Chapter 6

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

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

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

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

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

(7) _God of War_.--p. 8.

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

(8) _He went to the woman, laid his hand on her, and wept_.--p. 14.

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

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

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

(9) _A great man whose head nearly reached the sky._--p. 26.

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

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

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

POMATARE, THE FLYING BEAVER.

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

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

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

SONG OF THE MAN-FISH.

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

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

[Footnote A: River of Rivers. Mississippi.]

[Footnote B: Great Lake, the ocean.]

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

NOTES.

* * * * *

(1) _The winds had gone to their resting-place in the depths of the earth_.--p. 50.

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

(2) _Glittering at the sand of the Spirit's Island_.--p. 55.

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

THE ALARM OF THE GREAT SENTINEL.

A TRADITION OF THE DELAWARES.