FOOTNOTES:
[1] Derived from the words Alleghany and Atlantic, in reference to the race of Indians anciently located in this geographical area, but who, as expressed in the text, had extended themselves, at the end of the 15th century, far towards the north and west.
[2] From the Algic Oshtegwon, a head, &c.
[3] Denoting occidental. From Kabeyun the west—and embracing the tribes who, at the commencement of 1800, were located west of the Mississippi. The Sioux, Otoes, Omahaws, Osages, and Quapaws, constitute the leading members of this group.
[4] For some remarks on this question, see Am. Biblical Repository, second series, No. 2, April, 1839.
[5] From Tsallakee—the name by which, according to David Brown, the Cherokees call themselves.
[6] Keewaydin.
[7] The Brothertons.
INDIAN TALES AND LEGENDS,
MYTHOLOGIC AND ALLEGORIC.
RENDERED FROM THE ORAL TRADITIONS OF THE NORTH AMERICAN INDIANS BY COMPETENT INTERPRETERS,
AND WRITTEN OUT
FROM THE ORIGINAL NOTES.
PRELIMINARY OBSERVATIONS ON THE TALES.
The following tales are published as specimens of an oral imaginative lore existing among the North American aborigines. In the long period of time in which these tribes have been subjects of observation, we are not aware that powers of this kind have been attributed to them. And it may be asked, Why the discovery of this peculiar trait in their intellectual character has not been made until the first quarter of the nineteenth century? The force of the query is acknowledged; and, in asserting the claim for them, the writer of these pages proposes first to offer to the public some proofs of the correctness of his own conclusions on this point.
The era of the discovery was the era of maritime adventure. The master spirits of those times were men of shrewd, keen sense and adventurous tempers, who wished to get ahead in the world, and relied for their success, rather upon the compass and sword, than upon their pens. It was the age of action and not of research. Least of all, had they the means or the inclination to inquire into the mental capacities of fierce and warlike races of hunters and warriors, who claimed to be lords of the soil, and actually exterminated the first settlement made in St. Domingo and in Virginia. They set out from Europe with a lamentable want of true information respecting them, and were disappointed in not finding them wild animals on two legs. Long after the discovery, it was debated whether any faith ought to be kept with them; and the chief point of inquiry was, not whether they had any right to the soil, but how they could be turned to the best account in the way of trade and merchandise. The Spaniards, who occupy the foreground in the career of discovery, began by selling the Indian and compelling him to feudal servitude, and would probably have driven as profitable a traffic as was subsequently carried on with the Africans, had it not soon appeared that the Indian was a lazy man, and not a productive labourer. He sank under the overwhelming idea of hopeless servitude, lingered a few years an unprofitable miner, and died. The project was therefore relinquished, not because of the awakened sensibilities of the conquerors, but because it was (in the mercantile acceptation of the term) a bad business. The history of the manners, customs, and languages of the ancient nations, and particularly of the oriental branches of the human family, from whom they were thought to have descended, was deeply in the dark. Comparative philology was unknown, and the spirit of critical and historical acumen, which has evinced itself in Germany in modern days, and is rapidly extending itself over the world, still slumbered under the intellectual darkness which spellbound the human mind after the overthrow of Greece and Rome, and the dispersion of the Jews. To expect, therefore, that the hardy commanders of exploring voyages should have, at the opening of the sixteenth century, entered into any minute inquiries of the kind referred to, would be to expect that the human mind should reverse its ordinary mode of operation. These men do not appear to have troubled themselves with the inquiry whether the Indians had a history: certainly they took no pains to put on record facts in the department of inquiry to which our attention is now directed. This view results from an attentive examination of the earlier voyages and histories of adventure in this hemisphere, in which is exhibited the coldest air of mercantile calculation. The journals themselves are mere logbooks, rigid and dry in their details, destitute of any powers of reflection upon the events they narrate, and unrelieved by exact research, tact of observation, or high-souled sentiment.
