Part 4

The Wallum Olum, however, with its hieroglyphics, does not end with the brief extract given. Song five, consisting of fifty-eight verses, recounts the details of the occupation by the conquerors of the Ohio valley, and long wars with enemies denominated "_Father Snakes_," "_Stone Snakes_," and "_North Snakes_," whose pictograph in the original manuscript is here given (fig. 18). They pass the Alleghenies, and exploring the Chesapeake Bay and great rivers of "the large and long east land," finally establish themselves on the Delaware, making "_Maskekitong_," the rapids at Trenton, the centre of their dominions. We have now reached the time of the coming of the whites, and the last verses of the song speak in brief simplicity of a people who came from somewhere, "and that which was white" (ships) "coming from the East Sea."

There is still another song--the sixth--continuing the chronicle and recounting the melancholy story of the Lenape's contact with the whites, and final westward journey to Ohio, where the records were obtained. A narrative of sufferings and hard wrongs, whose recital by the Indian had caused Heckewelder, as he said, "to feel ashamed that he was a white man."

The symbols appended to the songs, and among which the forms of the rectangle and circle frequently occur, end with the fifth song; they appear very arbitrary, and it is certainly disappointing to find that they bear no resemblance to the carvings upon the Lenape stone, likewise, as we have supposed, productions of the Lenni Lenape and dealing with the same subject. Yet we need not be surprised when we consider the varied and often arbitrary methods of Indian picture-writing.

In comparing the carvings on the reverse of the Lenape stone with the Lenape and Huron-Iroquois traditions of their early migration and struggle with the mound-builders, we have spoken only of probabilities. Possibly these carvings may refer to the incantations of the prophets and doctors, to songs for "medicine hunting," or charms against evil spirits, and not to the history of the tribe, as recounted in the Wallum Olum and the narratives of Heckewelder and Cusic. Possibly, too, the modern Indians who have seen the carvings may have entirely mistaken their subject, as similar signs are used in quite different kinds of their picture-writing. Yet if we view the chief feature of the Lenape stone--the mammoth picture--as an example of muzzinabik or historical picture-writing, an attempt to explain the carvings on the reverse of the stone as specimens of the same class of writings does not seem extravagant. Viewed in the light of these legends, and compared with the fragments of ancient Indian history which chance has preserved to us, the carvings upon the Lenape stone vividly impress upon our minds the reality of that dark period of our continent's past, antecedent to the first coming of the white man, separated from us by but a few centuries, yet where the boundary line between history and geology becomes indistinct, when for hundreds, perhaps thousands, of years the Indian lived alone on the "great island," and while those deep-rooted peculiarities of his character, which civilization has failed to eradicate, were slowly growing out of his wilderness life.

The ancient presence of the Lenape is often remembered in the heart of his former dominions. Along the shores of the beautiful river, whose transatlantic name, applied also to his tribe, he resented, the arrow-head and tomahawk, everywhere found upon sites of ancient camps and fishing-grounds, tell of the long centuries of his possession. His memory lingers in the name and poetry of our Indian summer; and in that most delightful of autumnal seasons, when a warm wind blowing from the abode of the Great Spirit stirs the fields of ripened maize, we may see, where first the Indian's fancy must have seen it, a suggestion of his head-dress of feathers in the graceful motion of the corn-stalks. He is immortalized in richly melodious names of rivers, streams, and mountains, and his memory is forever recalled in the yearly growth of that noblest of American plants, the Indian corn.

In concluding here our view of the less distinct though not improbable reference of the carvings on the reverse of the Lenape stone to the ancient historical traditions of the Delawares, a brief review of the subject of the foregoing pages may not be out of place.

We have seen that the stone was found at a spot situated in the ancient territory of the Delawares, and where many articles of undoubted Indian workmanship have been found,--among them two carved stones,[N]--that similar aboriginal carvings of the hairy mammoth have been discovered in Europe, and that a race of men, relics of whom have been found on the Delaware river and in California, and who may or may not have been the ancestors of the modern Indian, have existed in North America at the time of the mammoth. Moreover, that as yet nothing is definitely known as to the antiquity of the Indians' occupancy of our continent, and that there is no geological evidence to prove that the mammoth did not survive in America to a comparatively recent period. We have seen further that the Indians in several of their traditions attribute the mammoth bones seen by them on the Ohio to a great monster who was destroyed by lightning, and that there is a similarity too strong to be accidental between the Lenape tradition of the great Buffalo and the carving on the stone; finally, we may see perhaps a reference in the carvings on the reverse of the stone to the early Delaware traditions of their migration to the eastward and wars with the mound-builders, as detailed in Heckewelder's account, the "Wallum Olum," and David Cusic's history.

APPENDIX.

