15–139. Kulóskap (Klûskâbe) is a god-man of truly Indian type who undoubtedly represents the principle of good, and particularly good nature, as opposed to his twin-brother Malsum the Wolf, who may be called the Ahrimân of the Wabanaki, although this is almost too dignified a term. It is highly interesting to notice that these twins were born from an unknown divine mother, the good Kulóskap in the natural manner, and the evil Wolf through the woman’s side, a method which he deliberately chose in order to kill his mother. The tendency of Kulóskap, in spite of his name, was essentially benevolent. Oddly enough Kulóskap means “the liar,” from a stem √_klûsk_, “lie” + _ap_, “a man, person, one who stands.” The stem appears in Penobscot only in compounds; cf. _klûskachemuwâgon_, “a lie falsehood.” This appellation, uncomplimentary as it sounds to our ears, was not really meant in this sense by the Indians. Kulóskap is called the deceiver, not because he deceives or injures man, but because he is clever enough to lead his enemies astray, the highest possible virtue to the early American mind. Kulóskap was at once the creator and friend of Man, and, strangely enough, he made the Indian (or Man; the terms are synonymous) from the ash tree. The following collection of songs, mostly from Micmac sources, bearing especially on the doings of Kulóskap, has been arranged by Mr. Leland and myself into a sort of epic embracing all the native lore known to us concerning this personage. The same culture-hero appears in the legends of the entire Algonkin family, although often under another name. In the present collection, to secure uniformity, the single name of Kulóskap has been used throughout.

Wabanaki mythology was really pure Shamanism, seeing a spirit in every tree and waterfall, and a malignant or benevolent influence in many animals. Like most barbaric races, these people were also fervent believers in witchcraft, a superstition which still survives in the minds of many of the older Indians. Any missionary to the Passamaquoddies, or to their kindred, the New Brunswick Milicetes, the Penobscots of Oldtown, Me., or to the Micmacs and Abenakis of Quebec, will admit that belief in the ancient Shamanistic sorcery among these Indians has by no means died out. Among the Passamaquoddies and Milicetes particularly, there is still a perfect mine of material relating to the wizards and their power over other men and over the curious beings with which the Indians have peopled the mysterious forests of their country.

In pre-Christian times the Passamaquoddies, like their other Algic kindred, were firm believers in the almost unlimited power of their _Mʾdeolinʾwuk_ or wizards, belief in the existence of many of whom still remains, subordinate, of course, to the Catholic doctrine, which nearly all the Indians profess--there being, I am informed, only three or four Protestant Passamaquoddy families.

A few examples of these sorcerers’ power are described below in the curiously curt style of Algic narrative.[12] We see from these tales that the wizards could transform themselves into animals at will; that they could cast a spell or curse on an enemy, even though he might also be a _Mʾdeolin_; that they could violate the laws of nature so far as to walk in hard ground, sinking up to the ankles or knees at every step, and, finally--that they could communicate with each other telepathically. I need hardly comment on the first two and the fourth of these wonders, as they are common among all Shamanistic conjurers, but the third phenomenon, the power to sink into hard ground while walking, is, I believe, characteristically American. Rink states that this is not an unusual feat among the conjurers of the Greenland Eskimo, who frequently sink into rocky and frozen ground “as if in snow.” The trick is probably done by some peculiar way of stooping, or is merely suggested, possibly by means of hypnotic influence. Leland compares here, however, the Old Norse statements regarding their wizards, who occasionally sank into the ground and who had power to pass through earth with the same ease as through air or water (Algonquin Legends, p. 342). It would be hardly permissible to draw a parallel between the ancient Norsemen and the northern Indians on this account, as the case Leland cites is that of a conjurer who disappeared into the ground head downwards, when he was stabbed at by a foe. It should be noticed that in the following tale, my Passamaquoddy authority did not see the actual feat, but only the deep tracks of the wizard where he had sunk into the earth “the night before.”