History is required to pass a less censorious judgment on the moral character of those of the colonists who settled north of the latitudes of the West Indies. The great Anglo-Saxon stock, which spread along the shores of the North Atlantic, carried with it notions of liberty and justice, which shielded the aboriginal tribes from the curse of slavery. They treated them as having a just right to the occupancy of the soil, and formed treaties with them. They acknowledged, by these acts, their existence as independent political communities, and maintained, in their fullest extent, the doctrine of political faith and responsibility. Some of the colonies went farther, and early directed their attention to their improvement and conversion to Christianity. The two powers were, however, placed in circumstances adverse to the prosperous and contemporaneous growth of both, while they occupied a territory over which there was a disputed sovereignty. It must needs have happened, that the party which increased the fastest in numbers, wanted most land, and had most knowledge (to say nothing of the influence of temperance and virtue), should triumph, and those who failed in these requisites, decline. It is believed that this is the true cause why the transplanted European race overspread the land, and the Indians were driven before them. And that the result is by no means owing to a proper want of sympathy for the latter, or of exertions both to better their condition and avert their fate. The Indians could not, however, be made to understand this. They did not look to causes, but reasoned wholly from effects. They saw the white race occupying the prominent harbours, pushing up the navigable streams, spreading over the uplands, and multiplying in numbers "like sands on the seashore." And they attributed to hostile purpose, breach of faith, and cupidity, what was, to a very great extent, owing to their own idle habits, vices, and short-sightedness. The two races soon came to measure swords; and this contest extended, with short periods of intervening peace, from about A.D. 1600 to the close of 1814. The Indians staked stratagem and the geographical obstacles of a vast unknown wilderness, against knowledge, resources, and discipline. Their policy was to fly when pursued, and pursue when relieved from pursuit; to avoid field fights, and carry on a most harassing war of detail. By avoiding concentration in camps, and occupying a comparatively large area of country, they have compelled their assailants, at all times, to employ a force entirely disproportioned to that required to cope with the same number of civilized troops. The result of this long-continued, and often renewed contest for supremacy, it is only necessary to advert to. It has been anything but favourable to the production of right feelings and a reciprocal knowledge of real character on both sides. The Indians could never be made to appreciate the offers of education and Christianity by one portion of the community, while others, were arrayed against them in arms. Their idea of government was, after all, the Eastern notion of a unity or despotism, in which everything emanates from the governing power, and is responsible to it. Nor has their flitting and feverish position on the frontiers been auspicious to the acquisition of a true knowledge of their character, particularly in those things which have relation to the Indian mind, their opinions on abstract subjects, their mythology, and other kindred topics. Owing to illiterate interpreters and dishonest men, the parties have never more than half understood each other. Distrust and misapprehension have existed by the century together. And it is, therefore, no cause for astonishment, that the whole period of our contemporaneous history should be filled up with so many negotiations and cessions, wars and treaties.
These remarks are offered to indicate, that the several periods of our colonial and confederate history, and wars, were unfavourable to the acquisition of that species of information respecting their mental capacities and social institutions, of which it is our purpose to speak. The whole tendency of our intercourse with them has been, to demonstrate rather the physical than moral capabilities of the Indian, his expertness in war, his skill, stratagem, powers of endurance, and contempt of suffering. Indian fortitude has been applauded at the stake, and Indian kindness and generosity acknowledged in the wigwam, and in the mazes of the wilderness. Admiration had been excited by his noble sentiments of independence and exaltation above personal fear. Above all, perhaps, had he been accredited for intellect in his acuteness in negotiation and the simple force of his oratory. But the existence of an intellectual invention had never been traced, so far as it is known, to the amusements of his domestic fireside; nor could it well have been conjectured to occupy so wide a field for its display in legendary tales and fables.