STATEMENT OF BERNARD Z. HANSELL.

On the writer's second visit to Hansell, the latter was at his father's farm. He stated that the photographs shown him were representations of the stone, and said that he considered that he had been cheated. He had had no idea of the stone's value, and declared that it was a "mean trick," the purchase of all his relics--the stone included--for $2.50. When it was explained to him that Mr. Paxon, the purchaser, had been as ignorant as he in the matter at the time, he seemed satisfied.

On the third visit, February 10th, Hansell said:

I am sure that I found the large piece first, in the spring of 1872 (the year after my father bought the place--1871), and while "ploughing for oats" in the "corner" field, and near the corner where the by-road joins the Durham road--the roots of the last year's corn crop had shortly before been harrowed out. It was in April. When I saw it, it was lying on the top of the ground, a little to one side of the furrow. I stopped and picked it up; it seemed like "something different" from what I had ever found before. It was dirty--dirt stuck to the stone; by rubbing, I could see lines--"queer marks" over it. (When I afterward saw it at Mr. Paxon's, the latter had "cleaned it.")

I am certain I saw an animal like an elephant on it before Mr. Paxon saw the stone. I carried it around a day or two in my pocket, and then put it in a box along with the other things; and whatever arrow-heads and other relics I found, I would put into the same box. The same day, I planted a corn-stalk into the ground to mark the place--a shower might wash out something else, I thought. I left the corn-stalk until the oats harvest, and then threw a stone there, but I soon came to know the place by heart. The box with the relics I kept locked up in my trunk, and I took care to keep it locked,--there were so many boys about. In the meantime, I was married. I showed the relics and stone to my wife, but she would not remember the elephant on the stone. I might have showed it to father, or might not, I am not sure. He would not remember. In the same field, I and others on the place found arrow-heads, coins (English and American pennies), and a part of a tomahawk or banner stone (sold to Mr. Paxon). I did not find any thing else in that field, but "gorget stones" without inscriptions, and round stone balls, with incisions on sides, were found near by.

In the spring of 1881, Mr. Paxon asked me whether I had any Indian relics. I said that I had. I told him I would be at home on Sunday, and he came the next Sunday afternoon--about May or June, as nearly as I can recollect,--1881. I brought out the box of relics, and told him that I would sell him the perfect arrow-heads for ten cents, and the broken ones for five cents apiece. I had a broken tomahawk and a piece of another, and I laid them and the stone aside, and said I thought I would keep them. But he did not take much interest in the rest, and said he wanted all the relics. He did not look much at the arrow-heads, but he picked up the stone and turned it around, and wet his thumb and rubbed it. He did not say any thing about the stone. I did not much want to sell him the stone, for I never saw any thing like it before.

But he said he would take all the relics or none for $2.50. So I let him have them. At the same time he asked me whether I had not the other piece; perhaps I had, he said, and did not know it. I told him that I had not.

About a month after that time, he came by on foot and asked me whether I had found any thing more? I said that I had not. "If you do," he said, "keep it and give me the first chance."

I always had the other piece in my mind, and when I went in the field I used to look for it. I would walk around the spot in a circle, for I thought some one might have picked it up and then thrown it away again.

After we had cut the corn in the field, and as I went in to husk, I happened to pass near the place--I always remember the place,--I was thinking of the other piece, and was hardly in the field before I picked it up. I noticed the marks and the shape, and saw at once that it was the missing piece. It had notches around the edges. I put it in my pocket and laid it in the drawer. My wife never saw it. It was the little piece. I was married then and in my own house, and there was nobody about the house, so I did not lock it up.

This was in the fall--after the exhibition at Doylestown (October), in 1881. When I went down to Mr. Paxon's father's, Squire Paxon's, to pay my tax, on the 9th of November, 1881, I took this piece along. Young Mr. Paxon was not at home, but I waited till he came back. I said I had something "pretty nice" for him, and showed him the missing piece. He thought when he saw it that I would make him pay pretty dear for it, but I told him that I would give it to him. I had not rubbed or cleaned it. He put the pieces together and said "that is the missing piece." He took me up to his room and gave me some minerals. I advised him to glue the pieces together with "hickory cement." I had some of this cement at home, and offered to give it to him.

The next spring I saw the stone again, all washed and cleaned. It did not look altered--only clean and rubbed off. I saw it again this February (1884), when you and Mr. Paxon came to see me, and I saw no change in it.

I never sold a relic before I sold those to Harry Paxon, and never knew any one from Philadelphia that took any interest in Indian relics. I used to give things away to relatives of mine, often boys--my cousins, when they came up from town. They had never seen any thing like an arrow-head before. I never gave a stone to any one but a relative. William Hansell, my brother, a little boy, saw me pick up the small piece of the Lenape Stone. I never heard of any one in this neighborhood interested in Indian relics before Mr. Paxon.