The anecdote of a cannibalistic feast is highly interesting. The wizards here eat their murdered comrade, evidently with the idea of absorbing into themselves some or all of his power. The cannibalistic orgies of the South Sea Islanders should be compared with this practice. For example, the Fijis and the New Zealand Maoris ate their enemies with the same object in view, viz., to become as brave as the fallen foe had been. All authorities tend to show, however, that cannibalism was extremely rare among the American races, and was only resorted to in isolated cases like the one here noted.

In the Delaware tale given below, a similar instance of cannibalism is cited; only in this case, the wizard, who is evidently a being similar in nature to the Passamaquoddy _Kiwaʿkw_ or the Micmac _Chînu_, desires to devour a very old, worn-out man. I can only look upon this feature as a highly interesting relic from very primitive times, when it was probably not unusual to devour the aged, perhaps for a double purpose: both to get rid of them, as was the case until recently among the islanders of Tierra del Fuego, and also, perhaps, to absorb sacramentally into the living members of the family the essence of the dead parent, whose soul is thus prevented from becoming entirely extinct. The fact that a giant ghoul desires to eat the Delaware old man is, however, a distinctly Algonkin feature, quite in accord with the ideas prevalent among the Passamaquoddies, Penobscots and Micmacs regarding the _Kiwaʿkw-Chînu_.

The Passamaquoddy tale given below of the _Kiwaʿkw_ or snow demon is one of a great number. The Algonkin Indian believed in many spirits, some benevolent like the _Wʾnagʾmeswuk_ or “little people,” who were wont to warn the tribesmen of impending danger; some neutral, like the wandering _Kiwaʿkw_ in this tale, or the _Chibelaʿkwe_, the tree sprite who sits in the crotch of the large branches; and some again distinctly malevolent, like the _Appodumken_ or spirit of the deep water, who lurks in the lakes to drag down the unwary swimmer. The _Kiwaʿkw_, however, as remarked above, was often an evil being. Compare also Leland’s wonderful tales of the _Chînu_ (Algonquin Legends, pp. 233 ff).

The reader’s attention should be called at this point to the remarkable ideas prevalent among the Wabanaki regarding the cohabitation of women and serpents (see below, and also Leland, _op. cit._, pp. 268 ff). These may seem strange coming from a land where there are no ophidians large enough to warrant such a superstition. It is not impossible, however, that in these hideous tales we have some relic of far distant prehistoric days when huge serpents were not unknown. It should be added, moreover, that in every case of such sexual relations between snakes and man among the Wabanaki the serpent was always a wizard (_Mʾdeolin_) in disguise, a fact which shows that in the later superstition at least the unusual character of such monstrous serpents was fully appreciated.

The following points should be noted with regard to the pronunciation of the Indian words herein given. The vowels have the Italian values, except that _ö_ = German _ö_ in _schön_. The apostrophe ʾ is a very short _u_-vowel. The consonants are equivalent to the same consonants in English, except that _ñ_ represents the French nasal _n_ in _mon_, and the final combination _kw_ or final _q_ must be uttered as a _k_ followed by _w_ accompanied by a gentle indeterminate short vowel. The inverted apostrophe ʿ has the value of a softly breathed _h_. Thus _kiwâʿkw_ must be pronounced _kee-wah-kwᵘ_.

As explained the name of the culture-hero is spelled _Kulóskap_ for the sake of uniformity, but so far as possible, the Indian expressions used in the different stories have been kept in harmony with the original languages. The reason for this discrepancy lies in the fact that some of the Passamaquoddy and Micmac tales were related by Penobscots, who frequently inadvertently used their own forms. For the same reason, in some stories labelled as Micmac, Passamaquoddy words will occasionally be found. In every such case the Micmac tales came through a Passamaquoddy medium, who, whenever he was ignorant of the proper Micmac word, used the corresponding Passamaquoddy expression, but elsewhere employed Micmac words. The Indian headings to the stories are nearly all in Passamaquoddy because the _raconteurs_ generally began in this dialect, even when they broke into Micmac or Penobscot in continuing the tale in question. The Glossary explains every Indian word occurring in the midst of the English text.