My attention was first arrested by the fact of the existence of such tales among the Odjibwa nation inhabiting the region about Lake Superior in 1822. Two years previous, I had gone out in that quarter as one of the members of a corps of observation, on an exploratory expedition to the head waters of the Mississippi. The large area of territory which it was found this tribe occupied, together with their number and warlike character, induced the department of war to extend a military post to the Falls or Sault of St. Mary's, near the outlet of Lake Superior, in the year above named. I accompanied this force, and assumed, at the same time, an official relation to this tribe, as Agent of Indian Affairs, which led me to inquire into their distinctive history, language, and characteristic traits. It was found that they possessed a story-telling faculty, and I wrote down from their narration a number of these fictitious tales;[8] some of which were amusing merely, others were manifestly intended to convey mythologic or allegoric information. The boundaries between truth and fiction are but feebly defined among the aborigines of this Continent, and it was found in this instance, that the individuals of the tribe who related the tales were also the depositories of their historical traditions, such as they were; and these narrators wove the few and scattered incidents and landmarks of their history into the web and woof of their wildest tales. I immediately announced this interesting discovery in their moral character to a few friends and correspondents, who were alike interested in the matter; and a new zest was thus given to the inquiry, and the field of observation greatly extended. The result was the finding of similar tales among all the northwestern tribes whose traditions were investigated. They were also found among some of the tribes west of the Mississippi, and the present state of the inquiry demonstrates that this species of oral lore is common to the Algic, the Ostic, and some tribes of the Abanic stock. It is conjectured to exist among the rather extended branches of the Muskogee, and also the Cherokee, although no actual proof is possessed. And it becomes a question of interest to ascertain how far a similar trait can be traced among the North American tribes, and where the exceptions and limitations are to be found. To find a trait which must hereafter be deemed characteristic of the mental habits of these tribes, so diffused, furnishes a strong motive for extending inquiries farther and wider. It may be asked whether the South American aborigines possessed or still possess, this point of intellectual affinity with the tribes of the North. Did Manco Capac and Montezuma employ this means to strengthen political power, inspire courage, or console themselves under misfortune? Do the ice-bound and impoverished natives of the Arctic circle draw inspiration in their cruel vicissitudes from a similar intellectual source? What sound deductions can be drawn from a comparison of Eastern with Western fable, as thus developed? And, finally, is this propensity connected, in other of the American stock tribes, with a hieroglyphic system of notation, as we find it in the Algic, which will bear any useful comparison with the phonetic system of Egypt, the Runic of Iceland and Norway, or with any other mode of perpetuating the knowledge of events or things known to the human race?
A few remarks may be added respecting the character of the tales now submitted to inspection. And the first is, that they appear to be of a homogeneous and vernacular origin. There are distinctive tribal traits, but the general features coincide. The ideas and incidents do not appear to be borrowed or unnatural. The situations and circumstances are such as are common to the people. The language and phraseology are of the most simple kind. Few adjectives are used, and few comparisons resorted to. The style of narration, the cast of invention, the theory of thinking, are eminently peculiar to a people who wander about in woods and plains, who encounter wild beasts, believe in demons, and are subject to the vicissitudes of the seasons. The tales refer themselves to a people who are polytheists; not believers in one God or Great Spirit, but of thousands of spirits; a people who live in fear, who wander in want, and who die in misery. The machinery of spirits and necromancy, one of the most ancient and prevalent errors of the human race, supplies the framework of these fictitious creations. Language to carry out the conceptions might seem to be wanting, but here the narrator finds a ready resource in the use of metaphor, the doctrine of metamorphosis, and the personification of inanimate objects; for the latter of which, the grammar of the language has a peculiar adaptation. Deficiencies of the vocabulary are thus supplied, life and action are imparted to the whole material creation, and every purpose of description is answered. The belief of the narrators and listeners in every wild and improbable thing told, helps wonderfully, in the original, in joining the sequence of parts together. Nothing is too capacious for Indian belief. Almost every declaration is a prophecy, and every tale a creed. He believes that the whole visible and invisible creation is animated with various orders of malignant or benign spirits, who preside over the daily affairs and over the final destinies of men. He believes that these spirits must be conciliated by sacrifices, and a series of fasts and feasts either follow or precede these rites, that by the one they may be rendered acceptable, and by the other, his gratitude may be shown. This constitutes the groundwork of the Algic religion: but superstition has ingrafted upon the original stock, till the growth is a upas of giant size, bearing the bitter fruits of demonology, witchcraft, and necromancy. To make the matter worse, these tribes believe that animals of the lowest, as well as highest class in the chain of creation, are alike endowed with reasoning powers and faculties. And as a natural conclusion, they endow birds, and bears, and all other animals with souls, which, they believe, will be encountered in other shapes in another state of existence. So far the advantages of actual belief come in aid of their fictitious creations, and this is the true cause why so much importance is attached to the flight and appearance of particular birds, who, being privileged to ascend in the air, are supposed by them to be conversant with the wishes, or to act in obedience to the mandates of the spirits: and the circumstance of this belief deserves to be borne in mind in the perusal of their tales, as it will be found that the words put into the mouths of the actors express the actual opinions of the natives on life, death, and immortality, topics which have heretofore been impenetrably veiled.
The value of these traditionary stories appeared to depend, very much, upon their being left, as nearly as possible, in their original forms of thought and expression. In the original there is no attempt at ornament. Great attention is paid, in the narration, to repeating the conversations and speeches, and imitating the very tone and gesture of the actors. This is sometimes indulged at the risk of tautology. Moral point has been given to no tale which does not, in the original, justify it; and it is one of the unlooked-for features connected with the subject, that so considerable a proportion of them possess this trait. It is due to myself, and to those who have aided me in the collection and translation of the materials, to say, that the advantages enjoyed in this respect have been of the most favourable character. The whole examination, extending, with intervals, through a period of seventeen years, has been conducted not only with the aid that a public station, as an executive officer for the tribes, has supplied, but with the superadded intelligence and skill in the languages existing within the range of my domestic and affiliated circle.
Of the antiquity of the tales, the surest external evidence may probably be drawn from the lexicography. In a language in which the actor and the object are riveted, so to speak, by transitive inflections, it must needs happen that the history of its names for objects, whether preserved orally or by letters, is, in fact, the history of the introduction of the objects named, and this fixes eras in the enlargement of the vocabulary. Although it is true, that without letters these eras cannot be accurately fixed, yet valuable inferences may be drawn from an examination of this branch of the inquiry. Words are like coins, and may, like them, be examined to illustrate history. It has been found that those of the highest antiquity are simple and brief. Most of the primitive nouns are monosyllabic, and denote but a single object or idea. A less number are dissyllabic; few exceed this; and it may be questioned, from the present state of the examination, whether there is a single primitive trisyllable. The primitives become polysyllabic by adding an inflection indicating the presence or absence of vitality (which is the succedaneum for gender), and a farther inflection to denote number. They also admit of adjective terminations. Pronouns are denoted by particles prefixed or suffixed. The genius of the language is accumulative, and tends rather to add syllables or letters, making farther distinctions in objects already before the mind, than to introduce new words. A simple word is thus oftentimes converted into a descriptive phrase, at once formidable to the eye and the ear. And it is only by dissecting such compounds that the radix can be attained.
Judged by this test, most of the tales are of the era of flint arrow-heads, earthen pots, and skin clothes. Their fish-nets are represented as being made of the bark of trees. No mention is made of a blanket, gun, knife, or any metallic instrument; we do not hear of their cutting down trees, except in a single instance, yet there is nothing to indicate that their economical labours were not well performed. Au is an original, causitive particle, and appears to be the root of a numerous class of words, sometimes with, and sometimes without a consonant added. Aukee is earth, and may be, but is rather too remote for a derivative from [**Hebrew]. By adding k to this root the term is made specific, and denotes an earthen pot or kettle. Aubik is the radix for metal, ore, rock. By prefixing the particle Pe, we have the name for iron, Misk for copper, and so forth; but as euphony requires, in forming compounds, that two vowels should not come together, the sound of w is interposed in these particular instances. Gunzh is the radix for plant; Tig for tree; Asee for animal, &c.; and either by suffixing or prefixing syllabical increments, the terminology of the three great departments of nature is formed. The terms of consanguinity are derived from Ai, a heart, hence Si-ai, elder brother, Sheem-ai, younger brother, or younger sister, &c. Konaus, a loose wrapper, is the most ancient and generic term for a garment which has been found. The principal female garment, leggon, &c., are derivatives from it. Muttataus, a beaver robe, is from the same root. Wyaun, a furred skin, and Waigin, a dressed skin, appear to form the bases of the nomenclature for the Indian wardrobe. Blanket is a modern term, meaning white furred skin. Woollen cloth took the name of dressed skin, and its various colours and qualities are indicated by adjective prefixes. Calicoes or printed cottons are named from a generic, meaning speckled or spotted. All these are modern terms, as modern as those for a horse, a sheep, or a hog, and, like the latter, are descriptive and polysyllabic. Tobacco and the zea mays, both indigenous productions, are mentioned. The latter is the subject of a simple allegoric tale.
These particulars may suffice to indicate the importance of etymological analysis in examining the antiquity of the tales. Narrations of a later era are denoted by the introduction of the modern compounds, such as their names for the domestic animals of Europe, a gun, a rifle, a ship, a spyglass, compass, watch, hat, &c. The bow and arrow, club and lance, are the only species of arms actually described as in use, except in a single instance, and this tale is manifestly an interpolated version of an ancient story. The father of the winds makes battle with a huge flagroot, and the king of reptiles is shot with a dart.
Geographical terms and allusions to the climate supply another branch of comparison. Some of the grand features of the country are referred to by their modern Indian names, but this is nearly restricted to what may be termed the historical legends. There are frequent allusions to the Northern hemisphere. Snow, ice, and lakes are referred to. Warm latitudes are once or twice mentioned, and the allusions are coupled with admonitions against the danger of corrupt and effeminate manners and habits.
Astronomy and cosmogony constitute subjects of frequent notice; and this might naturally be expected from a people who are quick in their perceptions of external nature, and pass a large share of their time under the open sky. The phenomena of thunder, lightning, the aurora borealis, meteors, the rainbow, the galaxy of the milky way, the morning and evening stars, and the more prominent groups of the fixed and minor stars, are specifically named and noticed. The cardinal points are accurately distinguished. They entertain the semi-ancient theory that the earth is spheroidal, and the sun and moon perform their circuits round it. The visiters to these luminaries, described in the text, personify the former as a male and the latter as a female, under the idea of brother and sister. We are left to infer, from another passage, that they believe the sky revolves. Nothing, however, in the "open firmament," is a subject of more constant and minute observation, and a more complex terminology, than the clouds. Their colour, shape, transparency or obscurity, movements, and relative position to the sun and to each other, constitute objects of minute notice and deep importance. A large proportion of the names of individuals in the Algic tribes is drawn from this fruitful source of Indian observation. The Great Spirit is invariably located in the sky, and the Evil Spirit, and the train of minor malignant Spirits, in the earth. Their notions of the position of seas and continents are altogether vague and confused. Nor has it been observed that they have any knowledge of volcanic action. The idea of a universal deluge appears to be equally entertained by the tribes of North and South America.[9] The Algics certainly have it incorporated in their traditionary tales, and I have found the belief in these traditions the most firmly seated among the bands the farthest removed from the advances of civilization and Christianity.
It is the mythology, however, of these tribes which affords the deepest insight into their character, and unfolds, perhaps, some of the clearest coincidences with Oriental rites and opinions. Were the terms Baalim and Magii introduced into the descriptions of their worship, instead of Manito and Meeta, this coincidence would be very apparent. Medical magic spread the charms of its delusion over the semi-barbaric tribes who, at a very early epoch, spread from the Persian and the Arabian Gulfs to the Mediterranean; and it would not be a light task to find branches of the human race who are more completely characterized by its doctrines and practices than the wide-spreading members of the Algic stock of this Continent. Their prophets, jugglers, and meetays occupy the same relative importance in the political scale. They advise the movement of armies, and foretell the decrees of fate to individuals. They interpret dreams, affect the performance of miraculous cures, and preside over the most sacred rites. Oracles alike to chiefs and kings, warriors and hunters, nothing can be accomplished without their aid, and it would be presumptuous and impious to attempt anything, in war or peace, which they had decreed to be wrong. But our more immediate object is the class of oral fictions among the Western tribes, and for the growth and development of which their peculiar belief in the doctrine of spirits and magicians has furnished so wide a field. Come from what quarter of the world they may, the propensity to amusing and serio-comic fiction appears to have been brought with them. What traits, if any, of the original threadwork of foreign story remain, it would be premature, in the present state of these collections, to decide. The character and incidents of the narrations are adapted to the condition they are now in, as well as the position they now occupy. There is, it is true, a spirit of reminiscence apparent which pleases itself in allusions to the past; they speak of a sort of golden age, when all things were better with them than they now are; when they had better laws and leaders; when crimes were more promptly punished; when their language was spoken with greater purity, and their manners were freer from barbarism. But all this seems to flit through the Indian mind as a dream, and furnishes him rather the source of a pleasing secret retrospection than any spring to present and future exertions. He pines away as one that is fallen, and despairs to rise. He does not seem to open his eyes on the prospect of civilization and mental exaltation held up before him, as one to whom the scene is new or attractive. These scenes have been pictured before him by teachers and philanthropists for more than two centuries; but there has been nothing in them to arouse and inspire him to press onward in the career of prospective civilization and refinement. He has rather turned away with the air of one to whom all things "new" were "old," and chosen emphatically to re-embrace his woods, his wigwam, and his canoe.
Perhaps the trait that was least to have been anticipated in the tales is the moral often conveyed by them. But, on reflection, this is in accordance with the Indian maxim, which literally requires "an eye for eye, and a tooth for a tooth." And the more closely this feature of poetic justice is scrutinized, the more striking does it appear. Cruelty, murder, and sorcery are eventually punished, although the individual escapes for the time and his career may be long drawn out. Domestic infidelity meets the award of death in the only instance narrated. Religious vows are held inviolate. Respect for parents and for age, fraternal affection, hospitality, bravery, self-denial, endurance under fatigue or suffering, and disinterestedness, are uniformly inculcated. Presumption and pride are rebuked, and warnings given against the allurements of luxury and its concomitant vices. With a people who look back to some ancient and indefinite period in their history as an age of glory, an adherence to primitive manners and customs naturally occupies the place of virtue. The stories are generally so constructed as to hold up to admiration a bold and independent spirit of enterprise and adventure. Most of their heroes are drawn from retired or obscure places, and from abject circumstances. Success is seen to crown the efforts of precocious boys, orphans, or castaways. But whatever success is had, it is always through the instrumentality of the spirits or Manitoes—the true deities worshipped by all the Algic tribes.
The legend of Manabozho reveals, perhaps, the idea of an incarnation. He is the great spirit-man of northern mythology. The conception of the character reveals rather a monstrosity than a deity, displaying in strong colours far more of the dark and incoherent acts of a spirit of carnality than the benevolent deeds of a god. His birth is shrouded in allegoric mystery. He is made to combine all that is brave, warlike, strong, wise, and great in Indian conception, both of mortal and immortal. He conquers the greatest magician, overcomes fiery serpents, and engages in combats and performs exploits the most extravagant. He has no small share in the Adamic-like labour of naming the animals. He destroys the king of the reptile creation, is drawn into the mouth of a gigantic fish with his canoe, survives a flood by climbing a tree, and recreates the earth from a morsel of ground brought up in the paws of a muskrat. In contrast with these high exploits, he goes about playing low tricks, marries a wife, travels the earth, makes use of low subterfuges, is often in want of food, and, after being tricked and laughed at, is at one time made to covet the ability of a woodpecker, and at another outdone by the simple skill of a child. The great points in which he is exultingly set forth in the story-telling circle, are his great personal strength, readiness of resource, and strong powers of necromancy. Whatever other parts he is made to play, it is the Indian Hercules, Samson, or Proteus that is prominently held up to admiration. It is perhaps natural that rude nations in every part of the world should invent some such mythological existence as the Indian Manabozho, to concentrate their prime exploits upon; for it is the maxim of such nations that "the race is always to the swift, and the battle to the strong."
In closing these remarks, it will not be irrelevant to notice the evidence of the vernacular character and antiquity of the tales, which is furnished by the Pontiac manuscript, preserved in the collections of the Historical Society of Michigan. By this document, which is of the date of 1763, it is shown that this shrewd and talented leader of the Algic tribes, after he had formed the plan of driving the Saxon race from the Continent, appealed to the mythologic belief of the tribes to bring them into his views. It was the Wyandots whom he found it the hardest to convert; and in the general council which he held with the Western chiefs, he narrated before them a tale of a Delaware magician, which is admirably adapted in its incidents to the object he had in view, and affords proof of his foresight and powers of invention. It is deemed of further interest in this connexion, as carrying back the existence of the tales and fables to a period anterior to the final fall of the French power in the Canadas, reaching to within a fraction more than sixty years of their establishment at Detroit.[10] While, however, the authenticity of this curious politico-mythologic tale is undisputed, the names and allusions would show it to be of the modern class of Indian fictions, were not the fact historically known. The importance of this testimony, in the absence of any notice of this trait in the earlier writers, has induced me to submit a literal translation of the tale, from the original French MS., executed by Professor Fasquelle.