The first things that I remember giving away were a couple of black arrow-heads that I gave to James Aikens, in 1871. He lives in Germantown. This was before I found the stone.

[Signed] BERNARD Z. HANSELL.

Sworn to before BENJAMIN S. RICH, J. P., Nov. 6, 1884.

The writer questioned Hansell's wife. She remembered his having shown her the relics before they were sold to Mr. Paxon, but had paid no attention to "these little stones he picks up," and did not remember whether "this stone you are talking about" was among them or not. The writer also questioned Hansell's father and mother. Neither had seen the stone. The boy, William Hansell, brother of Bernard, said that he had seen the little piece when Bernard picked it up, but had never seen the large piece of the stone. The piece he had seen was covered with dirt and mud, and had "half a hole" in it. Bernard had told him that he was going to give it to Mr. Paxon.

STATEMENT OF MR. HENRY D. PAXON.

I remember Hansell telling me of his Indian relics at my father's office. I went to see him on a Sunday, and he showed me, in the wood-shed, a tobacco-box half full of relics, among them the large piece of the Lenape Stone. At the time I never realized what it was. It was covered with dirt, as were all the relics. There must have been about two hundred arrow-heads, broken and perfect, besides a broken axe and fragments of a banner stone, and one or two large spears and so-called "gigs." The stone struck me as an extraordinary Indian relic. Buying the relics, I brought them home that Sunday afternoon, and at once showed them to my father. He saw the elephant. Whether I had noticed it before I cannot remember. Mr. John S. Ash saw this first piece--the large piece--before Capt. Bailey saw it. I showed it to any and everybody that came to my father's office, but can only be sure now of Mr. Ash. Capt. Bailey saw it and borrowed it while preparing his article. I had it at the Bucks County Bi-Centennial Exhibition, August 31, September 1 and 2, 1882. I did not particularly value the stone until I read Capt. Bailey's article. I cleaned out the soil which clung to the stone with a toothbrush, and may also have used a stick--but I think not a nail.

[Signed] HENRY D. PAXON.

Sworn to before ELIAS EASTBURN, J. P., Nov. 8, 1884.

STATEMENT OF MR. ALBERT PAXON.

Young Hansell and his father were at my house on business (I am Justice of the Peace). They had rented a house. I think it was on a Saturday in '80 or '81, in the summer. The next day my son went to Hansell's and brought back a large number of Indian relics. He had invested two or three dollars in them. In the lot was one of the pieces of the stone. I remember saying that it was a pity he had not the other half. The lines were not cleaned out. I recollect the elephant. He emptied the relics on the floor of the piazza. It was early summer, and warm weather--about May or June,--and I think on Sunday. I am certain of having seen the elephant the first day he got the stone. Bernard Hansell, I find in my book, paid his tax November 8, '81, but I am not positive in these dates to a day. There is not, and never has been, to my knowledge, any strange or suspicious person of an "archæological turn" in this neighborhood, and there is no one here clever enough to have made the stone.

[Signed] ALBERT S. PAXON.

Affirmed before JAMES GILKYSON, J. P., Nov. 8, 1884.

STATEMENT OF MR. JOHN S. ASH, OF GREENVILLE,

NOVEMBER 8, 1884.

At the time of my first seeing the Lenape Stone, I observed an elephant or mammoth carved upon the fragment. I cannot now fix the date of my first seeing this piece. Probably it was some three years since, though it may not be two and may be four. I think it was before the Bucks County Bi-Centennial Exhibition.

[Signed] JOHN S. ASH.

Affirmed before ELIAS EASTBURN, J. P., Nov. 8, 1884.

STATEMENT OF CAPT. J. S. BAILEY.

I saw the stone first, I think, in November, in the fall of 1881, and a few days after Mr. Paxon had obtained the second piece. He had said to me that he had a curious stone which he wished to show me. I remember his mentioning the figure of a turtle, a snake, and an elephant carved on the stone, although he did not first mention the elephant figure or show that he appreciated the mammoth. It was not till he had read my article in the county newspaper that he came to know the value of the carving. He was only eighteen or nineteen then, and I believe would have sold the stone for a comparatively trifling sum. As soon as I took the stone home, after Mr. Paxon had lent it to me, all my family saw it. Judge Paxon, his uncle, did not realize its archæological importance, neither did Mr. Paxon, the owner's father. I showed it to Judge Paxon before I wrote the article. The first time Mr. Harry Paxon showed me the stone I remember his saying that "he could sell it for five dollars." He wanted me to glue or cement the pieces together, but I discountenanced the plan. I think he must have scraped out the original soil clinging to it with a nail or some sharp instrument, and I told him that he had cleaned the lines too much and that the stone had lost the look of age. The next time I saw it he had filled the lines with clay, and this I advised him to remove, as it did not resemble the soil of the original field. So the next time I saw it he had cleaned it again. I took the stone to the January or April meeting of the Bucks County Historical Society, 1882, and showed it to all the members present. I showed it to Gen. Davis, who advised me in connection with it to prepare an article on the Indian relics found in Bucks County, to be read before the July meeting at Penn's Manor. A few days after that I returned the stone to Mr. Paxon. Somewhere in June or July (1882) I borrowed it again, and kept it until two or three weeks after the meeting at Pennsbury. This meeting was on the third Tuesday in July, 1882. Mr. Paxon did not go to the meeting, but after reading my article in the paper he set a higher value on his relic and wished me to return it. I do not recollect seeing either part separately. The two pieces were together when I first saw it. I think Hansell told me that the large part had been found first. Very many people saw the stone at my lecture at Penn's Manor. I had a large diagram of the inscription, several feet long. Two hundred people must have seen it. There was an article in the Bucks County _Intelligencer_ about it, and it was at the Bi-Centennial and there seen by everybody.

[Signed] JOHN S. BAILEY.

Affirmed to before ELIAS EASTBURN, J. P., Nov. 8, 1884.

Letter from Dr. D. G. Brinton, Professor of Archæology and Ethnology in the Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia.

_To the Editor of the Bucks County "Intelligencer"_:

The discussion in your paper about the so-called "Lenape Stone," in which my name has incidentally been introduced, leads me to address you a few lines on some archæological points, especially on the methods of distinguishing genuine from fabricated specimens. I shall only refer to the Lenape Stone by way of illustration. It was first shown to me by Professor Lewis, and after a careful inspection I pronounced it a modern piece of work, which opinion has been substantiated by later observers. My opinion was based, first, on the design, and secondly, on the execution. It may be laid down as a rule, holding good in all aboriginal designs of the Eastern United States, that no lines indicating either shading or rounding are found on figures of pure native origin. Every line was significant, and nothing was done for affect. Grouping was also unknown, and any such triple arrangement as the brute, the human, and the divine groups, standing in immediate relation to each other and forming parts of a picture, as appears on the Lenape Stone, was as far above aboriginal æsthetic conceptions as the Sistine Madonna would be above the execution of a sign-painter. Certain artistic details, as the lightnings shooting in various directions from a central point (as from the hand of Jove), were also unknown to the art notions of the red race. The treatment of the sun as a face, with rays shooting from it, I also consider foreign to the pictography of the Delaware Indians, nor have I yet seen any specimens proved to be of their manufacture that present it. It is found, indeed, in Chippeway pictography, but there only in late examples.

The execution of such imitations also usually betrays their origin. The lines on the Lenape Stone are obviously cut with a metal instrument, making clean incisions, deepest in the centre and tapering to points--quite different from the scratch of a flint point. Shrewder fabricators than the unknown author of this one make use of flint points. Some of the Western "tablets" have been so inscribed. They may thus conceal their tools, but there are other resources for the archæologist. The surface of all stones undergoes a certain chemical change on exposure to the air, which is called by the French term _patine_. In many varieties, as flints, jasper, and hard shales, this affords a decisive means of discriminating a modern from an ancient inscription or arrow-head. It requires the use of the microscope and some practice, but with these most of such impostures can be detected. This does not exhaust the resources at the command of the antiquary to circumvent those who would practise on his love for relics of the past. But I have said enough to show that opinions on relics need neither be vague nor prejudiced. It is most desirable that the citizens of our Commonwealth should take an earnest interest in the collection of our aboriginal remains, and it is gratifying to learn that Bucks County is not behindhand in this direction.

Respectfully yours, [Signed] D. G. BRINTON, M.D.

From the Bucks County _Intelligencer_ of Sept. 6, 1884.

Letter from Mr. H. Carvill Lewis, Professor of Mineralogy, Academy of Natural Sciences, Philadelphia.

PHILADELPHIA, Feb. 19, 1884.

CAPT. J. S. BAILEY:

_Dear Sir_:--Upon careful examination I am convinced that the mammoth on the Indian tablet is a forgery, being copied directly from the drawing of a mammoth on a piece of ivory found in the cave of La Madeleine, Perigord, France. The tablet is genuine, but the drawing upon it is recent.

Who do you think perpetrated this fraud?

Yours, very truly, [Signed] H. CARVILL LEWIS.

Letter from Dr. F. W. Putnam, Curator of the Peabody Museum of Archæology, Cambridge, Mass.

CAMBRIDGE, March 17, 1884.

DEAR MR. MERCER: